biblestudy: Offerings (Part Six)


John W. Ritenbaugh
Given 14-Mar-87; Sermon #BS-OF06; 87 minutes

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The peace offering shows that keeping God's commandments leads to satisfaction and fellowship between God, the priest, and the worshipper. The sin and trespass offerings are different from the sweet savor offerings because they deal with sin, which is not pleasing to God. The sin offering was for sins in general, while the trespass offering was for specific acts of sin. The sin offering dealt with our evil nature, while the trespass offering dealt with the fruits of that nature. Even though the animal sacrifices were perfect, they could not fully atone for human sin. Only Christ's sacrifice was sufficient. When Christ became a sin offering, He was rejected and cast out of God's presence. This allows our sins to be forgiven since we are judged in Christ. Our ongoing fellowship with God depends on the continuous application of Christ's sacrifice. Seeing more sin in ourselves should make us appreciate Christ's sacrifice and long for God's Kingdom. The trespass offering shows God's grace in forgiving sins and giving gifts to sinners. We should extend similar grace to others.




We will try to pick up where we were two weeks ago when we left off in the peace offering with just a very brief review of that.

Remember that one of the metaphors that the offerings teach us is of us sitting down, having a meal; that the Temple/Tabernacle is God's house, the altar is His table, and the offering is the food.

In the peace offering, the effect is to be satisfied and to have a sense of well-being. So in this, God shows a progression. He shows in the burnt offering that He is satisfied. And so He is the one that consumes the entire meal. In the meal offering, part of the offering went on the altar and another part of it went to the priest. And so we see those two personages, then, satisfied by the offering.

Then in the peace offering, the last one of the sweet savor offerings to God, God got His portion, the priest got his portion, and also then the offeror got his portion. So God, the priest, and the man are all satisfied, all are in communion together, fellowshipping, eating a meal with one another.

We find here that what this pictures to us is that from this, that is, the keeping of the commandments of God portrayed by the burnt offering, the commandments that relate directly to God, and the meal offering which portrays the keeping of the commandments by a person in devotion to God but in behalf of man, we find that the effect, the consequence of that is peace. All are satisfied, all are in communion and fellowship with one another, eating a common meal.

You recall that Jesus said to His disciples in John 14:27, "Peace I leave with you, My peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you." But rather He was giving the peace of God. In practical application we find that peace comes from two different sources. On the one hand, the source is from God directly and that is what Jesus was speaking of there. Peace, My peace I give to you. This is not something that we earn. It is something that is freely given of God.

Now here in Ephesians 1, verses 5 and 6, it states,

Ephesians 1:5-6 Having predestined us to adoption as sons by Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the good pleasure of His will, to the praise of the glory of His grace, by which He has made us accepted in the Beloved.

But here, brethren, is how peace comes. This is how God gives peace. He has made us know, understand, to be deeply appreciative of the fact that we are in the Beloved. Now by Beloved, he may mean the church of God, the body of Jesus Christ. He may also mean, and I am sure he does, that we are in that inner circle of friends, in fellowship with Him, sitting down, having a meal together, communicating with one another, fellowship and enjoying life together. It is something that He gives because there is a sense of well being that comes from knowing, understanding, these things.

The second place that peace comes from is shown through the other two offerings. That is, our part in keeping the commands of God—devotion to God in the burnt offering, devotion to God in behalf of man in the meal offering. And so a certain amount of peace can be produced by the keeping of the commandments. This is shown in I John 3. Now these are not the only places that is shown, but I think that these show it clearly enough.

I John 3:19 And by this we know [and know here means by experience] that we are of the truth, and shall assure our hearts before Him.

It is this principle of assurance that I am talking about. When a person is assured, he has a sense of well being. He feels well. He feels comfortable. He feels secure.

I John 3:19-21 By this we know [by experience] that we are of the truth, and shall assure our hearts before Him. For if our heart condemns us, God is greater than our heart, and knows all things. Beloved, if our heart does not condemn us, we have confidence before God.

A person who is living in doubt, who is fearful that God is going to crash down on Him at any moment, that person does not have peace. He lives in fear. He is concerned that at any moment his sins are going to find him out. But a person who is striving to keep God's commands, he knows that he is doing the best that he can, with all of his might he is trying to do the right thing, his heart is assured.

I John 3:22 And whatever we ask we receive of Him, because we keep His commandments and do those things that are pleasing in His sight.

We find peace is produced by the keeping of the commandments of God. So we see it coming from two different areas. One, being what God gives by grace. It is one of the gifts that He gives to us. And two, us being led, guided, obeying God as a result of being led and guided by His Spirit.

Now from here, we are going to go directly on to the sin offering and we are going to immediately begin to notice some very striking differences between the sweet savor offerings and the sin offerings.

First of all, there are several things that are added. Things that did not appear in the sweet savor offerings do appear in the sin offering, the trespass offering. And second, in something that is missing. Now, the factors that are added involve sin. There is no sin seen in the burnt offering and the meal offering and the peace offering. They were not offered for sin, they were offered for acceptance, but not for sin. And so we see God satisfied as a result of the devotion of the worshipper.

Now it is good here to remember always that Christ is the object of the offerings. And He is the one who is the offeror, He is the offering, and He is the priest—all three in one in this metaphor that is being given to us. And so we see God pleased by the offering of the offeror, Christ offering Himself. So He is accepted because God is satisfied.

The factor that is subtracted is that these offerings are not a sweet savor to God. They are not pleasing to Him. He takes no pleasure in them even though He accepts them.

In the sin offerings, sin is shown to be abominable, to be exceedingly hateful and evil before God. And yet, even though it is described by every terrible, despicable adverb or adjective that we could come up with, it is still nonetheless met and covered for by the sacrifice.

Let us turn to Leviticus 9. We are going to begin in a period of time just shortly after the giving of the instructions regarding the offerings. We will begin in verse 10, actually, we are going to go back to verse 1 because I want to set the stage here a little bit.

