The Sacred Love-Token

A SERMON DELIVERED ON LORD'S-DAY MORNING, AUGUST 22, 1875,

BY C. H. SPURGEON,

AT THE METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE, NEWINGTON.

"And the blood shall be to you for a token." Exodus 12:13.

You remember that last Lord's-Day morning we spoke upon the witness
within the child of God. We tried to show that Believers did not need
any man to assure them that they are forgiven, that they could get on
exceedingly well without absolution from a priest and could know their
salvation altogether apart from the ghostly father, seeing that they
have the evidence of it in their own souls by believing in the Lord
Jesus Christ. We shall not think or speak much of that miserable
impostor, the priest, this morning, for he really is not worth thinking
of. But we shall continue our consideration of the witness which the
Lord has given to His believing people concerning their safety in Jesus
Christ. May the Holy Spirit help us while we meditate upon the most
vital of all subjects, which lies at the very heart of true religion.

There are some, as we have said, who desire a token of their safety
from man–a poor thing when they get it and not worth asking for! And
there are others who desire it from God in the form of a sign or a
wonder, or else they will not believe. "Show me a token for good" is a
prayer which is often used in a very mistaken sense. They desire some
special transaction of Providence, or remarkable dream, or singular
feeling. But God says to all those who desire a token for good, "The
blood shall be to you for a token." What more can we desire? All the
squadrons of the angelic host could not better assure us if each one
brought a message from Heaven. The best of all evidences of Divine Love
is the Cross!

The strongest of all assurances of safety, the surest of all pledges of
favor, the best token of Grace that a man can possibly behold is the
sprinkled blood by which he is cleansed from sin. "The blood shall be
to you for a token." Before we dive into this subject, let us notice
that the blood which was a token to God's people was not merely that
which had been shed by the sacrifice of all unblemished lambs, but
blood which had been caught in a basin, had been taken by the person at
the head of the household in his own hands and recognized as shed for
him.

Then a bunch of hyssop was laid to soak in a basin and afterwards the
blood was sprinkled upon the lintel and the doorposts–this blood, thus
appropriated, was the token. By an appropriating faith we must take
Christ to be ours. We must, in a word, believe in the Atonement which
He has made, for an Atonement which is not believed in is no Atonement
to us. Our Lord Jesus laid down His life for us, but He that believes
not in Him shall by no means partake of any of the blessings of His
death. The sprinkled blood preserved the houses of the Israelites and
it is the blood of Jesus accepted by us, relied upon and applied to our
consciences which delivers us from death.

This sprinkling, moreover, was done in a very public manner. They
stained the lintel and the two side posts, so that every passerby might
see it, yes, and must see it. So salvation is promised, not alone, to
believing, but to confession with the mouth. "He that with his heart
believes, and with his mouth makes confession of Him shall be saved."
And so the grand commission at the end of the Gospel by Mark puts it,
not, "he that believes shall be saved," but "he that believes and is
baptized shall be saved." For if we believe in Christ we must not be
ashamed of Him! Shame about faith would argue insincerity of faith.
True faith in the Savior is so potent a principle of our lives that it
must be seen whether we publish it or not–and we must be willing that
it should be seen!

Yes, this should be the most visible point in our lives–our glory and
our delight–that we do, indeed, believe in the Savior, Jesus Christ.
Oh, that every one of you, my dear Hearers, used the Cross for its
proper purpose! I grieve that any among you should need to have it
asked of you–

"Is it nothing to you, oh you that pass by, Is it nothing to you that
Jesus should die?" The Lamb is slain but you have never caught the
blood, you have never sprinkled it with the hyssop of faith and,
consequently, you are not saved! Oh that each one of you could say, "My
faith is resting in the substitutionary work of Jesus."

