Now such a sold or forfeited condition is ours by nature, under the ruins of Adam. Forfeiture of every thing is the simple idea that holds our natural condition in the just light. We have forfeited life, and with it all things, by the breach of those terms on which we held life, and with it all things. We have incurred the debt of death. "In the day thou eatest thereof, thou shalt surely die." Adam did eat, and this law demanded death. We sold ourselves under that sentence, and to that penalty, and were debtors to die the death. But our Kinsman has paid the price. Jesus died. He has counted out the money to the uttermost farthing. In the language of the law, eye has gone for eye, life for life, blood for blood. We have not been redeemed by corruptible things as silver and gold, but by the precious blood of Christ. The value of that blood was well tried. The blood of bulls and of goats was not rich enough. It would not do, it could not do. But "Lo, I come to do Thy will, O God," tells us that He was satisfied who exacted, and could not but exact, the full ransom or redemption-price. And now _we and our inheritance stand repurchased by our Kinsman_. This is the very principal in the great services of Christ for us. It is largely noticed and foreshadowed by the law (Lev. xxv.), but it was understood from the beginning. For sacrifice or vicarious offering proceeded on this principle. And that was made known upon the entrance of sin, or act of forfeiture. The coat of skin which covered Adam bore witness that he stood in the value of a ransom, that the virtue of One who had met the demand of God against him was now upon him. But this is full of blessing--that the great mystery of the Kinsman or Redeemer was known (published by the Lord, and believed by the sinner) ere the law had shadowed it, or prophets proclaimed it.²⁹ ²⁹ The same Hebrew word signifies kinsman, redeemer, and avenger. Another of these duties was this--to rescue or deliver a brother taken captive. In the previous case of ransom or repurchase, the Kinsman had to deal with a rightful claimant, and to answer his demands. His brother or his brother’s inheritance had been sold, and had to be repurchased at a price well and justly ascertained, according to the law of estimations. But this duty of rescuing or delivering a brother is different. Here the Kinsman has to do with a stranger or a foe; and by counterforce, or the strength of a stronger arm, to perform this service. But this, also, is our natural condition, our state under the ruins of the fall. And this character of Kinsman-service, the Son of God, partaker of our flesh and blood, renders us.