Leviticus 9:1 It came to pass on the eighth day that Moses called Aaron and his sons and the elders of Israel.

What is taking place here is the ordination of the priests into their office, the installation service. And so it is technically the very first offerings that are going to be made by the priesthood. Now, this is instructive because surely they made the offerings in the right order the first time they did it, because there was Moses, having received the instructions from God. He gave them to Aaron and Aaron and the priests then carried them out. They carried them out in a very interesting progression. Was the burnt offering made first? Was the meal offering made first? Was the peace offering, the sin offering, or the trespass offering made first? Which one came first in order of application.?

Another question: Which one comes first in order of listing in the Bible? Well, that one you ought to be able to answer pretty easily. Were they put on the altar in exactly the same progression that they are given in the Bible? Does it make any difference which order that they are done in? Yes, it does make a difference. It makes a difference to you and me, it made a difference to God. And so we find them listed in the Bible in two different orders.

The teaching order is what is given in Leviticus 1, 2, and 3. Seemingly what God wants us to learn first of all is about the burnt offering, then the meal offering, then the peace offering, then the sin offering, and then the trespass offering. But we find an order of application, when they actually did the ritual, that is not the way they were done. The sin offering was made first. Why? Let us look at it verse 2.

Leviticus 9:2-4 And he said to Aaron, "Take for yourself a young bull as a sin offering and a ram as a burnt offering, without blemish, and offer them before the Lord. [Right there you begin to notice a difference. He mentions the sin offering first.] And to the children of Israel you shall speak, 'Take a kid of the goats as a sin offering, and a calf and a lamb, both of the first year, without blemish, as a burnt offering, also a bull and a ram as a peace offering.'

There they are listed sin offering, burnt offering, peace offering, right in that order. Now, we can understand from Leviticus 2 that whenever a burnt offering was made, the sin offering always went with it, it was put right on top. So even though the meal offering is not mentioned here, you can be sure as anything that meal offering appeared right with the burnt offering.

Let us drop down to verse 8. Here, they are going to actually do it.

Leviticus 9:8-12 Aaron therefore went to the altar and killed the calf of the sin offering [See which one he killed first. It was the sin offering that came first.], which was for himself. And then the sons of Aaron brought the blood to him. And he dipped his finger in the blood, put it on the horns of the altar, and poured the blood at the base of the altar. But the fat, the kidneys, and the fatty lobe from the liver of the sin offering he burned on the altar, as the Lord had commanded Moses. The flesh and the hide he burned with fire outside the camp. And he killed the burnt offering. . .

You see, after the sin offering had already been completed, then came the burnt offering, the meal offering went right on top of it, and then came the peace offering. That is very clear.

Now, why are they listed in one direction in Leviticus and then in practical application, they are applied in a totally different progression altogether? The reason is this, this is one of the differences that are striking distinctions that immediately appears.

As they are listed in the book of Leviticus, beginning in chapter 1 with the burnt offering, chapter 2 with the meal offering, chapter 3 with the peace offering. Remember what these portrayed. Christ is the object of the offerings. What does the first one portray to you? The complete and total perfect devotion of Christ to God in the keeping of the first four commandments. What does the second one picture to you? It pictures to you the complete and total devotion of Jesus Christ to God in behalf of man. It pictures the keeping of the last six commandments. What is produced is peace between God and man.

But what we are seeing here is this that in order for Jesus Christ to become a perfect sin offering, He first had to live perfectly and that is what He did. He did not become a sin offering until He was 33½ years old, but it was preceded by 33½ years of sinless living, completely and totally perfectly devoted to God in the keeping of all ten commandments. That is what made Him a sin offering.

Now, why are they applied in the other direction? Because that is the way we approach God. We cannot approach God as a burnt offering. We cannot approach God as a sin offering because we have already sinned. We are imperfect. The only way that we can approach God is to have the way cleared by a sin offering that was made in our behalf. And so when we come to God, the sin offering has to precede. We cannot come to God on the basis of our works because they have been tarnished. They are full of sin. We have to come there on the basis of the work, of the life and sacrifice of Jesus Christ. After we get into God's presence, then we begin to be able to become a burnt offering and a meal offering because God is able to feed us by His Spirit, whereby the strength begins to come to change our heart and to yield to the Spirit of God in the keeping of the commandments of God, not just in their letter, but also in their spirit as well.

There is a secondary but also another important reason why they are applied in a different way than they are given in Leviticus. And that is, this is the way that our understanding of Christ and His sacrifice progresses. Having grown up in Protestant America, whether you are a Protestant or a Catholic, or an atheist or agnostic, or whatever you happen to be, you just kind of played at religion. Whatever you did, I would bet the very first thing that you can remember of any kind of intelligence about Jesus Christ is that He died for our sins. You know that He died for your sins long before you know or understand the perfection of His life. There is just no comparison.

And I will tell you in actual application in our life, even in coming into the church and being fed the truth of God through the booklets, the Bible, and whatever other means that God has made available through the church, you know very well that the very first thing that hits your mind is that you need to repent and you need to have a sacrifice for sin made for you. You and I do not even begin to appreciate what Christ did in the perfection of keeping the burnt offering and the meal offering until we begin to try it ourselves. Then it begins to dawn on us. Then we begin to understand what an awesome thing He did. Thirty-three and a half years of perfection! I do not know of anything in the world that can even begin to compare.

Something popped into my mind. Can you imagine, those of you who have played golf, that every time you drove the ball off, you hit a hole-in-one. Or every time you shot for the hoop it went through. Or every time you swung a bat at a baseball traveling 95 miles an hour, you hit a home run. That does not even begin to compare to the absolute perfection in everything that He did. We cannot even begin to appreciate that until we begin to become pretty mature because we have tried it ourselves.