1 could, indeed, sing that blessed hymn just now, and I drank it in
with all my heart! And I heartily wish you could all sing it, too–

"Complete Atonement You ha ve made

And to the utmost farthing paid

Whatever Your people owed:

Nor can His wrath on me take place,

If sheltered in Your righteousness,

And sprinkled with Your blood!" Now, to the text. The blood of Jesus
Christ is to Christians a token and in order to bring out the whole
sense we must have five words–it is a distinguishing token, an
assuring token, a significant token, a love-token, and a recognition
token.

I. First, then, the blood shall be to you for a token, A DISTINGUISHING
TOKEN. You could tell where the Israelite dwelt, for the blood-mark was
there that night. You knew the Egyptian's abode, for he knew nothing of
the token. Nothing so truly distinguishes Christians as the blood of
Jesus Christ. Where the blood is not believed in, nor prized, you have
dead Christianity, for "the blood is the life thereof." A bloodless
Gospel is a lifeless Gospel! If the Atonement is denied or frittered
away, or put into a secondary place, or obscured–in that proportion
the life has gone out of the religion which is professed.

But we, Brethren, bear this distinguishing token, the mark of the
blood. Our religion is, in many respects, a very singular one–one open
to a world of objection and ridicule from carnal minds. It is one which
always has been criticized and always will be, for we believe, first,
that our sin deserves death. We do not believe transgression to be a
trifle, or a mere misdemeanor of the first class. We know it to be a
capital offense deserving the death penalty! When the Lord says, "The
soul that sins, it shall die," our conscience says, "Amen," to the
sentence of the Most High. The blood on the doorpost meant that those
who dwelt there confessed that they deserved to die as much as others
and would have done so had it not been for the paschal lamb.

The crimson mark was virtually a confession of deserving death. So
every Believer feels that his sin is great and grievous, terrible and
overwhelming. He does not subscribe to theories which make little of
man's guilt. He has no ear for those who try to mitigate the penalty
and endeavor to make the guilt appear small. He does not call sin a
mistake, a failure or a lapse. I think I have heard all those words,
lately, used about sin, by those who say, "Poor unhappy man! So
mistaken, seeking after the light and crying after God in the dark. How
sad that he should stumble! Surely God will not be so harsh as to
punish him forever."

Such talk has no charm for us! We admit the heinous criminality of sin
and the justice of the awful sentence which declares that the wicked
shall go away into everlasting punishment. Our God is just and takes
vengeance on iniquity. The God who smote all the first-born of Egypt
and overthrew Pharaoh in the Red Sea, is the God whom we adore! And as
we bow before Him we admit that He might righteously have smitten us,
also, and have utterly destroyed us. For us the blood-mark is virtually
an acknowledgment that we have the sentence of death in ourselves and
dare not trust in ourselves.

We are singular enough to believe in Substitution. The blood upon the
lintel said, "Someone has died, here, instead of us." We also hold and
rest in this Truth of God, that Christ died, "the Just for the unjust,
to bring us to God." We believe, "He was made a curse for us, as it is
written, Cursed is everyone that hangs on a tree." The belief in the
greatness of sin distinguishes Christians from Pharisees, and all other
self-justifiers. And the belief in Substitution separates Christians
from all those philosophic adulterators of the Gospel who are willing
to hold up Christ's example, but cannot endure His expiatory Sacrifice.
They will speak to you of Christ's spirit and the power of His
teaching, but reject His vicarious death.

We do not subscribe to the lax theology which teaches that the Lord
Jesus did something or other which, in some way or other, is, in some
degree or other connected with the salvation of men! We hold as vital
Truths of God that He stood in His people's place and for them endured
a death which honored the Justice of God, and satisfied His righteous
Laws. We firmly believe that He bore the penalty due to sin, or that
which, from the excellence of His Person, was fully equivalent thereto.
My Brothers and Sisters, this is and always will be assailed, but it is
the keystone of the Gospel arch!

