In Exodus 30:34-38, God gives us an account of the sweet incense. There were to be four
ingredients in its composition, each of them in themselves being "sweet spices"_"stacte, onycha,
galbanum, and pure frankincense." The peculiar and aromatic properties of each of these it may
be impossible for us to express; but the moral virtue and value of each, when "tempered together"
after the art of the apothecary, according to Divine instruction, it would be impossible to miss.
Never had there been anything like it before "to smell thereto". Never has there been anything like
it since, until the blessed Lord came into the scene and brought into actuality in His own Peerless
Person that unique fragrance to God which the sweet incense typically set forth in the days when
He was foreshadowing that beloved Son in the tabernacle of old.

That it must have been something beyond measure delightful to God goes without saying, seeing
it was that which God chose to set forth the fragrance of the moral glories of His Son, and
intensified by the action of fire (judgment); and that of which each ingredient was absolutely
perfect.

Moreover, the cloud formed in the holiest of all on the day of atonement, by the incense put on
the burning coals of fire in the censer (Lev. 16:12,13), was not formed to envelop the high priest,
though doubtless it did so, but "that the cloud of incense may cover the mercy seat." It was God’s
provision to surround Himself with that which typically portrayed the intense satisfaction and
delight which God found in the moral fragrance of the Person of His beloved Son, and doubtless
through which He viewed the high priest when he entered to make propitiation by blood.

Nor was this action of the high priest with the incense in Leviticus 16 the making atonement,
though intimately connected with that work. It was a setting forth of the first and greatest of all
lessons for sinful creatures to learn_namely, that the Person of Christ comes first, before all else,
even before His infinitely precious work.

How needful to grasp it, and own it with worship-ping hearts! The Person of Christ upholds His
cross, as the cross upholds the Person who hung on it. Touch that glorious Person in anyway sq
as to detract from or tarnish the glory of what He is in Himself as the "pure and holy" One, like
the incense, and His work is valueless, and we lose the Saviour, the beloved Son, Jehovah’s
Fellow, and leave ourselves helpless and hopelessly lost souls! God preserve us all in this respect!

As before remarked, the "sweet incense" in itself sets forth the moral fragrance of the Person of
Christ. And in its connection with the burning coals in the censer on the day of atonement, it is
seen intensified by contact with fire (judgment); and forming the cloud with which Jehovah
surrounded Himself on His throne.

Let us briefly glance at what is said of these ingredients which God calls "sweet spices" (Exodus
30:34; 37:27). They were not to be taken at random and used indiscriminately simply because
each was "sweet". No; each was to be carefully measured and weighed_"Of each there shall be
a like weight". Human wisdom had no say in this matter. God was setting forth what was to be
for His pleasure, not for man’s! Then these "pure and holy" ingredients had to be "tempered

together," not merely put together in a vessel, but mixed_blended together. Then some of it had
to be "beaten very small," and set aside for use, as we see in Lev. 16:12,13. Thus it was to be a
"pure and holy" and "most holy" perfume.

All these details as to the composition and compounding of the incense are exceedingly precious,
and reveal to us in typical language the absolute perfection in every minute particular and detail
of that which was to set forth the moral fragrance of Him who was then to come, and whom,
when He came and was manifested, God called "My beloved Son in whom I have found My
delight" (Matthew 3:17).

What He was in Himself could only be known to God:"No man knoweth the Son but the Father."
But He has taken these ways to picture it out to us, in order to increase our delight in His Son
likewise. "Sweet spices" _"of a like weight"_no one spice predominating over another, each
equally perfect. "Tempered together"_ blended so perfectly that no one overpowered the rest.
"Beaten small"_so that the smallest particles, produced by "beating" (suffering) and blending,
expressed the perfection of the whole.

In speaking of Leviticus 16, where we see the use the "sweet incense" was put to, a brother used
to say, "It takes a cloud to meet a cloud." How true this is. In that chapter we see God hidden in
His glory cloud (verse 2), and prohibiting man from rashly meeting his doom by entering His holy
presence except in His prescribed way. Man, in his sinful state, is utterly unable to be in the
presence of God except on the ground of atonement. But who can tell how God will be
approached? or what He requires in order to approach Him? Only God Himself could make that
known, and that He has done in this beautiful chapter. At present, however, I must confine myself
to the first lesson.

What then was the first thing to be done after the victims were selected? What could meet the
glory cloud but the incense cloud! And thus we see, as already noticed, God setting the first lesson
and typifying the moral fragrance of the Person of His beloved Son who was to be Offerer,
Offering, and High Priest, and make propitiation by blood; the only One who, because of who and
what He is in Himself, could at any time, and all times, stand in the presence of that glory-cloud,
and therefore was fitted to do all else that was needful for God and man.

But what a cloud was that incense cloud! See that high priest a» he passes within the vail into the
immediate presence of God enthroned in His cloud on the mercy seat! Slowly he enters with the
censer of burning coals hanging on his finger, and both hands full of sweet incense. Then he sets
it down and empties his hands of the incense on to the burning coals; immediately it ignites and
sends forth its cloud of aromatic fragrance; thus, and there,, and then surrounding the throne of
Jehovah and giving satisfaction and joy to His heart, speaking as it did, and as only He then could
understand, of the perfections of His Son. God, in His holiness in the cloud, was met by the
purity, and holiness, and preciousness of Christ seen in the incense cloud. What a wonderful
thought! Now, for us, we can sing:

The veil is rent, our souls draw near
Unto a throne of grace:

The merits of the Lord appear,
They fill the holy place.

Blessed be God it is so, and our hearts know it and respond to it in holy and happy worship, based
of course, not merely on what Christ is, but what He has done in His blood-shedding and death
on the cross.

David had some faint idea of the value of incense to God when he prayed "Let my prayer be set
forth before Thee as incense" (Psalm 141:2). Moses and Aaron too knew its value when Aaron
put it in the censer and ran among the rebels and made atonement for them and thus stayed the
plague (Numbers 16:46-48). It will have its place once more when God is again dealing with His
earthly people after the removal of the church to heaven; and thus we see in Rev. 8, the angel with
the golden censer and much incense given to him to offer with the prayers of the afflicted and
suffering saints in that day. How precious this is! God, even then, still seen to be the Hearer and
Answerer of prayer, and the prayers rising up to Him mingled with the sweet perfume of the
incense.

Many other thoughts will doubtless connect themselves with it in the minds of thoughtful readers
of their Bibles. The Lord give each one of us in a fuller and deeper way to enter into His thoughts
about the Son of His love in every way in which He has been pleased to make them known.