Well, tonight we continue our study of the book of Leviticus, which is sort of a sweeping survey of sorts. We're not making no attempt to plod through it in any kind of careful, detailed way. If you do that on your own, more power to you. Let me know how it goes and if you get past chapter 3. Anyway, it is one of the more difficult books, I think, of Scripture in terms of understanding what was happening and the importance of all the detail that we're given and being many, many, many, many, many generations and significantly finding ourselves in a very, very different culture, finding difficulty in sometimes understanding just what's there. So hopefully, at least in our little sweeping survey here, we'll get a sense for what's there so that we can have a sense for what. The writer of Hebrews is going to be talking about, particularly in later chapters, when he talks about Moses and the law given through Moses. He's talking about Leviticus. That's all part of it. When he talks about the priesthood and the better priests that we have, he's talking about Leviticus. So a lot of things referring to the book of Leviticus and things that take place in and around this great Old Testament book, though difficult Old Testament book. So we'll continue our little survey tonight looking at the sacrifices, the sacrifices themselves. We kind of launched into this a little bit last week looking at the very first sacrifice mentioned, the bird offering, but tonight we'll sort of put the major sacrifices together and hopefully you'll get a sense for their similarities, their differences, their distinctiveness, etc. So let's go to the Lord in prayer before we do that. Heavenly Father, we thank you for your book to us, your message to us. We thank you for the book of Leviticus, though it is difficult for us sometimes to fully understand and difficult for us to maintain interest because of the level of detail, but it was detail that was necessary for your people under the Old Covenant, which reminds us of the relative simplicity that we've entered into in the New Covenant and how it is truly better. There weren't many sacrifices necessary, but one sacrifice, once for all, made for the sins of all mankind. So sufficient was that sacrifice. Lord, I pray that tonight as we hear about these different sacrifices, the contents, how they were different, the purposes they were different, the reasons for giving them would be different. Lord, may we be mindful of, again, the relative simplicity that you've ushered us into by your blood. So we thank you, Jesus, for dying for us. Make us mindful of that sacrifice tonight, we pray in Jesus' name. Amen. All right, last time we did talk about the burnt offering. The burnt offering is listed for us in chapter one. As I said, the burnt offering would have been probably one of the most common sacrifices. It was a general sacrifice, a sweet aroma to the Lord. That issue of sweet aroma we'll see cropping up several times again tonight, and I'll talk about that a little bit further. If we just do a quick survey of the sacrifices, even quicker than I intend to do tonight. So we'll begin by just surveying it, then we'll take each one and go a little bit deeper and then call it an evening. And by the way, later on we will be taking prayer requests. So if you've got something on your mind, something you'd like to share with us that we can be praying for, please be thinking of that as well. So chapter 1 contains the burnt offering. Chapter 2 is the meal offering or grain offering. Chapter 3 is the peace offering. Chapters 4 and the first part of chapter 5 contain instructions concerning sin offerings. Chapters 5, the last half, through chapter 6, the first half, deal with trespass offerings. And then chapters 6, the last half, through chapter 7, deal with instructions for the priests who would, in all cases, be overseeing these offerings, making sure that they were done correctly, in accord with the scriptural teaching, making sure that somebody wasn't trying to sneak a blemished animal in there, trying to cut corners or whatever. The instructions for the priests are in chapters 6 and 7. Of these offerings, these five offerings, the first three offerings were soothing aroma offerings. They were made in communion with God and they were made to celebrate that communion. The last two offerings, the sin offering and the trespass offering, are expiation offerings, expiation meaning a taking away of sin. They were made for sins committed that would take away or cover those sins. They were not soothing aroma offerings. Every offering involved three objects. It involved an offerer. That's the person bringing the offering, whether that person had sinned, or whether that person was just fulfilling a vow, or maybe that person was simply doing it out of his own free will, or maybe he was simply wanting to thank the Lord for some great blessing in his life, or something like that. All these offerings had provisions for all of those things. So you have the offerer bringing the offering. You have the offering, which is the animal or the object offered. And you have the mediator, the priest. You always had a priest mediating the offering. You didn't just go and there wasn't a self-service line, you know, sort of a speed check out kind of a thing where you