The Sacrificial System – How To Draw Near To God
The Grain Offering - Lev. 2
This morning we are going to be in Lev. 2 and consider the second offering God prescribed for the nation of Israel as a means for them to draw near to their God. It is known by a variety of names – meal, grain, and even meat (Keil and Delitzsch, Edersheim). I‟ll be referring to it as a grain offering because it consists of grain being offered on the altar in a variety of forms.
Memory Project: “Then the LORD spoke to Moses, saying, „Speak to the sons of Israel and say to them, „I am the LORD your God. You shall not do what is done in the land of Egypt where you lived, nor are you to do what is done in the land of Canaan where I am bringing you; you shall not walk in their statutes. You are to perform My judgments and keep My statutes, to live in accord with them; I am the LORD your God. So you shall keep My statutes and My judgments, by which a man may live if he does them; I am the LORD.‟”
Very quickly, someone remind us of the theme of Leviticus. Right. It is “the holiness of God.” What does holy mean? Holy means separate, set apart, or sacred. God was holy, and the nation of Israel wasn‟t! So if they wanted to be in fellowship with their God, two things had to happen. First of all, they had to be aware of what was separating them from their holy God, and second, they had to have a means of dealing with the things separating them. Everything in the book of Leviticus falls under one of those two general categories. What constitutes separation from God, and how do I deal with it?
Remember too that Leviticus is full of object lessons. God graciously illustrated for His people what holiness looked like, and the first set of object lessons was the five sacrifices, or offerings. What is the root idea of the word “offering?” To draw near. If these people who were separated from their God wanted to get close to God, or to “draw near” to God, there was a specific way they could do it. So last week we looked at the burnt offering in which the one bringing the animal slit its throat, cut it into pieces, and then gave to the priest to throw on the altar. The entire animal was consumed in the fire on the altar – none of it was burned outside of the camp, the priest didn‟t get to keep a part of it, and the one bringing the burnt offering didn‟t get to share a meal from it with the priest, like some of the other offerings.
This morning we are going to look at the grain offering, and this offering is in a category all by itself in that it is the only offering that didn‟t involve the shedding of blood. This fact alerts us to the purpose behind the offering, which we will see at the end of the message, but for now, just keep in mind as we are going through the particulars that this offering has special significance for the one bringing it.
Let‟s start with the word that is translated as “grain” in the phrase “grain offering” in verse one. “When anyone presents a grain offering as an offering to the Lord, his offering shall be of fine flour.” There is a very interesting word used here that really doesn‟t have anything to do with corn or wheat or barley. The word literally means “gift, tribute, offering,” or “present.” We see the concept illustrated in Gen. 32 where Jacob is on his way back home after spending 14 years in exile at his uncle‟s house. If you remember the story, Jacob tricked his older brother into giving up the family inheritance and then fled for his life. But in Gen. 32, he is now a wealthy man and on his way home knowing that he is going to have to face his brother. And he has no idea how Esau is going to respond – but he is clearly fearing for his life! So in Gen. 32 let‟s start reading in verse 13.
"So he spent the night there. Then he selected from what he had with him a present for his brother Esau: 14 two hundred female goats and twenty male goats, two hundred ewes and twenty rams,15 thirty milking camels and their colts, forty cows and ten bulls, twenty female donkeys and ten male donkeys. 16 And he delivered them into the hand of his servants, every drove by itself, and said to his servants, "Pass on before me, and put a space between droves." 17 And he commanded the one in front, saying, "When my brother Esau meets you and asks you, saying, 'To whom do you belong, and where are you going, and to whom do these animals in front of you belong?'18 then you shall say, 'These belong to your servant Jacob; it is a present sent to my lord Esau. And behold, he also is behind us.'" 19 Then he commanded also the second and the third, and all those who followed the droves, saying, "After this manner you shall speak to Esau when you find him; 20 and you shall say, 'Behold, your servant Jacob also is behind us.'" For he said, "I will appease him with the present that goes before me. Then afterward I will see his face; perhaps he will accept me."
That is the idea behind the word translated as “grain” in the phrase “grain offering.” It is a “gift” or “present” used to “draw near” to God. The reason the translators use the word “grain” is because of what we see in verse one – “his offering shall be of fine flour,” and verse 14, “if you bring a grain offering of early ripened things to the Lord, you shall bring fresh heads of grain roasted in the fire.”
Concerning the specifics of this offering, there were four different ways you could bring it – it could be flour baked in an oven as we see in verse 4, or fried on a griddle as we see in verse 5, or something like a dumpling or donut boiled in oil as we see in verse 7. The NAS says, “Now if your offering is a grain offering made in a pan, it shall be made of fine flour with oil.” The Hebrew there indicates something a little different as the New English Translation shows, “If your offering is a grain offering made in a pan [the NKJV calls it a “covered pan”, so it would be similar to a pot], it must be made of choice wheat flour deep fried in olive oil.” The final way this offering could be made was to bring roasted grain, as we see in verse 14.
Of particular interest to us is the kind of flour that was used. It is repeatedly referred to as “fine flour,” to be contrasted with roughly ground flour that would be more like corn meal. Some of the resources I have been using referred to this as “spun” flour to reflect how it was obtained. After the wheat was ground, it was put into a bag that allowed only the finest particles of flour to come out, and it was spun around in a larger container. The centrifugal force of the spinning would force the fine flour through the cloth, where it would be collected and spun again in a finer woven bag. Jewish tradition stipulated that the flour used in these offerings had to be spun 13 times!