So the order of application shows how we must come to view and understand, first the sin offering and then progressing to the perfection of the meal offering and the burnt offering. But the Bible presents it in the other direction because it wants to impress on our minds once we begin to understand, that in order for Christ to become a sin offering, He first had to be perfect. That makes you really able to appreciate what He did. Can you understand why Paul wrote in I Corinthians 11 about not discerning the Lord's Body? People going to take the Passover without appreciation for what He did because they have never tried it themselves. And they do not realize what an awesome thing it was to live for 33½ years without sin. There is not a word to describe it.

Also, one third thing that I might add here, and that is that the order of application shows to us also how our communion, our fellowship with God is established. We do not go to God on our own strength, we go with the sin offering preceding us. So we go into the Holy of Holies as a result of the veil being rent by the sacrifice of Jesus Christ. We did not rend the veil. That was not our work. Our works do not get us into His presence. But that is how contact with God is established and maintained. It is because, we are going to see also, that that communion is maintained by the continuous application of the sin offering.

Now, back to Leviticus the fourth chapter and we will read a number of verses before too much more comment.

Leviticus 4:3-4 'If the anointed priest sins, bringing guilt on the people, then let him offer to the Lord for his sin which he has sinned a young bullock without blemish as a sin offering. He shall bring the bull to the door of the tabernacle of meeting before the Lord, lay his hands on the bull's head, and kill the bull before the Lord.'

Leviticus 4:13-14 'Now if the whole congregation of Israel sins unintentionally, and the thing is hidden from the eyes of the assembly, and they have done something against any of the commandments of the Lord in anything which should not be done, and are guilty. . . . then the assembly shall offer a young bull [and it shall be killed before the Lord].'

Leviticus 4:22-23 'When a ruler has sinned and done something unintentionally against any of the commandments of the Lord his God in anything which should not be done, and is guilty, or if his sin which he has sinned comes to his knowledge, he shall bring his offering of a kid of the goats, a male without blemish. And he shall lay his hands on the head of the goat [and it is killed].'

Leviticus 4:27 'If anyone of the common people sin unintentionally by doing something against any of the commandments of the Lord in anything which ought not to be done, and is guilty. . .'

Leviticus 4:28 '. . . then he shall bring as his offering a kid of the goats, a female without blemish, for his sin which he has committed.'

I want to emphasize at this point that the offering was without blemish and even though it was without blemish, it was not a sweet savor. Now, this I am mentioning (we did not read it yet), but it was not a sweet savor to God. There is one third thing here that I want to mention because I think it is important to understanding as we go along, and that is that the purpose of the offering was different, even though you will find in both the sweet savor offerings and in the not-sweet savor offerings, something mentioned. That is, that they were offered for atonement.

I mentioned to you very early in the beginning of this series that sin is not seen at all in the first three offerings. There is no mention of sin. It is perfection that is being concentrated upon. And so the word atonement that appears there in the English is a little bit misleading because atonement always makes us think of sin. But sin is not involved in the first three offerings. If sin were involved, it would not be a sweet savor. When the offerings that are not a sweet savor appear sin is involved, and that is what makes them not a sweet savor to God.

Now, the word atonement as it appears for the burnt offering, the meal offering, and the peace offering, simply means that the offering is made for acceptance. And what it pictures is the devoted Israelite—Christ—worshipping God and it is accepted because of His devotion. Now, we understand that it was a perfect devotion, a perfect worship of God.

In the sin offerings, we have a different approach altogether. Here, atonement means what we normally understand it to mean, and it means that a covering, a payment, an expiation, a propitiation, has been made for sin. And so we find here the offering is charged, just like a person before the police would be charged with some kind of a law breaking. Here, we find the offering is charged with sin and being charged with sin it takes something to expiate that sin.

Now, expiate indicates the payment of a legal obligation to an authority, a payment that meets a legal obligation to an authority. Here, the payment is in blood, the authority is the law of God, or we might say God. The wages of sin is death and whenever a person sins, the law has power. You see, you are under the law when you sin, the law has power over you, the power to take your life. Now, in order to pay, in order to expiate, an atonement has to be made, a payment has to be made. And that payment is the life of the offeror.

In actual application, what they did then was this: the offeror brought the animal before the priest, he laid his hands on the head of that offering, and he was transferred, as it were, to the animal. The animal then died and the penalty was paid. As Paul said, we are dead to sin. So the sin offering shows a convicted sinner coming before God to receive judgment and the judgment is death. Although it was not a sweet savor, it had to be just as perfect as the burnt offering. I mean, the animal that was offered had to be just as perfect as the burnt offering and the meal offering.

Let us go back to the New Testament to I Peter 1 because it is good to think about this, especially good at this time of the year, to think about the perfection of the offering that has been made for us. Now, we are shifting away from the the animal offerings in Leviticus. They are always going to be there. We are shifting into the reality of the sacrifice of Jesus Christ.

I Peter 1:17-18 And if you call on the Father, who without partiality judges according to each one's work, conduct yourselves throughout the time of your stay here in fear, knowing that you are not redeemed. . .

Redeeming has to do with buying back something that has been taken away, either put in hock or, as Mr. Armstrong used, the metaphor of being kidnapped. We have been kidnapped by Satan and we have to be redeemed from him, bought back, and we are in hock over our heads because of sin.

I Peter 1:18-19 knowing that you are not redeemed with corruptible things, like silver or gold, from your aimless conduct received by tradition from your fathers, but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot.

I was beginning to mention before that it is well to begin to meditate on this, to meditate on His perfection. Because it was because He was sinless that our own imperfections can be paid for. Now. would the imperfection of an animal disqualify it from being burned on the altar? Well, the answer to that is, yes.

