There are few things which the servant of Christ finds more difficult than to adjust, with spiritual accuracy, the claims of natural relationship, so as not to suffer them to interfere with the claims of the Master. In the case of our blessed Lord, as we know, the adjustment was divine. In our case, it often happens that divinely recognized duties are openly neglected for what we imagine to be the service of Christ,--the doctrine of God is constantly sacrificed to the apparent work of the gospel. Now, it is well to remember that true devotedness always starts from a point within which all godly claims are fully secured. If I hold a situation which demands my services from ten till four every day, I have no right to go out to visit or preach during those hours. If I am in business, I am bound to maintain the integrity of that business in a godly manner. I have no right to run hither and thither preaching while my business at home lies "in sixes and sevens," bringing great reproach on the holy doctrine of God. A man may say, I feel myself called to preach the gospel, and I find my situation, or my business, a clog. Well, _if you are divinely called and fitted_ for the work of the gospel, and that you cannot combine the two things, then resign your situation, or wind up your business, in a godly manner, and go forth in the name of the Lord. But, clearly, so long as I hold a situation, or carry on a business, my work in the gospel must begin from a point within which the godly claims of such business or situation are fully responded to. This is devotedness: aught else is confusion, however well intended. Blessed be God, we have a perfect example before us in the life of the Lord Jesus, and ample guidance for the new man in the Word of God; so that we need not make any mistakes in the varied relationships which we may be called, in the providence of God, to fill, or as to the various claims which God's moral government has set up in connection with such relationships. II. The second point in our theme is the mode in which the meat-offering was prepared. This was, as we read, by the action of fire,--it was "baken in an oven"--"baken in a pan," or "baken in a frying-pan." The process of baking suggests the idea of suffering. But inasmuch as the meat-offering is called "a sweet savor" (a term which is never applied to the sin-offering or trespass-offering), it is evident that there is no thought of suffering for sin--no thought of suffering the wrath of God on account of sin--no thought of suffering at the hand of Infinite Justice, as the sinner's substitute. The two ideas of "sweet savor" and suffering for sin are wholly incompatible according to the Levitical economy. It would completely destroy the type of the meat-offering were we to introduce into it the idea of suffering for sin.