A CUSTOM that prevailed among the Israelites in the wilderness; “The bodies of those beasts,” etc. The apostle writes as though the camp and this custom still existed. The camp, however, was gone, but the custom remained with this difference only, that the temple was now substituted for the tabernacle and the city for the camp. It was a custom of Divine appointment. The Lord, in framing a law for the Jews, regarded the whole nation as sinners. Besides, therefore, the offerings to be made by individuals for their own sins, various sacrifices were ordained for the sins of the nation, and among these, one of unusual solemnity. It was to be offered once in every year, and on a certain day of the year, called from this circumstance the day of atonement.
II. AN EVENT which took place at Jerusalem, closely resembling it; “Wherefore Jesus also,” &c. Notice three points of resemblance between our Lord and the animals burnt on the day of atonement.
1. They did not die a natural death; their blood was shed before they were carried forth. And our Lord also “ suffered”; His precious blood, too, was poured forth.
2. He suffered in the same place in which these animals were destroyed. They were slain, indeed, in the camp, but they were burned outside of it. So our Lord” suffered without the gate.” “They led Him out to crucify Him,” out of their city, to the very spot probably where, after the people were settled in Jerusalem, the bodies of those beasts which had so long prefigured Him were consumed.
3. He suffered for the same end. The blood of these animals was shed that it might be taken “into the sanctuary by the high priest for sin,” as a propitiation for sin; their bodies were burned as a testimony of the Divine indignation against sin. When these two ceremonies had been gone through God is said to have been reconciled to His people, the whole camp was considered as purged from its transgressions. And what was the end for which our Lord suffered? It was that His people, His spiritual Israel, might have sin removed from them.
III. AN EXHORTATION grounded on the event mentioned. “Let us go forth,” &c. We must again imagine ourselves in the desert. Around us are spread the tents of Israel. The men dwelling in them are all worshipping the Lord in one way--as their fathers worshipped Him, looking for His mercy through rites and ceremonies and bleeding victims. The Lord Jesus appears amongst them; tells them He is sent of God to abolish these rites and ceremonies, to become Himself once for all a victim for them, and calls upon them in consequence to turn from their shadowy rites and long accustomed sacrifices to Him. Instead of this, they cast Him forth out of their camp and crucify Him. We are to conceive of Him, therefore, as even now hanging in shame and suffering on a Cross beyond the gate, and then comes this apostle saying to us among our tents, “Let us not linger here. Let us go forth unto Him without the camp, bearing His reproach.”
1. It is clear, then, that He calls on us, first, to forsake the religion of our fellow-men, a religion, it may be, that either is or once was our own. The Jew in the desert could not go forth to a bleeding Jesus without turning his back on the Jewish worship, and giving up all his long-cherished Jewish hopes. He must abandon the sanctuary and ordinances with which all his religious feelings have been long associated, and around which he beholds his countrymen still gathering. A painful sacrifice. And it is the same now. Many of us have a religion that the gospel calls on us to renounce. It is made up of opinions and feelings and hopes which are as much opposed to the gospel of Jesus Christ as the religion of any Jew ever was. We may have cherished it long, even from our childhood. The world around us may respect and commend it; it is natural it should do so--it is the world’s own religion; the world taught it us. But no matter who commends it or how highly we may have valued it, we must let it go; or rather we must turn our backs on it, we must cast it away, before we and the Cross of Christ can ever meet.
2. And with the religion of the world, we must forsake also to a considerable extent the men of the world.
3. Then, connected with this forsaking of the world, there must be an actual coming, the apostle says, to Christ our Lord. Observe, he does not simply bid the Israelites leave the camp, as though his only object was to get them away from their old religion and companions, he directs them all to one spot; he bids them leave the camp for one purpose, that they may go to Him who is suffering for them without the gate. So we are not to go forth only, we are to go forth unto Christ. It will profit us nothing to give us the empty religion of the world, if when we let that go, we get no other. Superstition for scepticism is a poor exchange. And it will profit us as little to forsake the world, if we stand still when we have forsaken it. The going forth, the apostle enjoins, is not going into cells and hermitages, nor is it roaming this desert world in a proud, dreary solitariness. It is a going forth unto Jesus. It is exchanging the religion of the world for the religion of His Cross; it is giving up that which cannot elevate, comfort, or save us, for that which can. And then it is leaving the world for the world’s Master; it is suffering the loss of all things that we may win Christ; it is the forsaking of a world which is not worthy even of us, that we may be--what? outcasts? No; but “fellow-citizens with the saints and of the household of God”; sharers now of higher riches and pleasures than the earth can give, and heirs of a world that is worthy, if any world can be, of the God who made it. (C. Bradley, M. A.)
