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Testimonies for the Church Volume 4
Jerusalem, for Calvary was outside the city walls. This was to show
that Christ did not die for the Hebrews alone, but for all mankind. He
proclaims to a fallen world that He has come to be their Redeemer and
urges them to accept the salvation He offers them. The heifer having
been slain in a most solemn manner, the priest, clothed in pure white
garments, took the blood in his hands as it issued from the body of the
victim and cast it toward the temple seven times. “And having an high
priest over the house of God; let us draw near with a true heart in full
assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience,
and our bodies washed with pure water.”
The body of the heifer was burned to ashes, which signified a
whole and ample sacrifice. The ashes were then gathered up by a
person uncontaminated by contact with the dead and placed in a vessel
containing water from a running stream. This clean and pure person
then took a cedar stick with scarlet cloth and a bunch of hyssop, and
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sprinkled the contents of the vessel upon the tent and the people as-
sembled. This ceremony was repeated several times in order to be
thorough and was done as a purification from sin.
Thus Christ, in His own spotless righteousness, after shedding His
precious blood, enters into the holy place to cleanse the sanctuary. And
there the crimson current is brought into the service of reconciling
God to man. Some may look upon this slaying of the heifer as a
meaningless ceremony, but it was done by the command of God and
bears a deep significance that has not lost its application to the present
time.
The priest used cedar and hyssop, dipping them into the cleansing
water and sprinkling the unclean. This symbolized the blood of Christ
spilled to cleanse us from moral impurities. The repeated sprinklings
illustrate the thoroughness of the work that must be accomplished for
the repenting sinner. All that he has must be consecrated. Not only
should his own soul be washed clean and pure, but he should strive
to have his family, his domestic arrangements, his property, and his
entire belongings consecrated to God.
After the tent had been sprinkled with hyssop, over the door of
those cleansed was written: I am not my own; Lord, I am Thine. Thus
should it be with those who profess to be cleansed by the blood of
Christ. God is no less exacting now than He was in olden times. The
psalmist, in his prayer, refers to this symbolic ceremony when he says: