MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.— Exodus 25:17-23
THE MERCY-SEAT
The Lord Jesus Christ is the true mercy-seat; the piece of temple furniture in the text is the shadow of which Christ is the substance.
I. In Christ the mercifulness of the Divine nature is fully declared. The Old Testament is ever celebrating the mercy of God. Some contend that the God of the Old Testament is an inexorable and cruel deity, but the inmost idea of the whole dispensation is that of the Divine mercifulness (Exodus 20:6). This glorious idea runs through the whole of their worship; the whole ceremonial culminates on the golden mercy-seat. And this idea also runs through the whole of their literature. But in Christ we have the clear, full declaration of the mercifulness of God. Thus Zacharias: “Blessed be the Lord God of Israel; for He hath visited and redeemed His people, to perform the mercy promised to our fathers” (Luke 1:68-72). The mercifulness of God is hinted in nature; it is more clearly made known in Mosaism; it is finally and fully declared in Jesus. Mercy for the worst (Luke 19:10); mercy for all; mercy through all generations. The Cross of Christ is the true rainbow in the black cloud which hangs over the destinies of the world.
II. In Christ the mercifulness of the Divine nature is manifestly reconciled with the claims of truth and righteousness (Exodus 25:18-20). The cherubims over the mercy seat symbolise the fact, that the extension of mercy to mankind is justified in the eyes of the heavenly universe. When man fell, the cherubims were the witnesses of his guilt and of his exclusion from paradise (Genesis 3:24), and now they are the consenting witnesses to his forgiveness and restoration. Some speak as if it were a very easy thing for God to show mercy to a world of sinners, but Revelation throughout reminds us that it was not such an easy thing as sentiment suggests. The claims of truth and righteousness were to be sustained. These conflicting claims are reconciled in Christ. God shows mercy in the Cross without sacrificing truth (Exodus 25:21). The law is the basis. Although God pardons sinners, the truth is honoured. God shows mercy in the Cross without sacrificing righteousness. The golden mercy-seat, sprinkled with blood, tells how the holiness of God was vindicated by the death of Christ (Romans 3:19-27). The universe of glory looks down with wondering, consenting eyes upon the resumption of the world in Jesus Christ (1 Peter 1:12).
III. In Christ alone will the Divine mercifulness be extended to guilty men (Exodus 25:22). There would God meet with Israel, and there alone. God will only save and bless men through Christ crucified. There is no other name given by which men can be saved.
1. We all need mercy. Where is the man who can stand before God on the grounds of justice?
2. We may all find mercy. There is no exception. The mercy of Christ is infinite, universal, everlasting.
3. Let us so seek this mercy that we may find it. Come to the mercy-seat with penitence, renouncing all sin; come with a bold faith.
SUGGESTIVE COMMENTS ON THE VERSES
Exodus 25:17-23. Then, again, we have to remark as to the meaning of the word “mercy-seat;” it literally signifies “covering.” The mercy-seat was a complete covering; it came between the law and God. The law condemned the people who had broken that law; when God commanded the mercy-seat to be placed over it, it was as if He had said, Cover it, I will not look upon it; it would be impossible to look upon it without reading, as it were, in blazing letters, the condemnation of My beloved people. This is just what God has condescended to say in another place, “Their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more,” or, as we have it again in the 103d Psalm, “As far as the east is from the west, so far hath He removed our transgressions from us.”
—W. H. Krause, M.A.
ILLUSTRATIONS
BY
REV. WILLIAM ADAMSON
Typology! Exodus 25:1-40. If you hold up your hand between the candle and the wall, what do you see? That shadow of your hand is not, however, of the same size and colour. It is only an outline. Holding up some beautiful object which we have never seen before, its shadow would give but a feeble impression of itself. So Hebrews 10:1 says, that the Law had a shadow of good things to come. Those good things have come; and
“Man has gazed on heavenly secrets,
Sunned himself in heavenly glow;
Seen the glory, heard the music,—
We are wiser than we know.”
—Mackay.