"And he shall put his hand upon the head of the burnt-offering; and it shall be accepted for him, to make atonement for him." The act of laying on of hands was expressive of full identification. By that significant act, the offerer and the offering became one; and this oneness, in the ease of the burnt-offering, secured for the offerer all the acceptableness of his offering. The application of this to Christ and the believer sets forth a truth of the most precious nature, and one largely developed in the New Testament, namely, the believer's everlasting identification with, and acceptance in, Christ. "As He is, so are we in this world." "We are in Him that is true." (1 John iv. 17; v. 20.) Nothing, in any measure, short of this could avail. The man who is not in Christ is in his sins. There is no middle ground: you must be either in Christ or out of Him. There is no such thing as being _partly_ in Christ. If there is a single hair's breadth between you and Christ, you are in an actual state of wrath and condemnation; but, on the other hand, if you are in Him, then are you "as He is" before God, and so accounted in the presence of infinite holiness. Such is the plain teaching of the Word of God. "Ye are complete in Him"--"accepted in the Beloved"--"members of His body, of His flesh, and of His bones." "He that is joined unto the Lord is one spirit." (1 Cor. vi. 17; Eph. i. 6; v. 30; Col. ii. 10.) Now, it is not possible that the Head can be in one degree of acceptance and the members in another. No; the head and the members are one. God counts them one, and therefore they are one. This truth is at once the ground of the loftiest confidence, and of the most profound humility. It imparts the fullest assurance of "boldness in the day of judgment," inasmuch as it is not possible that aught can be laid to the charge of Him with whom we are united: it imparts the deep sense of our own nothingness, inasmuch as our union with Christ is founded upon the death of nature and the utter abolition of all its claims and pretensions.