As at Waterloo all the battle seemed to rage around the chateau of
Hugoumont, so does the conflict center around the doctrine of the
atoning death of our great Substitute–and we are not going to shift
our ground for a moment–nor

adopt any other phraseology. We stand to the literal Substitution of
Jesus Christ in the place of His people and His real endurance of
suffering and death in their place. And from this distinct and definite
ground we will not move an inch! Even the term, "the blood," from which
some shrink with the affectation of great delicacy, we shall not cease
to use, no matter who may take offense at it, for it brings out that
fundamental Truth of God which is the power of God unto salvation.

We dwell beneath the blood-mark and rejoice that Jesus poured out His
soul for us unto death when He bore the sins of many. But we believe
more–and what will seem very strange to some–we believe that we died
in Jesus. The Israelite knew that when the angel went through Egypt he
meant to exact a life at every house, and so he exhibited the blood, as
much as to say, "The first-born is dead here." The lamb had died
instead of the first-born and, virtually, the first-born is dead, and
there is no cause for smiting, because the smiting has been done. So,
when Jesus died, His elect died in Him and their sins received the
vengeance due in that day when on the accursed tree He yielded up His
life a ransom for many.

How can we die? We are already dead in Him and have been buried with
Him by virtue of our union with His blessed Person. This is a most
precious Truth of God and those who hold it are thereby distinguished
from the rest of mankind. Believing this, we next come to the
conclusion that we are safe, for when the Hebrew had struck the blood
upon the doorposts of his house, he went in to feast, not to fret–he
went into the house to eat the lamb whose blood had been
sprin-kled–and to stand at the table with his loins girt about,
expecting not to die, but to go forth to a land which the Lord his God
would give to him!

This is the distinguishing mark of a Christian that he knows himself to
be saved and, therefore, he keeps the feast rejoicing in the Lord! And,
standing with his loins girt, he is expecting, soon, to be called away
to the land which the Lord his God has given to him, that he may
inherit and dwell there forever. Other men are not saved, nor dare they
profess that they are! They acknowledge that they have a great deal to
do before they will be saved–present salvation they know not. Or if
they think they are saved, yet they dream that their continued
salvation depends upon themselves–there is still something needed
besides the sprinkled blood. The Israelite needed nothing but the
blood–his was perfect satisfaction with that.

And so is the Believer! He has believed in Christ as dying in his
place. He is delighted to know that he is complete in Him and accepted
in the Beloved. He waits till the summons shall come and he shall be
called to ascend to the Glory Land where Christ has gone to prepare a
place for him. The Israelite in Egypt made this distinction prominent.
As we have already said, he put it upon upper part of his door and upon
the two side posts, too. We read in Revelation that those who received
the mark of the beast sometimes bore it in their forehead, but
sometimes also on their right hand, while he who had the mark of God
always received it on his forehead, never on his right hand where it
could be hidden within the palm.

It has been very well remarked that there is a back door to Hell, but
there is none to Heaven. The way to Heaven is the King's Highway, a way
which is not made for concealment, but for honest travelers who have
nothing to hide! Believers must be seen, for they are the lights of the
world! Yet there are some who try to go to Heaven up the back stairs
and serve the Lord only by night. It must not be! Strike the blood
where all can see it, and let men know that you are a believer in the
Lord Jesus Christ's atoning Sacrifice! Whether they like it or not, let
them know that this is all your salvation and all your desire.

I had the pleasure of riding into the Leonine city in Rome a short time
after the Italian troops had taken possession, and I noticed that every
house had marked up, most conspicuously, the arms of the kingdom of
Italy and the name of Victor Emmanuel. They were not content to have it
over their doors, but all over the front of the houses you read,
"Victor Emmanuel, King of Italy," showing that they were right glad to
escape from the dominion of the Pope and to avow their allegiance to a
constitutional king. Surely if for a human monarch and the earthly
freedom which he brought, men could thus set up his escutcheon
everywhere, you and I who believe in Jesus are bound to exhibit the
blood-red token, and to keep it always conspicuous!

