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The Tabernacle simple faith. Abraham had taken the ground of a guilty sinner before a gracious God. Up to the time of Israel's arrival at Mount Sinai, Go_d had dealt with His people upon the ground of uncondi- tional grace. He fed them with manna. He sent the quail for them to eat. He gave them water out of the rock-to say nothing of His previous deliverance from the cruel lash of the Egyptian taskmaster and from the waters of the Red Sea. Though, from the beginning, the Israelites were a stiff-necked and murmuring people; yet God could bless them, because they were standing in simple depen- dence upon His grace. Then at Sinai Israel presumptuously asked for the law. In ignorance and spiritual pride, she said she would do all the law required-in ignorance of her sin; in spiritual pride, unmindful of her guilt and weakness. Once the covenant was made, no one could annul it. It was a cov- enant which bound Israel to perfect obedience, and which bound God to punish disobedience. It was a covenant which rested, for the performance of its terms, upon Israel's own faithfulness and strength; a covenant in which God had nothing to do, so to speak, but to watch the results of their actions and to deal with them accord- ingly. And what was Israel? They were a nation of poor, lost sinners at the very outset, who could act only in the way of sin. Doubtless it sounded well in the ears of men when they uttered the resolutions to obey God, and to make their relationship to Him depend upon their own efforts. Yet what was it in reality but the expression of their ignor- ance of God's righteousness and of their own helplessness and ruined condition? What was it but a proof that sin had so blinded their eyes that they were unable to discern
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The Law Within the Ark A Type of God's Law in the Heart of Christ
In our study today we have referred, from time to time, to the very important fact that in the ark Israel's treasures were hidden: the covenant of their relationship with God, the golden pot of manna, and Aaron's rod. All these treasures were laid up before the Lord in the ark of the covenant. The realities, which these priceless possessions foreshadowed, are found in our Lord Jesus Christ, for in Hirn "are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge" (Col. 2: 3). In Him unsearchable riches are kept against all the cunning of Satan, and against all the weakness of the believer. Now Israel's treasures so definitely foreshadowed our Lord, in His Person and work, that we want to give further emphasis to their importance by a special glance at each one separately. First of all, it was in the ark that the law was hidden, its mouth stopped, its demands silenced by the payment of the sinner's debt; for in Christ is hid our complete justification from all things before a holy God, from which we "could not be justified by the law of Moses" (Acts 13 :39) . I. The Law Was Kept Unbroken in the Ark. To understand better the significance of Christ's keeping the holy law of God unbroken, let us go back to Israel's earlier history. God had dealt with Abraham upon the ground of unconditional grace; for His promises and His grace go together. Promise is the simple expression of God's own will and intentions, and its accomplishment rests solely upon His power and unchangeableness. That is why jus- tification before God requires nothing on man's part, but
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