UPON THE

CEREMONIAL LAW.

DISCOURSE III.

The SONG of SOLOMON, iv. 6.

Until the day break, and the shadows flee away, I will get me to the mountain of myrrh, and to the hill of frankincense.

AFTER man had broken the moral law, and had fallen into a helpless state of guilt and misery, it pleased God to reveal the covenant of grace. As soon as the way to salvation was stopt by the law, he opened a new and living way by the gospel. The Messiah was promised, and the rites and ceremonies were instituted, which were to represent what he was to be, and to do for the salvation of men. "Which things were a shadow, but "the body, or substance, was Christ." They were expressive figures and shadows of his actions and sufferings, and in them the religion of the gospel was delineated to the senses of the believer. This law of ceremonies was revealed upon the fall, and afterwards republished in writing by Moses. It had God for its author, and was established by his divine authority, and therefore it deserves our particular consideration.

In my last discourse I endeavoured to explain the scope and design of the moral law, and to prove, that, by its works, no flesh can be justified in the sight of

God. The next body of law is the ceremonial, which preached salvation from the pains and penalties incurred by the breach of the moral law. It held forth this doctrine under a great variety of types and figures, and taught it in many plain passages. The words which I have read contain the Messiah's own sentiments of the subject. The commentators allow him to be the speaker, and he is addressing himself to the believer, with whom he holds sweet and spiritual discourse in this divine treatise. He particularly informs them, where he vouchsafed his presence, and would be found of them that sought him, so long as the ceremonial law was in force. Until the day break, says he, until the day of my first coming in the flesh shall dawn, and the shadows flee away, the types and shadows of the law shall vanish, I will get me to the mountain of myrrh, and to the hill of frankincense, to the mountain of the Lord's house, even to the holy hill of Sion, and there I will be spiritually present in the temple service; I will there give my blessing to the ordinances, and will make them the means of grace: whatever your wants may be, apply to me in these instituted means, and you will find an abundant supply: for, until the day break and the shadows flee away, &c.

The consideration of this passage will, I hope, by the assistance of God, help us to comprehend the scope and design of the ceremonial law. And, may the Holy Spirit, who inspired these words, accompany our present meditation upon them, that we may,

First, Clearly understand their true sense and meaning, and

Secondly, May be established in the doctrine which they contain.

There are many parts of the song hard to be understood, especially by the unlearned and unstable, who wrest it, as they do also the other scriptures, to their own destruction. But the passage which we have now before us is very easy. There is no difficulty in it to persons who have a little acquaintance with the scripture

manner of writing, which constantly uses and accommodates natural things to explain spiritual, suiting its instructions to man's present embodied state, in which he cannot see the things of grace, but through the glass of nature. The language of the Old Testament is entirely of this kind. Every Hebrew word has a literal sense, and stands for some sensible object, and thereby gives us a comparative idea of some spiritual object. As this is the nature of the language, so is it also of the subject matter of the book of Canticles. It is drawn up in the manner of a dialogue, in which outward and material things are used to represent inward and spiritual things. This way of writing is very abstruse to them who have not the senses of their souls exercised to discern the things of God, but, to them who have, it is an easy book. He who runs may read it, if he has but a little acquaintance with the scripture language, and some of that love in his heart of which this book treats: for it is a song of loves, setting forth the mutual affection between Christ and the believer, who is united to him by saving faith. And, in the words of my text, Christ informs the believer where he might at all times find his presence. He would be spiri tually present in the services and ceremonies of the temple. By these he would convey grace and strength to his faithful people, until his coming in the flesh.

Until the day break. The scripture mentions two days by way of eminence, and distinguishes them by two of the greatest events, which the Redeemer's love and power are to produce, the day of Christ's first coming, and the day of his second coming. The day of his first coming in the flesh is here spoken of-the day which Abraham earnestly desired to see, and which is often mentioned in the prophets under the expressions "of the day of the Lord, or the day of our God;" and sometimes it is very emphatically styled "that day," that day's wonders raising it above all days from the beginning to the end of time. And, in the New Testament, our Lord calls it my day, the day of my incar

nation, when I, Jehovah, should take a body of flesh, and God and man should be one Christ. This day many prophets and kings desired to see; for God manifest in the flesh was the foundation of their faith and hopes. They longed to see this day break, and to be hold the sun of righteousness, with his saving and healing influences, arising upon the earth, and, when he did arise, we find those, who were then looking for redemption, singing his praises with grateful hearts, "Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, through whose "tender mercy the day-spring from on high hath visit"ed us :" they blessed God, because the substance was now to take place of the shadow, and all the legal ceremonies were to be succeeded by gospel realities. When the glorious day of Christ's appearance in the flesh was come, and the light of life was risen upon the earth, then

The shadows were to flee away. The legal ceremonies are called shadows in scripture, because they were the outward and visible signs of inward and spiritual objects. St. Paul says, the ceremonial law "had the shadow of good things to come," Heb. x. 1. of the good things which are now come to us by the advent of Christ, and it had the patterns and examples of heavenly things; every one of which had God for its author, and was instituted by him to be an apt figure, and to raise a just idea of some spiritual object; as Moses was admonished of God, when he was about to make the tabernacle. "For see," saith he, "that thou "make all things according to the pattern shewed to "thee in the mount." Every rite and ceremony was

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a patttern of some heavenly object, the real existence of which the pattern proved, as a shadow proves the reality of the substance from which it is cast, and the resemblance and likeness of which is set before the eyes, as the shadow of a body is a representation of it. The scripture has expressly determined what all these shadows were to represent: for the apostle, speaking of them in Col. ii. 17. declares, "that they were the

"shadow of things to come, but the body is of Christ." Christ is the reality of all the shadows of the law; he is the body, and the substance, of whom they are the pictures. If you take away their reference to him, they cease to be examples and shadows of heavenly things; but, if you suppose them to represent him and his actions, and sufferings, &c. then they answered many noble purposes, until he came in the flesh to fulfil them for then these shadows were to flee away, one great end of their institution being answered. The observance of them was to be no longer in force; but they were to be entirely repealed and abrogated. However, until this blessed day should break, and these legal shadows should thus flee away, the text says, they were to serve a double purpose; they were, first, to be the outward and visible signs of the inward and spiritual grace given unto us, and ordained by Christ himself, to be, secondly a means whereby we receive the same, and a pledge to assure us thereof. This is plainly implied in the last words of the text, in which Christ declares, that until the ceremonies were fulfilled by his coming in the flesh, he would be spiritually present in them.

I will get me to the mountain of myrrh, and to the hill of frankincense. Where was this mountain of myrrh? Was it not the place in which the Lord was present, until the shadows were fled away? And where was he present but in the services of the ceremonial law, which could not be performed any where, when the text was spoken but in the temple? There the Lord had put his name and had sanctified the house by the presence of his glory. "I have chosen," says the "Lord, 2 Chron. vii. 16. and sanctified this house, that

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my name might be there for ever, and mine eyes, and "mine heart, shall be there perpetually:" there will I receive the sacrifices which I have forbidden to be offered any where else; there will I accept of the prayers of the faithful offerer; and there will I dwell between the Cherubim, with visible tokens of my divine pre