Christ Alone Saves the Sinner

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, promises, salvation, Sovereignty of God, The Father Leave a comment

And Moses said unto Aaron, Take a censer, and put fire therein from off the altar, and put on incense, and go quickly unto the congregation, and make an atonement for them: for there is wrath gone out from the LORD; the plague is begun. – Numbers 16:46

Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us, and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. – 1 John 4:10

You who know not Christ, hear this! You are lost and ruined by the fall. Wrath is gone out from God against you. That wrath will consume you to the lowest hell, unless some one can propitiate God on your behalf. You cannot do it. No man can do it, no prayers of yours, no sacraments, nay, though you could sweat a bloody sweat, it would not avail, but Christ is able to make propitiation. He can do it, and He alone, He can stand between you and God, and turn away JEHOVAH’s wrath, and He can put into your heart a sense of His love.

Oh, I pray you, trust Him, trust Him. You may not be ready for Him, but He is always ready to save, and indeed I must correct myself in that last sentence, you are ready for Him. If you be never so vile, and never so ruined by your sin, their needs no preparation and no readiness. It was not the merit of the people that saved them, nor any preparation on their part, it was the preparedness of the high priest that saved them.

Trust Him, and you shall not find need for delay. Rely upon Him, and you shall not find that He has to go a day’s journey to save you, “He is able to save unto the uttermost them that come unto God by Him, seeing He ever liveth to make intercession for them.” He is prepared. He stands on the behalf of those who believe on Him. Would that you would now believe on Him and trust your soul in His hands, and oh, believe me, your sins which are many shall be all forgiven, the plague shall be stayed, nor shall God’s wrath go out against you, but you shall be saved. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

The High Priest Standing Between the Dead and the Living

An Incense Incomparable

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And Aaron took as Moses commanded and ran into the midst of the congregation; and behold, the plague was begun among the people: and he put on incense, and made an atonement for the people. – Numbers 16:47

…to Jesus the Mediator of the new covenant, and to the blood of sprinkling that speaks better things than that of Abel… – Hebrews 12:24

(Jesus’) incense, as we know, consists first of all of His positive obedience to the divine law. He kept His Father’s commands, He did everything man should have done, He kept to the full the whole law of God and made it honorable.

Then mixed with this is His blood—an equally rich and precious ingredient. That bloody sweat—the blood from His head, pierced with the crown of thorns, the blood of His hands as they were nailed to the tree, the blood of His feet as they were fixed to the wood, and the blood of His very heart—richest of them all—all mixed together with His merits—these make up the incense—an incense incomparable—an incense peerless and surpassing all others.

Not all the odors that ever rose from tabernacle or temple could for a moment stand in rivalry with these. The blood alone speaketh better things than that of Abel, and if Abel’s blood prevailed to bring vengeance, how much more shall the blood of Christ prevail to bring down pardon and mercy! Our faith is fixed on perfect righteousness and complete atonement, which are as sweet frankincense before the Father’s face. ~ C.H Spurgeon

The High Priest Standing Between the Dead and the Living

The Greatest Trial on Record

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You who are King of kings and Lord of lords, we worship You. Before Jehovah’s awful throne we bow with sacred joy.

Sermon Text

The Propitiator

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And Aaron took as Moses commanded and ran into the midst of the congregation; and behold, the plague was begun among the people: and he put on incense and made an atonement for the people. – Numbers 16:47

Wrath had gone out from God against the people on account of their sin, and it is God’s law that His wrath shall never stay unless a propitiation is offered. The incense which Aaron carried in his hand was the propitiation before God, from the fact that God saw in that perfume the type of that richer offering which our Great High Priest is this very day offering before the throne.

Aaron as the propitiator is to be looked at first as bearing in his censer that which was necessary for the propitiation. He did not come empty-handed. (As) God’s high priest, he must take the censer, he must fill it with the ordained incense, made with the ordained materials, and then he must light it with the sacred fire from off the altar, and with that alone. With the censer in his hand he is safe, without it Aaron might have died as well as the rest of the people. The qualification of Aaron partly lay in the fact that he had the censer, and that that censer was full of sweet odors which were acceptable to God.

Behold then, Christ Jesus as the propitiator for His people. He stands this day before God with His censer smoking up towards heaven. Behold the Great High Priest! See Him this day with His pierced hands, and head that once was crowned with thorns. Mark how the marvelous smoke of His merits goes up forever and ever before the eternal throne. ’Tis He, ’tis He alone who puts away the sins of His people. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

The High Priest Standing Between the Dead and the Living

He Cheerfully and Joyfully Laid Down His Life

Sherry salvation, Character of Jesus, Attributes of God, promises, The Father, Sovereignty of God Leave a comment

And Aaron took as Moses commanded and ran into the midst of the congregation… – Numbers 16:47

Aaron as a lover of the people of Israel deserves much commendation, from the fact that it is expressly said, he ran into the host. I am not just now sure about Aaron’s age, but being older than Moses, who must have been at this time about ninety years of age, Aaron must have been more than a hundred, and probably, a hundred and twenty or more.

