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154 The Tabernacle anointed with the Holy Spirit, saying, ..This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased" (Matt. 3: 17). He was acknowledging before men, angels, and demons the fra- grance of the sinless life of His beloved Son. Salt was put into the meal offering, and salt is a preser- vative. Our Lord's words were always "seasoned with salt," even as His Holy Spirit exhorted Christians, in giving "an answer to every man" (Col. 4:6), to emulate His gra- cious example. The officers whom the Pharisees sent to take Him prisoner returned with this striking statement, "Never man spake like this man" (John 7:46). Humanly speaking, that was a strange excuse for officers to give for not obeying orders; but we know why they could not touch our Lord-not until His "hour had fully come" to offer Himself, a voluntary sacrifice upon the cross. His words were filled with "grace and truth." He Himself was the very embodiment of grace and truth. (See John 1: 14.) Even in His death His body "saw no corruption." The prophet had foretold these very words; and both Peter and Paul, guided by the Spirit of God, applied them un- mistakably to our Lord. (See Psalm 16: 8-11 ; Acts 2: 2 5 - 31; 13:34-37.) If only we, God's redeemed children, would heed His admonition to let our words be "seasoned with salt," we should be more like our sinless Saviour, and the salt would hinder the work of "the leaven of malice and wickedness" in our lives! To us the inspired Word says plainly, "Ye are the salt of the earth: but if the salt have lost his savour, wherewith shall it be salted? it is thenceforth good for nothing, but to be cast out, and to be trodden under foot of men" (Matt. 5: 13). No leaven and honey were to be burned upon the altar; and what a lesson God has for us here! Leaven in the
The Tabernacle Scriptures is always a type of sin. The Israelites were to eat unleavened bread on the feast of the passover and the feast of unleavened bread. They were even to put all leaven out of their houses. The Lord Jesus admonished His own to beware of "the leaven of the Pharisees and Sad- ducees" (Matt. 16:11, 12). And Paul warned against the «leaven of malice and wickedness" (I Cor. 5: 8). Just as there was no "spot or blemish" in the passover lamb, so also there was no sin in Christ's holy nature-no leaven! That is why the meal offering, which typified His sinless life, could have no leaven in it. Honey, likewise, is typical of the sweetness of the nat- ural man, the unsaved man, which appears in an attrac- tive form to the godless world, but has nothing of the God- given, divine nature. Honey, when tested by fire, fer- ments, then becomes sour; it will not stand the test. Yet the :fires of suffering but served to show forth the sweet- ness of our Lord's divine nature, His unspeakable love! Fire makes frankincense more fragrant; it ruins honey. The fires of suffering made manifest before men, angels, and demons the beauties and perfections of the Man of Sorrows; and in Him there was no taint of the sinful na- ture, of which the honey speaks. No wonder God ex- pressly commanded Moses not to put honey or leaven in the meal offering! Sometimes the meal offering was "baken in the oven," reminding us once more of the unseen sufferings of our Lord. Sometimes it was "baken in a pan," showing forth, in type, His "more evident sufferings." Into the deeper agonies of Gethsemane and the cross no human soul can enter; yet enough of the suffering of our sinless Saviour is revealed to us to make us love Him for all eternity! A handful of the meal offering was burned upon the
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