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The First Sunday after Easter.

MORNING SERVICE.-First Lesson: Numbers xvi.

Verse 48.-" And he stood between the dead and the living; and the plague was stayed."

"REBELLION is as the sin of witchcraft, and stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry." Never was this more fully vindicated than in the case recorded in this chapter. Rebellion against human constituted authority is bad, and ought to be severely punished; for "the powers that be are ordained of God:" but when we come to rebel against the direct authority of the Almighty, and arm ourselves in opposition to His openly appointed institutions: then, it is impossible but that our punishment will be inevitable. Nothing can be so awful as the frowns of an offended Deity; all other fears must sink into nothingness beneath the terrors of His judgments. The Israelites rebelled against Divine authority, when they murmured against Moses; hence they were punished in so summary a manner that ought to have awed those rebellious people for ever afterwards. Whether we regard the fire from the Lord which consumed the two hundred and fifty men that offered incense, or the earth opening her mouth, and swallowing up all that appertained unto Korah, or the plague that subsequently broke out among the people; we are taught that God is not to be trifled with, and He will not long suffer His appointed institutions to be despised with impunity. However, in wrath He remembers mercy, and condescends to hear the prayers and intercessions of His people in behalf of the rebellious. Who can tell how many hitherto worthless lives have been spared in answer to the fervent prayers of the righteous? Through the intercession of Aaron by the instruction of Moses, God spared the

murmuring congregation of Israel, even when the plague had commenced its ravages among them.

So great was the perversion of those people, that notwithstanding the warning which they had received in the case of the two hundred and fifty censer men who were consumed, and in the case of the whole families of Dathan and Abiram who were swallowed alive by the earth: the very next day, when the earth had scarcely reclosed, when the embers of the fire had scarcely been extinguished, or the smell had scarcely left the air, they repeated the act of rebellion in a still more aggravated form; for they charged Moses and Aaron, or rather God Himself, with the awful crime of murder, "saying, Ye have killed the people of the Lord." But God vindicated His justice in most severe punishments, for we are told that "they that died in the plague were fourteen thousand and seven hundred, beside them that died about the matter of Korah."

The aggravated nature of the offence, and the severity of the punishment, show the greatness of the mercy vouchsafed to forgive the former, and to remove the latter, as well as the power of intercessory prayer when offered sincerely to God. "And he stood between the dead and the living, and the plague was stayed."

We have here a plague, an intercessor, and an issue. In the plague I see an emblem of sin,-in the intercessor I see an emblem of Christ,-and in the issue I see an emblem of Christ's intercession for us.

I. In the plague I see an emblem of sin.

Sin itself is a plague, and the misery-the physical, moral, and spiritual misery consequent upon sin—is a plague in which the whole of mankind is involved. In respect to the plague on the Israelites we learn that it was instantaneous in its rise, gradual in its progress, and fatal in its effects. So also is the plague of sin, and its consequences.

1. It was instantaneous in its rise. No sooner had the congregation gathered against Moses and against Aaron, than

the cloud of glory covered the tabernacle, and Moses said unto Aaron, "Go quickly unto the congregation and make atonement for them, for there is wrath gone out from the Lord; the plague is begun." There was scarcely expression given to the offence before the punishment commenced.

God said unto Adam, "In the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die." Sin bears in its bosom the cause of its own misery. The germ of guilt is implanted by the act. The moment the sin is committed, the misery begins. Whatever form that misery may subsequently take, the evil is immediately connected with the crime. This fact is confirmed by our own experience; no one is guilty of a moral offence (if he knows it) but is at once conscious of a plague in his own bosom, which no effort of his can remove.

