What Is The True Christian Religion?/Chapter 7
CHAPTER VII
GOD'S REJECTION OF THE SACRIFICIAL SYSTEM
Did God reject the sarrificial system which He permitted the Israelites to establish? Yes, by showing that He did not care for animal sacrifices. but wanted His children to realize such sacrifices were only symbols of true spiritual worship and superseded by sincere spiritual living. Take as an example the 51st Psalm where David expresses contrition for the sins of adultery and murder. He had a glimpse then of something infinitely higher than symbolism, of the spiritual reality behind the symbolism. We read: "For thou desirest not sacrifice; else would I give it; thou delightest not in burnt offering. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart. O God, thou wilt nor despise." No. God did not desire animal sacrifices, and did not delight in burnt offering.
We have this brought out fully by the prophet Isaiah. Through Isaiah the Lord tried to make His people understand the emptiness of their ritual practices, yes, His utter rejection of sacrificial worship. We read in Isaiah 1:11: "To what purpose is the multitude of your sacrifices unto me? saith the Lord. I am full oi the burnt offerings of rams, and the fat of fed beasts; and I delight not in the blood of bullocks, or of lambs, or of he-goats. When ye come to appear before me, who hath required this at your hand, to tread my courts?"
The offering of animal sacrifices is revolting in itself, obviously from a heathen origin, even if permitted to the Israelites, because of their degraded spiritual state. We ought to be able to realize that if bloody sacrifices would overwhelm us with disgust and horror if offered to appease us, they would certainly be as offensive to God, permitted only because of the Lord's effort to make them help in lifting the thought of the worshipper to spiritual cleansing and sacrifice. We an see in the fact that He permitted this heathenish practice His infinite patience and desire to help pitifully crude humanity, people who could understand only the debased and cruel.
The Lord through Isaiah tells His people that outward worship cannot take the place of obedience to His commandments. Sacrifices and ritual can never be a substitute for spiritual living. The Lord states the case frankly to a people who ought to know better: "When ye spread forth your hands, I will hide mine eyes from you. Yea, when ye make many prayers, I will not hear." Why? Because "your hands are full of blood." In other words, because of their evil living.
And yet the Christian world is taught that the bloody sacrifice,— yes, the murder of the innocent Son of God, will appease the Almighty end be a substitute for living well! This is what is involved in the so-called Plan of Salvation.
The Lord through Isaiah insists that His children shall live well, and who can question that this is the message of the Lord throughout the Bible? Did not Jesus say, "Wherefore by their fruits ye shall know them?" Under the Plan of Salvation people have been told that they could not do anything that is good; all of their effort is as "filthy rags," dyed with self-merit. Then they are told that Jesus kept the Ten Commandments for us, in our place, as our substitute, that all we have to do is to "believe" that Jesus died as our substitute, that He bore the penalty of our sins and offers us a free pardon and an abundant entrance into heaven without any effort on out part, since we can do nothing whatever that is good.
A preacher once said to the writer, pointing to the Ten Commandments hanging on the wall before us: "They are an offence to me. Jesus kept them for me. I don't want to have anything to do with them." "But." I asked, "what about the Sermon on the Mount where the Lord tells us that they are to be kept not only in the letter but in the spirit? The Sermon on the Mount might be said to be a summing up of the Christian religion." "No." he answered angrily. "It belongs to the Old Testament religion. I am saved by grace and not by the works of the law. Jesus died on the cross as my substitute. He paid the penalty of my sins. All I have to do is to believe it."
In other words, he and others like him, reject the message of the Lord to His children: "Wash you; make you clean; put away the evil of your doings before mine eyes; cease to do evil; learn to do well; seek judgment; relieve the oppressed; judge the fatherless; plead for the widow." And Jesus says in Revelation: "Blessed are they that do his commandments, that they may have right to the tree of life, and may enter in through the gates into the city."