earth, in whom we were allotted our portion, for we are not the mere inheritance, but heirs of God and joint-heirs with Christ. The church is to share. His heavenly and earthly glories.

Israel on earth under Messiah and the new covenant will manifest the law written on their heart. No longer under the law and the yet deeper guilt of rejecting Messiah to their own long rejection, they will be the theatre here below, as His blessed earthly nation, of manifesting to all families the happiness of a people that is in such a case, the happy people whose God is Jehovah; and thus the earth shall be full of the knowledge of Jehovah, as the waters cover the sea.

But our calling is to be delivered from the present evil age, and to be blessed with every spiritual blessing in the heavenlies in Christ, while sharing His reproach and shame on earth, and waiting for Him to come and receive us to Himself in the Father's house.

ISRAEL'S PRACTICAL SANCTIFICATION.

Lev. xx. 1-8.

As the preceding chapter insisted on what was good and comely as became the people of Jehovah and in His name, the solemn and sufficient authority for every requirement, so in our chapter it is chiefly a guard against the evils, often enormous and unnatural, to which Israel was exposed through contact with their idolatrous neighbours. The cruel rites of infanticide is the first to be denounced; it was practised by the Ammonites on this side and by the Phoenicians on that, and so by the Carthaginians and others too, who boasted. loudly of their civilization.

"And Jehovah spoke to Moses, saying, "Thou shalt say also to the children of Israel, Every one of the children of Israel, or of the strangers that sojourn in Israel, that giveth of his seed to Molech shall certainly be put to death: the people of the land shall stone him with stones. And I will set my face against that man, and will cut him off from among his people; because he hath given of his seed to Molech, so as to make my sanctuary unclean and to profane my holy name. And if the people of the land in any way hide their eyes

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from that man, when he giveth of his seed to Molech, that they kill him not, "Then I will set my face against that man, and against his family, and will cut him off, and all that go whoring after him, to commit whoredom with Molech, from among their people. And the soul that turneth to necromancers and to soothsayers, to go a whoring after them, I will set my face against that soul, and will cut him off from among his people. "Sanctify yourselves therefore, and be holy; for I [am] Jehovah, your God. And ye shall observe my statutes and do them: I [am] Jehovah who sanctify you" (vers. 1-8).

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Nothing more profoundly marks the difference between God's word and men's thoughts in all ages than their levity as to idols and strange gods, and His abhorrence of it, especially in His own people. It may not be any deliberate intention to abandon His worship; it may only be, what they count a venial thing, occasional conformity to idolatry while still professing His name. God rejects absolutely any such unhallowed compromise, quite apart from the danger, for those who allow it, of utter revolt from Him. It strikes at His majesty, at holiness and truth, and is intolerable in His eyes.

But

The Israelite ought to have known that it was from out of this abomination that Abraham was chosen and called as a separate witness, he and his seed, to the one true and living God (Joshua xxiv. 3). Every child of his was bound at all cost to be faithful on pain of forfeiting, not only all his

privileges, but his life. Not Israel only was bound : the strangers that sojourned in their midst were under the same obligation. Whoever devoted his offspring to Molech must die by the ignominious death of stoning; and this to make the people of the land take their active part in personally executing the sentence. In this and no other way was the idolater to be put to death, that all around might share His horror and clear themselves of the evil.

Still more impressive is the repeated intimation. in vers. 3 and 5 that Jehovah sets His face against that man and will cut him off, because such wickedness defiles His sanctuary and profanes His holy Name. It is not the cruel barbarity toward their own children, or the children of others, into which Satan loved to draw those who worshipped false gods that were no God. But God must abdicate His own glory and being if such a sin could be passed over without His avenging the insult by the hands of Israel. Even such as shut their eyes to spare the guilty exposed themselves to the like doom (4, 5).

No doubt the Christian is entirely apart from the legal system and is called to the relationship of a son with the Father in total separation from the world. He belongs to the Lord Jesus who laid the foundation of Christianity in the cross whereon He bore our sins and suffered, Just for unjust. He is united to Him, rejected by Jew and Gentile, and glorified above on the Father's throne, and has thus the characteristic stamp of heavenly grace, as

he waits for His coming to take him there. But when the Lord returns (and all His saints with Him in power and glory) to be King over all the earth, He will execute judgment on every evil, and destroy the wicked from before Him; while man universally consigns every idol to the moles and to the bats. They shall be utterly abolished, and false gods (real demons) lead astray no more for ever, even though Satan may still remain (restrained for a thousand years from mischief) to be finally punished at the end. But Jesus shall reign in righteousness and peace; and we shall reign with Him over the earth where we suffered with Him.

Nor is it only such an enormity as that of Molech. Turning after necromancers or such as had familiar spirits, and soothsayers or wizards, came under the same unsparing judgment of Jehovah (ver. 6): "I will set my face against that soul, and will cut him off from his people." How awful for professing Christians to tamper with such profanity! If Israel as an earthly people had thus to sanctify themselves and be holy, as under law, how much more have Christians under grace, who have Christ and all the written word their standard, with the Holy Spirit dwelling in them, to obey and please their God and Father!