lling the Scriptures; and those who both
saw what they had done and knew the Scriptures recognised the Divine
finger pointing out Jesus as the Sent of God.

The first of these texts is generally supposed[4] to be taken from the
account in Exodus of the institution of the Passover, and originally it
refers to the paschal lamb, which was to be eaten whole, the breaking
of its bones being forbidden. St. John's idea is that Christ was to be
the paschal lamb of the New Dispensation, and that therefore Providence
took care that nothing should be done to destroy His resemblance to the
type, as would have happened if His bones had been broken. The
Passover was the great event of the year in all the generations of
Jewish history. It was intended to carry the minds of God's people
back to the wonderful scenes of divine grace and power in which their
existence as a nation had begun, when God liberated them from their
bondage and led them out of Egypt with a mighty hand. The centre of
the solemnity was the slaying and eating of the paschal lamb. This
reminded them of how in Egypt the blood of this lamb, sprinkled on the
lintels and doorposts of their huts, saved them from the visit of the
destroying angel, who was passing through the land; and how, at the
same time, the flesh of the lamb was eaten by the people, with their
loins girt and staves in their hands, and supplied them with strength
for their adventurous journey. Thus through all ages it impressed on
them two things--that the sins of the past required to be expiated, and
that strength had to be obtained from above for the new stage of their
history on which at the annual Passover they might be supposed to be
entering. In the same way, in the New Dispensation, are our minds ever
to revert to the marvellous revelation of the grace and saving power of
God in which Christianity originated; and in the very midst is the Lamb
slain, who is both the expiation of the sins that are past and the
strength requisite for the conflict and the pilgrimage. "If we walk in
the light, as He is in the light, we have fellowship one with another,
and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanseth us from all sin."

The other words of prophecy which appeared to St. John to be fulfilled
on this occasion were, "They shall look on Him whom they pierced."
They are from a passage in Zechariah, which is so remarkable that it
may be quoted in full--"And I will pour out on the house of David and
up