Let us go forth therefore unto Him
Exhortation to decision and earnestness in religion:
I. A GENERAL VIEW OF THE ADMONITION IN THE TEXT.
1. The conduct which he intended to prescribe to the Christian converts to whom he wrote was evidently this--namely, that they should openly profess their faith in Jesus, who had been cast out as accursed, notwithstanding the reproach to which such a profession would expose them; and should publicly adhere to His worship and service in the sight of their unbelieving and reviling countrymen.
2. What does the apostle here exhort us to do? He doubtless exhorts us to make Christ crucified our only hope; to confess Him before men, and by our open and consistent attachment to His cause, His people and His ordinances, to show that we indeed belong to Him.
II. SOME PARTICULARS WHICH A COMPLIANCE WITH THIS ADMONITION INVOLVES.
1. That we renounce all other grounds of satisfaction for sin, and of acceptance with God, but those which the Cross of Jesus Christ provides.
2. That we separate ourselves from the world. Especially
(1) From its corrupt practices and principles; and
(2) From its religion--the resemblance of godliness without the power thereof.
3. That we are prepared to take up the cross and encounter reproach for Christ’s sake.
III. THE MOTIVES BY WHICH THE ADMONITION IS ENFORCED.
1. Our situation in this world is one of extreme uncertainty. “Here we have no continuing city.”
2. Besides “ we seek one to come.” This is our profession as Christians. We profess that we are seeking “a city which hath foundations”; a “house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.” But unless we go forth unto Christ, all such profession is vain. (E. Cooper, M. A.)
Let us go forth
I. We have, first of all, THE BELIEVER’S PATH. “Let us go forth without the camp.” The Divine command is not, “Let us stop in the camp and try to reform it--things are not anywhere quite perfect, let us therefore stop and make matters right”; but the Christian’s watch cry is, “Let us go forth.” To this day the Christian’s place is not to tarry in the camp of worldly conformity, hoping, “Perhaps I may aid they movement for reform”: it is not the believer’s duty to conform to the world and to the world’s ways, and say, “Perhaps by so doing I may gain a foothold, and men’s hearts may be the more ready to receive the truth.” No, from the first to the last day of the Church of God, the place of witness is not inside, but outside the camp; and the true position of the Christian is to go forth without the camp, bearing Christ’s reproach. What is meant by this “ going forth without the camp”?
1. I understand it to mean that every Christian is to go forth by an open profession of his faith. You that love the Lord are to say so. You must come out and avow yourselves on His side. You may be Christians and make no profession, but I cannot be sure of that, nor can any other man.
2. This done, the Christian is to be separate from the world as to his company. He must buy, and sell, and trade, like other men in the world, but yet he is not to find his bosom friends in it.
3. The follower of Jesus goes without the camp as to his pleasures. He is not without his joys nor his recreations either; but he does not seek them where the wicked find them. If thou hast no separation from the world, as to thy pleasures, since thy heart is generally in thy pleasures, thy heart therefore is with the wicked, and with them shall thy doom be when God comes to judge mankind.
4. Furthermore, the true follower of Christ is divided from the world as to his maxims; he does not subscribe to the laws which rule most men in their families and their business. Men generally say, “Every one for himself, and
God for us all.” “Look not every man on his own things, but every man also on the things of others,” is the Christian’s rule.
5. Once more--and here is a very difficult part of the Christian’s course--the Christian is to come out not only from the world’s pleasures, andsins, and irreligion, but there are times when the true followers of Christ must come out from the world’s religion as well as irreligion.
II. But now, secondly, we have in the text, THE CHRISTIAN’S LEADER. It does not say, “Let us go forth without the camp” merely, but, “Let us go forth therefore unto Him.”
1. It means, let us have fellowship with Him. He was despised; He had no credit for charity; He was mocked in the streets; He was hissed at; He was hounded from among society. Expect not to wear the crown where Christ carried the Cross; but, for fellowship’s sake, follow Him.
2. Again, if I am to follow Him, I am to follow His example. What Christ did, that I am to do.
3. I am to go forth unto Him: that is, I am to go forth to His truth. Wherever I see His truth, I am to espouse it: wherever I see error, I am to denounce it without hesitation.
4. And then I am to go forth to Christ’s witness-bearing. The present age does not believe in witness-bearing, but the whole Bible is full of it. The duty of every Christian is to bear witness for the truth.