So as we think of what this offering entailed, don‟t envision going to the pantry and getting out some flour, making it into a batter, frying it, and then bringing it to the tabernacle to be used as a grain offering. It was much more involved than that, and in keeping with the costly nature of a sacrifice. While the grain offering may not represent the financial sacrifice that a burnt offering represented, it did represent a significant sacrifice of your personal time.
In the grain offering we are introduced to an element not seen in the burnt offering, and we see it in verses two and three. “He shall then bring it [the fine flour] to Aaron's sons, the priests; and shall take from it his handful of its fine flour and of its oil with all of its frankincense. And the priest shall offer it up in smoke as its memorial portion on the altar, an offering by fire of a soothing aroma to the LORD. 3 'And the remainder of the grain offering belongs to Aaron and his sons: a thing most holy, of the offerings to the LORD by fire.” Only a portion of the sacrifice was put on the altar and burned, the rest of the offering went to the priest.
We will deal with this more fully when we look at the priesthood, but for now just understand that this was God‟s way of providing for the priesthood. The overarching principle is that since the “men of God,” or the priests, spent their days caring for the spiritual needs of the people of God, the people of God were to take care of the material needs of the priesthood.
Now, there were three special rules that applied to this sacrifice, found in verses 11 – 13. “No grain offering, which you bring to the LORD, shall be made with leaven, for you shall not offer up in smoke any leaven or any honey as an offering by fire to the LORD. As an offering of first fruits, you shall bring them to the LORD, but they shall not ascend for a soothing aroma on the altar. Every grain offering of yours, moreover, you shall season with salt, so that the salt of the covenant of your God shall not be lacking from your grain offering; with all your offerings you shall offer salt.”
The three rules were no leaven, no honey, and salt had to be added. Why the prohibition against leaven and honey? Leaven, or yeast as we know it, and honey were both used in fermentation. If you had some grape juice that you wanted to turn into wine, you added yeast and sugar, in the form of honey. If you had some grape juice you wanted to turn to vinegar, you added honey and let it ferment. But understand that there was nothing intrinsically evil or wrong with either of these ingredients. We know that because leaven could be used in the offering of firstfruits (v. 12), but it could not be used in an offering that was burned on the altar. So why the prohibition?
Remember that one of the unique elements of Leviticus is God‟s use of object lessons. He often took ordinary things to teach eternal truths, and we see this in the rejection of honey and leaven. What both of these substances were know for was their pervasive nature. In other words, a small amount affected the whole batch. One cup of sugar can ferment an entire gallon of kombucha. One tablespoon of yeast can double the size of a lump of dough. Honey and yeast don‟t stay contained – they spread. That is their nature, and it is because of this that leaven is often compared to sin. In both 1 Cor. 5 and Gal. 5, Paul makes the statement that “a little leaven leavens the whole lump of dough,” and he says it in the context of unrepentant sinful people in close proximity to God‟s people. He goes on to say, “clean out the old leaven so that you may be a new lump.” And then just to make sure they understood his point, he ends the chapter by saying, “Remove the wicked man from among yourselves.”
God‟s point with the prohibition is that these two elements, know for their spreading and corrupting influence (fermentation is a corruption of the original liquie), have no part in a holy sacrifice that is going to ascend to Him in smoke on an altar. God wants purity. He wants a perfect animal. He wants flour that has been refined, and refined, and refined to the point that it is pure and without any corrupting influences.
But what about salt though? Salt is so common to us today that it is meaningless, but salt used to be so rare that it was very valuable. Our word “salary” comes from the Latin salarium, which is a form of sal, or Latin for salt, and it is believed that at one time, Roman soldiers were paid in salt because it was so valuable. So in the days of the Old Testament, to add salt to a sacrifice was a costly thing to do, but it didn‟t end there because salt also had symbolic importance, much like leaven and honey. Salt, as we all know, is a preservative. It draws the moisture out of food to enable the food to last for long periods of time. This is why we have things like salt cured ham and salted fish.
I have cabbage in my basement that is salted and preserved. This summer, I‟d lay down a layer of shredded cabbage, salt it, and then pound it flat. Then another layer of cabbage and more salt and pounding. Then another layer of cabbage and salt and pounding. And eventually, the crock was full of the liquid that had been sucked out of the cabbage. You let it sit in that brine for three or four weeks, and you have sauerkraut that doesn‟t need refrigeration. Because of the salting, it is preserved. Salt stops the course of nature as living matter starts to break down and deteriorate.
That is the nature of salt – it is a preservative. Which is why as recently as a hundred years ago, salt was being used symbolically in Arabic cultures to seal deals and invoke a binding nature to an agreement. The two parties would sprinkle a little salt on the ground, and that made the agreement permanent. This helps us understand Num. 18:19 a little better. “All the offerings of the holy gifts, which the sons of Israel offer to the LORD, I have given to you and your sons and your daughters with you, as a perpetual allotment. [Now listen to how God describes these offerings.] [They are] an everlasting covenant of salt before the LORD to you and your descendants with you.” So to add salt to the offering was a symbolic gesture invoking permanence and incorruption.
Finally, the grain offering was another voluntary offering. Or as we described it last week, it was a free will offering. It was something you did at your own initiative, and it was usually offered at the same time of the burnt offering or peace offering, but could be offered all by itself. And in verse 2 we see that it was described as a “sweet savor” to the Lord. What is this “sweet savor” that described these first three offerings: the burnt, the grain, and the peace offering (the other category of offerings was the “non-sweet savor,” which were the sin and trespass offerings)? The best way to understand it is to think of it from the perspective of being “pleasing.” When you walk past a house where they are grilling something outside, you say, “m-m-m-m-m . . . that smells nice.” It is a pleasant smell, and God was pleased when His people would on their own initiative draw near to Him with a sacrifice.