Let others believe the priest, we believe Jesus! Let others trust their
works, we trust the sprinkled blood! Let others rely on frames and
feelings, discipline and development, we believe in Jesus Christ and
Him only! And we nail to the mast the blood-red banner of the atoning
Sacrifice!–

"My faith is built on nothing less

Than Jesus' blood and righteousness. I dare not trust the sweetest
frame, But wholly lean on Jesus' name. On Christ, the solid Rock, I
stand, All other ground is sinking sand." Thus much, then, upon the
blood as the distinguishing token.

II. Now, secondly, the blood was an ASSURING TOKEN. When we mean to do
a special kindness for a friend it may be we say to him, "That you may
be sure I shall do it, here is a token of my faithfulness." God gave to
His people the blood of sprinkling as the token that He would preserve
them safely. And surely, the more the Israelite studied that token, the
more at ease would he be, for he would say, "God has appointed this
unblemished lamb to take our place, and seeing that He appointed it,
and the lamb has been slain, we are sure He will not run back from the
substitution which He has, Himself, ordained, so we are perfectly
safe."

Now, I want you, for a few minutes, especially you who have any doubts
and fears, to look upon the blood of Christ and see its suitableness to
be an assuring token to your consciences. Remember, first, what it
was–blood, the token of suffering. Your sin deserves suffering. Christ
has suffered for sin. Think what suffering He endured, what
contradiction of sinners and what forsaking of His Father! Suffer no
one to depreciate the physical sufferings of Christ, but still,
remember that His mental sufferings were greater! His soul sufferings
were the soul of His sufferings. Go to dark Gethsemane, go to shameful
Gabbatha, go to deadly Golgotha and as you see your Lord and mark that
wondrous spectacle of woe, will you not feel that He can put away your
sin and that if He so terribly suffered, you need not suffer?

God has accepted an expiation worthy of His Justice! That
Heaven-rending cry, "My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?" shows
how keen were the pangs with which our hope was born! Think,
further–blood signifies not only suffering but death–for our Lord
could only put away sin by actually dying. All His tears, all His holy
living, all His painful sufferings, even, could not recompense for sin
till the death penalty was paid, for death was that which God had
appointed as the reward of sin, and Jesus died.

Oh see Him die–see HIM die! Was ever such a spectacle? Every drop that
distils from His pierced hands cries aloud, "Safety for the Believer!
The ransom price is paid!" That gash in His side, like the mouth of
love, speaks eloquently to our hearts, "Pardon, acceptance, eternal
love!" I cannot see that bowed head, those eyes glazed in death and
that dear body taken down to be laid in the tomb without feeling, "If
Christ has died, there must be boundless mercy for the guilty sons of
men." Think of it and I pray God the Holy Spirit to lead you to see the
sweetness and comfort which lie in this token.

Remember, too, that you rest, not merely on suffering and death, but on
the excellence of the Person so suffering and dying. Ask whose
suffering and death it is? In the Israelites' case it was an
unblemished lamb. In your case and mine it is the spotless Lamb of God!
Oh, Brothers and Sisters, think of the life of Jesus in its innocence
and disinterestedness! Was ever such a life, was ever such a death of
such a sacred Person? He was God, "very God of very God." Those hands
that were pierced had healed the sick with their touch! And those
nailed feet had trod the sea! Those eyes, all closed in death, had
looked into men's hearts and those silent lips had spoken miracles! It
was God, Himself, who, on the bloody tree, offered expiation for sin
against Himself!

There must be power in such a death as that to put away sin. Do you not
admit that it must be so? Is not the token full of comfort to you?
Think, again, that it was not merely the lamb, but it was the Lamb of
God. That is to say, when the Israelite killed the lamb he was doing
what God commanded him to do, and when Jesus died in our place, He did
not die as an amateur Savior, but as one appointed by God. Now, if God
appointed the Atonement, He must accept it. Surely if He said that
Christ should die in our place, if He "laid upon Him the iniquity of us
all," then the Atonement must be accepted since God, Himself, set it
forth, provided it and ordained it!