III. Now, in the third place, we have THE CHRISTIAN’S BURDEN. He is to bear the Lord’s reproach. I knew you may live without it if you will fawn and cringe, and keep back part of the price; but do not this, it is unworthy of your manhood, much more is it unworthy of your Christianity. For God and for Christ be so holy and so truthful that you compel the world to give its best acknowledgment of your goodness by railing at you--it can do no more, it will do no less. Be content to take this shame, for there is no heaven for you if you will not--no crown without the cross, no jewels without the mire. You must stand in the pillory if you would sit in glory; and if you reject the one you reject the Other.
IV. THE CHRISTIAN’S REASON FOR BEARING HIS REPROACH, AND GOING WITHOUT THE CAMP. It is in the text, “Let us go forth therefore”--there is the reason. Why then?
1. First, because Jesus did. Jesus Christ came into the world pure and holy, and His life and His testimony were a witness against sin. Jesus Christ would not conform. He stands out like a lone mount of light, separate from the chain of dark mountains; and so must the Christian. Christ was separate; and so must you be. Christ was pure, holy, truthful; so must you be. I pray you either renounce your profession, or else seek grace to carry it out.
2. Moreover, the connection of the text tells us that Christ set apart His people by going without the camp. That He might sanctify His people, He suffered without the camp. The Head is not of the world, and shall the members be of it?
3. Again, Christ would have His people separate for their own sanctification. You cannot grow in grace to any high degree while you are conformed to the world. The path of separation may be a path of sorrow, but it is the path of safety. The martyrs tell us in their diaries that they were never so happy as when they were in the dungeon alone with Christ for company; nay, their best days were often their days of burning: they called them their wedding-days, and went to heaven singing and chanting the triumphal paean, as they mounted in their chariots of fire.
4. Thus we shall hope to win the crown if we are enabled by Divine grace faithfully to follow Christ in all respects. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
Going forth to Christ
1. Let us go forth unto Christ without the camp, that we may testify to Him as the Messiah, the only Saviour. This is manifestly the first leading idea which our text is designed to convey. On this fundamental doctrine of our holy faith hinges the essential difference between Christianity and Judaism. It constitutes also one vital point of difference between the gospel and the various systems of heathenism and infidelity. All the sections of the unbelieving world agree in this, that they do not acknowledge Christ as the promised Messiah. “Unto you who believe He is precious.” Attachment to the person of Christ can only spring from a Divine principle. “No man can truly call Him Lord, but by the Holy Ghost.” I beg of you, therefore, distinctly to understand, that I do not expect you will be prepared to lift up a consistent testimony to His Messiahship, unless you are the subjects of a saving change. “The carnal mind is enmity against God, and is not subject to His law, neither indeed can be.”
2. Let us go forth unto Jesus without the camp, that we may specially bear testimony to Him as King of Zion. This is what may be emphatically called our present duty. We might justly regard it as treason against the Lord of Glory, were we to overlook this view of our subject. We dare not hold our peace regarding the sovereign authority of the Redeemer, although some prejudiced souls should be offended.
3. We must go forth unto our Lord without the camp if we would enjoy fellowship and communion with Him. This idea is naturally suggested by the preceding context, “We have an altar whereof they have no right to eat which serve the tabernacle.” The importance of this consideration should ever be borne in mind. It argues a very diseased state of things on the part of any professing Christian, when the question with him is--How far he may go in the path of error and corruption, and still enjoy communion with the “author and finisher of our faith.” And it certainly is a sign of daring impiety when individuals, be they ministers or hearers, are exercising their ingenuity in devising reasons for palliating soul-destroying errors, and when they have the effrontery to tax us with want of charity when we endeavour to vindicate the doctrine of spiritual fellowship, and call upon the Christian people to abandon the communion of a Church that has practically renounced the King of saints.
4. In obeying this command we must lay our account with contempt, reproach, and persecution. It is the dictate of experience, as well as of Scripture, that “all who will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution.” The mere circumstance of coming out from the world lying in wickedness, and of faithfully serving the Captain of our salvation, has never failed to bring upon them the scorn and hatred of the ungodly. The votaries of superstition cannot bear to see the truth as it is in Jesus openly proclaimed and honoured. Men of despotic principles will not tolerate, if they can help it, a spiritual authority which stands in the way of their usurpations. And false professors of the gospel, whose interests are linked with corruption and tyranny, will be among the foremost to vilify such as for conscience’ sake withdraw from their communion. Where do we find, among men, a brighter example of piety, and holiness, and philanthropy, than that of the apostle of the Gentiles? and who ever experienced greater reproach or more bitter persecution than he? When we look higher we see that our Lord Himself “was despised and rejected of men, a Man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief.” Why should we dream of exemption from trials? The offence of the Cross has not ceased. But we must not be deterred from following Christ by the dread of obloquy, or the loss of all things. (John Thomson.)
