The next psalm of atonement we find in the last section of the second book. And here, whatever difficulty of interpretation may attach to it otherwise, there is nothing to dim the assurance that the sixty-ninth psalm gives us the trespass-offering. The very word for sins-" My sins are not hid from Thee"-should be rather "trespasses." While -the restitution character of the trespass-offering comes out with unmistakable plainness in the fourth verse,-" Then I restored that which I took not away." In the words of the eleventh verse we may discern with little more difficulty the ram of the trespass-offering. The difficulties of the psalm belong rather to its exposition, which I am not attempting here. With this brief notice, therefore, we may pass on to the final psalm.

This is the hundred and second, whose place in connection with the book to which it belongs is full of interest. The fourth book speaks, as the fourth book of Moses does, of the world as the scene of man's strangership through sin. Its first psalm, the ninetieth, shows him thus; his link with eternal blessedness snapped with his link with God. It is a strain of the wilderness, a lament over that generation of men who because of their unbelief died there, and who thus could be used as a fit exemplification of the general condition. The Lord, man's dwelling-place, has been forgotten. He who brought man from the dust bids him return to it. Sin and God's righteous anger explain' this terrible anomaly. "Thou hast set our iniquities before Thee, our secret sins in the light of Thy countenance; for all our days are passed away in Thy wrath; we spend our years as a tale that is told." The psalm concludes with a prayer:"Re-turn, O Lord, how long? and let it repent Thee concerning Thy servants;" but no ground is given for such repentance till we come to the following psalm.

And here we have, not the first man, but the second ; and in plain contrast to the first:Man has forgotten the name of his God:how clearly this comes out in Moses' question at the bush!- "And Moses said unto God,' Behold, when I come unto the children of Israel, and shall say unto them, The God of your fathers hath sent me unto you; and they shall say unto me, What is His name? what shall I say?' " (Ex. 3:3.)

But this lost name of God is the key to man's condition. It reveals him as a wanderer (how far!) from the Father's house, " without God in the world; without, therefore, a hiding-place from the forces of nature now in league for his destruction! How wonderful that " a Man shall be as a hiding-place from the wind, and a covert from the tempest,"-a Man, but the " Second Man "! It is He who, abiding in the secret place of the Most High, shall lodge under the shadow of the Almighty; He who in the path of faith takes Jehovah for His refuge and fortress, His God, in whom He trusts. Here is One who, at least for Himself, can claim fully the divine protection-an unfailing, perfect Man.

But how does this avail for men ? God's name revealed is "Jehovah;" and "Jehovah" is " the God of redemption"-the name under which He intervened to redeem His people of old. Redemption, too, by power is seen in the following psalms. Jehovah's throne is established upon earth; the wicked are destroyed; the righteous flourish. The earth also is set upon a permanent ground of blessing-" The world also is established, that it cannot be moved." Jehovah comes (96:-100:) to His restored creation; which claps its hands, rejoicing in His presence.

This closes the first half of the book, but the fullness of the blessing is not yet told out, nor the ground of it. This, redemption not by power but by purchase, and at the hands of the Kinsman-Redeemer, can alone disclose.

In the hundred and first psalm we find accordingly once more the Second Man, into whose hands now the earth is put, King of Israel evidently, but with another name and a wider title soon to be declared. For in the hundred and second psalm, not only Zion's time of blessing is come, but tor the earth also to be blessed, "when the peoples are gathered together, and the kings also, to serve the Lord."

But all this blessing waits upon One who in the meanwhile is seen, not only in human weakness, but under the wrath of God. Alone in the presence of His enemies, His heart smitten and withered like grass; and why? "Because of Thine indignation and wrath; for Thou hast lifted Me up and cast Me down."

But how then is the blessing to come, if Israel's King, the Second Man, upon whom all depends, is cut off under the wrath of God ? "He weakened My strength in the way; He shortened My days. I said, 'O My God, take Me not away in the midst of My days:Thy years are throughout all generations.' "

What, then, is the answer to this prayer? It is the amazing declaration as to this humbled One:-

"Of old hast Thou laid the foundations of the earth; and the heavens are the work of Thy hands:they shall perish, but Thou shalt endure; yea, all of them shall wax old like a garment; as a vesture shalt Thou change them, and they shall be changed:but Thou art the same, and Thy years shall have no end."

Thus Creator and Redeemer are the same wondrous Person:Jehovah, whose throne is set up upon earth, is that very Second Man into whose hands the restored earth is given; and this, and the blessings resulting from it, the hundred and third and hundred and fourth psalms celebrate. This weakness of man is the power and grace of God for man's salvation. God's name is in, deed decisively declared, and man finds his happy hiding-place in God Himself, never to be. a wanderer again.

How fit a conclusion to the picture of atonement which the Psalms, and indeed the whole of the Old Testament, present! May our joyful adoration grow in equal pace with our apprehension of them.