the fin:tl result to be achieved by obedience. 2. Su~tenance to nerve for duty. Lamb not merely to be killed but eat.en. The people saved from the destroyer are to be released also from the oppressor; to commence at once the life of liberty. Strength needed for the march. That which saves is that which supports. If the lamb represents the offerer as he ought to be, feeding upon the lamb will represent feeding by faith upon the ideal thus figured. To become righteous we must hunger a.nd thirst after right.eousness, Matt. v. 6. Dedication is the starting-point, but the road is pen;;isten t obedience, e.nd they only ca.n walk that road who feed upon the ideal first set before them (Phil. iii. 12-14). ID. CIIRIST oUR PASSOVER. The type leads naturally to the great anti type. I. Our sacrifice. (1) Pure, perfect. Sle.in for us. By faith accepting his work, pea.ce with God; shelter from the avenging angel. This is what we mean by substitution-Christ died for me. Notice however :-(2) Accepting this sacrifice we must still regard it as representative. Ple&ding its efficacy, we not merely mean "Forgive me for Christ'M sake," but also, "I would be like Christ, I would give myself up wholly to Thy will even as he has done-Accept me in him, ma.kc me like him I" The doctrine of snbstit11J;wn is only explained by this underlying doctrine of identity, it could not other- wise be a doctrine of salvation. 2. Our sustenance. We too, saved in Christ, have to march on along the road which leads from slavery to freedom. To do this we must feed upon our ideal, "inwardly digest" it. What we ought to be; what we hope to be; what Christ is. Our great advantage over the Jew is that our ideal is realised in a person. To feed upon it is to feed upon Christ. 'l'o attain it is to be like Christ, to be one with him. .Application. Christ died for us. True, but Christ dying for us implies that we also die with him. Dedication of a substitut.e not enough unless self is dedicated in the substitute. ,ery well wishing to be happy, and the hope of many is little more than this. God, however, means us to be holy, and there is no easy road to holiness. Accept the ideal, accept Christ out and out, we shall find him more than an ideal: he will stren!!then and sustain us till we attain it. Forget what the ideal is; forget what dedication" means; we may yet find that it is possible for those who are saved frc.m bondage to perish in the wildemess.---G.
EXPOSITION. Ver. 21-28.-Tlm FmsT PABSOVER. Hav- brevity; or they may have been added by ing received the Divine directions as to the Moses of his own authority. On the other new rite, if not with all the fnlness ultimately he.nd, several very ma.in points of the original given them, yet with sofficient fulness for the directions a.re not repeated in the injunctions immediate purpose, Moses proceeded to com- given to the elders, though there can be no municate the Divine Will to the people under doubt that they were commnnicated. his protection. Having already aroused the jealousy and hatred of Pharaoh, he could not Ver. 21-Draw out-i.e., "Withdraw from the flock." (Seever. 3.) A lamb, The summon a general w,sembly of the people, bnt word used is generic, e.nd would not exclude he ventured to call a meeting of the elders, or the offering of a goat. heads of principal families, e.nd through them Ver. 22.-A bunch of hyssop. The hyssop comm.nnicated the orders which he bad re- was regarded as having purging or purifying ceived to the entire nation. We find, in the qnalities, and was used in the cleansing of the leper (Lev. xiv. 4), and of the leprous honse directiow; which he gave, two small points (ilnd. 51-52), e.nd also formed an element in which are not comprised in the record of the "water of separation" (Nnm. xix. 6). God's words to him. 1. The designation of It was a species of plant which grew on the" hyssop," as the instrmnent by which the walls, and was generally low and insigni.ficab.t blood was to be placed on the side-posts e.nd (I Kings iv. 33), yet which could furnish a lintel (ver. 22) ; e.nd, 2. The injnnction not stick or stalk of some length (John xix. 29). It mnst also have been a common plant m to qnit the house" until the morning." These Egypt, the wilderness, and Pa:!estine. Two poinu may have been contained in the original suggestions are made with respe:t to it. One, wrectioDS, though omitted from the record for that it was a species of ma.rjore.;n ( Origanwm OD. xn. 21-28.] THE BOOK OF EXODUS. 275