How sweetly do I rest in this! I feel, when I look up to my dear Lord,
and I desire evermore to do so, as if I could say to the Justice of
God, "What can You do against me? Do I not present to You all You can
demand–a death? I bring before You a death which You did appoint to be
instead of my death? If You have appointed it, I know You will not
refuse it." This is one of the sweetest parts of the whole matter of
Atonement and fills the token with assurance. One other thought, and a
sweet one, this token was that of blood which was shed–not to be shed,
but shed already! They had killed the lamb, they had taken the warm
blood in the basin and smeared the door-posts, it was all done and all
over!

You and I, also, are resting in a finished Sacrifice, not in a
sacrifice to be offered, nor in a sacrifice which continues to be
offered, according to this Anglican Popery which reeks in so many
parish Churches, but a complete Sacrifice, for, "by one offering He has
perfected forever them that are set apart." There is no continuance of
the offering of Christ in the sacrifice of the "mass"–it is a
barefaced lie before Almighty God, for Christ declares that when He had
once offered Himself, He forever sat down at the right hand of the
Majesty in the heavens. By that word, "It is finished!" He has put an
end to all sacrifices and offerings by way of expiation for sin,
because they are not needed–one death has accomplished it all!

Beloved, what joy is here! Suffering, suffering to the death, the
suffering of the Son of God, a suffering ordained of God to be the
vicarious Sacrifice and a suffering which is perfect and complete! Let
us look at the token and let our hearts be glad within us from now on
and forever. One of our kings once gave a ring to his favorite, and
said to him, "I know that at the council tomorrow a charge of heresy
will be brought against you. But, when you come in, answer them if you
will, but you need be in no fear–if you find yourself brought to a
strait, simply show them the ring and they will go no

further."

It is even so with us. The Lord has given us the precious blood of
Christ to be like a ruby ring upon our finger and now we know how far
conscience may go, and how far accusations from Satan may go–we have
only to produce that token and bar all further proceedings. "He that
believes in Him is not condemned," neither can he be. God cannot and
will not go back from His promise! The blood is the faithful assurance
of the security of all the saints.

III. But now, thirdly, this is A MOST SIGNIFICANT TOKEN. Tokens
generally mean something. Some inner sense is implied in them. Now, our
token of the blood means four things. When the Jew smeared the blood
upon the lintel and the two side posts he meant redemption. He did as
good as say, "We are redeemed by blood! The people who live in this
house are free! They have been slaves but they are redeemed! They are
going out tomorrow morning and old Pharaoh and all his army cannot hold
them."

That is just what the blood of Jesus Christ means to us. We are bought
and paid for and we are a free people! And if the Son has made us free,
we are free, indeed! "O Lord, I am Your servant! By Your Grace I am
Your servant! You have loosed my bonds. You have brought me up out of
the house of bondage and out of the iron furnace. You have broken all
my chains–the sprinkled blood declares it." Then the blood meant,
next, that the people who lived beneath that sign belonged to God. It
was the mark of the Lord's property–"You are not your own, you are
bought with a price."

He who redeemed us ought to possess us. The blood, when it bought us,
also set us apart to be forever the property of the Redeemer. Whenever
you think of Jesus, crucified, think of yourself also as crucified to
the world, as no more belonging to self or sin or Satan–no longer
bound by worldly customs, fashions, maxims, laws–but under law to
Christ, for you are the Lord's freeman. Give up the members of your
body to His service! Yield them as servants unto righteousness, because
you have not been purchased–spirit, soul, and body–with corruptible
things as with silver and gold, but with the precious blood of Christ
as of a lamb without blemish, and without spot! The token set forth our
redemption and also God's property in us.

This token next means acceptance. He who has the blood of Christ
sprinkled on him has that to show which renders him acceptable before
the Lord. There has been a war and a wounded soldier comes home. He
goes to the house of a father and mother who have a son out in the
army, and he inquires, "Does So-and-So live here?" "Yes." "Can I see
him?" "Yes." "I have a letter from your son, whom I left in the army,
he was my dear comrade." "Are you sure you have such a letter?" The man
looks disreputable, his garments are torn, and he is evidently very
poor, but he replies, "Yes, I have a letter from your son." He puts his
hands into his pockets, and he cannot find it. The master of the house
is angry and says "It is of no use your coming here with this tale, you
are deceiving me."

