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218 The Tabernacle 2. The Law Was Hidden beneath the Sprinkled Blood. We hardly need dwell longer here upon the all-important signincance of the sprinkled blood upon the mercy seat- above the law! We have sought, throughout this lesson, to keep this truth ever before us. We repeat it here, how- ever, for emphasis. We are living in a day when the aton- ing blood of the Son of God is being "trampled under foot." And we must earnestly "contend for the faith." We must never lose sight of Calvary. Do you not see, my Christian friend, the typical signi- ficance of the ark and the mercy seat? God planned it, and gave Moses the pattern for it, in order to point the sinner on to Christ. In Him the law was carefully preserved- out of sight; removed by His matchless grace. He came to do His Father's will; He delighted in doing it; and hav- ing died in the fulnllment of that will, He now stands before the Father as the witness of vindicated justice. He has forever removed the stern barrier that had prevented man's approach to God; namely, the demands against him of an unfulfilled law; so that now righteousness, which was the very hindrance, now becomes the ground of our full and free communion with God. Christ, not the law, is the "Way ... unto the Father." God meets us in Him! As another has expressed it, "How foolish for men to think that, by observing fragments of a broken law, they can satisfy God or justify themselves!" We can not "mingle law and grace"; else "grace is no more grace." The Golden Pot of Manna Within the Ark A Type of Christ, the Bread of Life for Our Earthly Pilgrimage When God fed Israel in the wilderness with the manna from heaven, He told Moses to put some of it in a golden
The Tabernacle pot to be placed in the ark of the covenant. (See Exod. 16:32-26; Heb. 9:4.) The manna, like the shewbread, w~s f Ch . t the Bread of Life; the golden vessel, m a type o ns , · d · d which it was kept, reminds us once more of His e1ty an glory. We need only read the sixth chapter of John to. see f L d showing that He Hrm- the repeated statement o our or , self is the Heavenly Manna, the "bread sent down_ from heaven." As the manna was Israel's daily :oo? m the wilderness, so Christ is Food for our daily pilgnm~ge, as we journey from Egypt to Canaan, from the Chnst-less world to the Promised Land. The manna is a beautiful type of Christ. It came do~n from heaven; so did our Lord and Saviour. It ~ame 10 the night, while Israel slept; even as Christ c~me mto the world in the night of sin, as men were sleepmg the sleep of spiritual death. The manna was white; our Lord was spotless in His character, absolutely holy. 1:he mann~ was sweet to the ,:aste--"like wafers made ~1th honey_ (Exod. 16:31); our Lord Jesus ever bore witness to His gentle, compassionate, sympathetic love for the lost._ The manna in the wilderness was seen upon the ground m _t~e morning when the dew had disapp~ared; t~e Holy Spmt, suggested by the dew, does not mamfest Himself, but_ pre- sents Christ. Before Jesus died on the cross, He said to His disciples concerning the Spirit of God, "He shall not speak of himself; but whatsoever he shall hear that shall he speak: and he will shew you things to'come. He shall glorify me: for he shall re- ceive of mine, and shall shew it unto you" (John 16:13, 14). But there is also "the hidden manna" of Rev. 2:17, which the risen Lord will give "to him that overcometh." This seems to refer to our Saviour as the Food for our souls
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