went through and handled it on your own. You always had a priest mediating, helping, assisting a go between you and the Lord, making sure you did it right. Well, with that kind of real brief overview, let's look a little more deeply. We saw again the burnt offering last time. The burnt offering, what's unique about it is the entire animal was consumed. which speaks of complete and total consecration, complete and total dedication to the Lord, and complete acceptance by the Lord. So you put the whole animal, essentially, with the exception of just a few parts, you put the whole animal on the fire and the whole thing was consumed. That's somewhat the uniqueness about the burnt offering. That brings us to the meal offering or the grain offering. What is the grain offering? Well, it's given to us in chapter 2. Let's just read a little bit of it. I won't read the entire chapter. Now, when anyone presents a grain offering as an offering to the Lord, his offering shall be of fine flour and he shall pour oil on it and put frankincense on it. He shall then bring it to Aaron's sons, the priests, notice the intercessor there, right? And he shall take from it its hands Yet his handful of its fine flour and of its oil with all its frankincense and the priest shall offer it up in smoke by fire, a soothing aroma to the Lord. That key word pops up again. The remainder of the grain offering belongs to Aaron and his sons, a thing most holy of the offerings to the Lord by fire. The grain offering was an offering of worship. It was a soothing aroma to the Lord. Now that is a key phrase there. It was a soothing aroma. Soothing aroma. Soothing aroma. And we read that about the Burt Offering. It was a soothing aroma to the Lord. What does that mean? Well, it means that it brought the Lord pleasure. In some way, in some sense, the Lord derived pleasure from His people interacting with Him via the offerings. It brought him pleasure. This offering was the fruit of human labor. From the fruit of the ground that had been tilled, planted and harvested. That's how you get grain, right? It could be baked. Verse four. It could be grilled. It could be fried. or it could be roasted. Verse 5, verse 7, and verse 14 all give different ways that the grain offering could be given. Regarding it being a soothing aroma, Wynham has said this, one of the commentators, God having granted forgiveness of sins through the burnt offering, the worshiper responded by giving to God some of the produce of his hands in the cereal offering. That's another name for it. The grain offering, meal offering, cereal offering. Unlike the burnt offering, which was entirely consumed on the altar, the grain offering was only partially offered. The rest was given to the priest for his food. As we read there in verse 3, the remainder of the grain offering belongs to Aaron, having only taken basically a handful out. The rest went to the priest to help support and sustain their families. Except in cases of those who were the poorest, the grain offering never seems to have been offered without a burnt offering first. So you don't just typically read of someone coming up and offering a grain offering without first offering a burnt offering. Now, there were provisions for those who were the poorest of the poor who could not afford a burnt offering of any kind. And you'll recall the burnt offering could be a variety of animals from sheep, to goats, to lambs, to bulls, to birds. So, you know, you think a bird wouldn't cost that much. But still, there were those who were even so poor as to not afford that. So there were provisions for the poorest of the poor. But you were to sacrifice commensurate with your station in life, commensurate with your income, etc. Alright, that brings us to the peace offering in chapter 3. Peace offering. Let's just read a little bit of that now, if his offering is a sacrifice of peace offerings, he is going to offer out of the herd, whether male or female, he shall offer it without defect before the Lord. He shall lay his hand on the head of his offering and slay it at the doorway of the tent of meeting. And Aaron's sons, the priests, shall sprinkle the blood around the altar. What is this sounding like immediately? Starting to. The burnt offering, right? This is very similar here. From the saccharite feis of the peace offerings, he shall present an offering by fire to the Lord, the fat that covers the entrails and all the fat that is on the entrails, and the two kidneys with the fat that is on them, which is on the loins and the lobe of the liver, which he shall remove with the kidneys. Alright, we're going to butcher school here. Right, brother? Learning a lot here about various parts of various animals. Verse 5, Then Aaron's son shall offer it up in smoke on the altar on the burnt offering which is on the wood that is on the fire and is an offering by fire of a soothing aroma to the Lord. But if his offering for a sacrifice of peace offerings to the Lord is from the flock, he shall offer it male or female without defect. Now, that's another distinction. The burnt offering had to be male. If he's going to offer a lamb for his offering, then he shall offer it before the Lord and he shall lay his hands on it, etc. All right, let's just talk a little bit about the peace offering. The offering