I want to close this morning by pointing out one of the differences between the burnt offering and the grain offering. The burnt offering accomplished atonement, as we saw in 1:4. That means the person‟s sinfulness was covered up and he was acceptable to God. Note that the grain offering did not accomplish atonement! This means that the purpose behind this offering had nothing to do with wanting to be acceptable to God, it was all about appreciation for God. When your heart welled up with gratitude for everything God had done for you, you brought a grain offering. You weren‟t looking for anything from God. You weren‟t after acceptance, like in the burn offering. You weren‟t after peace, like in next week‟s peace offering. You were simply saying to God, “Thank you.”
Tuesday, January 25, 2011
Friday, January 21, 2011
The Burnt Offering
Studies in Leviticus
The Sacrificial System – How To Draw Near To God
The Burnt Offering -Lev. 1
I‟d like you to turn in your Bibles to Leviticus chapter 1, and this morning we are going to start our study of the Old Testament sacrificial system. As I explained to you last week, this is not only a legitimate use of our time since all of God‟s Word is “profitable” according to 1 Tim. 3:16, it is valuable because of how it will enhance our appreciation of not only Jesus (especially as we study the sacrificial system and the priesthood) and what He has done for us but also of the New Covenant and life under the stipulations of grace.
Quick review: The theme of Leviticus is “the holiness of God.” Holy means “separate, set apart, or sacred.” The opposite of holy is common. Paper plates and plastic utensils are common. They are mass produced, used once, and then thrown out. But fine china and silver are sacred. We set them apart in special cabinets with glass doors and soft lighting. Since God is holy, only holy people can be in fellowship with Him. It doesn‟t matter if you lived 4,000 years ago in Israel, 2,000 years ago in Jerusalem, or if you are alive today – only holy people can be in fellowship with a holy God. But because holiness is somewhat abstract, in the book of Leviticus, God gives the nation of Israel a way to visualize holiness (remember the concept of object lessons). In the Old Testament system, holiness could actually be measured and viewed. The sacrifices, the offerings, the priesthood, and the laws concerning clean and unclean all served to quantify holiness. If you did all the “stuff,” you could be in communion and fellowship with a holy God.
Finally, let‟s say our memory project together. “Then the LORD spoke to Moses, saying, „Speak to the sons of Israel and say to them, „I am the LORD your God. You shall not do what is done in the land of Egypt where you lived, nor are you to do what is done in the land of Canaan where I am bringing you; you shall not walk in their statutes. You are to perform My judgments and keep My statutes, to live in accord with them; I am the LORD your God. So you shall keep My statutes and My judgments, by which a man may live if he does them; I am the LORD.‟”
So if you aren‟t in Lev. 1, let‟s go there now and look at the first object lesson God lays out for His people - the sacrificial system. This consisted of five different types of offerings – a burnt offering, a grain offering, a peace offering, a sin offering, and a guilt (trespass) offering. As we go through these offerings, be aware that I will be using the terms “sacrifice” and “offering” interchangeably. The offerings, for the most part, were costly; so whether you view it from the perspective of an offering or a sacrifice, it is the same concept.
What is this first offering we see mentioned in verse 2 when God says, “ . . . when any man of you brings an offering to the Lord, you shall bring your offering of the animals from the herd or the flock?” Offerings and sacrifices weren‟t a new concept to God‟s people, they go back to the early days of God‟s interaction with man, as far back as Cain and Abel in Gen. 4. But in Leviticus we see for the first time a systematic, comprehensive set of guidelines for the offerings / sacrifices. The word that is translated as “offering” has the basic idea of “drawing near.” So if the people wanted to “draw near” to their God, the sacrifices / offerings enabled them to do it. But to really appreciate what it meant to the Children of Israel to have a means of drawing near to God, we have to contrast it with Ex. 19. Let‟s turn there and see what the relationship between God and Israel was like when God gave the 10 Commandments.
10 And the LORD said to Moses, "Go to the people and consecrate them today and tomorrow. Have them wash their clothes
11 and be ready by the third day, because on that day the LORD will come down on Mount Sinai in the sight of all the people.
12 Put limits for the people around the mountain and tell them, 'Be careful that you do not go up the mountain or touch the foot of it. Whoever touches the mountain shall surely be put to death.
13 He shall surely be stoned or shot with arrows; not a hand is to be laid on him. Whether man or animal, he shall not be permitted to live.' Only when the ram's horn sounds a long blast may they go up to the mountain."
16 On the morning of the third day there was thunder and lightning, with a thick cloud over the mountain, and a very loud trumpet blast. Everyone in the camp trembled.
17 Then Moses led the people out of the camp to meet with God, and they stood at the foot of the mountain.
18 Mount Sinai was covered with smoke, because the LORD descended on it in fire. The smoke billowed up from it like smoke from a furnace, the whole mountain trembled violently,
19 and the sound of the trumpet grew louder and louder. Then Moses spoke and the voice of God answered him.
20 The LORD descended to the top of Mount Sinai and called Moses to the top of the mountain. So Moses went up
21 and the LORD said to him, "Go down and warn the people so they do not force their way through to see the LORD and many of them perish.
