
THE heart of Moses was full of that great, wonderful new word, Atonement. For  many days God had been telling him about it, and speaking it over and over to  his heart. He seemed, however, to feel that no ordinary sacrifices would avail:  the blood of goats and bulls would surely be insufficient to put away the black  transgression into which Israel had fallen. But there was rising in his heart a  resolve, to which he gave expression when he returned to God: "Blot me, I pray  thee, out of the book which Thou hast written." He did not realize that his  blood would not avail, but that the blood of Christ, who should, in the fullness  of times, offer Himself without spot to God, alone could put away sin.
In  every heart there is a deep conviction of the necessity of an Atonement. - This  is the source of the temples, altars, and sacrifices, which have marked the  history of every nation under heaven. Man has felt as by a natural instinct that  some reparation was necessary to the broken law.
The insufficiency of  animal sacrifice. - In the Levitical system there was a remembrance of sin made  year by year; but the sin itself could not be purged by such rites. The fact  that the worshippers so constantly came back to offer their sacrifices shows  that they were not assured. The priests always stood- their attitude was an  emblem of an unfinished work.
The sufficiency of Christ's Atonement. - He  was willing to be cut off out of the land of the living for the transgression of  His people; and because He died, there is no longer the " - " which in Moses'  prayer speaks of uncertainty; but a blessed assurance that we are at one with  God, with each other, and with all holy beings.