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The lessons of the incense.
The first feature that strikes one when reading Exod. 30: 1-10 is the intimate
association between the position of the altar of incense and the purpose of the
mercy-seat:--
"And thou shalt put it before the vail that is by the ark of the testimony, before the
mercy seat that is over the testimony, where I will meet with thee" (Exod. 30: 6).
Fellowship with God commences with the death of Christ, but continues through His
ever-present intercession at the right hand of God. He has entered with His own blood,
and that offering is ever remembered.
The second feature is found in verses 7 and 8:--
"And Aaron shall burn thereon sweet incense every morning, when he dresseth the
lamps . . . . . and when Aaron lighteth the lamps at even, he shall burn incense upon it,
a perpetual incense before the Lord throughout your generations."
The lamps stand for testimony. Among the duties of the priest was the "dressing"
of the lamps. This would include "snuffing", for "snuffers" are mentioned in
Exod. 37: 23. Is it not a cause for real gratitude to remember that, whenever the Lord
is obliged to "snuff" our lamps of testimony, He not only does it with "snuffers of gold",
but the sweet savour of His own acceptableness ascends before the Father, canceling and
covering the offensiveness of our failure, even as the sweet-smelling incense overcame
the smell of the badly burning lamp?
The third feature is found in verse 9:--
"Ye shall offer no strange incense thereon."
We read elsewhere of "strange fire" (Lev. 10: 1), and of a "strange god" (Psa. 81: 9).
The holy oil was never to be put upon a "stranger" (Exod. 30: 33). All this testifies to
the preciousness of that sweet-smelling savour that ascends on our behalf through the
work of Christ alone.
When we really weigh over the two expressions, "strange incense" and "strange fire",
we begin to realize something of the abomination that Christendom must be with its
religious flesh, its empty ritual and its parade of human wisdom and merit. To the
professing church, even as to Israel, the Lord could truly say:--
"Bring Me no more vain oblations; incense is an abomination unto Me . . . . . when ye
spread forth your hands, I will hide mine eyes from you; yea, when ye make many
prayers, I will not hear" (Isa. 1: 10-15).
Unless Christ be "all" in our worship, God cannot be well pleased.