22 Even the priests, who approach the LORD, must consecrate themselves, or the LORD will break out against them."
23 Moses said to the LORD, "The people cannot come up Mount Sinai, because you yourself warned us, 'Put limits around the mountain and set it apart as holy.' "
How accessible was God in this chapter? Not very! In fact, if they got too close, they paid for it with their lives! What we need to appreciate is that that dynamic changed drastically in Leviticus when God laid out a program for them to utilize so they could get near to God without dying – and it started with the sacrifices. So that is the idea behind the word “offering,” it was a means by which people could “draw near” to God.
Now the first of these five offerings is referred to as a “burnt” offering. Read verse three again with me. “If his offering is a burnt offering from the heard, he shall offer it, a male without defect; he shall offer it at the doorway of the tent of meeting; that he may be accepted before the Lord.” Then in verse 10 we read, “If his offering is of the flocks – of the sheep or of the goats – as a burnt sacrifice . . .” and in verse 13, “And if the burnt sacrifice of his offering to the Lord is of birds . . .” Let me give you six particulars about this offering, some of them are unique to the burnt offering, some of them are held in common by others.
First of all, the burnt offering was a voluntary offering. If you are using a King James version of the Bible this comes out a little more clearly because it uses the phrase in verse three, “he shall offer it of his own free will.” This presents a little bit of a problem when you compare it to the NAS and the NIV which say the offering is so that “he may be accepted before the Lord.” Is it a “freewill offering,” or is it an “acceptable” offering? This difference in translation illustrates the complexity of translating Hebrew. The literal translation of this verse is, “If burnt offering gift from the herd, male, perfect, bring near toward the entrance of the tent of meeting to offer _____________________ before the Lord.”
There is no question about the word itself, it is the word ratzone, and it‟s translated in a variety of ways - “goodwill, favor, acceptance, desire, pleasure” and “to do as you please” or “to do as you desire.” So, which idea do you go with? Is the author‟s emphasis on the person bringing the sacrifice (“freewill”), or is it on the nature of the sacrifice (“acceptable”)? Both translations are legitimate as well as defensible, but I lean toward the idea of “freewill” – “He shall offer it of his own free will.”
The reason I believe this is because as you study the burnt offerings, there was no external compulsion requiring a person to do this. It was a voluntary offering. There are no rules specifying how often a person had to do this (though there were regulations mandating how often the nation had to do it), or what circumstances would require a burnt offering. The burnt offering was not like the sin offering of chapter four and the trespass offering of chapter five which covered known sins or even potential sins. In those cases, when you knew you had broken the rules, you made the sacrifice. But the burnt offering was done at the discretion of the one doing it. It was simply an expression of his desire to draw near to the Lord and be pleasing to God.
Second, it was costly. Think about what sacrificing a bull did to your net worth! There is a reason why the burnt offering was a “sacrifice.” Kind David expressed this truth when he offered a burnt offering that was offered to him for free. He said, “No, but I will surely buy it from you for a price, for I will not offer burnt offerings to the Lord my God which cost me nothing.” So David bought the threshing floor and the oxen for fifty shekels of silver.” The burnt offering was a costly, voluntary offering.
But you didn‟t have to be wealthy to bring this offering. If you weren’t wealthy, according to verse 10 you could bring a sheep or a goat, or if you were even poorer still, according to verse 14 you could bring a dove or a pigeon. The principle here is that your offering was according to your ability.
Third, it was narrow. What I mean by this is that not only were the guidelines very precise about the condition of the animal (male and without blemish), there was a limited number of animals you could choose from for the offering. The guidelines were very narrow. If you had a valuable horse you wanted to sacrifice, you couldn‟t give it! If you really wanted to make a sacrificial burnt offering to the Lord and wanted to sacrifice one of your valuable camels, you couldn‟t do it. You also couldn‟t sacrifice donkeys. Why were these valuable animals off the list of acceptable sacrifices, especially in light of how nicely they fit the bill of being costly to the giver? Because horses, donkeys, and camels were not only unclean, but also they were used by the pagans in their sacrificial systems! That is significant.
In this act, God is establishing a very clear division between His people and the pagan culture they were surrounded by. Let that phrase sink in. This is a timeless principle I want you to keep in the back of your mind because we are going to see it over and over in this book, and at some point we‟ll stop and look at how it plays out in our daily lives.
But for now, just remember the theme of Leviticus – God is holy, and He can be approached only in the way He prescribes. Just because you think you have something of value you can offer to God doesn‟t mean a thing. You can only give to God what He prescribes. And just to make sure we get the point, in Lev. 10, right after God lays out all the stipulations for fellowship with Him through the offerings and the priesthood, two priests got it in their mind to approach God in their own way and they paid for it with their lives! It is a very narrow path God had for His people.
Fourth, it was comprehensive. This particular offering is referred to as a “burnt” offering. The word “burnt” means “ascent,” and refers to the smoke that ascended toward heaven, but more than that, the entire animal was consumed by the fire. None of the animal being sacrificed was kept back for the priest, like some of the other offerings - the entire animal was consumed. This was different from the sin and guilt offerings because some of the animal in those offerings was carted out of the camp and burned outside the camp, but not in the case of this burnt offering. The one bringing it could stand there and watch the entire animal go up in smoke. There was nothing left.
In addition to this, you couldn‟t bring part of the animal and sacrifice it. Again, in contrast to the next two offerings, you could bring a portion and sacrifice it – but not with the burnt offering. You couldn‟t just throw a hindquarter up there and let that be your offering – it was the whole animal. And again, hold on to this thought because there is an important principle being illustrated here and we will be revisiting it.
