The Meal Offering

by PRASHER, G. | Category: General | Jul 1957

The meal offering of Leviticus 2 presents a type of our Lord Jesus Christ as the perfect Man. As there is no bloodshedding in this oblation it sets forth the Man Christ Jesus in His life, whereas the burnt offering with which we dealt last month sets Him forth in His death upon the cross of Calvary.

The true humanity of the Lord Jesus is a subject that is dear to the hearts of all who have come to know Him; and there can be no greater delight to the godly soul than that of musing upon the perfections of Christ as revealed in the sacred, holy Scriptures of truth.

The great enemy of souls has been successful in deluding myriads in respect to who Christ is, the real nature of His Person, and the manner designed by God for His entrance as a Man into this world. Modernism has a Christ who is similar to that conceived by men at the close of the first century, and which denies the truth of the virgin birth of our Lord.

Unwilling to admit the miraculous in the birth of Christ, they teach that He was the natural son of Joseph and Mary, though they fail to recognize that this involves just as great a miracle, that of a sinless Offspring from sinful parents; the Divine from the purely human. This would involve interference with the physical and psychical order of the universe.

We can turn to the Scriptures and there find the breathings of God's Holy Spirit upon this important subject, and be assured that we are at the fountain-head of truth, in the region of divine revelation. But how fitting for us to approach with unshod feet, for the ground we shall tread is holy! Here we may discern the Shepherd's voice, since we have come to know Him, and by listening to Him we will flee from the voice of strangers.

Of the meal offering, then, we read, " His oblation shall be of fine flour; and he shall pour oil upon it, and put frankincense thereon." This fine flour typifies Christ in the evenness of His character, in His yieldingness in the hand of His God, and in His gentle ways as He moved amidst our ruined race. He was perfect in word and in deed. Of Him it has been said that" every moral quality met in divine, and therefore, perfect proportion. No one feature preponderated." This is true indeed. The Canannitish woman had no claim upon Him as Son of David, so He answers her not a word. Barren of sympathy the disciples say, Send her away ; for she crieth after us." But when she approached as a humble suppliant, taking the place of a Gentile dog, He said, "0 woman, great is thy faith: be it done unto thee even as thou wilt." He was particular as to what claim was made upon Him, and the woman had no such claim as her first words of address implied; but how gladly He allowed His mercy and power to flow when the proper position was taken! "And her daughter was healed from that hour" (Matthew 15.21-28). Mercy had found the proper channel.

The Lord Jesus says of Himself, "I am meek (Greek, praos meek, mild, soft) and lowly in heart." He was like the fine flour in the hand of God, soft, yielding, impressible. Never did He resist the Holy Spirit. He was in this unlike the Israel people of whom Stephen said,

"Ye do always resist the Holy Spirit: as your fathers did, so do ye." If the Spirit led to the wilderness to those trying days of hunger and temptation, He was ready and willing to respond. If the leading was to Jerusalem where trial and death were awaiting Him, He could say to the Pharisees, "I must go on my way today and tomorrow and the day following: for it cannot be that a prophet perish out of Jerusalem." Even to Peter's outburst, " Be it far from Thee, Lord: this shall never be unto Thee," He replied, "Get thee behind Me, Satan: thou art a stumblingblock unto Me: for thou mindest not the things of God, but the things of men."

Amazingly balanced were the human and the Divine. View Him arising from sleep to quell the storm and sea. Weakness was enjoying refreshment in sleep, Omnipotence commanded the wind and the deep.

"Calm and majestic rises from His pillow

Sea's mighty Lord, commanding, Peace, be still

Sink then to rest, with troubled wind and billow,

Their tossing minds, soothed by His potent will."

Pity and power blended with divine perfection whilst He moved among the sorrowing. As He met the funeral procession near the city of Nain there was a pity that wiped the widow's tear; and a power that quickened her son on the bier. His own tears flowed near Lazarus' grave, whom He called to life through His power to save. Generosity and frugality were evidenced in His feeding of the multitudes. "They have no need to go away; give ye them to eat... and they all did eat, and were filled." Here His munificence shines. Then He commands, "Gather up the broken pieces which remain over, that nothing be lost." In this we see economy. With Him there was not anything stingy on the one hand, or extravagant or wasteful on the other hand. In His prostration and supplication in the garden of Gethsemane we behold the humble Man: in His words to the traitor-band we hear the great I AM. Self-prostration and self-possession are shown forth. Before enemies there was a power to overawe; for the needy there was a kindliness to draw.

"Wist ye not that I must be in the things of My Father? " is in agreement with the attitude of the Nazirite (see Numbers 6). The true Nazirite said to His mother, "Woman, what have I to do with thee ?" The Son with the perfect human heart said to John the beloved disciple, "Behold thy mother." "And He went down with them, and came to Nazareth; and He was subject unto them," is in keeping with, "Ye shall fear every man his mother, and his father" (Leviticus 19.3). All through His life we see the perfection of the fine flour, that evenness, yieldingness, softness in the hand of God's Spirit; every act and word being the result of the Spirit's movement within Him. With the woman in the Song of Songs we can say, "Yea, He is altogether lovely. This is my Beloved, and this is my Friend."

