We have here the provision for defilement by sin, the principle of death in the desert, by death accomplished-long since applied by the power of the Holy Ghost.
This chapter is the restoration of worship. And so it is as to the Spirit, it is not forgiveness as acceptance, but a needed process in which the soul, and defilement on it, is brought sensibly connected with Christ's death by the power of the Spirit to be able first to worship, and then to serve.
It is well to take first the offering in itself in connection with Jehovah and then its application.
In the case of the red heifer the Lord speaks to Moses and Aaron; several are so. Moses receives what is necessary for God as such-the law between Him and man. When Aaron comes in, i.e., is addressed by God as in already, of course it refers to God, but it is priestly service, where we have to say to God. The red heifer was both. Intercourse with God refers to His holy nature (1 John 1)-compare Josh. 5:1515And the captain of the Lord's host said unto Joshua, Loose thy shoe from off thy foot; for the place whereon thou standest is holy. And Joshua did so. (Joshua 5:15), and the bush-as much as reconciliation, but still this is supposed in it. Here the blood was where the people met God, the efficacy of the great day of atonement is supposed, the individual is restored. Where he meets God, the perfect and abiding efficacy of the blood always is. It is purely a sinoffering all burnt without the camp. There was no imputation, the ashes proved that all that was settled long ago, but the man could not come to the tabernacle, though the blood was there. His communion and worship were interrupted; the sense of the sin, according to the death of Christ, was brought upon Him by the Spirit and Word. Hence the address was to Moses and Aaron; it was necessary according to what God was, but it was also restoration to one who was defiled, the atonement being a settled thing. It was not a simply priestly service. Then it would have been " the priest shall take," etc. Moses and Aaron give the heifer to Eleazar, he represented Aaron, but Aaron received the command, to give it its true and full character. The sprinkling with the water was by any clean person, not a priestly act, but none but a priest could take the blood. It refers to the wilderness, our path here, hence does not go within the veil, though, as burnt outside the camp, having all the efficacy of that which did, based itself on it, only applied to the journeying state, to man with God, not abstractedly to God in His nature. It is the High Priest, but as such, in atonement, he must for the full character of it go within the veil, but that is not the point here. It is a high priestly service, but refers to the administrative restoration in our walk here. Hence we have Eleazar to represent Aaron, but Aaron receives the command; it is not, or only as restoring relation with it as far as the people could go, sanctuary work. That was Aaron's part, separate from sinners, made higher than the heavens. It is high-priestly, but not the High Priest's proper place. That meets the eye of God, and represents the people and is perfect once for all. The command to Moses and Aaron meets this, but the work itself, while based on a perfect sin-offering is journeying restoration, based on what is perfect, but applied administratively to restore the man's cleanness, in order to come.
We have to consider here the analogy of our walk down here under the government of God, and Israel's place. Peter's epistle connects these two. Query, does Israel, in the millennium even, go further? I suppose not. His place then does rest on Christ having carried the blood within, but his relationship is at the door; they had in the fullest way touched death in crucifying Christ, even if it were atoned for.
The red heifer gives us a wonderful picture of God's estimate of sin in respect not of judgment but of holiness and any defilement. Its starting point and basis is the blood sprinkled seven times where the people met God, but showed that that had been wholly settled. Further the great day of atonement is supposed; there the blood was within the veil, so that God had been perfectly glorified as to sin, and the sins also put away. All that was a settled point, and for the approach of the people the basis laid in the seven times sprinkled blood; the question of personal state and defilement hindering communion remained, and to this the ashes of the red heifer applied. What I here note is, how in this respect, defilement and communion, the least defilement is intolerable to God. Every one that touched was unclean, the priest, the man that gathered the ashes, that sprinkled the water, all that was exposed in the house, the man that touched. Then I have the measure of uncleanness, the death of Christ, the Spirit and the Word, for the water is the Word in the power of the Spirit; the ashes were there, proof that sin as such before God, imputable guilt, was all consumed in the death of Christ, but it was measured by that in the heart. It was God's measurement, the true one of it, the Word discerns the thoughts and intents of the heart, as the eye of God—whatever is not of the life of Christ in us grieves the Holy Spirit.
We know, by the ashes, that the sin was all consumed and put away, and that enables us to estimate it as a question of holiness and our state. Thus the death of Christ, sin against His holy grace, the Spirit and the Word, are the measure of sin to the heart, but as we learn first its evil, we learn grace is above the evil and communion is restored—we judge ourselves, not having to be judged for it, and then return into deeper sense of the sunshine of God's favor.
But there is more; the glory of the world, all nature was cast into the burning of the heifer, and, when the water is applied to our souls, all this is gone and we are simply with the sole state of the soul in question with God. There is a natural life in which we live from day to day, even where rightly; here the soul is alone, such as it is, with God, according to what He is—revealed in the Cross, by the Spirit and the Word—and nothing else there. This makes it an absolute searching out, at least as to all that is then in question, as to its then state. We are manifested to God, and there is nothing to veil it, or interrupt the direct revelation of God to the soul, alone itself with God, naked and open to the eyes of Him with whom we have to do. It is wonderful how there we are in the inner world, and not in the vain show of the fashion of this world which passes away.
Note, the Levites were not washed but only sprinkled. The only other case of the use of the word is the red heifer and Ezekiel from niddah (separation) chapter 36. Perhaps it is because it is only service as offered in life, and not dying and renewal or new nature and life in order to be oneself with God, and that before Himself in heavenly places. The priests were washed.