angels, he accepted the hard conditions, left the bosom of his Father, put himself in our place, and submitted to endure the penalty due to sin. O what transcendent love! how incon- ceivable its heights, how unsearchable its depths ^l Let our minds dwell upon it continually ; that our hearts being warmed with this mysterious, incomprehensible love, we may be ever vying with the hosts of heaven in singing, " To him who loved us and washed us from our sins in his own blood, be glory and dominion for ever and ever^.]
y Epb. iii. 18, 19. ^ Rev. i. 5, 6.
Heb. ix. 23. It was therefore necessary that the patterns of things in the heavens should he purified with these; btd the heavenly things themselves with better things than these.
THERE is very considerable difficulty in this pas- sage. The scope of the whole chapter is clear : it is intended to shew, that, whilst the sacrifice of Christ was shadowed forth by the Levitical sacrifices, it was infinitely superior to them all. Bat the difficulty arises from the double meaning of the word which we translate " Testament :" it means either a cove- nant, or a testament : and the Apostle, having used it evidently in the former sense, comes, apparently at least, to use it in the latter sense : and the doubt is, whether the entire passage should be construed as relating to the covenant, or whether the idea of a testament should be admitted. On either construc- tion, there will be difficulty ; for, on the one hand, it is not easy to see what a mediator has to do with a testament ; nor, on the other hand, what need there is for a person, making a covenant, to die, before it can become valid. Perhaps the best solution of the difficulty, if solution it may be called, is this : That an agreement, as entered into between two parties, is a covenant : but that a free gift, as that agreement evidently is on God's part, and a gift of something through the death of him who obtains it for us, as- sumes somewhat of the character of a testament. A