Fifth, it was a substitutionary offering. Before we look at verse four where we see this matter of substitution, we need to go back to the Garden of Eden and recall God‟s actions when Adam and Eve sinned. What did God do in response to their sin? He killed an innocent animal and made clothing for them. In that act was established an eternal principle – sin is absolved only by the shedding of blood. The way the NT puts it is that “the wages of sin is death.” Any time you have sin, death follows. It doesn‟t matter if it was in the garden of Eden, or in the desert of Sinai, or in the days of Jesus, or this morning – there is an eternal principle that death always follows sin.
With that understanding, in verse 4 we read that the person bringing the sacrifice put his hand on the animal‟s head when he brought it to the door of the tabernacle. What was he doing? This was a symbolic gesture that transferred his sinfulness to the innocent animal. Why did he do this? Because blood had to be spilled! The offending, guilty party who could not draw near to God because of his sinfulness passed that guilt on to an innocent party, and then the innocent animal died instead of the one who deserved to die. And in that act, because of the blood being spilled, the person was brought into fellowship with his God. The bull or the goat was a substitutionary sacrifice.
Sixth, it was bloody. As we go through these sacrifices, you see blood everywhere. The blood was caught in a basin, and the, depending on the sacrifice, it was either sprinkled around the door, or poured out at the side of the altar, or poured on the four corners of the altar. We don‟t really appreciate how bloody this area was until we think about the size of the nation and realize that these offerings were taking place multiple times every day. God was making a very graphic point to His people, and that was that sin has serious consequences.
And seventh, it atoned for the sins of the one bringing the sacrifice as we see in verse 4. The word “atone” means “to cover.” In the Old Testament sense of the word, it doesn‟t mean to remove, only to cover. If I had a vase up here on the podium with me and threw a blanket over it, you would no longer be able to see it because it would be covered. Would the vase still be there? Sure. But it is only covered up. That is how we need to understand the idea of “atone” in these sacrifices. The sin was no longer visible to God because it was covered by the sacrifice, hence it no longer stood between the sinful person and the holy God. The holy God could be drawn near to.
I want us to close by looking at a short phrase in verse five. “And he shall slay the young bull before the Lord.” One of the dimensions of this sacrifice that we tend to overlook is that the person bringing the offering had to kill the animal himself. It didn‟t matter if you were squeamish about blood or not – you put the animal to death. Not only did you transfer your sinfulness to the animal through laying your hands on it, you were the means of its death. Let that sink in a moment - you were both the cause and the instrument of an innocent animal‟s death.
Several years ago Mel Gibson produced the very graphic movie The Passion of the Christ, and it is my understanding that when the part was being shot of the nails being pounded through Jesus‟ hands, it was a close-up and all you could see in the frame was Jesus‟ hand and the hands of a Roman soldier holding the hammer and spike. Guess which actor on the set was holding the hammer and spikes? Mel Gibson‟s!
That illustrates to me the reality of the burnt offering. That animal died at the hands of the sinner bringing it to the altar. He couldn‟t pass that off to the priest standing by. If it was a bird you were sacrificing, you ripped it in half with your own hands. There was nothing delicate about this offering – it was brutal and bloody! As we close in prayer, would you take a moment to reflect on the truth that Jesus was a burnt offering? Not that He burned, but when you think about the seven dimensions of the burnt offering, every one of them applies to Jesus.
It was voluntary
It was costly
It was narrow
It was comprehensive
It was substitutionary
It was bloody
It was atoning
And whose hands put Him to death?
The Sacrificial System – How To Draw Near To God
The Burnt Offering -Lev. 1
I‟d like you to turn in your Bibles to Leviticus chapter 1, and this morning we are going to start our study of the Old Testament sacrificial system. As I explained to you last week, this is not only a legitimate use of our time since all of God‟s Word is “profitable” according to 1 Tim. 3:16, it is valuable because of how it will enhance our appreciation of not only Jesus (especially as we study the sacrificial system and the priesthood) and what He has done for us but also of the New Covenant and life under the stipulations of grace.
Quick review: The theme of Leviticus is “the holiness of God.” Holy means “separate, set apart, or sacred.” The opposite of holy is common. Paper plates and plastic utensils are common. They are mass produced, used once, and then thrown out. But fine china and silver are sacred. We set them apart in special cabinets with glass doors and soft lighting. Since God is holy, only holy people can be in fellowship with Him. It doesn‟t matter if you lived 4,000 years ago in Israel, 2,000 years ago in Jerusalem, or if you are alive today – only holy people can be in fellowship with a holy God. But because holiness is somewhat abstract, in the book of Leviticus, God gives the nation of Israel a way to visualize holiness (remember the concept of object lessons). In the Old Testament system, holiness could actually be measured and viewed. The sacrifices, the offerings, the priesthood, and the laws concerning clean and unclean all served to quantify holiness. If you did all the “stuff,” you could be in communion and fellowship with a holy God.
Finally, let‟s say our memory project together. “Then the LORD spoke to Moses, saying, „Speak to the sons of Israel and say to them, „I am the LORD your God. You shall not do what is done in the land of Egypt where you lived, nor are you to do what is done in the land of Canaan where I am bringing you; you shall not walk in their statutes. You are to perform My judgments and keep My statutes, to live in accord with them; I am the LORD your God. So you shall keep My statutes and My judgments, by which a man may live if he does them; I am the LORD.‟”
So if you aren‟t in Lev. 1, let‟s go there now and look at the first object lesson God lays out for His people - the sacrificial system. This consisted of five different types of offerings – a burnt offering, a grain offering, a peace offering, a sin offering, and a guilt (trespass) offering. As we go through these offerings, be aware that I will be using the terms “sacrifice” and “offering” interchangeably. The offerings, for the most part, were costly; so whether you view it from the perspective of an offering or a sacrifice, it is the same concept.