highlighted the peace and fellowship between God and the worshiper. It was a celebration. of sorts between the worshipper and his God, that there was now peace between them. It was an optional sacrifice that the worshipper could bring whenever he wished as long as there was an actual relationship of peace that existed between the worshipper and God. It, too, was a soothing aroma. Unlike the grain offering, all the participants, the offerer, the priest and God, symbolically, partook of this offering together, eating a meal together, as it were, symbolizing unity and fellowship, unity between offerer and priest and priest and God and offerer and God all partook. This is my favorite offering. This is like a barbecue, right? Everybody gets together and they just celebrate the community that they share together, the oneness that they share. This is also Pastor Todd's favorite offer. He loves this one. The barbecue offering, as it were. These offerings were in the form of animals, and unlike the burnt offering, they could be female. They could be offered as a Thanksgiving offering. They could be offered as a freewill offering or to fulfill a vow, a votive offering, as mentioned later in chapter 7, verses 12 through 16. And so what we have here is really a communal meal Offer, priest, and the Lord partake together and enjoy fellowship. And as is the case in our own culture, it's even more so the case in ancient Near Eastern culture that to share a meal was to really bond. It was really to share fellowship. I mean, there was not a lot deeper culturally thing you could participate in together. I mean, to share food, to break bread was to really fellowship and get in to each other's lives. And so that's what's being celebrated with the peace offering. It's kind of a party offering. That brings us to one that is not a party offering. That brings us to the sin offering. Sin offering in chapter four. Let's just read a little bit of that. This goes through chapter 5 and verse 13. Then the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, Speak to the sons of Israel, saying, If a person sins unintentionally in any of the things which the Lord has commanded not to be done and commits any of them, if the anointed priest sins so as to bring guilt on the people, Then let him offer to the Lord a bull without defect as a sin offering for the sin he has committed. He shall bring the bull to the doorway of the tent and so forth. Now look at verse 13. Now, if the whole congregation of Israel commits error and the matter escapes the notice of the assembly and they commit any of the things which the Lord has commanded not to be done and they become guilty when the sin which they have committed becomes known, then the assembly shall offer a bull of the herd for a sin. Then the elders of the congregation shall lay their hands on the head of the bull before the Lord, and the bull shall be slain before the Lord. Verse 22, When a leader sins and unintentionally does any one of all the things which the Lord has commanded not to be done, and he becomes guilty if his sin which he committed is made known to him, he shall bring for his offering a goat, a male without defect. He shall lay his hand on the head of the male goat and slay it in the place where they slay the burnt offering before the Lord. It is a sin offering. Verse 27. Now, if any one of the common people sins unintentionally in doing any of the things which the Lord has commanded not to be done and he becomes guilty of his sin, which he committed is made known to him, then he shall bring for his offering a goat, a female without defect for his sin, which he has committed. He shall lay his hand on the head of the sin offering and slay the sin offering. And it basically goes on just like that. you get the idea. Previous to this main and leading issue has been the type of sacrifice to be brought. The issue has been up to now, what are you sacrificing for? And therefore, use the appropriate sacrifice to communicate what it is you're wanting to communicate. Here, the main and leading issue is on the kind of sin that a sin offering requires. So what sin did you commit? It's an unintentional sin. It's a, oh, did I do that? I really didn't mean to do that, but I did do that. I need to take care of that. It's not a high handed rebellion. It's not a willful sin where you knowingly entered into sin, having premeditated it and so forth. It's an unintentional sin. Whereas here's one commentator's thoughts on it, whereas the main issue in the burnt grain and fellowship offerings was the proper procedure to be followed. The main issue in the discussion in the sin and guilt offerings is the occasion that required these sacrifices. The two sins that called for a sin offering were inadvertent sin and sins of omission. Sins of omission are covered in chapter 5 verses 1 through 13. That's where you fail to do something that the Lord clearly commanded. The unintentional sin is doing something that the Lord forbade, but doing so unintentionally. One interesting observation is this. The root for sin occurs 595 times in the Old Testament. That Hebrew root word. 595 times in the Old Testament. Leviticus has 116 of these attestations. Far more occurrences than any other Old Testament book. This section, chapter 4 through chapter 5 and