SERMON III. Witness of the New Testament to the Doctrine of Sacrifice.
1 CORINTHIANS x. 18. “Are not they which eat of the sacrifices partakers of the altar?”
I RESUME the subject upon which I have spoken on two previous Sundays—the reality of the Christian priesthood, altar, and sacrifice.
I endeavoured to shew in the first of these discourses that it was no argument against the truth of the priesthood that they who hold it have “this treasure in earthen vessels,” that a priest is like and “of like passions” with others, nay, is “weak as another man.” In the second, I pointed out that sacrifice was an institution as old as the days of our first parents, and in all probability appointed directly by the Almighty upon man’s fall, with some revelation of its predictive significance; that certainly it met with His approval when duly and religiously performed; and that it was by faith that those who took part in it “obtained the witness that they were righteous:” { 45} whence we were led to consider more particularly its relation to the sacrifice upon the Cross of “the Lamb of God which taketh away the sins of the world,” and how from the beginning it looked forward, in its inner meaning, with a preparing and expectant eye and heart, to that wonderful consummation. We saw, too, that thus among God’s own chosen people, by special and minute provision, this doctrine and usage of sacrifice were preserved even as long as the elder dispensation lasted; whilst, though in terrible and wicked perversion, both as to the object and the mode of worship, they yet prevailed universally throughout the heathen world. Admitting it to be conceivable that in the Almighty’s will it might be intended that sacrifice should altogether cease when once the great sacrifice was completed; that, although He had appointed foreshadowing and predictive rites of that wonderful event, He did not intend that there should be any reflective or commemorative sacrifice to carry us back to it, or to apply its virtue, or to plead its merits ever afresh before the throne of God; we yet saw great reason to think this to be highly unlikely, and reserved the point more particularly for further examination. What is the testimony which has been furnished to us upon it? You will remember that I proposed to consider this testimony under the three heads: first, what Holy Scripture tells us; secondly, what has been the understanding by the Church from the beginning of the declarations of Holy Writ; and thirdly, what is the mind of our own Church in this matter?