SERMON VI.

THE SACRIFICE OF A BROKEN AND

A CONTRITE HEART.

PSALM LI. 16---19.

For thou desirest not sacrifice; else would I give it thou delightest not in burnt-offering.

The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit: a broken and a contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise.

Do good in thy good pleasure unto Zion: build thou the walls of Jerusalem.

Then shalt thou be pleased with the sacrifices of righteousness, with offering and whole burntoffering: then shall they offer bullocks upon thine altar.

IN our last Discourse we left the Psalmist expressing an anxious desire to set forth the

praises of God, as the God of his salvation, that his lips being opened by a sense of his pardoning mercy, his tongue might be loosened to sing aloud of his righteousness. In these concluding verses, he declares his readiness to give unto him any sacrifice that he might require; and shows what is the sacrifice most acceptable in his sight. Then he offers up a fervent prayer for the prosperity of Zion, and closes the whole by anticipating the joy which he should experience, on seeing the loving kindness and good pleasure of God displayed, in accepting the offerings of his faithful servants.

If your patience has not been altogether exhausted by our former discussions on this Psalm, I must further intreat your indulgence while we examine the interesting topics contained in these last four verses.

Verse 16. For thou desirest not sacrifice; else would I give it thou delightest not in burnt offering.

No sacrifices were appointed under the law of Moses for the heinous sins of adultery and murder; yet the Royal Penitent expresseth his willingness to present any sacrifice to God which he should require, in order that he might

again be made a partaker of his favour and blessing. In David's case, God did not require any sacrifice at his hands, as an equivalent for the crimes which he had lately committed; for what compensation could be made to the injured Majesty of heaven for his great transgressions? These were heinous in themselves, and were rendered still more heinous by the elevated rank and peculiar circumstances of the King of Israel. In one sense, God, had desired sacrifices, as expressive of repentance, and as typical means of atonement; "If any soul sin through ignorance," he saith, "then shall he bring a she goat of the first year for a sin-offering." And sacrifices were also required in many cases of infirmity and inadvertence. "But the soul that doeth ought presumptuously," he saith, "whether he be born in the land, or a stranger, the same reproacheth the Lord; and that soul shall be cut off from among his people. Because he hath despised the word of the Lord, and hath broken his commandment, that soul shall be utterly cut off; his iniquity shall be upon him."

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God had never delighted in sacrifices and burnt offerings on their own account; he had never required and enjoined them as an equivaa Num. xv. 27.. b Num. xv. 30, 31.

lent for moral duties: for, in this view, Samuel the Prophet saith; "Hath the Lord as great delight in burnt-offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams. For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft, and stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry."

But if God did not desire animal sacrifices, nor delight in burnt offerings, it might be asked, why then were so many sacrifices and peculiar offerings expressly appointed under the Law of Moses? Besides other reasons that have been alleged for those continual offerings, the most satisfactory one is this, which is now clearly developed by the Gospel of Christ, that those legal ceremonies and costly sacrifices were intended to prefigure and represent the prevailing and efficacious sacrifice of the great Messiah, which He in the fulness of time should offer unto God for the sins of the world. God delighted in them as typical emblems of that important transaction, by which the means of salvation should be provided for all penitent believers. They were evidently designed to keep up an expectation of something that was to come, although their spiritual import was e 1 Sam. xv. 22, 23.

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not clearly expressed; and they were the means grace, and proofs of the faith and obedience of all true Israelites. But when they were abused to purposes of superstition; when the worshippers relied upon them, as efficacious in themselves, while they were careless and inattentive to the great principles of religion inculcated by the law; then God declared that they were no longer acceptable in his sight; nay, he sometimes expressed his abhorrence of them; "To what purpose is the multitude of your sacrifices unto me, saith the Lord," by his Prophet Isaiah; "I am full of the burnt offerings of rams, and the fat of fed beasts; and I delight not in the blood of bullocks, or of lambs or of he-goats." And in the Fiftieth Psalm he

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says, "I will not reprove thee for thy sacrifices or thy burnt offerings which are continually before me.---I know all the fowls of the mountains and the wild beasts of the field are mine."

We cannot indeed imagine that a God of infinite mercy and compassion could delight in animal sacrifices, or in burnt-offerings. The burnt-offering, under the Jewish dispensation, was one of the most important and solemn kinds of sacrifice. The person who brought the