The renouncing spirit of Christianity
I. ALL PRIVILEGES AND ADVANTAGES WHATEVER ARE TO BE FOREGONE, PARTED WITHAL, AND RENOUNCED WHICH ARE INCONSISTENT WITH AN INTEREST IN CHRIST, and a participation of Him; as our apostle shows at Php_3:4-10).
II. That if it were the duty of the Hebrews to forsake these ways of worship, which were originally of Divine institution, that they might wholly give up themselves unto Christ in all things pertaining unto God, MUCH MORE IS IT OURS TO FOREGO ALL SUCH PRETENCES UNTO RELIGIOUS WORSHIP AS ARE OF HUMAN INVENTION.
III. Whereas the camp contained not only ecclesiastical but also political privileges, WE OUGHT TO BE READY TO FOREGO ALL CIVIL ACCOMMODATIONS ALSO IN HOUSES, LANDS, POSSESSIONS, CONVERSE WITH MEN OF THE SAME NATION, WHEN WE ARE CALLED THERE UNTO ON THE ACCOUNT OF CHRIST AND THE GOSPEL.
IV. If we will go forth unto Christ as without the camp, or separated from all the concern of this world, WE SHALL ASSUREDLY MEET WITH ALL SORTS OF REPROACHES.
V. THAT BELIEVERS ARE NOT LIKE TO MEET WITH ANY SUCH ENCOURAGING ENTERTAINMENT IN THIS WORLD AS TO MAKE THEM UNREADY OR UNWILLING TO DESERT IT, and to go forth after Christ bearing His reproach. For it is a motive in the apostle’s reasoning to a readiness for that duty, “we have here no continuing city.”
VI. THIS WORLD NEVER DID, NOR EVER WILL, GIVE A STATE OF REST AND SATISFACTION TO BELIEVERS. It will not afford them a city. It is Jerusalem above that is the “vision of peace.” Arise and depart, this is not your rest.
VII. IN THE DESTITUTION OF A PRESENT SATISFACTORY REST, GOD HATH NOT LEFT BELIEVERS WITHOUT A PROSPECT OF THAT WHICH SHALL AFFORD THEM REST AND SATISFACTION TO ETERNITY. We have not, but we seek.
VIII. As God hath prepared a city of rest for us, so IT IS OUR DUTY CONTINUALLY TO ENDEAVOUR THE ATTAINMENT OF IT IN THE WAYS OF HIS APPOINTMENT.
IX. THE MAIN BUSINESS OF BELIEVERS IN THIS WORLD IS DILIGENTLY TO SEEK AFTER THE CITY OF GOD, or the attainment of eternal rest with Him; and this is the character whereby they may be known. (John Owen, D. D.)
Coming forth to Christ
I. WE MUST COME FORTH OF THE CAMP OR CITY TO HIM.
1. The camp or city is Judaism, and all erroneous sects, and also the world, and men of the world: we must separate from all things inconsistent with the truth and Christ.
2. Out of this camp or city we must come forth, and that we do when we renounce all errors in religion and all earthly affections. We have something in our hearts which keeps us from our God till we be truly converted.
3. To come forth to Christ, therefore, is to be rightly informed, and to believe the saving truth of Christ; and upon this right information, to love Him above all, as far more necessary, excellent, and beneficial than anything, than all things else. To come forth to Him is not to change the place but our hearts; it is a motion not of the body, but the soul, and if we once knew the beauty of Christ, and had tasted of His sweetness, we should be ravished with Him, and all the world could not keep us from Him. In Him alone true happiness is to be found.
II. The second part of the duty is TO BEAR HIS REPROACH. Here is reproach, His reproach, the bearing of His reproach. In this the author alludes unto the bearing of the cross, which was the greatest shame any man could be put unto. To endure disgrace, and suffer in our reputation, credit, hot, our, and good name, is a very grievous evil, and few can endure it, and some can better suffer death than ignominy. The Cross was not only a matter of reproach, but of grievous pain, and was the epitome of all possible evils; and, therefore, by reproach is signified all kinds of afflictions which we may suffer from men, or may be obnoxious unto in this life. Yet this reproach and this cross here meant must be His reproach, His Cross. If we suffer punishment for our own crimes, and through our own folly, then it is not Christ’s cross. This is a reproach and cross laid upon us for His sake, because we profess His truth, obey His laws, oppose sin and His enemies, refuse to comply with the world in any sin, renounce all errors, idolatry, superstition, and wicked customs of the world, and all this out of love to Christ. To bear this cross is not merely to suffer any ways, but to suffer the worst man can do unto us with patience, with constancy, with joy, and to think ourselves happy and much honoured that we are counted worthy to suffer for so great a Saviour, and in so noble a cause. This requires a Divine faith well grounded upon the word and promises of God, and a special assistance of the Divine Spirit; for these will strengthen our hearts, and make us willing to suffer anything before we offend our God and lose our Saviour. (G. Lawson.)