See if an animal had any kind of imperfection, inside or out, visible or invisible—if it had a leg that made it lame; if its skin was marred, blemished in some way, covered with scars; if the fur of the animal was on in kind of a ragged way so that it looked rather mangy; if it had an eye that was not fully functional, maybe it had run into a wall or something and one of the eyes was gouged out; maybe an ear had been torn by an animal; or if there was some kind of a disease inside the animal so that it had a cancer, a tumor, a growth on the inside could not be seen on the outside and it might have even looked reasonably healthy but the owner of the animal knew that on the inside that was one sick animal—I think that you understand that all of those things represent physical and spiritual imperfections that might possibly have been in Christ. And they are physical and spiritual imperfections that you and I have all through us, inside and out.

What it means in actual practice is that for 33½ years, Christ never once had even one single little moral or spiritual imperfection in His life! Never did He do anything that was unethical, immoral, or unspiritual. Always He was using the mind of God. Never once did He reveal any kind of carnality at all. Even if the thought of sin arose in Him, which it undoubtedly did because He had human nature, He quickly put it out of His mind. And so He was never desecrated in any way internally. He did not carry around any envy. There was not any bitterness, there was not a gall, there was nothing in Him that would in any way disqualify Him from being a sacrifice fit to pay the penalty for our sins.

It is just astounding that anybody could live that way for 33½ years! We have trouble getting through one day, but 33½ years is almost beyond belief. So He was not disqualified. And so you have to begin to understand that the sacrifice of Jesus Christ, which really, to me, was by far and away, the greater sacrifice was Him being a perfect burnt offering and meal offering for 33½ years, which qualified Him to be the sin offering. The sin offering only took a moment of His life, a few hours and it was over. But the burnt offering and the meal offering took 33½ years of sinless living in order to qualify to be the sin offering.

In Isaiah the 53rd chapter, verses 9 and 10, we find an interesting insight of God's approach to this sacrifice.

Isaiah 53:9-10 And they made His grave with the wicked—but with the rich at His death, because He had done no violence, nor was any deceit in His mouth. [Not even one time did His heart rise up to try to deceive anyone, as childlike, as open as one could possibly be.] Yet it pleased the Lord to bruise Him; and He has put Him to grief. When You make His soul an offering for sin, He shall see His seed [that is you and me], He shall prolong His days, and the pleasure of the Lord shall prosper in His hand.

So it pleased God to make an offering of a life that was absolutely perfect so that the payment, the penalty for our sins could be paid.

Now, let us go back to I John 1, beginning in verse 8.

I John 1:8-10 If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us.

I John 2:1-2 My little children, these things I write to you, that you may not sin. [He is showing the obligation that we have for coming under the sacrifice of Jesus Christ, that being forgiven does not remove from us the obligation now of keeping the commands.] And if anyone sins, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. And He Himself is the propitiation [He is the payment, He is the expiation] for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the whole world.

So we find here then that not only does the sacrifice of Jesus Christ precede us at the time of conversion, but it is also something that God expects us to make use of from time to time as we sin during our Christian life. That sin offering can be made for us or at least applied for us over and over again.

Let us go to Hebrews the 10th chapter, a very interesting chapter here in the New Testament.

Hebrews 10:1 For the law, having a shadow of the good things to come, and not the very image of the things. . .

See, the law was not the reality. It only portrayed the reality. It was though things were being enacted of something greater that was going to come. And so what we see there in Leviticus 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 is the shadow of the good things. Christ is the reality for the law.

Hebrews 10:1 having a shadow of the good things to come, and not the very image of the things, can never with these same sacrifices, which they offer continually year by year, make those who approach perfect.

Now why? Why could not the blood of an animal substitute for the blood of Christ? Why did something so great have to die in order that we might live? We will look at it at a strictly dollar and cents basis.

Can something of lesser value, an animal, meet the cost of something of greater value, a man? Are you going to tell me that a bull, that a goat, that a lamb, that a turtledove, is worth as much as a human being?

Suppose that you went into a store and whatever it was that you want to purchase, redeem, meet the cost of, propitiate, expiate, whatever it was you wanted to redeem, it was going to cost you $100. And so you went to the counter with 50 bucks and plunked it down. Well, the owner would say, "You don't have enough here to meet the cost. You're going to have to go out and get more. That animal you brought in here will never cut it." So you go out and you get a $20 bill and you come back in and you plunk that down. The guy says, "That's still not enough. Go out and get more." You go out and get a $10 and you come back. That is still not enough. You see, over and over you are coming back with something of lesser value to pay the cost of something of much greater value.

Now, look what God did. You see, we are the thing that is costing, it is our redemption, it is the expiation of our sins that has to be paid for. So what God did is He came in with a trillion dollar note and He plunked it down for that $100 bucks and says, "Will this meet the cost?" See the trillion dollar note, that was Christ. God gave the life of the Creator to pay the penalty for sin. He did not come in with a dumb, stupid animal. He came in with something that was not only of equal value but of so much greater value there was no comparison. It was so great that all of the sins of all of mankind for all time could be paid by that one sacrifice.

Now, what does that mean in actual practice? It means you only have to make one payment. Now, what did They have to do in actual practice? Well, look what Paul says. See, the offerors were not made perfect by the sacrifice of an animal. And so Paul reasons in verse 2,

Hebrews 10:2 For then would they not have ceased to be offered?

I mean, if you come in with the proper payment, that is all you need. What he is saying is that no animal can pay the price of the sins of a man. The human is worth too much.

Hebrews 10:2-4 For the worshipers, once purified, would have had no more consciousness of sins. But in those sacrifices there is a reminder of sins every year [over and over again the person is reminded, but the payment has not been made yet]. For it is not possible that the blood of bulls and goats should take away sins.

No animal is going to measure up to a human being. God simply will not accept it. And so the sacrificial law was nothing more than a schoolmaster, that is all. He was putting them through an exercise. He wanted them to learn something. And now we are learning from it. We are learning the value of Christ's sacrifice.

