1206. The Bread Prepared for Food

The Bread Prepared for Food

"Bread corn is bruised; because he will not ever be threshing it, nor break it with the wheel of his cart, nor bruise it with his horsemen" (Isa_28:28).

When we speak of the bread, we should not fail to remember that the bread must pass through certain stage's before it is prepared for eating. When we have duly considered these stages, we will the more appreciate the bread itself.

1. There is the planting of the seed. "Except the grain of wheat fall in the ground and die, it abideth alone." Jesus Christ upon Calvary's Cross fulfills this type completely. However, the first step in Christ's crucifixion is seen in His becoming flesh. He was planted among the peoples of this earth. He took the form of a servant.

2. There is the growing of the grain. Jesus Christ grew up, "before Him as a tender plant, as a root out of dry ground." He grew "in stature and in wisdom."

3. There is the harvesting of the wheat. This, in type, would refer to the time when our Lord was cut off from among men. He was crucified in the fullness of time.

4. There is the bruising of the ripened grain. Isaiah says: "Bread corn is bruised."

Some of us love the old-fashioned way of grinding the wheat. It was ground out between two millstones. In Isa_47:2 we read, "Take the millstones, and grind meal." The millstones were two, the "upper and the nether."

The upper millstone stands for the part that God played in the crucifixion. Jesus Christ was delivered by the determinate council and foreknowledge of God. It was God Who made His soul "an offering for sin;" it was God Who "made Him sin for us."

The nether stone stands for the part man played in the crucifixion. It was man, who, with wicked hands took the Saviour and crucified Him; it was man who despised, and rejected Him.

In discussing this, we must not forget the One Who was bruised. We must think of Him Who was "wounded for our transgressions and bruised for our iniquities." We must see laid upon Him, "the chastisement of our peace."

"O it bows down the heart,

And the tear drops will start,

When in mem'ry that gray hill I see;

For 'twas there on its side,

Jesus suffered and died,

To redeem a poor sinner like me."

5. There is the baking of the bread. In Exodus 12, we read of the flesh of the Passover lamb–it was to be roasted with fire, and, any part of the flesh that remained until the morning, was to be burned with fire.

The baking or the roasting with fire, brings before us the judgment of God against His only begotten Son. When we remember how the Father hid His face, how the billows of the wrath of God passed over the dying Saviour, as He died a substitutionary death, we are assured that the sinner who rejects the Cross, will find God to be a consuming fire. To him God says: "Vengeance is Mine; I will repay, saith the Lord."

Autor: R.E. NEIGHBOUR