No. XXVII.

LEAVEN.

THERE is a tendency in all our minds "to savour the things of man," so as to draw human conclusions from the direct revelation of God. The affection of Peter, as well as his understanding, forbad the thought that "the Son of the living God" should suffer. It is well for us to profit by the Lord's rebuke to Peter. The thoughts of God are not as our thoughts. And that which has originally been matter of direct revelation from God, is only really apprehended by revelation. The Holy Ghost, "the Spirit of truth," is the Spirit of wisdom and of revelation;" and his direct teaching is needed by us to perceive the bearing of that which He himself has inspired others to write. Now the way of man is to regard that which God has revealed in the inspired writings, as subject-matter for him to speculate on, and from which he may safely draw his own inferences. Hence he stumbles at the very threshold, and instead "of obeying the truth," he makes truth subject to his own understanding. But God is pleased" to hide from the wise and prudent that which he reveals to babes." They having an unction from the Holy One, depend on the teaching of that anointing, and which is the truth, even in Him, who is the truth, Jesus Christ the true God and eternal life. But in those who have the unction, the savouring of the things of man in the things of God, is often found. Christians have tried to make out an orderly narrative from the four gospels, by harmonis ing them, and thus the varied aspects in which the Holy Ghost presents Jesus to our souls is reduced to the level of human biography. But it is not the way of the Holy Ghost to present scenes to us after the manner of man's history, his way is not as our way, neither his thoughts as our thoughts. The object He has to hold up to us cannot be so touched, without disparagement to the person and glory of the Lord Jesus, and His way is not to gratify a prying curiosity, and to satisfy the mind with a readily received theory; but so to exhibit Jesus in the

glory of His person and the depth of His grace, that whether it be our wants as sinners or the desires of the renewed heart, they may be fully met in Him in whom is centred the manifold wisdom and manifold grace of God. The attempt at an orderly biography entirely hinders this.

That there is precision and accuracy in the terms used by the Holy Ghost dare not be questioned. But it is His precision and accuracy, and not according to man's thoughts; and the attempt at human accuracy in that which God has revealed will hinder instead of helping our instruction. We make definitions of the terms used by the Spirit of God, instead of leaving it to Himself to define those terms. "The things of God knoweth no man but the Spirit of God. Now we have received, not the Spirit of the world, but the Spirit which is of God, that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God. Which things also we speak, not in the words which man's wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth." The Scripture is emphatically the word of God; and if it be received as the word of God, it will ever be in the character of little children, in dependance on the immediate and direct teaching of the Holy Ghost Himself. Many Christians who apprehend doctrinally, as well as by experience their own vileness, so as to find the need of habitual living on Christ as their sanctification, do not so readily acknowledge their own ignorance, as to lead to habitual dependence on the Spirit of Truth to guide them into all truth. Systematic theology often leads real Christians into a measure of self-complacency, and tends to make them measure the knowledge of others by their own. The teaching of the Spirit ever humbles; and in this line also we find the apparent paradox that growth in the knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ is accompanied with a deeper sense of our own ignorance. But so it must be when we really study Him who is the wisdom of God,

The foregoing thoughts have arisen in reflecting on the bearing of the word "leaven," as used by the Holy Ghost. In the law, that teaching-shadow of good things to come, leaven was forbidden. "Thou shalt not offer

the blood of my sacrifice with leaven" (Ex. xxxiv. 25). Again, "No meat-offering, which ye shall bring unto the Lord shall be made with leaven: for ye shall burn no leaven, nor any honey, in any offering of the Lord made by fire." Both these are shadows, of which the substance and reality is Christ Himself. In the blood of His sacrifice there was only to be found His own singular perfectness; even the very rendering it was the perfection of obedience; and, while it was a sacrifice of bloodshedding, it was, at the same time, an offering of a sweet-smelling savour unto God. And so of the meatoffering, the expression of that perfection of character in which God Himself could take complacency; it was singular; nothing could be added to it; nothing taken from it; whilst, even in "His own" (John xiii.), as to character, how much is wanting, how many flaws need to be removed.

