DAY 39

SETTING THE STAGE

Leviticus 4 & 5 and Matthew 24:29-51

Day 39, or are you thinking you are in the second day of your own wilderness experience, Day 2 of Leviticus! I am going to try and help and my prayer is that you will see that there are some principles in this Book of the Bible, that, while we no longer practice sacrifice, those principles are very real with respect to humanity and God; and that those principles are fulfilled by the person of Jesus Christ

Leviticus has five types of offerings. We learned about three yesterday, and we are reading about the other two today. Today we read of the sin offering and the guilt offering.

Rather than get bogged down with all the details (I actually made a table of each offering, who got what portion, etc. and it didn’t help me) I think it helps me more to think about what each sacrifice was all about. Specifically “why five, and what is each one for?”

After we learn about these types of offerings, then through the reminder of the book, among other things, we will learn when each type is to be offered.

I am going to summarize all five here, and then move on to Matthew 24:

I have to keep reminding myself that God gave the book of Leviticus to a people he already made a Covenant with. They are not trying to have God choose them – He already did! All of Leviticus is about God making them a holy nation and a royal priesthood.

I realize we read about the first three yesterday, but I am going to begin with summarizing them here in the order they are presented because the logic might flow better.

Burnt Offering is about our sinful nature and God's pleasure in accepting anyone who comes to Him. It required coming to Him in obedience to His prescribed sacrifice. There is a very basic point here, two actually. First we sin, we cannot be perfect (not new news, read Genesis 3). Second, and this is huge, God welcomes people who have the courage to admit they are not perfect – the fancy religious word is – sinner. We need to have the courage to admit it, and come to God as He prescribes.

Grain Offering is a joyful (oil) prayer (incense) of thanks to God. It was a gift to God from the best of the worshipper’s agricultural produce in an act of thanksgiving for sins forgiven. I am about to give you a bit of an advance, but I want this to make sense. In Leviticus 23 (I know that is days from now) you will read of a drink offering – it is not a new or sixth offering. It is a “variation in the theme of grain offering. Specifically the drink offering (or “libation”) was poured on top of the grain offering as a symbol of joy (Leviticus 23:13 and cf. Exodus 29:40-41).

As described yesterday the Peace Offering celebrated the sense of well being enjoyed by the worshipers as a result of the forgiveness their sins accompanied by the acceptance of the Lord, and the dedication of their life to him.

Similar to the Grain Offering there are variations in theme that we find ahead in Leviticus that it makes sense to talk about now. There were three primary peace offerings:

a. Thanksgiving Offering – a freewill offering given as an act of thanksgiving to God when He blessed someone without their asking for it. Only in this instance could an imperfect animal be offered (Lev 7:12-15).

b. Wave offering – the priest’s portion of the peace offering was waved before the Lord as a special act signifying that it was His (Leviticus 7:30-31).

c. Votive Offering – a freewill offering given because of a vow taken, or in relation to a favor, or a simple voluntary act of worship (Leviticus 7:16-17).

This brings us to the new offering and final two we read of today.

The Sin Offering might better be thought of as a “purification offering.” It dealt with two issues: the necessity of forgiveness from actual individual sins, even if unintentional. This compares to the Burnt Offering which is offered for our general sinful nature. The Sin Offering also provides for cleansing from ceremonial uncleanness.  

The last offering listed is referred to as the Guilt Offering. It is really about making reparations. Each sin has consequences. We sin against God and our neighbor. The guilt offering caused the individual to look beyond the sin to the damage it caused.  The person not only sought forgiveness, but first he or she also paid full restitution, adding to the price an additional percentage.

In many ways these first five chapter help get the stage set. Chapter six is going to finish up some details on the Guilt Offering, and Chapter seven is going to provide more specifics on the other offerings, but in many ways the stage is set.

The question you might ask yourself is, “Do we need offerings for these five areas of who we are?” That is really the question. The “How” we will read more about, but it revolves around what we a have read.

I did not comment on Matthew’s Gospel today. I will have a chance in the future. In many ways Jesus has Set the Stage, His Stage for the ultimate sacrifice.

The offerings in Leviticus had their ultimate fulfillment in Jesus Christ, there is no need for them today (Hebrews 10:1-18). In fact, after Jesus' sacrificed His life on the cross and rose again, the temple was destroyed in AD 70. No sacrifices have been made there since.