Hebrews 10:5-9 Therefore, when He came into the world, He said: "Sacrifice and offering You did not desire [Here, we have God the Son, the Savior, talking to God the Father.], but a body [yes, a human body] You have prepared for Me. [Why? So He could be the sacrifice.] In burnt offerings and sacrifices for sin You had no pleasure. Then I said, 'Behold, I have come—in the volume of the book it is written of Me [in the Old Testament]—to do Your will, O God.'" Previously saying, "Sacrifice and offering, burnt offerings, and offerings for sin You did not desire, nor had pleasure in them" (which are offered according to the law), then He said, "Behold, I have come to do Your will, O God." He takes away the first that He may establish the second.

The first there may refer to the first covenant "that He may establish the second." It may also refer to the first sacrifices which we are reading of there in the book of Leviticus, to establish the sacrifice of Jesus Christ because they did not do the job.

Hebrews 10:10 By that will we have been sacrificed through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.

Because of its value it only has to be made once. It does not have to be done over and over and over again because it was sufficient to meet any qualification that the law of God could lay upon what it takes to expiate sin.

Hebrews 10:11-12 And every priest stands ministering daily and offering repeatedly the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins. But this Man, after He had offered one sacrifice for sins forever, sat down at the right hand of God.

You see, what he is portraying to you? That part of the work of God is done! There will be no more sacrifice for sin. He sat down, the work was over.

Hebrews 10:13-14 From that time waiting till His enemies are made His footstool. For by one offering He has perfected forever those who are being sanctified.

A fantastic thing! We do not have to worry about whether or not our sins are covered.

Hebrews 10:15-18 But the Holy Spirit also witnesses to us; for after He had said before, "This is the covenant that I will make with them after those days, says the Lord: I will put My laws into their hearts, and in their minds I will write them," then He adds, "Their sins and their lawless deeds I will remember no more." Now where there is remission of these, there is no longer an offering for sin.

So we are clear there because an offering was made that fully meets the requirements that God has set forth.

From here, let us go to II Corinthians 5.

II Corinthians 5:18 Now all things are of God, who has reconciled us to Himself through Jesus Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation, . . .

Part of the responsibility of the church of God in the preaching of the gospel around the world is to inform mankind how they can be reconciled to God. In many cases, they do not even know that they are separated from God, but they are separated from God and they need to be reconciled to God through the redemption that is offered in the payment for sin. So we have to tell people what sin is. In most cases, they do not even know what sin is. So before they can be reconciled to God, they have to understand what sin is and what part Christ plays in all of this. And so we can begin to see that the gospel of Jesus Christ is not just preaching about the Kingdom of God, but other attendant features that are necessary for re-establishing communion with God.

II Corinthians 5:19-21 . . . that is, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not imputing their trespasses to them, and has committed to us the word of reconciliation. Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were pleading through us: we implore you on Christ's behalf, be reconciled to God. For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.

What Paul was saying in this last verse has terrific importance. Jesus Christ brought Himself. He was the offeror and He offered Himself before God as the sin offering. Now, when He did that, our sins came down on His head and He became sin personified. And when He did, then God was [sound cut out]. . . with our sins, it had to be judged and rejected. And that is what happened with His Son. He was not any longer a sweet savor before God—He became sin. And so He was cast out of the camp, cast out of His presence. Now because He has been judged, justice has been satisfied.

Now, what it means to you and me is this: we have been judged in Him, see, because He took our sins upon Him. He took our sins upon Him and we have been judged in Him, and so now God can forgive us. So that is how God is legally meeting the requirements of His law, you see, of expiating sin. We have been judged already and we are free and clear of sin.

Do you understand that we were judged in Christ? That is a terrific thing to understand and it ought to give you great peace. It ought to give you comfort to know and understand that you have been judged in Christ and you are now forgiven. You are free and clear. There is no sin hanging over you because of that. Christ was the one that was rejected, see, put out of the camp. You were not put out of the camp, He was, because your sins were transferred to Him. It is like He laid His hands on Himself and then He became sin.

With that, let us go back to Leviticus 4, verses 11 and 12.

Leviticus 4:11-12 'But the bull's hide [this is the sin offering] and all of its flesh, with its head and its legs, its entrails and offal—the whole bull he shall carry outside the camp to a clean place, where the ashes are poured out, and burn it on the wood with fire; where the ashes are poured out it shall be burned.'

And now back to Hebrews. I want you to think about Christ's life for just a brief period of time. Put together some pieces that you are familiar with. Just very quickly an overview beginning all the way back in Mark 1, where we find there that His ministry begins, and we will just kind of blend several things together here.

Mark 1:14 [He] came to Galilee, preaching the gospel of the kingdom of God, and saying, . . [to men] "The kingdom is at hand. Repent, . . ."

We find in Matthew 4 and Luke 4 that just prior to doing this, He was taken out into a desert and there He was tempted of Satan the Devil. So He had three very difficult temptations while He was out there. And we find it at the end of that temptation, especially in the book of Luke, that it says that Satan left off testing Him for a while. Certainly it was not the end of the temptations because they continued.

We find that in Christ's life there were periods of time in which He was relatively free of persecution, but always it was lurking in the background. And as He came toward the end of His life, that it kept mounting in intensity, especially around the area of Jerusalem, where those in power were very intensely concerned with this Man whose fame, whose teachings, the things that He did, were building it to a crescendo. And so they became alarmed because they perceived that the whole world was going after Him. And so they began to persecute Him as well.

We find that His own family did not believe in Him. In John the seventh chapter, we find that His own disciples who were with Him for 3½ years, that at the very end one of them turned into a traitor and the others all abandon Him.

Now through it all, you will find a story of undaunting courage. You will find a Person who seemed to be fearless, who was faithful to the nth degree, and He kept going ahead wisely and discreetly, enduring whatever came upon Him, but going to the next step and the next step and the next step in the carrying out the fulfillment of His mission.