But there are two remarkable exceptions in the law, in favour of leaven. Thus, we read: "And ye shall count unto you from the morrow after the Sabbath, from the day that ye brought the sheaf of the wave-offering; seven Sabbaths shall be complete; even unto the morrow after the seventh Sabbath shall ye number fifty days; and ye shall offer a new meat-offering unto the Lord. Ye shall bring out of your habitations two wave loaves of two tenth deals; they shall be of fine flour; they shall be baken with leaven; they are the first-fruits unto the Lord" (Lev. xxiii. 15-17). The body of this shadow, the reality of this feast, was manifested when the Day of Pentecost was fully come; and the Church was formally set up on earth by the coming down of the Holy Ghost from heaven. This is the real new meatoffering unto the Lord; even those who have the "firstfruits of the Spirit," and are, thereby, "a kind of firstfruits of His creatures." Whilst our hearts rejoice in the knowledge of what the Church is as presented in Christ and through Christ "holy and unblameable, and unrebukable" before God in heaven; we know, also, full well what it actually is; but even as it is actually with the divine recognition of leaven in it, it is a new meat-offering unto the Lord. In the world, though it be sorely

tempted and tried as it is, mourning over its own declension, ashamed and confounded and self-loathing, it is still the Church, the gift of the Father to the Son; the object of the Son's perfect love, and inhabited by the Holy Ghost. It is regarded here, whilst the leaven is in it, with the same love as that with which it is regarded in heaven, where it is only seen in virtue of Christ's sacrifice in the unleavened perfectness of Christ. Soulcheering truth in such a day as this, "brethren beloved of God"! It is the one object on the earth of present divine complacency, because it is "accepted in the beloved;" and, regarded in this light, "rebuke, discipline, and chastening," are only proofs of divine love. The law of the peace-offering is remarkable. "This is the law of the sacrifice of peace-offerings, which he shall offer unto the Lord. If he offer it for a thanksgiving, then he shall offer with the sacrifice of thanksgiving unleavened cakes mingled with oil, and cakes mingled with oil, of fine flour, fried. Besides the cakes he shall offer for his offering leavened bread, with the sacrifice of thanksgiving of his peace-offerings" (Lev. vii. 11, 12). "Christ is our peace;" the joy of a believer is in Him, from Him, and through Him. In its highest aspect it is unaccompanied with leaven," in whom, though now ye see Him not, ye rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory." But there are many occasions in which, although Christ be the source of our joy, natural susceptibilities may enter. Such might have been raised in the bosom of the Apostle, when he says to the Philippians, "But I rejoiced in the Lord greatly, that now at the last your care of me hath flourished again."

When the tear trickles down the cheek on witnessing any manifestation of the grace of God in converting a soul-in answering prayer-or sending an unexpected deliverance there is frequently found the leaven of the peace-offering. In many cases, too, when anguish of spirit has brought on bodily malady, and the soul is set at liberty through the reception of the truth, so that joy and thanksgiving take the place of mourning and depression, it can hardly be denied that the feelings of nature

There

enter into the expression of gladness for deliverance. The source and cause of the joy is unleavened; it is Christ Himself; but there is that which accompanies the joy, partaking of the character of leaven, because natural feelings almost necessarily find their entrance. There is danger of only regarding natural emotion; and that danger has been so manifest in the downward road of the great professing body, that Christians, in avoiding that path, almost seem to forget that they have any peaceofferings. Even in the days of allowed shadows, the very shadow was perverted. The harlot can say (too faithful picture of the corrupt Church), "I have peaceofferings to-day; this day have I paid my vows. fore came I forth to meet thee" (Prov. vii. 6-23). It is thus, too, in later days, that the prophet rebukes Israel: "Come to Bethel and transgress; at Gilgal multiply transgression; and bring your sacrifices every morning, and your tithes after three years; and offer a sacrifice of thanksgiving with leaven, and proclaim and publish the free offerings; for this liketh you, O ye children of Israel, saith the Lord God" (Amos iv, 4, 5). There lacked the liking for such ordinances in which the worshipper took no part himself, but which was either wholly rendered to God or the portion of the priest. But where the chief part belonged to the worshipper, there they liked to seem religious. And so, in the history of the Church, the great realities centred in the precious work and offices of Christ. The food of the quickened soul, and the ground of its joy, have been passed over, to make way for a form of godliness into which nature can readily enter, such as in the christening and wedding. Here it liketh men well to be religious; the leaven so entirely predominates, that there is no remembrance of "the unleavened cakes with oil;" no spiritual thought whatever relative to Christ; so that persons who despise Christ's work, and hate the doctrines of grace, would be grievously scandalised if they were not married, or their children baptized, after a Christian fashion. The popular meaning of the word "holiday" most significantly proves that God's permission of leaven, in the peace-offerings, has been perverted by men into the denial of the doctrine of the cross of Christ.