What is this first offering we see mentioned in verse 2 when God says, “ . . . when any man of you brings an offering to the Lord, you shall bring your offering of the animals from the herd or the flock?” Offerings and sacrifices weren‟t a new concept to God‟s people, they go back to the early days of God‟s interaction with man, as far back as Cain and Abel in Gen. 4. But in Leviticus we see for the first time a systematic, comprehensive set of guidelines for the offerings / sacrifices. The word that is translated as “offering” has the basic idea of “drawing near.” So if the people wanted to “draw near” to their God, the sacrifices / offerings enabled them to do it. But to really appreciate what it meant to the Children of Israel to have a means of drawing near to God, we have to contrast it with Ex. 19. Let‟s turn there and see what the relationship between God and Israel was like when God gave the 10 Commandments.
10 And the LORD said to Moses, "Go to the people and consecrate them today and tomorrow. Have them wash their clothes
11 and be ready by the third day, because on that day the LORD will come down on Mount Sinai in the sight of all the people.
12 Put limits for the people around the mountain and tell them, 'Be careful that you do not go up the mountain or touch the foot of it. Whoever touches the mountain shall surely be put to death.
13 He shall surely be stoned or shot with arrows; not a hand is to be laid on him. Whether man or animal, he shall not be permitted to live.' Only when the ram's horn sounds a long blast may they go up to the mountain."
16 On the morning of the third day there was thunder and lightning, with a thick cloud over the mountain, and a very loud trumpet blast. Everyone in the camp trembled.
17 Then Moses led the people out of the camp to meet with God, and they stood at the foot of the mountain.
18 Mount Sinai was covered with smoke, because the LORD descended on it in fire. The smoke billowed up from it like smoke from a furnace, the whole mountain trembled violently,
19 and the sound of the trumpet grew louder and louder. Then Moses spoke and the voice of God answered him.
20 The LORD descended to the top of Mount Sinai and called Moses to the top of the mountain. So Moses went up
21 and the LORD said to him, "Go down and warn the people so they do not force their way through to see the LORD and many of them perish.
22 Even the priests, who approach the LORD, must consecrate themselves, or the LORD will break out against them."
23 Moses said to the LORD, "The people cannot come up Mount Sinai, because you yourself warned us, 'Put limits around the mountain and set it apart as holy.' "
How accessible was God in this chapter? Not very! In fact, if they got too close, they paid for it with their lives! What we need to appreciate is that that dynamic changed drastically in Leviticus when God laid out a program for them to utilize so they could get near to God without dying – and it started with the sacrifices. So that is the idea behind the word “offering,” it was a means by which people could “draw near” to God.
Now the first of these five offerings is referred to as a “burnt” offering. Read verse three again with me. “If his offering is a burnt offering from the heard, he shall offer it, a male without defect; he shall offer it at the doorway of the tent of meeting; that he may be accepted before the Lord.” Then in verse 10 we read, “If his offering is of the flocks – of the sheep or of the goats – as a burnt sacrifice . . .” and in verse 13, “And if the burnt sacrifice of his offering to the Lord is of birds . . .” Let me give you six particulars about this offering, some of them are unique to the burnt offering, some of them are held in common by others.
First of all, the burnt offering was a voluntary offering. If you are using a King James version of the Bible this comes out a little more clearly because it uses the phrase in verse three, “he shall offer it of his own free will.” This presents a little bit of a problem when you compare it to the NAS and the NIV which say the offering is so that “he may be accepted before the Lord.” Is it a “freewill offering,” or is it an “acceptable” offering? This difference in translation illustrates the complexity of translating Hebrew. The literal translation of this verse is, “If burnt offering gift from the herd, male, perfect, bring near toward the entrance of the tent of meeting to offer _____________________ before the Lord.”
There is no question about the word itself, it is the word ratzone, and it‟s translated in a variety of ways - “goodwill, favor, acceptance, desire, pleasure” and “to do as you please” or “to do as you desire.” So, which idea do you go with? Is the author‟s emphasis on the person bringing the sacrifice (“freewill”), or is it on the nature of the sacrifice (“acceptable”)? Both translations are legitimate as well as defensible, but I lean toward the idea of “freewill” – “He shall offer it of his own free will.”
The reason I believe this is because as you study the burnt offerings, there was no external compulsion requiring a person to do this. It was a voluntary offering. There are no rules specifying how often a person had to do this (though there were regulations mandating how often the nation had to do it), or what circumstances would require a burnt offering. The burnt offering was not like the sin offering of chapter four and the trespass offering of chapter five which covered known sins or even potential sins. In those cases, when you knew you had broken the rules, you made the sacrifice. But the burnt offering was done at the discretion of the one doing it. It was simply an expression of his desire to draw near to the Lord and be pleasing to God.
Second, it was costly. Think about what sacrificing a bull did to your net worth! There is a reason why the burnt offering was a “sacrifice.” Kind David expressed this truth when he offered a burnt offering that was offered to him for free. He said, “No, but I will surely buy it from you for a price, for I will not offer burnt offerings to the Lord my God which cost me nothing.” So David bought the threshing floor and the oxen for fifty shekels of silver.” The burnt offering was a costly, voluntary offering.
But you didn‟t have to be wealthy to bring this offering. If you weren’t wealthy, according to verse 10 you could bring a sheep or a goat, or if you were even poorer still, according to verse 14 you could bring a dove or a pigeon. The principle here is that your offering was according to your ability.
