1 Corinthians 15:13-23.
This portion of the word of God is the Holy Spirit’s emphasis on the work of Christ in making atonement for His people. A clear apprehension of Christ risen from the dead is therefore of the utmost importance, as that which, through, of course, the instrumentality of the Spirit, discovers to and establishes in the soul an active sense of that glorious peace which Christ has made through the blood of His cross, and which He Himself is, and that, too, abidingly (Col. 1:20; Eph. 2:14). In raising Christ our Lord from the dead our God has stamped indelibly the atoning work of His beloved Son.
"As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up" (John 3:14, 15). Here is divine emphasis put on the need there was for Christ’s death. But if it "behooved Christ to suffer," it equally behooved that He should "rise from the dead the third day." He could not have entered "into His glory" otherwise (Luke 24:46, 26). Here we get the risen Lord Himself emphasizing the need of His resurrection, as before we found Him putting emphasis on the need of His death. It is in the power of resurrection that He places the heavenly credentials, that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in His name among all nations, in the hands of His ambassadors. (2 Cor. 5:20.) All that had to be still waited for was the "Power from on High" (Luke 24:49)-a Power which in due time was blessedly manifest. (Lev. 23:15, 16; Acts 2:)
The types and shadows which of old spoke of Christ and His glorious work whereby He should answer all questions affecting the holiness and righteousness of God, making atonement for the sins of His people, types and shadows now interpreted for us by the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven, are not confined to the Jewish ritual alone; they are found in "Moses, and in the Prophets, and in the Psalms," concerning Him.
But let us examine briefly one or two of these precious types and shadows, viz.-
The golden candlestick, Aaron putting off the linen garments, and the cherubim of the mercy-seat.
In the light of the golden candlestick (Ex. 25:31-40), we get the Holy Spirit. The candlestick was outside the veil, where without it all would be darkness. (Ex. 26:35; 27:21.) And if its light be a type of the Spirit, as it surely is, how blessed to see that the Holy Spirit, illuminating the darkness, already speaks of the resurrection and ascension of Christ!
But there is another point equally worthy of our attention.-Its seven branches (or perhaps, 1+6)- Branch and branches, as in Isaiah 11:i, 2-display beautiful carvings of almond blossoms all over them. This fact at once reminds us of Aaron’s rod which, on a memorable occasion (Num. 17:), "brought forth buds, and bloomed blossoms, and yielded almonds." The rod was a mere branch of the almond-tree, and cut off from the tree was dead. Christ was "cut off out of the land of the living," was "cut off and had nothing." (Is. 53:; Dan. 9:26.) Here was life out of death – resurrection. "Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that He might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the Spirit" (i Pet. 3:18).
On the day of atonement, Aaron is seen to put off his linen garments. Why? The work is completed. (Lev. 16:23.) On the resurrection morning, as recorded in Matthew and Mark, Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James and Salome are invited to behold the "place " where the Lord lay; in Luke and John it is the "linen clothes" that the early visitors are invited to behold. The "place" is empty, and the "linen clothes" are left there as a token of the Lord’s resurrection and consequently of atonement completed.
After the "linen garments " were divested by the high-priest, he came forth to continue whatever shall be sweet savor to God. (Lev. 16:24, 25.) After the "linen clothes" are seen in the "place where the Lord lay," is there not sweet savor in the Lord’s communion with His own then (Luke 24:30,41-43; John 21:5-12), and ever since? Is there not, both in Leviticus and in Luke and John more than a hint of that Melchizedek sustenance and joy, which are so essential to an endless life, communicated (John 20:22) to the children of faith! Christ is all.
Again, in Matthew it is, although the "angel of the Lord," one whose "countenance was like lightning"- almost the language applied to the Lord Himself in Rev. 1:16, and Dan. 10:6 – who stills the fears of the early visitors at the tomb. In Mark it is a "young man " who does so (chap. 16:5, 6). This is beautifully characteristic of this gospel, for who is fitter for service than a young man?
Then we hear the voice of the suffering Saviour, exclaiming in anticipative sorrow-"He shortened my days. I said, O my God, take me not away in the midst of my days! " (Ps. 102:23, 24).
In Luke we see "two men" standing by the women in shining garments (Luke 24:4-8), whose object is to awake them, as it were, by refreshing their memory with the Lord’s own words. "And they remembered His words." I hope to refer to the "two men " further on.
