The unity of Scripture is one of the most conclusive marks of its inspiration. To find a collection of sixty-six pamphlets, written by some forty authors, several of them unknown, and to find the whole marked by one controlling mind, distinctly raises the Bible as a book into a category of its own.
This unity comes without effort or advertisement, and often is seen where we would least expect it.
A charming instance of this came with delightful freshness in our morning reading today. Exodus 20 was the chapter read. It contains the giving of the law, the ten commandments, by Moses. Who could keep the law? Not one. What was its sentence when broken? There was but one ultimately, and that was death. 2 Corinthians 3:7 speaks of it, in language unsurpassed in solemnity, as “THE MINISTRATION OF DEATH.”
Does Exodus 20 stop at the giving of the law and leave us in despair? If Moses had been the author instead of the inspired penman, if it had been the writing of a mere man, however gifted, instead of a divine message with divine authority, it would doubtless have been so, but verses 24 and 25 immediately follow on, and speak of an ALTAR. Why of an altar? Because an altar speaks of atonement by death, of sacrifice, of substitution. If the law emphasized transgression, the altar emphasized that of without shedding of blood is no remission” (Heb. 9:22). Were the men chosen of God to be his inspired penmen statesmen like Moses, or a mixture of general and poet like David, or one who wore the prophetic mantle with distinction like Isaiah, or an exile in a foreign court like Daniel, or a scholar like Paul, or an “ignorant and unlearned” fisherman like Peter, they all alike strike the same note, man’s sinfulness on the one hand, and one remedy for sin, an atoning sacrifice.
Suppose a medical work, consisting of sixty-six pamphlets, written by medical men in different countries, and in different centuries; do you suppose that they would all diagnose disease the same way, or prescribe the same remedy for its cure? You know they would not. Or if it were statesmen, seeking to cure the ills of mankind, would there not be as many different schemes as statesmen? You have only to look at the League of Nations to answer the question. Again and again its differences threaten its disruption, and the question is, How long can it last?
And further. Not merely in broad outlines, but in details is the unity of the Bible seen. It certainly could not be by lucky guess, nor by collusion, that this could be brought about.
There are three striking details given us in the particular Scripture we are considering. First, if the altar built were of stone, no tool was to be lifted up upon it. It had not to be of hewn stone, else it were polluted. What was the teaching to be drawn from this? Surely that approach to God is not of human effort or merit. Does not the Apostle Paul put into theological language what Moses presents in type or figure? “Not of works lest any man should boast” (Eph. 2:9). How happy that this is so! What a sure basis it puts everything on! Not what we are and what we can do, but what Christ is and what He has done!
Secondly, there had to be no steps by which to approach the altar. What was intended to be conveyed by that? It was to show that no person or thing was to come between the soul and its needs and Christ. Does it not exactly fit in with 1 Timothy 2:5, “There is … one Mediator between God and men, the Man Christ Jesus.” There are not any intermediaries, no system of approach, no person or ordinance or ritual, to come between the soul and Christ. The Lord says, “Come to ME.” Again, “I,” and no one else, nor any system, “am THE WAY.”
Thirdly, we find immediately following the foregoing, the instructions concerning the Hebrew slave, a deeply touching type of the Lord Jesus. Philippians 2:7 comes to our mind, “Christ Jesus … made Himself of no reputation, and took upon Him the form of a servant [literally, slave or bondman], and was made in the likeness of men.” What amazing condescension that “The Mighty God,” “The Father of Eternity” (Isa. 9:6) should take human form, and become a real Man, though never ceasing to be the Eternal Word (John 1:1, 14).
When the Hebrew slave had served six years he was entitled to go free. If his master had given him a wife and she had born him sons and daughters, they remained the property of his master. But if he plainly declared that his affection for his master, his wife and children was such that he preferred to remain, then his master brought him to the judges, and then to the door post and bored his ear through with an aul. The bored ear was a sign of his affection for his master, his wife and children, and that because of this he was prepared to serve his master for ever.
Behold the unity of Scripture when we read a plain allusion to this, undoubtedly prophetic of Christ, in Psalm 40:6-7. “Sacrifice and offering Thou didst not desire: mine ears hast Thou opened [margin lit. digged].” Surely as far as the Lord was concerned, personally, He could have returned to heaven when He chose. But, wonder of wonders, He chose to go back by the way of the cross, so that God might be glorified in the place where He had been dishonoured by man’s sin, and that He might not go back alone. So we read in verse 7, “Then said I, Lo I come: in the volume of the book it is written of me, I delight to do Thy will, O My God.” Hebrews 10:7 quotes this as referring to Christ.
The Lord Jesus plainly showed His love to God; to His church, His bride; to His children, His earthly people, when He became Man; and He never turned aside until He had fulfilled God’s will and secured the eternal blessing and the companionship of His church, His bride, and of all His own.
It is very interesting to thus see how Scripture exhibits its unity. In this example it is truly delightful to have such typical teaching brought before us, prophetical of the Lord and the character of His atoning work on the cross. How stimulating is the study of Scripture!