He fumbles, still, in his pockets and at last he brings it out. Yes,
there is the token, the father knows the handwriting of his dear boy.
The letter says, "Father, this is a choice companion of mine and I want
you, when he reaches home, to treat him kindly for my sake. Tell mother
that anything she does for him shall be the same as if she had done it
to her own boy." See how well he is received at sight of that token!
And even so, when we present the blood-mark, we say to the Lord, "There
is the token that we are Jesus' friends," and the Lord does not look at
the rags in which our poor nature is arrayed, but He looks at the token
of His own Son's blood and accepts us for His sake. What surer and more
suggestive

token could we desire? When cleansed in the blood of Jesus we are
comely with His comeliness and dear to the heart of God for His Son's
sake.

Yes, Beloved, and it moreover means perfect safety. As soon as ever the
blood was on the lintel those inside the house were perfectly secure.
The angel could not strike them, for if he had done so he would have
struck his Master and insulted the Lord of Angels. To use his sword
while the Divine shield was exhibited outside the door would have been
to bid defiance to God's honor, and that no angel of God could ever do!
Oh, Brothers and Sisters, there is no shield for a guilty soul like the
blood-red shield of the Atonement! Stand beneath the purple canopy of
Sacrifice and the great hailstones of wrath can never fall upon you!
You must be safe if Christ's Atonement interposes between you and God.
So you see the sprinkled blood is a very significant token.

As I went, a few days ago, through a piece of forest much overgrown
with undergrowth and saplings, I noticed certain straight young trees
distinguished by a red mark, and I discovered that the woodmen were
about to cut down all the undergrowth and clear the ground for the
better growth of the timber. Those marked trees were to be spared to
become large oaks. I can see the red marks and the small trees in my
mind's eye at this moment–and there come the woodmen chopping down
everything with their axes and billhooks! Down goes all the brushwood
and many a pole falls, too, but they stop at the marked trees–these
must not be touched–the red mark saves them!

So is it with you and with me if we have known the sprinkling of the
blood! The Lord will not only say, "Let them alone this year, also,"
but He will say to the destroyers, "Come not near unto those upon whom
is the mark." By this token you may know that you shall live and not
die! Like Rahab, we hang this scarlet line in our window, and when all
Jericho goes down with terrible destruction, our house must stand, for
the red line secures it evermore!

IV. The fourth point is that THE BLOOD IS A LOVE-TOKEN. The blood is a
token of ancient love, for it was shed more than 1800 years ago. Oh my
Soul, the Lord has given you an ancient token which sets forth His
great love with which He loved you, even when you were dead in
trespasses and sins! Before you were born, the blood was poured forth
which is today the ensign and pledge of everlasting love! It is a token
of intense love, for it is a pledge taken from the heart of Christ and
it denotes not the love of the lips, not love which begins and ends
with outward deeds of mercy, but a love which wells up from the Essence
of the Redeemer's being–from His inmost heart which was reached by the
cruel spear.

What a token is this, a token taken not from the lilies of my Lord's
garden, nor from the jewels of His crown, nor even from the hair of His
head, but drawn from the inner sanctuary of His soul–from that Holy of
Holies–the heart of Emanuel, God With Us! Oh Believer, since you have
such a token as this, you should be ready to die sooner than doubt the
love of the Lord! It is a token, too, of mighty love, for it testifies
that He who gave it possessed a conquering flame of love which many
waters could not quench nor Death, itself, destroy. See, He gives you
the blood which is the token of death, His death for you, and thus
shows that He went to the grave for your sake, "and Death, by dying,
slew"!

