THE TRUE PRIEST
THE TRUE PRIEST
In a case of discipline every one is found out. The legalist, the Pharisee who seeks reputation from the assembly, has only one course for every case, and that is excision. The loose and indifferent says, in terms, ‘You wink at me and I will wink at you’. This is even more destructive than the other, and offensive to the Lord. The spiritual, the true priest, has but one thing, the prosperity of God’s assembly, before him. There must not be leaven allowed there. If the leprosy be deeper than the skin, it is a fretting leprosy, but the spiritual are slow to pronounce that it is so until it be self-evident. One is contrite and abject because continually overcome by the same evil; he evidently has conscience, but he has not judged the root; the act distresses him, and not the flesh from which the act springs. The spiritual has comparatively easy work with such a case. Another errs continually in the same line, but with increased cleverness to baffle discovery, and when discovered, a greater adroitness in excusing it. In the latter case, the question is, Is there any conscience at all? But I feel it is not so much for the wrong-doer we are to consider; “not for his cause that had done the wrong, nor for his cause that suffered wrong, but that our care for you in the sight of God might appear unto you” (2 Corinthians 7: 12). The saints are defiled by an unreserved association with leprosy. “Have no company with him, that he may be ashamed” (2 Thessalonians 3: 14), there is neither courage nor faithfulness to adopt; and thus the “hair”, the open demonstration of holy separation to the Lord, is lost; it does not exist, and many are defiled.
[p. 370] Where consideration for myself, directly or indirectly, sways me, and not God’s interest at the time, I am sure to be like Aaron, more or less influenced by the people. Moses was occupied with God’s interest, and he can judge for God. The terrible consequences of unreserved association with leprosy are so little apprehended that souls are contaminated unknown to themselves; they are betrayed by their lack of sensibility; they have moral colour-blindness.
If God’s present interest be not the aim and object of my life, I not only lose His support, so that I am like a bird with a wounded wing, but a lower character of holiness is tolerated, like Lot at Sodom, or Jacob at Shalem. I am not according to His nature, which I can never know nor imbibe but as I am near Him; and if I am near Him, I must be for Him.