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The Tabernacle H3 resurrection. But not only was Christ Jesus born of the Holy Spirit; He was also baptized with the Holy Spirit of God. He was "anointed" with "the Holy Ghost and with power" (Acts 10:38), for the Father gave "not the Spirit by measure unto him" (John 3: 34). He was filled with the Spirit at all times, co-equal and co-eternal with the Father and with the Holy Spirit of God. That is why He could live a sinless life, perform mighty miracles that only God can do, utter profound teachings which are divine, die in the sinner's place as the spotless Lamb of God, rise again from the dead, and ascend into heaven. He was eternal God "manifest in the flesh" (I Tim. 3: 16). "Through the eternal Spirit" He "offered himself without spot to God" (Heb. 9:14). And He was "declared to be the Son of God with power, according to the spirit of holiness (the Holy Spirit), by the resurrection from the dead" (Rom. 1: 4). Of these fundamental truths the :fine flour and the oil of the meal offering speak. Now frankincense is a sweet gum which becomes most fragrant when burned with fire. It reminds us of the di- vine fragrance of the life of our Lord, tested by fire, only to appear all the more beautiful in His matchless love and compassion and holiness. All the frankincense had to be burned upon the altar, suggestive of the fact that only God could fully appreciate the inner fragrance of our Lord's beautiful life. As the :fine flour symbolizes His perfect humanity; the oil, His eternal deity in His relationship to the Godhead; so frankincense, as it were, enabled Him to say to the unbelieving Jews concerning His relationship to His Father, "I do always those things that please him" (John 8:29). He was God incarnate; and in Him "dwell- eth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily" (Col. 2:9). The Father's voice spoke from heaven when the Son was
The Tabernacle became food for God, as well as spiritual food for the be- liever's soul. Moreover, in Christ, our Meal-Offering, we see the perfect pattern for the Christian to emulate; in this He taught us how to live for Him after we are born again. He is "the one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus" (I Tim. 2:5). We turn to the second and sixth chapters of Leviticus to :find the ingredients that went into the preparation of the meal offering: :fine flour, oil, frankincense, salt, and sometimes green ears of corn dried and offered with oil. Two items are mentioned that were not to be put in this offering; they were leaven and honey. Significant truths are bound up in these passages of Scripture-truths con- cerning the things to be put into the meal offering, and truths concerning those to be left out of this "sweet savour" offering unto the Lord. The fine flour speaks to us of the evenness and beauty of our Lord's sinless life. There was not a coarse thread in any fibre of His Person. There was no roughness, no unevenness, in His Being. He was "holy, harmless, unde- filed, separate from sinners, and made higher than the heavens" (Heb. 7:26). Oil was to be "mingled with" the :fine flour or poured upon it; and oil in the Scriptures is always a symbol of the Holy Spirit. In His virgin birth the oil was "mingled with" the :fine flour of His humanity. In His baptism by the Holy Spirit He was "anointed" with oil, as it were- born of the Spirit and anointed with the Spirit. That our Lord Jesus was born of the Holy Spirit, we know from such passages as Isaiah 7: 14 and the opening chapters of Matthew and Luke. Indeed, all Scripture truth stands or falls upon two eternal verities, one of which is the virgin birth of the Son of God-the other is His bodily
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