Bearing His reproach
Christ’s reproach
It is called Christ’s reproach in sundry respects: as
1. The union that is betwixt Him and His Church. So as the reproach of the body or of any member thereof is the reproach of Christ Himself.
2. The sympathy which is betwixt Christ and every of His members. He is sensible of that reproach which is cast upon any of them (Act_9:4).
3. The account which Christ hath of the reproaches of His saints; He doth account them as reproaches cast upon Himself.
4. His undertaking to revenge such reproaches and wrongs as are done to His members (Rom_12:19).
5. The cause of the reproach which is here meant, and that is Christ Himself, a profession of His name, a maintaining of His gospel, and holding close to His righteousness. In this sense an apostle calleth sufferings in such cases Christ’s sufferings (1Pe_4:14; Act_5:41).
6. That resemblance that is betwixt the reproaches of saints and Christ.
This reference of reproach to Christ in this phrase, “His reproach “ is for limitation, direction, consolation, and incitation.
1. It affordeth a limitation, in that it restraineth it to a different kind of reproach, which is Christ’s reproach. It is not every kind of reproach that can be counted a matter of glory, wherein a man may rejoice; but Christ’s reproach. I may in this case say of reproach, as the apostle doth of buffeting: “What glory is it, if when ye be reproached for your faults, ye shall take it patiently?” (1Pe_2:20).
2. It affordeth a direction in showing how we ought to bear reproach, even as Christ did; for we are in this case to look unto Jesus, who despised the Heb_12:2).
3. It ministereth much comfort, in that no other thing is done to us than what is done to our Head before us. Herewith doth Christ comfort His disciples (Mat_10:25; Joh_15:20).
4. What greater motive can we have to incite us willingly and contentedly to bear reproach than this, that it is Christ’s reproach? If honour, if profit may be motives to incite us to a duty, these motives are not wanting in this case. What can be more honourable than to be as Christ was? and if we be reproached with Him here, we shall enjoy with Him hereafter a crown of glory; what more honourable? what more profitable? (W. Gouge.)
Reproach incurred by Christians:
The following are the chief grounds on which the first Christians were called to bear reproach, and on which we also may be called to bear the same.
1. They suffered reproach, as being followers of a crucified Saviour.
2. A second ground of the reproach suffered by the first Christians was that they forsook the ways of an evil world.
3. Christians are reproached by many on account of their general seriousness and spirituality of character.
4. Lastly: those who adopt any peculiar mode of religious observance have been at times exposed to ridicule on that account. (R. Hall, M. A.)
Bearing Christ’s reproach
Sheriff--was the child of a Christian mother. He had lived to be over sixty years of age without openly confessing Christ. Some time ago he “became interested in his spiritual welfare, and after attending some meetings in the city where he lived, he arose and openly acknowledged his intention to be a Christian. The positiveness of his expression, and his prominence in the community, caused a reporter to insert an item in the next morning’s paper that the sheriff had been converted. When he went into the court-house in the performance of his duties, he was saluted by one of a throng of godless men with the remark, “Well, sheriff, we hear you are going to leave us.”
“Leave you?” said he. “What do you mean?” “Why, we heard,” said the man, “that you were going to leave the world, the flesh, and the devil.” The sheriff hesitated only an instant, and said, with great emphasis, “That’s just what I’m going to do.” One of the men then said, “How do you like its being printed in the paper that you have been converted?” He said, “Was that in the paper? I think that is grand. I wish that they’d print placards about it and put them up all over the city, so that people might know about it at once, that I mean henceforth to be a Christian man.” It is needless to say that from that time he was a devoted and faithful follower of Christ.
Prizing the Cross:
Tacitus reports that though the amber ring among the Romans was of no value, yet, after the emperor began to wear it, it began to be in great esteem: it was the only fashion amongst them. So our Saviour has borne the Cross, and was borne upon it. Once a disgrace, even, it comes to be a boast to the true believer. We should esteem it more highly than many of us do, and bear it daily in remembrance of Him. (E. P.Thwing.)
