Ourselves as lights.
There can be no doubt that the seven-branched candlestick in the holy place was typical of the Hebrew Church as the source of heavenly light. We therefore reach the subject of—
I. LIGHT DIVINELY KINDLED. All light must be of God, who himself is light (1 John 1:5). He has sought to illumine the human world in more ways than one.
1. He has given us the light of our spiritual nature—our reason, our conscience; "the spirit of man is the candle (lamp) of the Lord" (Proverbs 20:27).
2. This should have sufficed to us, but it did not; and God gave the revelation of himself in his Law. Amid the surrounding darkness there was light in Israel. The brightly burning lamp in the holy place represented the holy nation, the instructed people, with whom were the oracles of God, into whose minds the truth of heaven was shining.
3. Yet this did not suffice, and God gave the Light of the world, his only begotten Son. "That was the true light which, coming into the world, enlighteneth every one."
4. And he came that he might leave in the world the light of the Christian Church; those to whom and of whom he could say, "We are the light of the world." "As he was, so are we in this world," sources of heavenly illumination, of inward purity, of Divine wisdom.
II. ITS TRUE CHARACTERISTICS. These are:
1. Purity: they were to bring "pure oil olive beaten." The light which is to shine in our words and from our character is to be such that there shall be the least possible admixture of error and corruption.
2. Fullness: we read of "the lamps" (plural), and we know that there were seven of these (Exodus 25:31, Exodus 25:32)—a complete, perfect number. The truth we are to make manifest is not only to be pure, but full. We must declare the "whole counsel of God;" the severe as well as the gracious, the less pleasant as well as the more acceptable, the deeper as well as the more superficial, the ethical as well as the doctrinal, aspects of the truth of God.
3. Constancy: they were "to cause the lamps to burn continually" (Leviticus 24:2), "from the evening unto the morning before the Lord continually" (Leviticus 24:3). Whether all day and all night long, or only (as seems more probable) through the night, the lamps were to burn all the appointed time without ceasing to shine; there was to be no fitfulness or unsteadiness about the light which shone "before the Lord." So our words and our deeds are to be continually reflecting the light of heavenly truth. In our work and in our play, in things sacred and in things secular, at home and from home, consciously and unconsciously, we are to be "bearing witness unto the truth," we are to be "shining as lights in the world."
III. ITS MAINTENANCE. "Aaron shall order it." "He shall order the lamps." The Jewish priest was to take every care that the lamps burnt brightly and continually.
1. The Christian minister has to see that he does his part in "ordering the lamps." He must preach such truth and give such counsel as shall feed the fires of the soul most effectively.
2. Each Christian man must do his part also. Every one of us must
" … to his glory burn
With inextinguishable blaze."