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Recap: Last week, in reading through Leviticus 11-15, we found lists of clean and unclean animals, the ways priests determined who did and who did not have leprosy (and other infectious skin diseases), the effect of having been diagnosed with leprosy, cleansing after healing from leprosy, and the effects of bodily discharges on ceremonial fitness. We discovered that God commands his people to live up to their covenant promise to become a "kingdom of priests and a holy nation," (Ex. 19:6), and "I am the Lord your God. You must be holy because I am holy. . . I, the Lord, am the one who brought you up from the land of Egypt to be your God. You must therefore be holy because I am holy." (Lev. 11:44-45). God's purpose in all the sacrifices, the food laws, the clean and unclean distinctions, is to emphasize the need to be holy - distinct, separate, set apart for God's use.
The Day of Atonement: The 16th chapter of Leviticus shows in detail how grievous sin is to God and the lengths to which he goes to provide his children a way to atone for sin. Sin separates us from God; we saw that with leprosy. Sin puts us out of fellowship with God. Each day, the Israelites had an opportunity to atone for sin by bringing a sin offering and a guilt offering to the Tabernacle where the priest would shed the animals' blood as a substitute for the individual's blood. But once a year, God commanded a day of atonement for the entire nation - the sins of the community at large. The regulations for that day are in Lev. 16.
Leviticus 16: This is a most important chapter because not only do we see the means of atonement on Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, but we see typified the work of Jesus Christ who was our sin offering. This Day of Atonement is the one day of the year when the high priest entered the Holy of Holies where God's presence hovered over the Mercy Seat, the top of the Ark of the Covenant. This day, which is on the 10th of Tishri (Sept/Oct.) comes 10 days after Rosh Hoshana. It was to be a time of solemn fasting and of doing no work; it was a Sabbath of Sabbaths: distinct from all other Sabbath days - a day of rest and contemplation of sin and forgiveness. It is an intense chapter, and points repeatedly to what Jesus did for us on the cross. Significantly, it is observed now without the sacrifices and scapegoat, but taken very seriously by observant Jews.
Outline of Leviticus 16: The Day of Atonement instructions have six parts:
Lev. 16:1-3: Prologue
Lev. 16:4-5: Preparation
Lev. 16:5-19: Sacrifices to atone for Aaron's sins and for the people's sins
Lev. 16:20-22: The release of the scapegoat
Lev. 16:23: Further instruction
Lev. 16:34: Epilogue
In each of these sections, we see the high priest, Aaron at work, following God's instructions. We also see the blood offerings, the blood of bulls and goats, sprinkled and offered to God. But we see a most interesting ritual: the scapegoat. This is the only time in the Bible it is mentioned. The goat is the bearer of sins and is taken out into the wilderness, away from the community, and released. It's a clear demonstration of what occurs when people sin and are cut off from the community; it's also an illustration of Jesus taking our sins on himself. "God made him who knew no sin to be sin for us that we might become the righteousness of God." (2 Cor. 5:21) , and by whose blood we are redeemed. In 1 Peter 1:18-19 we read "For you know that it was not with perishable things such as silver or gold that you were redeemed from the empty way of life handed down to you from your forefathers, but with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or defect." Therefore, Christ's death and resurrection did away with the need for all the sacrifices including Yom Kippur. We have only to accept God's gift and claim the redemption Christ's blood provided.
When Aaron lays aside his garments of glory, we also see Jesus. In Phil 2, Paul tells us that Jesus "who being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant." Jesus laid aside his heavenly glory to take on himself a human body, a body which felt pain, which felt emotions, which grew and changed from babyhood to adulthood, who knew temptation but who didn't yield to temptation. It is in his human body that Jesus suffers the death on the cross.
