But there was another ingredient, as positively excluded from the meat-offering as "leaven," and that was "honey."--"For ye shall burn no leaven, _nor any honey_, in any offering of the Lord made by fire." (Ver. 11.) Now, as "leaven" is the expression of that which is positively and palpably _evil_ in nature, we may regard "honey" as the significant symbol of that which is apparently _sweet_ and attractive. Both are disallowed of God, both were carefully excluded from the meat-offering, both were unfit for the altar. Men may undertake, like Saul, to distinguish between what is "vile and refuse" and what is not; but the judgment of God ranks the delicate Agag with the vilest of the sons of Amalek. No doubt, there are some good moral qualities in man, which must be taken for what they are worth. "Hast thou found _honey_, eat so much as is convenient;" but, be it remembered, it found no place in the meat-offering, nor in its Antitype. There was the fullness of the Holy Ghost, there was the fragrant odor of the frankincense, there was the preservative virtue of "the salt of the covenant,"--all these things accompanied the "fine flour" in the Person of the true "Meat-offering," but "no honey."
What a lesson for the heart is here! yea, what a volume of wholesome instruction! The blessed Lord Jesus knew how to give nature and its relationships their proper place: He knew how much "honey" was "convenient." He could say to His mother, "Wist ye not that I must be about My Father's business?" and yet He could say, again, to the beloved disciple, "Behold thy mother." In other words, nature's claims were never allowed to interfere with the presentation to God of all the energies of Christ's perfect manhood. Mary, and others too, might have thought that her human relation to the blessed One gave her some peculiar claim or influence, on merely natural grounds. "There came, then, His brethren ["after the flesh"] and His mother, and standing without, sent unto Him, calling Him. And the multitude sat about Him; and they said unto Him, 'Behold, Thy mother and Thy brethren without seek for Thee.'" What was the reply of the true Meat-offering? Did He at once abandon His work, in order to respond to nature's call? By no means. Had He done so, it would have been to mingle "honey" with the meat-offering, which could not be. The honey was faithfully excluded on this as on every occasion when God's claims were to be attended to, and instead thereof, the power of the Spirit, the odor of the "frankincense," and the virtues of the "salt" were blessedly exhibited. "And he answered them, saying, 'Who is My mother, or My brethren?' And He looked round about on them which sat about Him, and said, 'Behold My mother and My brethren! For whosoever shall do the will of God, the same is My brother, and My sister, and mother.'"[5] (Mark iii. 31-35.)
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[5] How important to see, in the above beautiful passage, that doing God's will brings the soul into a relationship with Christ of which His brethren according to the flesh knew nothing, on merely natural grounds! It was as true with respect to those brethren as any one else that "except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God." Mary would not have been saved by the mere fact of her being the mother of Jesus. She needed personal faith in Christ as much as any other member of Adam's fallen family: she needed to pass, by being born again, out of the old creation into the new. It was by treasuring up Christ's words in her heart that this blessed woman was saved. No doubt she was "highly favored" in being chosen as a vessel to such a holy office; but then, as a lost sinner, she needed to "rejoice in God her Saviour," like any one else. She stands on the same platform, is washed in the same blood, clothed in the same righteousness, and will sing the same song as all the rest of God's redeemed.
This simple fact will give additional force and clearness to a point already stated, namely, that incarnation was not Christ's taking our nature into union with Himself. This truth should be carefully pondered. It is fully brought out in 2 Cor. v.--"For the love of Christ constraineth us; because we thus judge, that if one died for all, then were all dead: and that He died for all, that they which live should not henceforth live unto themselves, but unto Him which died for them, and rose again. Wherefore henceforth know we no man after the flesh; yea, _though we have known Christ after the flesh, yet now henceforth know we Him no more_. Therefore if any man be _in Christ_, he is a new creation: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new." (Ver. 14-17.)