OUR blessed Lord said in the Sermon on the Mount, ‘Think not that I am come to destroy the law or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil.’ He did not come as a sweeping reformer to break down existing institutions, and sweep away the law of types; but He did come as the predicted Messiah, to fulfil the prophecies of those prophetic pictures, and to give a fresh dignity to the law in which they were embodied. In no instance, therefore, do you find Him violating the law. He swept away with a strong hand the vain traditions which men had added to it; but the law itself he always honoured, and His great complaint against the advocates of tradition was, ‘Ye do make void the commandments of the law by your traditions.’ But it was not only in the practical details of life that He honoured the law, but in the whole great work of redemption. Every part of that wonderful work was an act of homage to the law. Not only did He obey it when He was come, but in the act of coming, or in other words, even in His incarnation, He showed His obedience. This will be easily seen if you study the law of redemption as laid down in this chapter. The law is here given respecting one who had sold himself to a stranger. How many are there who, like the bondsman, have sold themselves to sin! But we must not stop to dwell on that. The poor man had sold himself and was a slave. Till the year of jubilee nothing could release him but redemption. But who should pay the redemption price? that was the question. A stranger was not at liberty to do so. However kindly disposed he might feel, he had no right or power to interfere. According to this 48th verse, the Redeemer must be one of his brethren. ‘One of his brethren may redeem him: either his uncle or his uncle’s son may redeem him, or any that is nigh of kin unto him of his family, may redeem him; or, if he be able, he may redeem himself.’ The slave himself might redeem himself if he had the power to do so. But what hope had that slave of procuring his own ransom when all his powers and all his time belonged to another? Who then could redeem him? Who could set him free? The nearest of kin had the prior right, as we see in the case of Boaz and Ruth. But if he failed, the next in order of relationship might step in and take his place. But the redeemer must be a kinsman, and none but a kinsman could redeem. So closely are the two things identified, that redeemer and kinsman are both expressed by the same word in Hebrew. The same word stands for both, for the kinsman had the right of redemption, and the redeemer was obliged to have a blood relationship. And now observe the manner in which our blessed Lord and Saviour obeyed the law.