Jul 14
19
Worthy is the Lamb who was slain!
(Alexander Smellie, “The Hour of Silence” 1899)
“Then I saw a Lamb, looking as if it had been slain, standing in the center of the throne!” Revelation 5:6
“Then I looked and heard the voice of many angels, numbering thousands upon thousands, and ten thousand times ten thousand. They encircled the throne and the living creatures and the elders. In a loud voice they sang: Worthy is the Lamb who was slain, to receive power and wealth and wisdom and strength and honor and glory and praise!” Revelation 5:11-12
The Lamb of God is the center of this mystic and glowing book of the Revelation.
There is the Lamb with His wounds — the Lamb that was slain. Even in Heaven He carries those scars of His passion and death. Even in Heaven I shall be perpetually reminded that I owe everything to Calvary, and to Him who was both Victor and Victim there!
There is the Lamb in His royalty — the Lamb in the center of the Throne. The Head that once was crowned with the sharp thorns — is crowned with regal glory now! I rejoice in it for Christ’s sake. I rejoice in it for my own sake, for what is there which He cannot do for me — His little one? Over the world of nature and men, over unseen principalities and powers — He rules that He may befriend my soul.
There is the Lamb shepherding His own people — the Lamb shall lead them. To all eternity He will shepherd me, feed me, protect me, uphold me! I shall never be able to dispense with Him. I shall never wish to stand alone, outside His keeping and His care. Through the everlasting years, I shall avow myself my dear Lord’s debtor.
There is the Lamb in His triumphs — the Lamb shall overcome them. So, one day, I shall see all my enemies routed and dead. One happy day, I shall be entirely freed from the antagonism and harassment of my sins! He who is for me, is mightier than the hosts arrayed against me!
“Worthy is the Lamb who was slain, to receive power and wealth and wisdom and strength and honor and glory and praise!”
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The most prominent object in heaven?
Spurgeon, “The Lamb in Glory” #2095.
“Then I saw a Lamb, looking as if it had been slain, standing in the center of the throne” Revelation 5:6
Jesus, in his ‘sacrificial’ character, is the most prominent object in heaven. So far from ‘substitution’ being done with, and laid aside as a temporary expedient, it remains the object of universal wonder and adoration. In all his present glory, Jesus disdains not to appear as the Lamb that has been slain. This still is his chosen character. Jesus, as the Lamb, is the center of the wonderful circle which makes up the fellowship of heaven. As the Lamb slain, he is the object of heavenly worship.
He who became a Lamb that he might take away the sin of the world, is not ashamed of his humiliation, but still manifests it to adoring myriads, and is, for that very reason, the very object of their enthusiastic worship. They worship the Lamb that sits upon the throne and say, “Worthy is the Lamb,” because he was slain and redeemed his people by his blood. His atoning sacrifice is the great reason for their deepest reverence and their highest adoration.
The doctrine of Atonement is the first and foremost teaching of Scripture, the greatest well of the believer’s comfort, the highest hill of God’s glory.
In a loud voice they sang: “Worthy is the Lamb, who was slain, to receive power and wealth and wisdom and strength and honor and glory and praise!” Rev. 5:12
For the Lamb at the center of the throne will be their shepherd; he will lead them to springs of living water. And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.” Rev. 7:17
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Fig leaves?
(Horatius Bonar, “The Sin, the Sinner, and the Sentence”)
“At that moment, their eyes were opened, and they suddenly felt shame at their nakedness. So they strung fig leaves together to cover themselves.” Genesis 3:7
They are alone, yet they are ashamed.
They are in Paradise, yet they are ashamed.
It is conscience that is making them blush.
It not only makes cowards of them, but it works shame and confusion of face. They are ashamed of themselves; of their nakedness; of their recent doings. They cannot look one another in the face after their disobedience and recriminations against one another. They cannot look up to God now. The feeling of happy innocence is gone.
They must be covered.
This is their feeling, the dictate of conscience. The eye must not see them, either of God or man. The light must not shine on them; the eye of the sun must not look on them; and the fair flowers and trees of Paradise must not see their shame. They love darkness rather than light. Covering is what they seek; covering from every eye.
Thus, shame and guilt are inseparable.
“I must be covered,” is the sinner’s first feeling; from the eye of God and man, even from my own. They cannot look on me, nor I on them! Thus far they are right. But now they go wrong.
Man thinks he can cover himself.