Wear this token near your heart, I pray you, for it is the richest that
was ever given by the hands of Love to the choicest object of
affection. O You who are our Well-Beloved, You have loved us even to
the end, for You have loved us to the death! It is a token, too, of a
wise all-seeing love, for it shows that our Lord knows our sin and has
known it all. When He gives us the blood, He does as much as declare,
"My child, I am aware of the evil which is in you, for I have suffered
its penalty. I know your sin, but you shall know it no more, for I have
carried it away and cast it into the depths of the sea." By this token
Believers know that their sin is covered, and that in the sight of the
Lord they are "all fair," for He has cleansed them from every stain.

The day is come when if their sins were searched for, they would not be
found. No, they shall not so much as exist, for the blood has washed
them white! And it is the token of a love unlimited which will deny
nothing to its object. "He that spared not His own Son, but freely
delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give
us all things?" If you have received the blood of His dear Son, what
will the Lord refuse you? Do you think your God will deny you
Providential mercies when He has already given the bleeding heart of
Jesus to redeem you? Do you imagine that He will leave you without
bread and water, or garments to cover your backs when He has yielded up
the Jewel of His soul, the Delight of His heart, to you?

Prize the token of His love, and look at it till your soul weeps for
very joy! Blessed is that man to whom the Lord has said, "The blood
shall be to you for a token."

V. Lastly, it is A RECOGNITION TOKEN. The man who has this token is
known to the angels as one of the heirs of salvation to whom they
minister. As soon as they see the blood applied to the soul by faith,
there is joy among them, for this is a sure sign of repentance. All
God's children have this family mark at their birth and there is no
mistaking it, so that at the sight of it, the angelic guardians
commence their tender care and begin to bear up the newly begotten one
in their hands lest at any time he dash his foot against a stone.

The devil also knows that mark and, as soon as he sees it, he begins to
assail the man who bears it, seeking in all sorts of ways to destroy
him. If the Believer is not destroyed, it will not be for lack of
enmity or industry on Satan's part. He knows the mark of the "seed of
the woman," and he roars and rages, but at the same time he trembles,
for well he knows that he cannot prevail. At the sight of the
sacrificial token the great enemy stands confounded–like a raging lion
he would gladly devour the sheep of the Lord, but the mark of the blood
upon them saves them from his teeth.

And, Brothers and Sisters, this blood-mark is known among the saints,
themselves, and has a wonderful power for creating and fostering mutual
love. I have often noticed that as soon as we begin to discourse upon
the atoning death of our Divine Lord, we are at home with one another.
There may be Brethren present from various Churches and they may not be
well at ease when we handle other subjects, but when we come to the
precious blood we come to the heart of the matter and are all as one!
This is one of the secret signs of our spiritual freemasonry! I have
had my heart warmed and cheered against my own will, sometimes, by
devout writers whose doctrinal theories I do not believe, and whose
Churches I could not join, and yet when they write about my Lord, they
win my heart!

"Aliquid Christi," as one old Divine used to say–the something of
Christ in them awakens our affections and draws us near. Even books
which are corrupt with Sacramentarianism have, occasionally, such a
sweet savor of Christ in them that we cannot utterly cast them away.
Sometimes we feel bound to very carefully pare the apple and cut out
the rotten places, and remove the objectionable core for the sake of
the sweet morsels flavored with the love of Christ. As the sweet
honey-bearing flowers attract the bees, so does the name of Jesus draw
all His saints to Him, and so to each other. Give me your hand, my
Brother, for if you know my Lord, we belong to the same family–the
Infallible mark of the redeemed is upon us both!

Best of all, the Lord knows this token! When we go to the Mercy Seat,
if we would prosper, we must produce the sacred passport of the
precious blood. With this it is impossible to fail. The Primitive
Methodist Brother, when he was in a meeting where a friend could not
pray, cried out, "Plead the blood, Brother!" and the advice was wise.
Yes, plead that, and say, "For Jesus' sake–by His agony and bloody
sweat–by His Cross and passion." What mighty blows are given to the
gate of Heaven by that battering ram! These are arguments to which
Heaven always yields. Our God recognizes the blood-mark in the hour of
death and attends His people through the solemn article.