But in John, the gospel of the Godhead of Christ, the gospel in which the deity of Christ is the theme, and full access into the Holiest found, from beginning to close, because, as we have learnt, there is no rending of the veil in John’s gospel-faith finding the veil rent as it steps on to its glorious threshold- in this gospel, then, "two angels," are seen by Mary Magdalene, the intensity of the love of whose heart for her Lord and Saviour rivets her to the sacred spot where, though Peter and the "other disciple, whom Jesus loved," might go, she would abide, weeping. The position of the angels is significant. They are " in white, sitting, the one at the head, and the other at the feet, where the body of Jesus had lain" (John 20:12). Here the angels are sitting, as if to indicate that of which the cherubic figures of the mercy-seat (Ex. 25:18-22; Lev. 16:14) spoke in type was now accomplished in fact. But the angels could not satisfy Mary’s heart. Their question of "Woman, why weepest thou? " hinted rather of Eden (Gen. 3:6), where the "woman be-being deceived, was in the transgression" (i Tim. 2:14). The angels’ question is repeated by the Lord Himself, but is followed by another that goes to the root of the matter, "Whom seekest thou? " Ah, well He knew she sought Himself, the adorable Person, "whom God has set forth a mercy-seat through faith in His blood " (Rom. 3:25). He called her by name, for she was graven on the palms of His hands (Is. 49:16). Such was her joy that she would have thrown her arms about Him – that could not be:"Touch Me not; for I am not yet ascended to My Father:but go to My brethren, and say unto them, I ascend unto My Father, and your Father; and unto my God, and your God. " Blessed message! and so appropriately given and borne!
The transfiguration, so fittingly omitted in John, is very precious as recorded in Mark 9:Here, as I take it, the unsealed eyes of His own are privileged to gaze upon the High-priest, in His holy garments, anticipative of His assumption of that glorious place foretold of Him by the Voice in the psalm (Ps. 110:4). For it is as risen from the dead that Christ is here regarded, and in Mark it is distinctly stated – "He charged them that they should tell no man what things they had seen till the Son of man were risen from the dead." Was there not a divine reason for this? "The Holy Ghost was not yet given, because that Jesus was not yet glorified." Peter "wist not what to say," and so the flesh would act to dishonor the Lord. Through its zeal would it build, ostensibly for the Lord. How much of this sort of thing is going on to-day, while the Holy Sprit is quenched, grieved, and resisted in the "great house" of profession, and the living word itself equally set aside!
This brings us to the consideration of the "two men " alluded to before. The "two men" who were seen with Jesus on the Holy Mount (2 Peter 1:16-21), if carefully compared as they appear in Luke 9:30-32; 24:4, and Acts 1:10, will be seen to be symbols of the divine testimony to the all-sufficiency of the word of God-Moses (the law) and Elijah (the prophets) were the "two men " who were with Christ on the Mount and who talked with Him, the subject being "His decease which He should accomplish at Jerusalem." This is surely the wondrous theme of the word of God. The "two men" witnessed His resurrection and stamped it with the seal of His own words. The "two men" witnessed His ascension, rebuking the "men of Galilee" for gazing "toward Heaven." It is the living and unfailing word of God which they, and we too, must look into to learn all about Him and His coming again. This living and abiding "Volume of the Book," read in the sanctuary in the "light of the seven-branched Candlestick," as another has put it, will give us burning hearts, for thus indeed shall we hear Him talking with us by the way.
Blessed be God! He has defeated Satan’s devices to nullify and render void the atonement. The enemy’s devices are recorded for us in Matt. 28:11-15, and in the arrogant utterances of the "Higher Criticism" of our own day. Yes, indeed, our blessed God has perfectly safe-guarded by type, shadow, and prophetic voice the invulnerable glories of a full and perfect atonement. Let the attacks of the enemy be ever so furious, " nevertheless the foundation of God standeth sure "(2 Tim. 2:19). Men may try as energized by Satan to lay another foundation; but the One that "liveth and was dead" is God’s foundation, our joy, and our hope. Now, "Unto Him who loveth us, and has washed us from our sins in His own blood, and made us a kingdom, priests to His God and Father, to Him be glory and the might to the ages of ages." J. M.