verse 13, has 53 of these attestations, and it's the heaviest concentration of the discussion of sin in all of the Bible. Interesting. Not totally surprising, given the fact that we're talking about sin offerings. This offering was not a soothing aroma before the Lord. This was not one that the Lord merely took pleasure in. This was something that was absolutely needed It was absolutely required in order for there to be restored fellowship between offerer and the Lord. Those who were too poor to afford an animal sacrifice, again, provision was made for a more affordable option. Look at chapter 5 and verse 11. But if his means, the offerers means are insufficient for two turtle doves or two young pigeons, then for his offering, for that which he has sinned, he shall bring a tenth of an ephah of fine flour for a sin offering. He shall not put oil on it or place incense on it for it is a sin offering. Now. I think there's a lot of interesting things in that. One is God's care and provision for the poor. He's concerned for them that their access to him not be restricted on the basis of their means. So he makes gracious provision here. It's not the preferred method, but there is provision. The sin offering, so says one commentator, covered only the sins committed unintentionally. This category included sins done by mistake, in error, through oversight or ignorance, through lack of consideration or by carelessness. That is, the sacrifice covered sins that sprang from the weakness of the flesh. It did not cover sins committed with a high hand, namely in haughty, defiant rebellion against God. That's the sin offering. Alright, the final offering we look at tonight is the trespass offering. The trespass offering. Which is found in 5.15-6. This offering is sometimes called the reparation offering. for it called for reparations to be made when you had wronged God and wronged a fellow member of the community, you were to make it right. And not simply by saying you're sorry, but by compensating that person for the damage that was done to them. This too was not a soothing aroma offering. It was to be offered when Israelite wronged someone. Chapter five, verse 15. Let's look at that. If a person acts unfaithfully and sins unintentionally against the Lord's holy things, then he shall bring his guilt offering to the Lord around without defect, according to your evaluation. In terms of the shackle of the sanctuary for guilt offering, he shall make restitution for that which he has sinned against the holy thing and shall add it to a fifth part of it and give it to the priest. The priest shall then make atonement for him with the ram of the guilt offering and it will be forgiven him. There's that key word atonement again, which we see time and again in the book of Leviticus, that covering of sin, that that payment for sin so that the worshiper is then in right relationship once again with God. The offending person had to pay restitution to the person he had wronged, plus they had to add 20 percent, a fifth part, one fifth of whatever the amount was that they had wronged the other person. Look at chapter six and verse five. He shall make restitution for it in full and add to it one fifth more. He shall give it to one to the one to whom it belongs on the day he presents his guilt offering. So there's a very real sense of justice here, of not only again asking forgiveness, but making it right, fulfilling your duty to the community, to the person that you've wronged. So there we have the various offerings. The sacrificial system, quoting Windham here, the sacrificial system therefore presents different models or analogies to describe the effects of sin and the way of remedying them. The burnt offering uses a personal picture, a man of man, the guilty sinner who deserves to die for his sin and of the animal dying in his place. God accepts the animal as a ransom for man. The sin offering uses a medical model. Sin makes the world so dirty that God can no longer dwell there. The blood of the animal disinfects the sanctuary in order that God may continue to be present with His people. The reparation offering presents a commercial picture of sin. Sin is a debt which man incurs against God. The debt is paid through the offered animal. So as you survey these various sacrifices, something that comes to my mind is, thank you, Lord, that we're not under this system anymore. You know, I mean, I would need like a little cheat sheet, you know, in my back pocket to say, OK, now what offering am I required here? Was that a high handed sin? Was that an unintentional sin? Are reparations required, etc.? I just, I think becomes very, very difficult, very, very complex and very, very burdensome. But that was the whole point. Wasn't it? One of the major reasons for the law was that it would be a burden, that it would be a schoolmaster that would lead us to Jesus Christ. How does it lead us to Jesus Christ? Because it shows us we're faced with it. Each and every day we're faced with the fact that we can't have relationship with a holy God. without killing a whole bunch of animals to get there. And that the payment for sin is death. Death is required. Death always comes from sin. And in the case of the sacrifices, it's the death of an animal who has now taken my place so that I can have