Death's terrors are gone to him who has the blood for a token. Lay me
down on my bed! There let me endure the allotted pain and weakness till
the clammy sweat stands on my brow and needs to be constantly wiped
away! Lay me down, I say, and I will calmly fall asleep like a child
tired with a day's play, if I have but the token! Distresses and
poverty and anguish of body may molest me, yet shall I be perfectly at
ease and ask for no exchange. Why is this, you ask? Many a man
possessed of health and wealth is not one-half so blessed as the poor
saint upon his death pallet! From where does this blessedness come?

Here is the secret. The Lord has passed by and given a token! "A
token," you say, "what is it? Is it some line extracted from the golden
book of God's election? Is it a gem taken from the diadem which is
prepared for him in Heaven?" No, no, it is not this. "Has he, in his
sleep, beheld a vision and seen the shining ones walking the golden
streets, or has he heard an audible celestial Voice saying to him, 'You
are mine'?" No, he has none of these! He has neither dream nor vision
nor anything that men call superhuman. He is resting in the precious
blood–and this blood is the token of friendship between God and his
soul! By this he knows the love of God and by this, God communes with
him. They meet at the

blood!

God delights in the sacrifice of Christ and the believing soul delights
in it, too. They have, thus, a common love and a common joy–and this
has bound the two together by a bond which never can be broken! This is
it which makes some of us sing–

"And when I'm to die, Receive me, I'll cry

For Jesus has loved me,

I cannot tell why.

But this thing I find,

We two are so joined,

He won't be in Heaven

And lea ve me behind." Oh what a blessing to feel that the blood of
Jesus has united us to Him eternally!

Suffer this last word. Some of you, perhaps, have said, "Oh, I wish I
had the blood of Jesus Christ for a token." Then let me tell you,
first, that you have not to provide a sacrifice, for that is done! The
Lamb is slain, the blood of the Everlasting Covenant is ever before the
Presence of God. What have you to do? You have nothing to do but to
have the blood sprinkled upon you. You know how they sprinkled it–it
was with a bunch of hyssop. Hyssop is a common herb to be found
everywhere in and around eastern cities, growing even on walls where
but little soil is found. It was a plant with a great many stalks, so
that it would hold the blood and act as a sort of brush. Indeed, its
only excellence was its power to hold the blood.

Now, faith is a very simple thing, and it is the act not of refined and
educated minds, only, but of the poorest and simplest. The efficacy of
the hyssop did not lie in what the hyssop was, but in its being put
into the basin to drink up the blood. My poor faith is just as common
as a bit of hyssop pulled up from the wall, but then I lay it to soak
in the Atonement, while I muse upon who Jesus was, and what He
suffered, and for what purpose, till it is wet, saturated, and all
crimsoned with the vital blood.

The hyssop was an insignificant item in the whole business, it is only
mentioned once, the second time the sprinkling is commanded it is not
mentioned at all. And, so, after all, faith is but the humble
instrument of salvation–the blood is the main matter–it is the life,
the shelter, the token, the everything! Let your trembling faith lay to
soak in the precious blood and then say, "I believe You, Jesus, and I
tell the world I believe You. Sinner as I am, Your precious blood was
shed for me and I trust in You alone."

Thus you crimson the lintel and the door posts! Let all men know that
whatever you may have been, and whatever you are now, you do now
believe in the substitutionary death of Jesus, oppose who you may.
Witness, you men and angels and devils, that Jesus' blood is our sole
hope! He who thus believes is saved. Brother, go your way, and leap for
joy! No man ever perished who from his heart rested in the atoning
blood. God bless you. Amen.

PORTION OF SCRIPTURE READ BEFORE SERMON–Exodus 12:1-15; 21-30. HYMNS
FROM "OUR OWN HYMN BOOK"–152, 280, 404.