"A BELL AND A POMEGRANATE."

The work of salvation from sin, wrought in the heart by the Holy Spirit, is represented all through the Scriptures as having the twofold or twin result of confession and fruit. The term confession, in its widest sense, embraces those contents of the heart which are expressed in speech or language; the term fruit, in its broad sense, includes those contents of the heart which are expressed in graces, tempers, tones, manners and actions. The twin results of grace — confession and fruit — are both intensified in the sanctifying baptism of the Holy Spirit.

This is strongly and beautifully set before us in the Old and New Testaments.

Paul teaches us that the high priest, entering the Holy of Holies, was a figure to represent the believer entering into heart-perfection. See Heb. ix. 7, 8, 9. We are told of the garniture which the priest was to wear when he entered the "second vail," every part of which has its reality in advanced spiritual life. Upon this robe of righteousness there was to hang the bell of confession and the pomegranate of fruit in alternate succession.

"And upon the hem of the high priest's robe thou shalt make pomegranates of blue, and purple, and scarlet round about the hem thereof; and bells of gold between them round about. A golden bell and a pomegranate, upon the hem of the robe round about. And it shall be upon Aaron to minister: and his sound shall be heard when he goeth in unto the holy place before the Lord, and -when he cometh out, that he die not." Ex. xxviii. 33—35.

What sound more sure and sweet than that of a golden bell? What seed in the vegetable world so fruitful as the pomegranate?

Not all fruit, nor all sound, but they were equal; the confession equal to the living experience, and the life equal to the confession; only the sound of the bell comes first, and next the fruit, for sound is instantaneous — fruit is not. The ringing witness of the cleansing Spirit within, must precede the bearing of fruit; hence the people might hear the sound of the bell under the "second vail" before they saw the scarlet fruit emerging from the holy place. How emphatic, concise and awful the language: "The sound of his bells shall be heard, that he die not." This was the figure of a reality still existing. A dumb Christian is a dead Christian; a soundless Church is a spiritless Church; a voiceless holiness is a vanished holiness. If the high priest did not ring the bells, he would not live long enough to come forth and show the pomegranates. If the cleansing blood is not confessed, the holy experience will not live long enough to show its fruit.

We find a similar lesson of the twin product of profession and fruit recorded in Deut. xxvi. 1-4.

When they reached Canaan— the type of perfect love — they must collect the first-fruit in a basket, and say to the priest: "I profess this day unto the Lord, that I am come unto the country which the Lord sware to give us." After this profession of being in Canaan had been given, then he was to give the basket of the fruit of Canaan over to the priest. The profession of perfect love is to be followed by extending to others a basket of its fruit.

In order to demonstrate that I am not fancy- painting as to this interpretation of the "bell and the pomegranate," and that I am not "handling the word of God deceitfully," we have only to turn to the infallible comment of the inspired Paul on this matter in Heb. x. 19- 24. He has told the converted Hebrews in the previous chapter, that entering the "second vail of the tabernacle " was a figure of the Holy Ghost to represent perfection." (See Heb. ix. 7. 8. 9. ) He teaches them in chapter x. 14, 15, that God is able to "perfect, or purify, forever them that are sanctified," and assures them in the next verse, that the "Holy Ghost witnesses to this" work. Having finished his luminous logic, he begins in verse 19 to apply it, urging his converted "brethren" (not unregenerate sinners) to press, like the old high priest, into the "second vail," the holiest, by the blood of Jesus, through the rent vail of Christ's torn flesh into the sanctuary of Christ's inner heart-life; the condition of entering was a true heart and fullness of faith, that is, perfect sincerity and perfect trust, having by this means their hearts sprinkled from the evil conscience, i. e., hearts cleansed from depravity. After he had led them "into the second vail of holiness," under the cleansing and witnessing touch of the Shekinah-Spirit, he writes the following words, exactly confirmatory of the "bell and pomegranate" quotation from Deuteronomy: "Let us (who have thus entered) hold fast the profession of our faith without wavering, and let us consider one another to provoke unto love and good works." Here the firm, clear, unwavering, profession of faith- is the sounding of the golden bell, that his experience die not before the Lord; and the activity of love and good works is the holy lustre of the richly-hued and prolific pomegranate round about. And still it is the witness first, and fruit next. In the life of our adorable High Priest, we see confirmation of this argument. When he entered from the holy place of private life, into the most holy of official redemption, girded as He was with the invisible robes of High Priestly glory, "He drew near to His baptism, with a true heart," in the perfection of faith, having no need to be leansed from a depraved conscience, but having His body washed with pure water, immediately the Shekinah Spirit came upon Him, and the golden bell of Divine testimony was sounded forth. Matt. iii. 16, 17. But following the golden testimony in the Jordan, came the purple and scarlet pomegranate of holy fruit in the wilderness temptation. Matt. iv. 1. And what was His entire life but an alternate succession of a golden speech, and then a variegated miracle, a Divine confession followed by a prolific act of love, so that His entire life was a seamless robe of prophetic and priestly service, about the hem of which hung a bell and a pomegranate round about.

It is highly probable that there were twelve bells and twelve pomegranates around the priest's robes, one for each tribal name oh his breast plate, which gives one of each to every hour in the day (John xi.9), as well as for every month in the year; for Canaan was cut into twelve species of property; there were twelve tongues to sound forth the report of Canaan; the tree of life is to bear new fruit every month. Ezk. xlvii. 12; Rev. xxii. 2.