And then, on that last evening, we have the agony of a very heartfelt, intense, almost desperate prayer. And then finally, the taking of His freedom, the trial, the scourging, and then death. You know, there was only one thing in that whole time (that I can perceive) that He feared. And He said it, you see, after He was crucified. He said, "My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?" The only thing that He ever feared was that He would lose His communication, that He would lose His fellowship with God. And He knew that once the sins of mankind were put on Him, He would be cast out of God's presence and there would be no longer any contact with His Father. And He did not know what He would do then.

That is where the source of our spiritual strength is! It is being in fellowship with God, in communion with God, in prayer to God, in Bible study with God, in order so that He might feed us by His Spirit. Do you fear being out of communion with God, of not having fellowship with God, so much so that day after day, it is a regular portion, a regular part of your life, that you never miss a day that you are not in communion with your Father, thanking Him, praising Him, appealing to Him, asking forgiveness, for guidance, for direction, for strength, reading His Word, applying with all of your strength the things that you already know that you have been instructed in.

The one thing that Christ feared is that He would be cut off—and He was.

That is the meaning of the offering being burned outside the camp. And so we find here in Hebrews 13,

Hebrews 13:10 We have an altar from which those who serve the tabernacle have no right to eat.

Remember, the altar is God's table and we are fed spiritually from that table, spiritual food. Jesus said, "The words that I speak to you they are spirit and they are life." You will find in the book of Leviticus, the priest could eat of the meal offering, the priest could eat of the peace offering and of the sin and trespass offering. And so those who serve at the altar are fed of the altar.

Now, you and I are part of a spiritual priesthood (I Peter 2:5 and I Peter 2:9). It is our responsibility to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God. So we have an altar that we can eat at that they cannot eat at. So when he says that those who serve the Tabernacle have no right to eat, he is talking about the physical Tabernacle or the physical Temple that was erected in those days. But we have a right to eat at that altar. And it says in verse 11,

Hebrews 13:11-12 For the bodies of those animals, whose blood is brought into the sanctuary by the high priest for sin, are burned outside the camp. Therefore Jesus also, that He might sanctify the people with His own blood, suffered outside the gate.

Like Mr. Armstrong said, "God will not budge one inch with His law!" That even when the sinner is His own Creator Son, God judges without partiality and He had to be put out of His presence. Is sin that serious to you? Is the sacrifice of Jesus Christ worth anything, so that you strive with all your being to keep from having to have that applied? Are you really all that concerned about being put out of the presence of God? Brethren, for thousands of years man has been waiting to get back into the presence of God because of what Adam and Eve did, and all of mankind afterwards. And now the way has been opened. Do we want to be put back out? Because God judges without partiality.

But I will tell you, we can be mighty thankful God knows that we are flesh and He knows that we are going to sin. And the sacrifice of Jesus Christ can be reapplied to us as long as we are in a good attitude. Isaiah 59:1-2 makes it very clear. It shows that sin separates us from God. But let us turn instead to Ephesians 2.

Ephesians 2:11-13 Therefore remember that you, once Gentiles in the flesh—who are called Uncircumcision by what is called the Circumcision made in the flesh by hands—that at that time you were without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ.

So the blood of Jesus Christ is what establishes for you and me access into the very throne room, into the very presence of God.

We have seen two distinctions so far. One, that though the offering was without blemish, it was not a sweet savor to God. The second distinction was that it was burned outside of the camp. Now, a third distinction is this: Are sin and trespass the same? The sin offering is an offering for sin and the trespass offering is a offering for trespass. Are they not the same thing? Is not sin and trespass the same thing? Do you see a difference? God sees the difference because there were two different offerings. One was for sin and the other was for trespass.

Now, we have a tendency to observe what a man does rather than what a man is. We are willing to think that we do evil things, but we are not so willing to think that we are evil. There is a big difference.

You are going to find as you continue to grow, that God judges us just as much for what we are as what we do. What does God judge? It says that God looks on the heart. Is the heart doing the evil works? The heart is not doing the evil works. But God judges the heart. The heart is the fountain from which evil works come. How is the sin that is in that heart going to be covered unless there is an offering for what is in that heart? It is covered in the sin offering. You see the difference? The distinction between the two is this: the sin offering (chapter 4 of Leviticus) is for our evil nature. The trespass pass offering (chapter 5) is for the fruits of that evil nature. It is for the sin, the trespass that is actually done.

Let us go back to Leviticus 4 and let us begin to see how God shows this. We will just do this very quickly. In verse 3, He mentions the anointed priest. That is the high priest.

Leviticus 4:3 'If the anointed priest sins, bringing guilt on the people, then let him offer for the Lord. . .'

Notice that though the priest is mentioned, there is no specific sin that is mentioned. It just mentions it in general.

Leviticus 4:13 'If the the whole congregation of Israel sins unintentionally, and the thing is hidden from the eyes. . .'

And so forth. Again, if you want to read through that more thoroughly, you again find that the persons are mentioned but no particular sin. It is just very broadly sin. The same in verse 22,

Leviticus 4:22 'When a ruler has sinned, and done something unintentionally against any of the commandments of the Lord. . .'

Again, a person is mentioned but a particular sin is not.

Leviticus 4:27 'If anyone of the common people sin. . .'

And it is the same thing over again.

So in the sin offering, no particular act of sin is seen, but the person is always seen offering an offering.

Now, in the trespass offering, we begin to see sins but the specific person disappears. And so we see in verse 1,

Leviticus 5:1 'If a person sins in hearing the utterance of a oath, . . .'

Leviticus 5:2 'Or if a person touches any unclean thing, . . .'

Leviticus 5:3 'Or if he touches human uncleanness, . . .'

Leviticus 5:4 'Or if a person swears, speaking thoughtlessly, . . .'

Leviticus 5:5 'And it shall be, when he is guilty in any of these matters, . . .'

In the trespass offering, it is the act that is concentrated on, not the person. So what we are seeing then is that the sin offering was given because a person is evil. The trespass offering is given because the person does evil, does evil things.

