when in his worship we bow down our souls under his authority alone, when we see such an impress of divine wisdom on all his institutions, as to judge all other ways folly in comparison of them, when we have experience of the grace represented and exhibited in them, then do we glorify God aright. And without these things, whatever we pretend, we honour him not in the solemnities of our worship. But we return.

In the charge given to Moses two things are observable. The time when it was given him. 2. The charge itself.

1. The time when it was given. Μέλλων επιτελείν την σκηνήν, when he was about to make the tabernacle.' Mλλ, expresseth that which is immediately future. He was in procinctu, in readiness for that work; just as it were taking it in hand, and going about it. This made the divine warning seasonable. It was given him on the entrance of his work, that it might make an effectual impression on his mind. And it is our duty on an entrance into any work we are called to, to charge our consciences with a divine admonition. What immediate revelation was to Moses, that the written word is to us. To charge our consciences with rule from it, and with its authority, will preserve us in whatever may fall out in the way of our duty, and nothing else will do it.

Ex, is perficere, to accomplish,' to perfect,'' to finish.' But it includes here the beginning, as well as the end of the work, which he was to perfect. The same with ποιησαι, Acts vii. 44. where this whole passage is somewhat otherwise expressed to the same purpose. Καθως διεταξατω ὁ λαλων τω Μωσης ποιησαι αυτην κατα τον τυπον ἐν ἑωρακει, as he appointed who spake to Moses' (which was God himself, as our apostle here declares, in the second person, the great angel of the covenant) that he should make it according to the pattern which he saw.' forex, compriseth the whole service of Moses, in making, framing and finishing the tabernacle.

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The warning and charge itself is, that he should make all things according to the pattern shewed him in the mount. What this pattern was, how it was shewed to Moses, and how he was to make all things according to it, are all of them things not easy to be explained.

In general, it is certain, that God intended to declare hereby, that the work which Moses had to do, the tabernacle he was to erect, and the worship thereof, was not, either in the whole, or in any part of it, or in any thing that belonged to it, a matter of his own invention or contrivance, nor what he set on by chance, but an exact representation of what God had instructed him in, and shewed to him. This was the foundation of all the worship of God under the Old Testament, and the security of the worshippers. Hence, at the finishing of this work, it is eight times repeated in one chapter, that all things were done

as God commanded Moses. And herein was that truth fully consecrated to the perpetual use of the church in all ages, that the will and command of God is the sole reason, rule and measure of all religious worship.

For the pattern itself, expositors generally agree, that on the top of the mount, God caused to appear to Moses, the form, fashion, dimensions and utensils of that tabernacle which he was to erect. Whether this representation was made to Moses by the way of internal vision, as the temple was represented to Ezekiel, or whether there was an ethereal fabric proposed to his bodily senses, is hard to determine. And this nan, 'exemplar,' or pattern,' our apostle here calls heavenly things. For to prove that the priests served only to the resemblance and shadow of heavenly things, he produceth this testimony, that Moses was to make all things according to the pattern shewed him in the mount. And this pattern, with all that belonged to it, is called heavenly things, because it was made to appear in the air on the top of the mount, with respect to that which was to be made beneath. Or it may be called heavenly, because it was the immediate effect of the power of God, who worketh from heaven. But supposing such an ethereal tabernacle represented to Moses, yet it cannot be said that it was the substance of the heavenly things themselves, but only a shadow or representation of them. The heavenly things themselves, in the mind of God, were of another nature, and this pattern on the mount was but an external representation of them. So that here must be three things intended.

1. The heavenly things themselves.

2. The representation of them on the mount.

3. The tabernacle made by Moses in imitation thereof. Wherefore this tabernacle and its worship, wherein the Levitical priests administered their office, was so far from being the substance of the heavenly things themselves, as that they were but a shadow, of that shadow of them which was represented in the mount.

I know not that there is any thing in this exposition of the words that is contrary to the analogy of faith, or inconsistent with the design of the apostle. But withal I must acknowledge, that these things seem to me exceedingly difficult, and such as I know not how fully to embrace, and that for the reasons following.

1. If such a representation were made to Moses in the mount, and that be the pattern intended, then the tabernacle, with all its ministry, was a shadow thereof. But this is contrary to our apostle in another place, who tells us that indeed all legal institutions were only a shadow, but withal that the substance or body was of Christ, Col. ii. 17. And it is the body that the shadow doth immediately depend on and represent. But ac

And

cording to this exposition, this figure or appearance made in the mount, must be the body or substance which those legal institutions did represent. But this figure was not Christ. it is hard to say, that this figure was the body which the tabernacle below was the shadow of, and that body was the shadow of Christ. But that Christ himself, his mediation and his church, that is, his mystical body, were not immediately represented by the tabernacle, and the service of it, but somewhat else that was a figure of them, is contrary to the whole dispute of the apostle in this place, and the analogy of faith.

2. I do not see how the priests could minister in the earthly tabernacle as an example and shadow of such an ethereal tabernacle. For if there were any such thing, it immediately vanished after its appearance; it ceased to be any thing, and therefore could not be any longer a heavenly thing. Wherefore, with respect thereunto, they could not continue te serve to the example of heavenly things, which were not.

3. No tolerable account can be given of the reason or use of such a representation. For God doth not dwell in any such tabernacle in heaven, that it should be thought to represent his holy habitation. And as to that which was to be made on the earth, he had given such punctual instructions to Moses, confirming the remembrance and knowledge of them in his mind by the Holy Spirit, by whom he was acted and guided, as that he needed no help from his imagination, in the view of the representation of such a fabric.