Atonement in the Old Testament vs. New Testament: In the OT, atoning sacrifices covered sin, and had to be repeated each time a person sinned. In the NT, Jesus blood takes away sin. John the Baptist tells us this in John 1:29: "Look, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world." And in 1 John 1:9, the apostle John tells us "If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us, [cleanse us, take away] all our sin." Hebrews tells us that the OT system demanded repeated sacrifices, and "those sacrifices are an annual reminder of sins because it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goals to take away sins. . . . [but] we have been made holy through the sacrifice of the body of Jesus Christ once for all. . . . And where these have been forgiven, there is no longer any sacrifice for sin." (Heb. 10: 3-5, 10, 18). Jesus gave himself once and for all and now he's at the right hand of the father interceding for us. We have been forgiven by God's grace-and by our acceptance of Jesus sacrifice, and it is cause for rejoicing.
Leviticus 17: Now after the Day of Atonement, and its institution as an annual and solemn occasion, God returns to his directions for day to day living. And in ch. 17, we read regulations for two areas of concern: the first is that sacrifices are to be offered ONLY in the sacred place God has made holy by his presence-The Tabernacle (later the Temple). No Israelite was to offer sacrifices in his own tent, on a high hill, or wherever else he chose. God tells Moses that "the people must no longer be unfaithful to the Lord by offering sacrifices to evil spirits out in the fields," by which we see that they had been doing this. God says not to. Then in the second portion of the chapter, God tells them to be very careful about blood. "It is the life of any creature," and of the 5 great sacrifices, 4 are blood sacrifices, the blood drained and sprinkled on the altar signifies that the life of the animal is substituted for the person to atone for sin. This blood is thereby made holy. And to dishonor the blood by eating or drinking it as pagan nations did was to profane it, make it unholy and dishonor God.
Leviticus 18: this chapter concerns sexual transgressions, abominations to God because of the behavior of pagan nations who would be displaced by the Israelites in Canaan. God tells them to demonstrate their faithfulness to him, to "be holy as I am holy," by keeping sex inside marriage between a man and a woman. Period. There was to be no incest, no bestiality in Israel as there was in Egypt and Canaan. God detested this and was punishing the people of Canaan for their acts against him by giving their land to his own chosen people. In Lev. 18:17-30, God summarizes his commands by saying "be careful to obey my laws and do not practice any of these detestable activities Do not defile yourselves by doing any of them, for I, the Lord, am your God."
Leviticus 19: Now we come to a variety of social regulations reiterating and expanding the laws given in Exodus 20-24. For example, God reminds them not to slander, not to worship other gods or idols, not to steal or cheat. Others are added such as the law against mediums and psychics, or satanic practices. And God also tells them not to trim their hair or beards in ways that would mimic other nations. And at the summary of this chapter, in v. 37 "You must be careful to obey all my laws and regulations, for I am the Lord."
An interesting feature of Lev. 19 is forbidding fields to be completely harvested (vv. 9-10). In this way, God provided for the poor, and we see this in Ruth. Ruth "gleaned" remaining grain in Boaz's fields, a practice that God ordered to be a way of harvesting for Israel before they even entered the Promised Land.
Leviticus 20: Punishments are now prescribed for detestable acts such as worshiping Molech, a bronze idol popular with the Canaanites, to which infants were sacrificed. God says never to do this. But as early as Solomon (1 Kings 11:5), David's son, the third king of Israel who came to the throne in 970 B.C., Molech worship was introduced (just 500 years after this command was given). And for many other sins, punishments are listed in ch. 20, which ends with another statement that "I the Lord, am your God who has set you apart from all other peoples." God is serious about this and he repeats this as a drum beat, emphasizing that HIS people, those he chose to descend from Abraham as a unique, covenant people, are to be different from other nations. They are HIS and they are holy.
We'll conclude Lev. 20-27 next week, and then on Dec. 15, we'll look at Hebrews in more depth than we have in the passing references I've made as we've studied Leviticus. And I'll preview our study of Matthew which I tentatively have set to begin Jan. 12, the second Monday of January, and we'll finish in seven weeks, ending just before the beginning of Lent on Feb. 25.
Let's close in prayer.
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