Third, it was narrow. What I mean by this is that not only were the guidelines very precise about the condition of the animal (male and without blemish), there was a limited number of animals you could choose from for the offering. The guidelines were very narrow. If you had a valuable horse you wanted to sacrifice, you couldn‟t give it! If you really wanted to make a sacrificial burnt offering to the Lord and wanted to sacrifice one of your valuable camels, you couldn‟t do it. You also couldn‟t sacrifice donkeys. Why were these valuable animals off the list of acceptable sacrifices, especially in light of how nicely they fit the bill of being costly to the giver? Because horses, donkeys, and camels were not only unclean, but also they were used by the pagans in their sacrificial systems! That is significant.
In this act, God is establishing a very clear division between His people and the pagan culture they were surrounded by. Let that phrase sink in. This is a timeless principle I want you to keep in the back of your mind because we are going to see it over and over in this book, and at some point we‟ll stop and look at how it plays out in our daily lives.
But for now, just remember the theme of Leviticus – God is holy, and He can be approached only in the way He prescribes. Just because you think you have something of value you can offer to God doesn‟t mean a thing. You can only give to God what He prescribes. And just to make sure we get the point, in Lev. 10, right after God lays out all the stipulations for fellowship with Him through the offerings and the priesthood, two priests got it in their mind to approach God in their own way and they paid for it with their lives! It is a very narrow path God had for His people.
Fourth, it was comprehensive. This particular offering is referred to as a “burnt” offering. The word “burnt” means “ascent,” and refers to the smoke that ascended toward heaven, but more than that, the entire animal was consumed by the fire. None of the animal being sacrificed was kept back for the priest, like some of the other offerings - the entire animal was consumed. This was different from the sin and guilt offerings because some of the animal in those offerings was carted out of the camp and burned outside the camp, but not in the case of this burnt offering. The one bringing it could stand there and watch the entire animal go up in smoke. There was nothing left.
In addition to this, you couldn‟t bring part of the animal and sacrifice it. Again, in contrast to the next two offerings, you could bring a portion and sacrifice it – but not with the burnt offering. You couldn‟t just throw a hindquarter up there and let that be your offering – it was the whole animal. And again, hold on to this thought because there is an important principle being illustrated here and we will be revisiting it.
Fifth, it was a substitutionary offering. Before we look at verse four where we see this matter of substitution, we need to go back to the Garden of Eden and recall God‟s actions when Adam and Eve sinned. What did God do in response to their sin? He killed an innocent animal and made clothing for them. In that act was established an eternal principle – sin is absolved only by the shedding of blood. The way the NT puts it is that “the wages of sin is death.” Any time you have sin, death follows. It doesn‟t matter if it was in the garden of Eden, or in the desert of Sinai, or in the days of Jesus, or this morning – there is an eternal principle that death always follows sin.
With that understanding, in verse 4 we read that the person bringing the sacrifice put his hand on the animal‟s head when he brought it to the door of the tabernacle. What was he doing? This was a symbolic gesture that transferred his sinfulness to the innocent animal. Why did he do this? Because blood had to be spilled! The offending, guilty party who could not draw near to God because of his sinfulness passed that guilt on to an innocent party, and then the innocent animal died instead of the one who deserved to die. And in that act, because of the blood being spilled, the person was brought into fellowship with his God. The bull or the goat was a substitutionary sacrifice.
Sixth, it was bloody. As we go through these sacrifices, you see blood everywhere. The blood was caught in a basin, and the, depending on the sacrifice, it was either sprinkled around the door, or poured out at the side of the altar, or poured on the four corners of the altar. We don‟t really appreciate how bloody this area was until we think about the size of the nation and realize that these offerings were taking place multiple times every day. God was making a very graphic point to His people, and that was that sin has serious consequences.
And seventh, it atoned for the sins of the one bringing the sacrifice as we see in verse 4. The word “atone” means “to cover.” In the Old Testament sense of the word, it doesn‟t mean to remove, only to cover. If I had a vase up here on the podium with me and threw a blanket over it, you would no longer be able to see it because it would be covered. Would the vase still be there? Sure. But it is only covered up. That is how we need to understand the idea of “atone” in these sacrifices. The sin was no longer visible to God because it was covered by the sacrifice, hence it no longer stood between the sinful person and the holy God. The holy God could be drawn near to.
I want us to close by looking at a short phrase in verse five. “And he shall slay the young bull before the Lord.” One of the dimensions of this sacrifice that we tend to overlook is that the person bringing the offering had to kill the animal himself. It didn‟t matter if you were squeamish about blood or not – you put the animal to death. Not only did you transfer your sinfulness to the animal through laying your hands on it, you were the means of its death. Let that sink in a moment - you were both the cause and the instrument of an innocent animal‟s death.
Several years ago Mel Gibson produced the very graphic movie The Passion of the Christ, and it is my understanding that when the part was being shot of the nails being pounded through Jesus‟ hands, it was a close-up and all you could see in the frame was Jesus‟ hand and the hands of a Roman soldier holding the hammer and spike. Guess which actor on the set was holding the hammer and spikes? Mel Gibson‟s!
That illustrates to me the reality of the burnt offering. That animal died at the hands of the sinner bringing it to the altar. He couldn‟t pass that off to the priest standing by. If it was a bird you were sacrificing, you ripped it in half with your own hands. There was nothing delicate about this offering – it was brutal and bloody! As we close in prayer, would you take a moment to reflect on the truth that Jesus was a burnt offering? Not that He burned, but when you think about the seven dimensions of the burnt offering, every one of them applies to Jesus.
