(6) And Moses said.--As the people now stood assembled in the court and around it, Moses explained to them the import of the ritual which they were about to witness in the presence of the Lord.
9:1-21 These many sacrifices, which were all done away by the death of Christ, teach us that our best services need washing in his blood, and that the guilt of our best sacrifices needs to be done away by one more pure and more noble than they. Let us be thankful that we have such a High Priest. The priests had not a day's respite from service allowed. God's spiritual priests have constant work, which the duty of every day requires; they that would give up their account with joy, must redeem time. The glory of God appeared in the sight of the people, and owned what they had done. We are not now to expect such appearances, but God draws nigh to those who draw nigh to him, and the offerings of faith are acceptable to him; though the sacrifices being spiritual, the tokens of the acceptance are spiritual likewise. When Aaron had done all that was to be done about the sacrifices, he lifted up his hands towards the people, and blessed them. Aaron could but crave a blessing, God alone can command it.
This is the thing which the Lord commanded that ye should do,.... Namely, what they had done, bring the creatures and things for sacrifice they had:
and the glory of the Lord shall appear unto you; either Christ, the brightness of his Father's glory, in an human form, as a presage of his future incarnation, as he frequently did; or some more than ordinary refulgence of glory breaking out of the holy of holies, where God had now taken up his dwelling between the cherubim; or, as Aben Ezra explains it, the fire that should go out from him, and consume the sacrifice, which would be a demonstration of his presence with them, and of his acceptance of the sacrifice.
and the glory of the Lord shall appear unto you; either Christ, the brightness of his Father's glory, in an human form, as a presage of his future incarnation, as he frequently did; or some more than ordinary refulgence of glory breaking out of the holy of holies, where God had now taken up his dwelling between the cherubim; or, as Aben Ezra explains it, the fire that should go out from him, and consume the sacrifice, which would be a demonstration of his presence with them, and of his acceptance of the sacrifice.