He knows not the greatness of the evil; he does not calculate on the penetration of the all seeing eye. He sets to work and makes himself a covering, and he says this will do.
What sin is, or what the sinner needs, or what God requires, he has no idea of.
Each sinner has his own way of covering himself.
He weaves his own web, whatever may be the substance of which it is composed. He wishes to be his own coverer, the maker of his own clothing. He thinks he can do it himself. He has no idea that it is utterly beyond his power. He trusts to the skill of his own hands to provide the dress that shall hide his shame from the eye of God and man. He thinks it an easy thing to deal with shame, and fear, and conviction, and conscience. He will not believe that these can only be dealt with by God. This is the last thing that he will admit.
He will try a thousand plans before accepting this. He will make and try on many kinds or sets of clothing before betaking himself to that which God has made.
The unbelieving man’s whole religious life is a series of plans and efforts for stitching a clothing for himself, with which to appear before God and before men; no, with which he hopes to appear before the judgment.
It is with this man made, this self made clothing, this earth made, or priest made, or church made religion, that he robes himself; with this he soothes conscience; with this he quiets fear; with this he removes the feeling of guilty shame. He can do all that is needful himself, or at the most with a little help from God.
Man thinks he can cover himself with fig leaves. He supposes that what will hide his shame from his own eye will hide it from God; that even such a frail covering as the foliage of the fig tree will do. He has no thought of anything beyond this. The fig leaf will do, he thinks. What more do I need?
But he is mistaken; the fig leaf will not do, broad and green as it may be. But why will it not do?
It is man’s device, not God’s. That which covers sin, and renders the sinner fit to draw near, must be of God, not of man. God only has the right, God only can, prescribe to man how he is to draw near.
What then is ‘ritualism’ but a religion of fig leaves?
It is simply for the body, not the soul. It does not relieve the conscience, or satisfy the guilty spirit, or cover the whole man. It is utterly insufficient. It could not remove one fear, or quiet one pang of remorse, or make the man feel tranquil in the presence of God.
Man’s devices for covering sin are useless. They may be easy or difficult; cheap or costly; still they are vain. They profit nothing. The covering is narrower than a man can wrap himself in.
Man’s devices for covering sin are innumerable. Good deeds, long prayers, fervent feelings, self mortifications and penances; church attendance, rites, ceremonies, religious performances; such are man’s ways for approaching God, his coverings for a sinful soul. They are all fig leaves!
Man’s devices for covering sin all turn upon something which he himself has to do, not on what God has done. Man misses the main point of importance.
Man’s devices for covering sin assume that God is such a one as himself. He can conceal himself from his fellow man; therefore he thinks he can cover himself, so that God shall not see him. That which conceals him from a human eye, he supposes will conceal him from a divine.
Man’s devices for covering sin all trifle with sin. They do not fathom its depths of malignity in God’s sight. They assume that it will be easily forgiven and forgotten. They overlook its evil, its hatefulness, its eternal desert of woe.
What are fig leaves as a protection against the wrath of God, or the flames of hell!
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Justification and sanctification are distinct blessings. The first springs out of, and is connected with, the finished work of the Son of God; the other springs out of, and is connected with, the work of the Holy Spirit on the soul. Sin has defiled our persons externally, as well as polluted our souls internally. We cannot, therefore, stand before God unless washed in the blood of the Lamb, and clothed in his spotless righteousness. This righteousness forms our title to heaven, as holiness constitutes our fitness. The former is our wedding robe, the latter our spiritual qualification. The hymn well draws this distinction–
“Tis he adorned my naked soul,
And made salvation mine;
Upon a poor, polluted worm
He makes his graces shine.
And, lest the shadow of a spot
Should on my soul be found,
He took the robe the Savior wrought,
And cast it all around.
The Spirit wrought my faith, and love,
And hope, and every grace;
But Jesus spent his life to work
The robe of righteousness.”
Without these two qualifications, what entrance could there be into heaven, or what happiness there, could entrance be gained? For consider not only the infinite purity and holiness of God, but the blazing splendor of his immediate presence, the piercing ray of his deep-searching eye. Who or what can live in his presence but what is absolutely perfect without and within? But this the Church could not be, unless she were washed in the blood and clothed in the righteousness of God’s dear Son, and perfectly sanctified by the operations and indwelling of his Spirit. We therefore read–“Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the Church, and gave himself for it; that he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word, that he might present it to himself a glorious Church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing; but that it should be holy and without blemish” (Ephesians 5:25-27).J.C.Philpot.