4. Whatever Moses did, it was for a testimony to the things which were to be spoken afterwards, chap. iii. 5. But these were the things of Christ and the gospel, which therefore he was to have an immediate respect to.

5. The sense of the words must be determined from the apostle himself. And it is evident,

1. That the heavenly things, to the resemblance of which the legal priests did minister, and the pattern shewed to Moses in the mount, were the same. Hereon depends the whole force of his proof from this testimony.

2. These heavenly things, he expressly tells us, were those which were consecrated, dedicated to God, and purified by the sacrifice of the blood of Christ, chap. ix. 23.

3. That Christ by his sacrifice did dedicate both himself, the whole church and its worship to God. From these things it follows,

4. That God did spiritually and mystically represent to Moses, the incarnation and mediation of Christ with the church of the elect, and its spiritual worship, which was to be gathered thereby. And moreover he let him know how the tabernacle, and all that belonged thereunto, did represent him and them.

For the tabernacle that Moses made was a sign and figure

of the body of Christ. This we have proved in the exposition of the second verse of this chapter, and it is positively affirmed by the apostle, Col. ii. 17. For therein would God dwell really and substantially, Col. ii. 9. In him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily.' And the tabernacle was but to represent this inhabitation of God in Christ. Therefore did he dwell therein typically by sundry pledges of his presence, that he might represent the real substantial inhabitation of the Godhead in the body, or human nature of Christ. This therefore was the agros, whereunto the tabernacle was to be framed, and this was that which was shewed to Moses on the top of the mount. These were the heavenly things, which they served to the resemblance and shadow of. It is therefore most probable, and most agreeable to the mystery of the wisdom of God in these things, that before the building of the tabernacle below, God did shew to Moses what was to be signified and represented thereby, and what he would introduce when that was to be taken away. He first shewed the true tabernacle, then appointed a figure of it, which was to abide and serve the worship of the church, till that true one was to be introduced, when this was to be taken down and removed out of the way, which is the substance of what the apostle designeth to prove.

It will be said, that what was shewed unto Moses in the mount, was only an and TUTOS, as here, that is, a likeness, similitude and type of other things. This therefore could not be Christ himself and his mediation, which are the substance of heavenly things, and not a resemblance of them.

I answer, First, All representations of Christ himself, antecedent unto his actual exhibition in the flesh, (as his appearances in human shape of old,) were but resemblances and types of what should be afterwards.

Secondly, His manifestation unto Moses, is so called, not that it was a type of any other things above, but because it was the prototype of all that was to be done below.

1. This was the foundation of the faith of the church of Israel in all generations. Their faith in God was not confined unto the outward things they enjoyed, but on Christ in them, and represented by them. They believed that they were only resemblances of him and his mediation, which when they lost the faith of, they lost all acceptance with God in their worship. The relation of their ordinances unto him, their expression of him, as their prototype and substance, was the line of life, wisdom, beauty, glory and usefulness that ran through them all. This being now taken away, they are all as a dead thing. When Christ was in them, they were the delight of God, and the joy of the souls of his saints. Now he hath unclothed himself of them, and left them to be rolled up as a vesture, as a monument of the garments he thought meet to wear in the

immature age of the church, they are of no more use at all. Who now can see any beauty, any glory in the old temple administrations, should they be revived? Where Christ is, there is glory, if we have the light of faith to discern it; and we may say of every thing wherein he is not, be it ever so pompous unto the eyes of flesh, Ichabod; where is the glory of it, or it hath no glory.

Jude tells us of a contest between Michael and the devil about the body of Moses, ver. 9. It is generally thought, that the devil would have hindered the burial of it, that in process of time it might have been an occasion of idolatry among that people. But that which was signified hereby, was the contest he made to keep the body of Moses, the whole system of Mosaical worship and ceremonies, from being buried, when the life and soul of it was departed. And this hath proved the ruin of the Jews unto this day.

2. Consider the progress of these heavenly things; that is, of Jesus Christ, and all the effects of his mediation in grace and glory.

1. The idea, the original pattern or examplar of them, was in the mind, the counsel, the wisdom and will of God, Eph. i. 5-9.

2. Hereof God made various accidental representations, preparatory for the full expression of the glorious eternal idea of his mind. So he did in the appearance of Christ in the form of human nature to Abraham, Jacob, and others; so he did in the pattern he shewed to Moses in the mount, which infused a spirit of life into all that was made to a resemblance of it. So he did in the tabernacle and temple, as will be more fully declared afterwards.

3. He gave a substantial representation of the eternal idea of his wisdom and grace, in the incarnation of the Son, in whom the fulness of the Godhead dwelt substantially, and in the discharge of his work of mediation.

4. An exposition of the whole is given us in the gospel, which is God's means of instructing us in the eternal counsels of his wisdom, love and grace, as revealed in Jesus Christ, 2 Cor. iii. 18.

The actings of faith with respect to these heavenly things, do begin where the divine progress of them doth end, and end where it begins. Faith, in the first place, respects and receives the revelation of the gospel, which is the means of its receiving and resting in Christ himself. And through Christ our faith is in God, 1 Pet. i. 20. as the eternal spring and fountain of all grace and glory.

VER. 6.—Νυ δε διαφορωτέρας τετευχε λειτέργιας, όσω και κρείττονος εστι διαθήκης μεσιτες, ήτις επι κρειτζοσιν επαγγελίαις νενομοθέτηται,