restored fellowship with the God I serve. The law was a burden. And that's why the New Covenant is better. We're going to see that in Hebrews. The New Covenant's better. This is a better way. We talk a lot about how things change over time, right? And sometimes we think, boy, wouldn't it be nice, the good old days, you know? We talked about Ecclesiastes, how sometimes the good old days aren't really all that good. We just have sort of short memories and we sort of fantasize about the past and think that it was really better than it really was. But in fact, things have gotten better. I mean, life has really gotten easier, has it not? Some of us may feel like we were born in the wrong century and wish we were pioneer people, you know, coming out, you know, in the covered wagon. Boy, all the travels we did this summer, you know, just trekking west. You know, I couldn't help but think all the time about these poor families, you know, You know, they're having babies along the way and kids are dying and they're having to, you know, provide for themselves and they're out in the elements and everything. Boy, is life not better now? It is better. It is better. I wouldn't want to go back. You know, it might be fun for a vacation to try it out. But, you know, put me back in the time machine and get me back here quickly as possible. The fact is, it is better. And that's the same with the new covenant. The new covenant is a better covenant. It's a better system. It works better. It's what the old covenant was always pointing toward. It was never to be the place where anyone landed. It was a transitional covenant into what would be the covenant, the new covenant in Christ's blood. And so we come to verses like 2 Corinthians 5 19. God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them. And he has committed to us the word of reconciliation. God is not counting our trespasses against us. He's not keeping score and saying, what sacrifice are you going to offer? Because you better make sure it's the right one. No, he made one sacrifice and it covers everything. You know, your intentional sins, Covered. Unintentional sins? Covered. It's all covered. Colossians 2.13, When you were dead in your transgressions and uncircumcision of your flesh, He made you alive together with Him, having forgiven us all our transgressions. 2 Corinthians 5.21, He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him. There's that point where the offer, and we talked about this in depth last week, where the offer comes up and lays his hands on that burnt offering. He lays his hands on the head of the animal, as it were, transferring his guilt to the head of that animal that's about to die. And then in very quick succession, slits the throat of that animal, causing blood to go everywhere. showing that this animal was clearly dead. The sin that this person had committed had been transferred to the animal and the animal had died in place of that person and had received the just punishment for sin. You know, that's exactly what Jesus Christ did for us. He who knew no sin became sin for us. It's as though while Christ is on the cross, our hands are lifted up onto his head. and that transference of guilt is being made. My sins are now laid on Him. He became sin for us. And the wrath of God was poured out upon Him. And He, so to speak, had His throat slit. And blood was everywhere to show clearly that He was dead. What a better sacrifice. A once-for-all sacrifice. covering every kind of sin, every form. So that is what Christ has done for us. Romans 5.1, Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. You know, we talked about the party offering. The peace offering. The offering where we celebrate that communal activity where only a very small portion of the animal was actually consumed on the fire. Most of it was partaken of. It was eaten by the offerer, by the priest, and by the Lord in a symbolic way. And I can't help but think of the commonality that has with communion that we share. It is a communal feast, as it were, We partake together of the body and blood of Christ, which reminds us so graphically of the peace we have with the Lord Jesus, who, having become sin for us, takes away our sins. We are justified by faith. Therefore, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. So no, thank you. I don't care to return to the old covenant. It wasn't better. It was indeed perfect for it was given from God. It was perfect in what it was intended to do. The law of God is perfect. But the new covenant is better and praise the Lord. It's in that new covenant in which we stand by God's grace and through the Lord's sacrifice. Lord Jesus, thank you for being our all-sufficient sacrifice. Thank You for the simplicity that there is in the grace we have found in You. Lord, I pray that we wouldn't take that for granted. I pray that we wouldn't take that grace as a license to sin, but that we would be all the more thankful and grateful to You for delivering us from a system that was never able to save us in the first place. It only foreshadowed You, foreshadowed Your perfect sacrifice pointed to Christ. Lord, I pray that as we continue to study this book, that we would allow it to indeed point us to You and Your perfect provision for us. Thank you. And it's in Your name we pray. Amen.