2. The plague was gradual in its progress.

God graciously ordered that it should not seize the whole congregation at once, but it commenced in one portion, and crept gradually, but rapidly, and surely onwards, sweeping thousands in its march. There were the dead and the living. Though sin produces its immediate effects, the full force of its consequences are not felt at once. This is true in respect to the hardness of sin. It is not at once persons run into "excess of riot." Felony or murder is not the first step on the road of crime. Sins of smaller legal import are first indulged in. There are compunctions of conscience preventing an instant plunge into the depths of iniquity. Gradually, by constant practice, the feelings become hardened until the greatest crimes are perpetrated without a blush.

The punishment of sin is also gradual in its infliction. There are the lesser consequences in the shape of pains of body and remorse of mind: then will come the heavier judgments, involving the transgressors, individually and collectively, in utter desolation and ruin. Such were the judgments on Pharaoh and the Egyptians; they began by affecting their luxuries, then their comforts, then their necessaries, and lastly their lives.

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3. The plague was fatal in its effects.

What an awful havoc it made in the camp of Israel! Fourteen thousand and seven hundred persons were swept away in the course of at least a few hours. No human means could restrain its ravages. Before the setting sun not a soul would have been left had not God in His mercy stayed its course. Not less fatal are the ravages of sin. Desolation and destruction follow in its train. Not only a few thousands, nor even one whole nation, are involved in the catastrophe, but a world is buried in its ruins; and not a soul escapes except those whom God in the same mercy graciously

spares.

We come

II. To the intercessor, in whom I see an emblem of Christ. Aaron was a type of the Lord Jesus Christ in His office of the Great High Priest of His people. Being "appointed of God" to his sacred position, Aaron prefigured the Priesthood of our Saviour in all the functions of his office. As in other departments, so in that of intercessor, which appears especially in the instance before us.

There are four things here which bear out the resemblance.

1. Aaron interceded on the foundation of an atonement. "Go quickly," says Moses, "and make an atonement for them." The usual offering of a burnt sacrifice was not indeed resorted to on the occasion. The urgency of the case was so great that such an offering was for the time suspended; but the intercession had respect to either a retrospective or prospective sacrifice, for "without the shedding of blood there is no remission of sin." The intercession of Christ has respect to a retrospective atonement; the atonement which He Himself made when He offered Himself a sacrifice of sweet smelling savour" unto God. Before the throne in heaven He pleads His "agony and bloody sweat;" He pleads His "cross and passion;" He pleads His "death and burial," that the plague of sin and its con

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sequences may be removed from us. Without that atonement there would have been no ground for His intercession: it is fixed on that foundation, it turns on that pivot, on that account alone the Father attends to His plea.

2. The intercession was accompanied with the burning of incense. "Take a censer, and put fire therein from off the altar, and put in incense." Incense was burnt in the tabernacle and temple both morning and evening at the hour of prayer; and on the great day of atonement two handfuls of it was burnt before the ark in the holy of holies when the high priest went in to intercede for the people. In the revelation of St. John we are told, "And another angel came and stood at the altar, having a golden censer; and there was given unto him much incense, that he should offer it with the prayers of all saints upon the golden altar which was before the throne. And the smoke of the incense, which came with the prayers of the saints, ascended up before God out of the angel's hand." The "other angel" was the Great Angel of the Covenant, the Lord Jesus Christ, who ever liveth to intercede for us; through the incense of whose love our prayers are heard at the altar before the throne

above.

3. Aaron "stood between the dead and the living." He stood both between the dead and living Israelites in the camp, and between God and them as their intercessor. Christ stands between the living God and man, who is "dead in trespasses and sins." He is the "Daysman betwixt us, who can lay his hand on us both." He is the "mediator between God and man." One who can say unto God, "my Father," and can say to the sinner, "my brother," thus reconciling God and man, and uniting us in Himself.

4. Aaron made haste to intercede. He "ran into the midst of the congregation." Old as he was, such was his anxiety for appeasing God's anger and saving the rebellious people, that he exerted all his strength to prevent further desolations of the plague. Our Great High Priest is touched with the feeling of our infirmities, He is anxious for our salvation, and

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