How wondrous are the prophecies of Isaiah after this experience. He
seems to look down the centuries for seven hundred years and to see the
glorious blessings of the gospel dispensation almost as clearly as if
they were already present. Hear him in the thirty-fifth chapter: "And
an highway shall be there and a way; and it shall be called the way of
holiness; the unclean shall not pass over it; but it shall be for
those: the wayfaring men, though fools, shall not err therein." And in
the fifty-first chapter: "Awake, awake! Put on thy strength, O Zion!
put on thy beautiful garments, O Jerusalem, the holy city; for
henceforth, there shall no more come into thee the uncircumcised and
the unclean," and in the sixtieth chapter: "Thy sun shall no more go
down, neither shall thy moon withdraw itself; for the Lord shall be
thine everlasting light, and the days of thy mourning shall be ended."
To Jeremiah the Lord said, "I sanctified thee; and I ordained thee a
prophet unto the nations," which must mean not only that he was set
apart for the office of a prophet, but also that he was cleansed from
inbred sin, as a necessary preparation for the office itself.
In the thirty-sixth chapter of Ezekiel we have some striking passages
on the theme before us. These were, no doubt, addressed primarily to
the outward Israel, but they may very justly be appropriated by the
Israel of God, the Church of Christ, since as Augustine says, "The New
Testament lies hidden in the Old, and the Old is revealed in the New."
In the twenty-fifth verse we have the promise of pardon or
justification with cleansing from the pollution of their past sins:
"Then will I sprinkle clean water upon you and ye shall be clean, from
all your filthiness and from all your idols will I cleanse you."
Committed sin implies both guilt and pollution. And the pollution that
is thus acquired by the practice of sinning is removed in regeneration.
Thus the new convert is brought back again to the state of the little
child. "Except ye be converted," said the blessed Saviour, "and become
as little children, ye cannot enter into the kingdom of God." The
little child has neither the guilt nor the pollution of committed sin;
whilst he does have within him the inherited or inbred sin of his
nature.
Now in the promise quoted above, allusion is made to the clean water
made from the ashes of a red heifer and sprinkled, under the Mosaic
law, upon those who had incurred ceremonial uncleanness. The thing
signified, however, is the precious blood of Christ which cleanseth
from all sin, or possibly the cleansing operation of the Holy Spirit,
typified by water, may here be meant. At any rate the twenty-fifth
verse points to nothing less than a full and free justification.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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