Now in Matthew the seventh chapter (I will just mention this), verses 16 through 18, it is just a principle, and that is, Jesus is showing that it is from the roots, it is from the heart from which evil springs. And He shows that a good tree brings forth good fruit and an evil tree brings forth evil fruit. In fact, He goes so far as to say that it is impossible for an evil tree to bring forth good fruit.

In Matthew 12:34 (an easy way to remember this scripture).

Matthew 12:34 "Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks."

Again, He is showing you that the tongue utters what is already in the heart.

And then in Matthew 15, He says, "Out of the heart proceeds evil thoughts, adulteries, fornication, murders."

What is the sum of all this? It is very important. God has covered sin, and the penalty for sin, and the expiation of sin, from every angle possible in order to ensure that we are going to be in His Kingdom. He has covered sin, not only in the acts that we commit, but also He has covered it in what causes the acts to occur: human nature.

This has very interesting ramifications to you and me. One of the ramifications of this is this. Did you ever wonder why whenever God baptizes you or whenever you are counseled for baptism, that He never tells you everything that is going to happen—what you are going to have to go through, what you are going to have to learn? Usually when we get baptized, we are pretty confident that this is going to be something pretty good. And so we get baptized and then we begin to grow. Lo and behold, as we grow, as we become more mature, we begin to see sin everywhere we look—and it is not always in other people. Most of it is in us! And if we are not careful, we will see so much sin in us that we will begin to become discouraged and we are going to despair because everywhere we turn, every angle we look, we catch ourselves in little deceits, the envy begins to rise, jealousy, anger, rage, hatred, all of which we are trying to cork in, you know, and try to keep it from breaking out. But it is always there. It is on the surface. It is like a cancer that is getting in us and boom!

You could get very discouraged about something like that because you could begin to think that, "Well, I thought as I grew in the grace and knowledge of Jesus Christ that things would get continually easier. That I would just get holier and holier and life would become a real pleasure and everything." But it seems to work in the opposite direction. The older and more mature we get in the church, the more dirt and corruption we see in ourselves. "Oh, woe is me."

Hey, rejoice! God has got that covered too. The fact that you see more of your nature is good because it should make you able, on the one hand, to rejoice in the fact that the more of your nature that you see, the more you also see the efficacy of the sacrifice of Jesus Christ, of His graciousness and goodness in applying this to us, as wretched and miserable as we are. Not only that, it ought to spur you to say "Thy kingdom come! I want to get out of this flesh."

Now also, it might be an indication that if you become discouraged over seeing sin within you, that without realizing it you are subtly being deceived into trusting in your own works to keep you in good standing with God. And you do not see good works and you become worried, guilt-ridden, discouraged, and full of despair.

Brethren, it is not our works that get us in to the Father and keep us in communication with Him. It is the sacrifice of Jesus Christ. It is the sin offering that precedes us that gets us into His presence. If we can get into His presence by means of our works, who needs Christ? You will be sufficient to save yourself.

With that, let us go back to the book of Romans. Can you remember (this ought to tie something together for you beautifully), when we were going through the meal offering how I showed you that once leaven was put into that offering, it was not allowed to be burned on the altar because no amount of oil could change the damage that was done by sin? No amount of God's Spirit will ever change human nature. God's Spirit can help us to keep it suppressed but it will not change it. It will always be there. It is something that we are going to have to deal with. It is a fact of our spiritual life.

Romans 7:14-15 For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am carnal, sold under sin. For what I am doing, I do not understand. For what I will to do, that I do not practice; but what I hate, that I do.

Now, Paul does not mean that he was doing this as a way of life. It was not something that was going on constantly in his life. He is expressing something here to help you and me to understand that there is an aspect to our Christian life that is always going to be with us. No matter how mature we become in God's way of life, that human nature is always there.

Romans 7:16-17 If, then, I do what I will not to do, I agree with the law that it is good. But now, it is no longer I who do it [Because remember, spiritually Paul died, the law slew him. It claimed its penalty.], but sin that dwells in me.

That is what the sin offering is for. Baptism does not take it away. It is something that we constantly have to deal with and it is covered too! Not just the acts that we do, but our evil nature is also covered by the blood of Jesus Christ.

Romans 7:18-25 For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh) nothing good dwells; for to will [see, the desire] to do good is present with me, but how to perform what is good I do not find. For the good that I will to do, I do not do; but the evil I will not to do, that I practice. Now if I do what I will not to do, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me. I find then a law, that evil is present with me, the one who wills to do good. [That is the way it is with us. We want to do the right thing, but human nature is always there.] For I delight in the law of God according to the inward man. [With his mind, he believed it. He loved it. He desired to do it.] But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members. O wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? I thank God—through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, with the mind I myself serve the law of God, but with the flesh the law of sin.

Romans 8:1 There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit.

Paul was setting things straight. We are not going to do like the Protestants do and say, "Well, it's all been done for you. You don't have to keep the law of God." That is not what Paul is saying. He is saying that though we are under no condemnation, we still have to yield to the Spirit of God to the very best that we possibly can to strive for perfection. See,

Romans 8:1-3 . . . who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death. [yeah, that human nature is covered] For what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh, God did by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, on account of sin: He condemned sin in the flesh.

"Lo, You have prepared a body. . ." (Hebrews the 10th chapter.)

Now, a couple of other secondary features in regard to the sin offering and that is the mention of those various peoples: the high priest, the whole congregation, the ruler, and the common people, it says there. One thing that He wants to teach you is that this human nature is everywhere. Every strata of society is infected with it. There is no one who has escaped. Everybody has it—top to bottom, bottom to top, all through the middle, every level, every strata. It is there; so nobody escapes from it.

