#11 Laying The Hand on The Sacrifice

Here we have an emblem of the way in which a sacrifice becomes available for the offerer. The same ceremony is commanded in chapter 4:4, 15, 24, 33, and in other places: it is therefore important and instructive.

The question with many souls is how to obtain an interest in Christ so as to be saved by him. Never could a weightier question be asked.

It is certain that this is absolutely needful; but alas, it has been fearfully neglected by many. In vain did Christ die if he is not believed in.

It ought to be attended to at once.

The text gives us a pictorial answer to the question,—How can Christ’s sacrifice become available for me?

Let us learn,—

I. THE INTENT OF THE SYMBOL.

It was a confession of sin: else no need of a sin offering.
- To this was added a confession of the desert of punishment, or why should the victim be slain?
- There was also an abandonment of all other methods of removing sin. The hands were empty, and laid alone upon the sin offering.
- Do this at the cross; for there alone is sin put away.
It was a consent to the plan of substitution.
- Some raise questions as to the justice and certainty of this method of salvation; but he who is to be saved does not so, for he sees that God himself is the best judge of its rightness, and if he is content we may assuredly be so.
- Substitution exceedingly honors the law, and vindicates justice.
- There is no other plan which meets the case, or even fairly looks at it. Man’s sense of guilt is not met by other proposals.
- But this brings rest to the most tender conscience.
- “What if we trace the globe around,
- And search from Britain to Japan,
- There shall be no religion found
- So just to God, so safe to man.”
It was an acceptance of the victim.
- Jesus is the most natural substitute, for he is the second Adam, the second head of the race; the true ideal man.
- He is the only person able to offer satisfaction, having a perfect humanity united with his Godhead.
- He alone is acceptable to God; he may well be acceptable to us.
It was a believing transference of sin.
- By laying on of hands sin was typically laid on the victim.
- It was laid there so as to be no longer on the offerer.
It was a dependence—leaning on the victim.
- Is there not a most sure stay in Jesus for the leaning heart?
- Consider the nature of the suffering and death by which the atonement was made, and you will rest in it.
- Consider the dignity and worth of the sacrifice by whom the death was endured. The glory of Christ’s person enhances the value of his atonement. Hebrews 10:5–10.
- Remember that none of the saints now in Heaven have had any other atoning sacrifice. “Jesus only” has been the motto of all justified ones. “He offered one sacrifice for sins for ever”: Hebrews 10:12.
- Those of us who are saved are resting there alone; why should not you, and every anxious one?
- II THE SIMPLICITY OF THE SYMBOL.
There were no antecedent rites. The victim was there, and hands were laid on it: nothing more. We add neither preface nor appendix to Christ: he is Alpha and Omega.
The offerer came in all his sin. “Just as I am.” It was to have his sin removed that the offerer brought the sacrifice: not because he had himself removed it.
There was nothing in his hand of merit, or price.
There was nothing on his hand. No gold ring to indicate wealth; no signet of power; no jewel of rank. The offerer came as a man, and not as learned, rich, or honorable.
He performed no cunning legerdemain with his hand. By leaning upon it he took the victim to be his representative; but he placed no reliance upon ceremonial performances.
Nothing was done to his hand. His ground of trust was the sacrifice, not his hands. He desired his hand to be clean, but upon that fact he did not rest for pardon.
- Come then, dear hearer, whether saint or sinner, and lean hard upon Jesus. He takes away the sin of the would. Trust him with your sin, and it is forever put away. Put forth now your hand, and adopt the expiation of the redeeming Lord as your expiation.

Anecdotes And Illustrations

A poor blind woman in Liverpool, after her conversion, committed many hymns to memory. She was an occasional attendant upon the old Earl of Derby, the grandfather of the present Earl. She repeated one of her hymns to him. The old Earl liked it, and encouraged her to repeat more. But one day, when repeating the hymn of Charles Wesley, “All you that pass by,” she came to the words:—

“The Lord in the day of his anger did lay

Your sins on the Lamb, and he bore them away.”

He said, “Stop, Mrs. Brass, don’t you think it should be—

‘The Lord in the day of his mercy did lay’?”

She did not think his criticism valid; but it proved that she was not repeating her verses to inattentive ears, and other indications showed that the blind woman was made a blessing to the dying nobleman.—Paxton Hood’s Life of Isaac Watts.

“When Christmas Evans was about to die, several ministers were standing round his bed. He said to them, ‘Preach Christ to the people, brethren. Look at me: in myself I am nothing but ruin. But look at me in Christ; I am Heaven and salvation.’ ”

It is not the quantity of your faith that shall save you. A drop of water is as true water as the whole ocean. So a little faith is as true faith as the greatest. A child eight days old is as really a man as one of sixty years; a spark of fire is as true fire as a great flame; a sickly man is as truly living as a healthy man. So it is not the measure of your faith that saves thee—it is the blood that it grips to that saves you. As the weak hand of a child, that leads the spoon to the mouth, will feed it as well as the strong arm of a man; for it is not the hand that feeds thee—albeit, it puts the meat into your mouth, but it is the meat carried into your stomach that feeds you. So if you can grip Christ ever so weakly, he will not let you perish.… The weakest hands can take a gift as well as the strongest. Now, Christ is this gift, and weak faith may grip him as well as strong faith, and Christ is as truly your when you have weak faith, as when you have come to those triumphant joys through the strength of faith.—Welsh.

The Puritans speak of faith as a recumbency, a leaning. It needs no power to lean; it is a cessation from our own strength, and allowing our weakness to depend upon another’s power. Let no man say, “I cannot lean;” it is not a question of what you can do, but a confession of what you cannot do, and a leaving of the whole matter with Jesus. No woman could say, “I cannot swoon:” it is not a matter of power. Die into the life of Christ; let him be all in all while you are nothing at all.