Besides the fine flour in the meal offering there was oil. The oil is a type of the blessed Holy Spirit, and we should note three things that are mentioned in connexion with the oil; the flour or cakes had oil mingled; the unleavened wafers were anointed with oil; and there were cakes of fine flour soaked with oil.

That flour and those unleavened cakes mingled with oil, cause us to think of the conception of the Lord Jesus by the Holy Spirit. In Hebrews 10.5 we read,

When He cometh into the world, He saith, Sacrifice and offering Thou wouldest not, But a body didst Thou prepare for Me."

Isaiah had foretold that

"A virgin shall conceive, and bear a Son, and shall call His name Immanuel" (Isaiah 7.14),

and in the Gospel by Luke we have recorded some of the most precious revealings, set forth with a sensitiveness wholly in keeping with the subject. Mary was that virgin. To her, Gabriel said,

"Thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and bring forth a Son, and shalt call His name JESUS ... The Holy Spirit shall come upon thee, and the power of the Most High shall overshadow thee: wherefore also the Holy Thing which is to be born shall be called the Son of God"

(Luke i. 31, 85, R.V.M.).

Here we have the truth concerning the humanity of Christ, a humanity that was without a taint of sin. Blessed be God for preparing such a body for His Son; and blessed be the Son of God who came as it is written in the roll of the book,

"To do Thy will, 0 God"! (Hebrews 10. 7).

From all eternity He had been in the bosom of the Father; but now God, in the fulness of the time, hath "sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the law" (Galatians 4.4). Here is One who is God and Man in one combined, a glorious, unique Person, like whom there is not another in all the universe of God. Happy are all who, like Thomas, can say, My Lord and my God." He is " Christ who is over all, God blessed for ever. Amen" (Romans 9.5).

In the unleavened cakes anointed with oil, we are caused to consider Him who when He was setting out on His public ministry was anointed by the Holy Spirit. "Jesus also having been baptized, and praying, the heaven was opened, and the Holy Spirit descended in a bodily form, as a dove, upon Him, and a voice came out of heaven, Thou art My beloved Son; in Thee I am well pleased" (Luke 3.21, 22). Then as we think of the fine flour soaked with oil we recall the verse, "And Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan, and was led by the Spirit in the wilderness." All He did was by the Spirit's power. Though Himself the very Son of God, yet it was by the Spirit of God He cast out demons, and performed His many works, which delighted His Father in heaven, and brought such unspeakable blessing to men. Peter told "How that God anointed Him with the Holy Spirit and with power: who went about doing good, and healing all that were oppressed of the devil; for God was with Him" (Acts 10.38).

We have now to consider the frankincense and the salt which were ingredients in the meal offering. The frankincense was put upon the flour and the oil, and in the memorial which was burned on the altar all the frankincense was taken and went up to God in a sweet savour. This shows that it speaks of that in the life of the Lord Jesus which was all for God. The priests could partake of the flour and oil, but not of the frankincense. While there is so much for us in the lovely life of Christ, we recognize there was that which was all for the glory of His God. Vast and continuous was that fragrance that went up to God from His Son-from His thoughts, His words, His deeds. True are those words of His in John 17. "I glorified Thee upon the earth, having accomplished the work which Thou gavest Me to do." The fire of the altar brought out the sweet fragrance of the frankincense, and the trials of the Lord Jesus only brought out the sweetness of His Person and work. As He did the will of God amid constant opposition the heart of God was refreshed by the frankincense, an odour of a sweet smell.

Salt had to be in all the oblations-the salt of the covenant. We know that salt is a preservative, it checks and stops corruption. The Spirit associates the seasoning with salt, with speech, as in Colossians 4.6; and we recall how in the speakings of the Lord Jesus there was so frequently the evidence of the salt. His words were not without their effect on the corrupt thoughts and ways of those around Him. The salt was not lacking

Honey and leaven were to be omitted from the meal offering. Honey might remind us of the natural sweetness which is not desired by God; and leaven usually speaks of evil, of malice and wickedness. Nothing of these was in the Lord Jesus.

Then there were three forms in which the meal offering could be offered: cakes baken in the oven; cakes baken on a flat plate or frying pan; bruised corn parched before the fire. These speak to us of varying degrees of suffering or trial : in the oven, the greatest, since the heat was from every side: the flat plate or frying pan, the lesser, since the heat was from beneath ; before the fire, the least, in the case of the parched corn. Possibly this least is suggestive of His sufferings from the hands of Man; that from beneath, as His sufferings from the hands of the hosts of the underworld, with Satan at their head: the greatest trials were those endured as under the hand of God. That He did suffer thus we are fully assured.

For ever on Thy burdened heart

A weight of sorrow hung;

Yet no ungentle, murmuring word

Escaped Thy silent tongue."

PRASHER, G. | Jul 1957
General