him, God interposed with a provided substitute. All God required in Abraham's peculiar case was the spirit of surrender. He guards, therefore, his prerogative of deal- ing with life, and enjoins his people only to take human life away when he directs them. 'l'hey are not to presume to offer such a sacred gift aa human life upon his altar in the way of sacrifice. They may dedicate themselves and their children as living beings to his service, but their death he requires not in such a voluntary fashion at their hands.. IV. AT UIE BAME TillE, WE FIND BUMAN LIFB REGULARLY S..lCRIFlCED IN THI: ORDER OF DIVINE l'ROVIDENOE AND AT THE OALL OF DUTY. Tbat is to say, though we have not monstroUB and unhallowed sacrifices required of God at his altars, he doea make demands on men and women to surrender, like Abraham, their sons, or to sur- render themselves at the call of duty. This is indeed as real a sacrifice as in the arms of Molech:, and at the same time a far nobler one. In fact, self-sacrifice seems to be a law of providence in the case of all who would be truly noble in their careers. The voluntary element, coming in along with the sweet reasonableness of the sublime nece;sity, vindicates the morality of the whole transaction. Men and women cheer- fully lay down their lives in gradual sacrifice to duty's call, or sometimes in audden and immediate sacrifice. And the act is moral as well as heroic. V. TBIB LEADS TO A LAST OBSERVATION, THAT BUMAN BACRITICE BAD ITS GREAT CULMINATION AND CLIMAX IN THAT OF JESUS CBBIBT. For what God did not require from Abraham-the actual sacrifice of his son-he has requirt:d of himself. The demand for a humau sacrifice made only apparently in the case of Isaac, was made really in the case of Christ. An innocent, sinless human being was once co=anded by his God and Father to lay down his life and bear, in doing so, the sins of man. Hence we find him saying, " Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I might take it again" (John x. lT). It would seem a harsh command, a cruel necessity, were it not that the Father and Son are essentially one, and the co=and- ment that the Son should die was virtually Divine self-sacrifice. "He who is sent is one in being with him who sends." The atonement of Christ is really the aelf- sacrifice of God. Hence the only human sacrifice demanded is God incarnate responding to himself. The necessity for thUB atoning for human sin at the expense of self-sacrifico is in the main mysterious. But its very mystery makes it more deeply profitable to faith. How great must God's love be when it leads him to lay down his own life o.nd die ignomi- niously in the interests of men I The ram which was offered in the stead of Isaac is the type of the self-sacrificing Jesus who was offered for us.-R. M. E. Vers. 1-5.-Sin ae its worse. There is, perhaps, no development of sin which is more shocking to the renewed mind of man, and more offensive to the pure and gmcious heart of God, than that which is here condemned. The verses intimate- I. 'l'HAT SIN SOMETIMES LEADS TO A BHOCKlNG DISTORTION OF THE HUKAN JUD<lllENT. How, we no.turally ask, could men ever come to believe in the desirableness of such inhuman rites as those here prohibited? That any Divine Being could possibly bo conciliated by the infliction of a cruel death, by the offering up of little children to consuming fires, by this presentation on the part of their own parents I How revolting and incredible seem such ideas I There is no account to be given of it but that sin, sis it goes on its maleficent path, not only disfigures the life and corrupts the heart, but nlso degrades and distorts the understanding of men. It ends in the "evil eye " and so in the "great darkness" of the soul (Matt. vi. 23). II. 'l'HAT Goo CANNOT AND WILL NOT PERMIT THE GLORY WHICH 18 DUE TO Bll[SELF TO BE GIVEN TO ANOTHER. "I will set my face o.gainst that man" (ver. 3). God ho.s empho.tically said, " My glory will I not give to another" (Isa. xiii 8). 'l'be " face of the Lord is against " them that withhold their homage from the Creator, and offer worship and tribute to false gods. 'l'his, (1) not on the selfish ground that he can claim and secure something for himself which he desires, after the manner of men, but (2) on the ground that it is in itself right end fit that men should worship the one true God, and (3) also because idolatry is not only a guilty but a mischievous principle working every imaginable harm to those who commit it. If we are keeping back from God and giving to another or to ourselves the thought, interest, affectiou, regard, which is <lue to him, we must remember that we make the Almighty our enemy; hia "face i1 against us." 316 THE BOOK OF LEVITICUS, [011. :u. 1-27.
Ill. TIJAT DELIBERATE TRANSGRESSION MAKES .ALL WORSHIP UNAOOBPTABLE, Ill' NOT ilINFUL. The man who, while flagrantly violating the Law of Jehovah by II giving his seed unto Molech,'' pres~nted himself, at the same.time? before the tabernacle, was only 4 II ' defiling the sanctuary ' of the Lord and profaning his holy Name" (ver. 3) by such worthless devotion. God did not desire to see in his presence a man who was wilfully and wantonly committing such a heinous sin. No man is more welcome to the throne of grace than the penitent sinner who is burdened with a sense of guilt and who craves t~e _me~y and he!p of the D_ivine ~avi~ur. But let not that man who is cherishing sin m his soul think that his offenng lS accepted of the Lord. It is hypocrisy pro- fanation (see Ps. L 16; Isa. i. 11, 12). ' IV. THAT UNREPENTED sm MUST BE.AR rrs DOOM. "He shall surely be put to death" etc. (ver. 2); "I will cut him off from among his people" (ver, 3). There is 0 provision here stated of mercy for the penitent. Probably none was allowed; the r: exigencies of the situation demanded death under any circumstances. Under the present dispensation there is an offer of Divine mercy to the penitent, whatever their sins may be, however many, however great. But the impenitent must lay their account with the fact that they have offended One who" will by no means clear the guilty," who will "surdy" punish and destroy, V. THAT CONNIVANCE AT DEADLY BIN IB A GUILTY PABTIOIPATION IN WBONG, AND MUST SHA.B.E ITB MISERABLE DOOM. (Vere. 4, 6.) There are evils at which no friend- ship however dear, no kinship however close, may dare to wink. We must unsparinaly 0 denounce and even determinedly expose. VL TH.AT THOSE WHO ABE RESPONSIBLE FOB THE CHURCH'S WELFARE MUST WARN REPEATEDLY AGAINST THE MOST D.ANGEBOUB BINS. .&gain, "Thou shalt say," etc. (ver. 1).-C.