Putting the Hand upon the Head of the Sacrifice (sermon 1771)

This is a deliberately simple sermon. Spurgeon sets out to answer the prayer of the boy who asked, "Lord, grant that our minister may say something to-morrow that I may understand." Some might not have turned to Leviticus in order to answer that prayer, but Spurgeon does so in order to "deal with the essence and soul of true religion." Taking an image that recurs in Leviticus, he speaks here primarily of the attitude of the one who makes the burnt offering, involving confession, acceptance, transference, identification. That vocabulary might not be the simplest, but the explanation of each is plain and pressing, driving at the penal substitutionary atonement (to use a similarly dense phrase!) which lies at the heart of our acceptance with God. Of interest may be the fact that the sermon for the following week (number 1772) he takes the same text and deals with the death of the sacrifice, so that out of one brief verse he unpacks the core of our salvation, as it is accomplished by Christ and the cross and appropriated by the faith of the repenting sinner.