Jesus, our Brother, our Saviour, has paid our debt, borne our blame, and won for all who love Him a home and an inheritance in heaven. The Lord then said to Moses, "I am the God of thy father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob." Now, before we try to consider what was meant by the burning bush, we must notice what is said about it in the New Testament. The Lord Jesus Christ, who was the best Explainer of Scripture, was speaking one day to the Jews about the resurrection, or rising of the body from the dead, which many of His hearers didn't bebelieve; but the Lord shewed them that they ought to believe it, because Moses taught it at the burning bush, "when he calleth the Lord the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. For He is not a God of the dead, but of the living: for all live unto Him," Luke xx. 37, 38. The Jews were confounded when they heard that, for they professed to believe everything that Moses wrote. We see that Moses himself learnt at the bush, that the body was to be raised, by the Lord calling Himself the God of Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob; not of their spirits only, but of the men themselves, both body and spirit. The spirits of those holy men are living in paradise all this time; and their bodies shall be raised from the dust by and by, when body and spirit shall be joined together, and they shall be Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob again, and shall sit down in the

kingdom of God. Notice again, that the Lord Jesus sometimes says such a thing was spoken by Moses, and sometimes that it was the word of God. That shews us what He, who knew all truth, thought about the books of Moses: that they were nothing less than the word of God Himself. Hold fast to the whole Bible, my brethren, for it is from beginning to end, the truth of the living God.

The time has now come for the children of Israel to be redeemed out of the land of their bondage, and Moses, in the hand of God, is to be their deliverer. You remember that the books of Genesis and Exodus, and all the Old Testament histories, are like so many pictures to teach us about the work that the Lord Jesus Christ was to do. The whole Bible tells us of Him. The creation of the world shews us the way in which God's people are created anew: for as the world was made perfect, and beautiful, and good, out of what was dark, and shapeless, and confused, by the mighty power of God's Spirit; so children of the evil one, lost in sin and ignorance, are made children of God, and become holy and loving by degrees, instead of cold, and hard, and desperately wicked as they were by nature; and that is the work of the same mighty Spirit of God that made the world. So now the redemption of the children of Israel out of the land of their cruel bondage, by the hand of Moses, is made to shew beforehand, how the children of

men were to be redeemed from the worse bondage of sin and death, by the Son of God Himself coming to stand in their place, and suffer and die instead of them. Moses had to be taught how this was to be, and he learned it by the burning bush. Do you notice that it was to a shepherd feeding his flock in the desert, that this great picture of the Redeemer of the world was shewn ; and when He, who shewed His good will to men by appearing in the bush, was born an Infant into our world, the first men who heard the joyful news were humble shepherds watching their flocks in the plains of Bethlehem, when the midnight-sky was lighted up with the brightness of heaven, and angels raised the hymn of praise, "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will towards men!"

That great sight that Moses turned aside to see, a bush burning with fire, but not consumed, blazing in the flames, yet not burnt, was a type or figure of the Lord Jesus Christ in His Person, and in His enduring sufferings; but into that we cannot enter now. In His Person, our Redeemer had two natures, the nature of God and the nature of man. The nature of God was shewn to Moses by the flaming fire, which was a sign of the Presence of God; and the nature of man was shewn by the bush, which is an earthly thing springing out of the ground. The Lord Jesus Christ is often called in the Bible, a Branch, a

Plant, a Root springing out of the dry ground, Isa. liii. 2; and these words always mean that He took our very nature, and was born on this earth a human being just like us, excepting that He had no sin. Now listen, brethren. Any other bush than the one Moses saw, would have been burnt to ashes in the fierce flames in a few minutes; any other human creature than the Man Christ Jesus, would have perished instantly by the awful brightness of God's Presence in him, for no mere man can see God and live; but Jesus was God as well as man, He was the brightness of the Father's glory,' Heb. i. 3, and that brightness did not hurt His human nature. He needed to be both God and Man, in order that He might be a perfect Saviour. If Jesus had been only God, He could not have suffered and died at all-if He had been only Man, His suffering and death would not have been enough to save us; but He was both God and Man, and so was able to do and bear all that God's holiness required, and all that man's guilt and misery needed, at the same time. My brethren, you cannot understand how this can be, and I cannot help you; but we can well believe it, because it is God's truth; and it will be our happiness in heaven to praise Him for having given us such a Saviour. Let us seek to know and love. the Lord Jesus more and more, for He was the dearest Gift that our Father's love could find to give us.

C

There are many lessons to learn from the burning bush, but we will only speak of one thing more about it. As it blazed in the flames and was not burnt, it is a picture of God's people, as well as of their Saviour. In Egypt, the children of Israel were in the fire, as we may say; every pain was taken to hurt and destroy them, but the more fiercely the flames of wrath and cruelty raged around them, the more they multiplied and grew. And God's church, His believing people, have been often and often exposed to fiery trials in all ages of the world-they have been wasted by fire and sword, the blood of His saints has been poured out like water, but the church has never been destroyed, because He who was in the burning bush, takes care of His own. He says to each of His suffering ones, "When thou walkest through the fire, thou shalt not be burnt; neither shall the flame kindle upon thee. For I am the Lord thy God, the Holy One of Israel, thy Saviour," Isa. xliii. 2, 3.

Moses was terrified at the sight of the bush burning with fire, and "he hid his face, for he was afraid to look upon God." Sinful men must always be afraid of God's Presence; you remember how Adam, after he sinned, was frightened when he heard God's voice, and hid himself behind the trees in the garden of Eden; and how Jacob was afraid when he saw God in his dream at Bethel. We cannot help being afraid of meeting God,