Another thing: if you would follow those the directions given regarding those sacrifices, the sacrifice made by the high priest and the sacrifice that is made by the whole congregation, you will find a distinction between those two and the other two, the one that is the sacrifice of the leader and the sacrifice of the common person. And that is this: the sacrifice that the priest made for himself, the high priest, and the whole congregation, was killed on the outside of the Tabernacle. The blood was poured in a basin and then the blood was taken by the high priest right inside the Tabernacle and it was smeared on the horns of the incense altar. The incense altar was standing in front of the veil that separated the Holy Place from the Holy of Holies. The Holy of Holies represented God's throne room. The blood from the other two was merely taken by the high priest to the horns of the brazen altar and there smeared on it.

What He is signifying is this: He is showing us in this picture the consequences of various segments of society's sin. There is no more disastrous spiritual result than if the high priest should sin. What the high priest does affects everybody in the country. And so what God is showing is that when the high priest sins, communication with Him is totally cut off by the sins of one man. That is why the blood had to go on the incense altar. So when the whole nation or the whole congregation sinned, see everybody was sinning anyway, and so the blood had to go on the incense altar.

But when a private individual, be he a leader or be he a commoner, when they sin their sin only affects themselves and those immediately involved. And so they were still free to carry out their service to God in other areas on the earth. The brazen altar represents the earth, the incense altar represents God's throne in heaven. And so the blood always indicates a reunion of man with God.

Let me see if there is something I want to pick up here. Yes. This we will not get to because I am five minutes overtime already. We will not get to it in the detail that I would like to go in it because I want to eventually get done with these sermons. There are other things in the Bible besides the sacrifices. But this I want to get to.

You will notice when you read through the trespass offerings that not only does the person have to make an offering, but there is also a financial penalty that goes with the making of the offering according to the value set by the priest that was there. Now, there is something very valuable in here, a very valuable spiritual picture that is being made for you and me, and I hope that I can get it across to you clearly.

The valuation was set at one-fifth of whatever the cost of the restitution that had to be made. Now let us say that you stole something from another person and it was worth $100. And so you would come before the priest with your offering, the animal, and you would also come before the priest with the $100. But you had to add 20% to that, one-fifth thereof, and that $100 plus the 20% went to the person that you stole it from. So he would be not only restored in terms of what you originally stole from him, but also he would be restored another 20% that would cover any difficulties, mental agony, or whatever you might say that he had to go through as a result of you stealing that thing from him and being deprived of the use of whatever it was that you stole from him. That is what occurred physically.

Spiritually, though, when we begin to trace this out, a very interesting thought. Now we are going to inject God into this because that is where our real life is. When we break His law, we are indebted to Him. We come under His law, the penalty of that law. We come before Him for the forgiveness of sin. Now, He is the one, remember—He is God—if we pay the penalty, what happens to us? We die. That is the end of it. So He allows the sacrifice of Jesus Christ to substitute for us. I am going to show you the way God thinks.

Now He has a claim on us that He did not previously have. See before, all He had was the claim of our obedience. Now, He not only has the claim of obedience, but now we owe Him our life because He spared us the death penalty in allowing the sacrifice of Christ. But look what God does in actual practice. He not only forgives our sins, but He then goes on to clear the guilt from our mind and also to give us the wherewithal to keep His law in the future. You see, He adds grace, gifts. That is all grace means. He adds gifts. And so Paul put it this way, I believe it is in Romans 6. He said that where sin abounded grace abounds even more—super-abounds.

That is what God does for you and me. When He forgives our sins at the beginning of our conversion, what does He give us? Does He just give us forgiveness? No! He invites us in to eat with Him and to have communion with Him. Besides, in addition to that, He says, "Hey, I'm going to give you eternal life on top of that because you've repented of your sins. And not only that, I'm going to give you direct access to Me. I'm going to give you access to all of the promises that I've made to My people. And not only that, I'm going to ensure that you don't have to worry about where your next meal is coming from. I'm going to take care of you just like it says in Matthew 5, 6, and 7."

You see, what God does. Now, what should we do? That is His example; something that He is not even required to do. All He would really be, I guess, required to do would be to forgive our sins. You see, He gives grace over and above. He not only forgives, He gives things over and above. Brethren, He expects us to do exactly the same thing that He did.

And so the 20% payment over and above what was actually owed represents the way we are to act toward men, first of all, that we have sinned against and also all of mankind in general. We are to go over and above just merely keeping the commandments. Now, what it leads you to is this; remember, the apostles came to Christ and said, "Lord, increase our faith." And so He showed them that the way to increase your faith is to do more than is required of you. See, that is giving grace.

If you begin to follow this out in the New Testament here is what you begin to see. I will just take you to the Sermon on the Mount. Jesus said, "You have heard of old" to love your enemy or love your friends, you know, and hate your enemy. "But I say unto you," you have to love your enemy too. That is going above and beyond. In Matthew 11 He said that we have to be quick to forgive. He set the example Himself while He was hanging there on that stake. He said, "Father, forgive them for they know not what they do." Did He wait until they repented before He asked His Father to forgive them? No, He forgave them right there.

Now, what is your reaction to somebody who has sinned against you, offended you, hurt your feelings, or whatever? "Boy, I'm not going to forgive them until they repent of that." See, we extend grace to them before they even want it.

How did Christ say that we are supposed to live life? You can read it through Matthew the sixth chapter because He set the example. He said, "Full measure, pressed down, running over." He said for the measure with which you deal to others, God is going to deal right back to you. So if you want to super-abound, give grace, go above and beyond what is required, and what that will begin to produce is a mind like God, generous to a fault.

I Corinthians 6. Going to law with a brother who has taken something from you. What does Paul say to do? He said, do not take them to law. He said, forgive him, suffer the loss, swallow your pride, forget about it. See, that is going above and beyond. It is giving grace.

That is what God did with the trespass offering. He showed us His attitude. Ever-willing to forgive and not only that, He gives gifts to the sinner. What a fantastic thing! He gives gifts to the ones who offended Him in their sin.

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