It is no little thing to say that such a man, clad no doubt in his priestly robes, ran, and that for a people who had never shown any activity to do him service, but much zeal in opposing his authority. That little fact of his running is highly significant, for it shows the greatness and swiftness of the divine impulse of love that was within.

Ah! and was it not so with Christ? Did He not haste to be our Savior? Were not His delights with the sons of men? Did He not often say, “I have a baptism to be baptized with, and how am I straitened till it be accomplished.” His dying for us was not a thing which He dreaded. “With desire have I desired to eat this passover.”

He had panted for the moment when He should redeem His people. He had looked forward through eternity for that hour when He should glorify His Father, and His Father might glorify Him. He came voluntarily, bound by no constraint, except His own covenant engagements, and He cheerfully and joyfully laid down His life—a life which no man could take from Him, but which He laid down of Himself. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

The High Priest Standing Between the Dead and the Living

The Plague Slew Him

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And Moses said unto Aaron, Take a censer, and put fire therein from off the altar, and put on incense, and go quickly unto the congregation, and make an atonement for them: for there is wrath gone out from the LORD; the plague is begun. And Aaron took as Moses commanded and ran into the midst of the congregation; and behold, the plague was begun among the people: and he put on incense and made an atonement for the people. – Numbers 16:46-47

You will see the love and kindness of Aaron, if you look again. Aaron might have said, “But the Lord will surely destroy me also with the people, if I go where the shafts of death are flying, they will reach me.” He never thinks of it, he exposes his own person in the very forefront of the destroying one. There comes the angel of death, smiting all before him, and here stands Aaron in his very path, as much as to say, “Get you back! Get you back! I will wave my incense in your face, destroyer of men, you cannot pass the censer of God’s high priest.”

Oh, You glorious High Priest of our profession, You might not only have feared this which Aaron might have dreaded, but You did actually endure the plague of God, for when You did come among the people to save them from JEHOVAH’s wrath, JEHOVAH’s wrath fell upon You. You were forsaken of Your Father. The plague which Jesus kept from us slew Him, “The LORD hath laid on Him the iniquity of us all.” The sheep escaped, but “His life and blood the Shepherd pays, a ransom for the flock.”

Oh, You lover of Your Church, immortal honors be unto You! Aaron deserves to be beloved by the tribes of Israel, because he stood in the gap and exposed himself for their sins, but You, most mighty Savior, You shall have eternal songs, because, forgetful of Yourself, You did bleed and die, that man might be saved! ~ C.H. Spurgeon

The High Priest Standing Between the Dead and the Living

Staying the Plague

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, promises, salvation Leave a comment

And Moses said unto Aaron, Take a censer, and put fire therein from off the altar, and put on incense, and go quickly unto the congregation, and make an atonement for them: for there is wrath gone out from the LORD; the plague is begun. And Aaron took as Moses commanded and ran into the midst of the congregation; and behold, the plague was begun among the people: and he put on incense and made an atonement for the people. – Numbers 16:46-47

Aaron in thus coming forward as the deliverer and lover of his people, must have remembered that he was abhorred by this very people. They were seeking his blood, they were desiring to put him and Moses to death, and yet all thoughtless of danger, he snatches up his censer and runs into their midst with a divine enthusiasm in his heart. He might have stood back, and said, “No, they will slay me if I go into their ranks, furious as they are, they will charge this new death upon me and lay me low.” But he never considers it. Into the midst of the crowd, he boldly springs.

Most blessed Jesus, You might not only think thus, but indeed You did feel it to be true. You did come unto Your own, and Your own received You not. You did come into the world to save a race that hated You, and oh, how they proved their hatred to You, for they did spit upon Your cheeks, they did cast calumny and slander upon Your person, they did take the heir and say, “Come, let us kill him that the inheritance may be ours.”

Jesus, You were willing to die a martyr, that You might be made a sacrifice for those by whom Your blood was spilt. Jesus transcends Aaron, Aaron might have feared death at the hands of the people, Jesus Christ did actually meet it, and yet there He stood even in the hour of death, waving His censer, staying the plague, and dividing the living from the dead. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

The High Priest Standing Between the Dead and the Living