It was voluntary
It was costly
It was narrow
It was comprehensive
It was substitutionary
It was bloody
It was atoning
And whose hands put Him to death?
Introduction to Leviticus
Studies in Leviticus
Leviticus is not an easy book to read. One of the first things you will notice as you read the book that there is lots of repetition about things we don‟t do, nor are we expected or required to do them! Sacrifices, clean and unclean food, rituals for childbirth, priests, rituals for leprosy, rituals for death, feasts, rituals for mildew, rituals for offerings, and on and on the list goes.
Between the repetition and the emphasis on the culturally distant, at first glance there doesn't seem to be much there to hold our attention - much less apply to our daily lives. However, there are messages in these 27 chapters that are of great importance to us.
Leviticus in a Nutshell
The theme of Leviticus is “the holiness of God.” The word “holy” is used 57 times, and generally speaking, holy means “sacred,” “separate,” or “set apart.” That may be a little vague, so let‟s look at it this way. Holy is the opposite of common. If we were to apply it to dishes; paper plates, Styrofoam, and plastic utensils would be “common;” and fine china, crystal, and genuine silver utensils would be “sacred,” or “set apart,” or even “holy.” That is the root idea behind “holy.” Unfortunately, holiness is an abstract idea. If you were to ask three different people to describe it, you would most likely get three different answers.
Because of this, in the book of Leviticus, God gives His chosen people a series of object lesson that quantify holiness. In other words, He makes it tangible – it is attainable. So even though God is separate and not common (holy), by following the object lessons of Leviticus, God could be approached and communed with. The distant God could be brought near.
One other thing to remember about Leviticus is that it is very closely connected with Exodus. In Exodus, God chooses, delivers, miraculously provides for, and establishes Israel as a nation. The book ends with the people building a tabernacle to house God‟s glory, and in Ex. 40:34 we read that God filled the tabernacle with His glory, visible proof that God was near and present.
But that is only half the formula because now the sinful, unholy, rebellious people, separated from a holy God, needed access to their God. How could they do that? There were two critical things that had to happen. First of all, they had to be made aware of their sin. They had to know what was acceptable and what was unacceptable. And second, they had to then have a way to deal with that sin. Everything you read in the book of Leviticus has these two issues as their foundation – the knowledge of sin and then its antidote (cf. touching a dead body). We know this is true because of what Paul tells us explicitly in Rom. 3:20 when he says, “for through the law comes the knowledge of sin.” He then elaborates on that in Gal. 3:24 when he says, “Therefore the Law has become our tutor [education] to lead us to Christ [antidote], that we may be justified by faith.”
Memory Project: Lev. 18:1-5
Then the LORD spoke to Moses, saying, “Speak to the sons of Israel and say to them, „I am the LORD your God. You shall not do what is done in the land of Egypt where you lived, nor are you to do what is done in the land of Canaan where I am bringing you; you shall not walk in their statutes. You are to perform My judgments and keep My statutes, to live in accord with them; I am the LORD your God. So you shall keep My statutes and My judgments, by which a man may live if he does them; I am the LORD.‟”
Schematic of the book:
Chapters 1-16: How To Obtain Fellowship With God – Purification
Chs. 1-7: The sacrificial system – “how to draw near to God”
Chs. 8-10: The priestly system – “the mediators between God and man”
Chs. 11-15: The fellowship system – “clean versus unclean”
Ch. 16: The Day of Atonement – “the annual removal of sin”
Chapters 17-25: How To Maintain Fellowship With God – Sanctification
Chs. 17-20: Concerning daily living
Chs. 21-22: Concerning the priesthood
Chs. 23-24: Concerning the feasts
Ch. 25: Concerning the sabbatical and jubilee years
Summary of section #1 – sacrifice and purification culminate in atonement atonement
Summary of section #2 – sanctification culminates in rest
Chapters 26-27: Appendices
Ch. 26: Blessings for obedience and punishments for disobedience
Ch. 27: Guidelines concerning vows
Warnings about Leviticus
The follower of Christ today is faced with a tricky situation when he starts to interpret and apply the book of Leviticus. We acknowledge with Paul in 2 Tim. 3:16 that “all scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable.” We also acknowledge with Paul in 1 Cor. 10 that all the things that are recorded for us in the OT “happened to them as an example, and they were written for our instruction.” But what do we do with all the regulations in Leviticus? Do they apply to us today? Do we have to follow them? If so, why, and if not, why not?
Here is the principle I want you to keep in mind as we go through this book. We can‟t confuse the object lesson with the spiritual reality it represents. Let me say it again. We can‟t confuse the object lesson with the spiritual reality it represents. In the book of Leviticus, the visible and tangible always points toward the invisible and intangible. The physical leaven / yeast that grows and permeates the entire loaf of bread is an object lesson that illustrates the nature of sin (1 Cor. 5 and Gal. 5). Yeast is not intrinsically evil. The meat of the young goat boiled in it‟s mother‟s milk is an object lesson only. There is a bigger spiritual reality that God was drawing their attention to. It‟s not like something happened to the goat meat at the molecular level if it was boiled in it‟s own mother‟s milk that didn‟t happen if it was boiled in some other goat‟s milk.
How do we know that is true? Because of what Jesus said in Mt. 5:17-18. “Do not think that I came to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I did not come to abolish, but to fulfill. 18 "For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or stroke shall pass away from the Law, until all is accomplished.” Circle the words “fulfill” and “accomplish.” “Fulfill” means “to give the complete or true meaning of something.” It means “to provide the true significance of something.” The word “accomplished” means “to come into existence,” and indicates that something was missing, it is still outstanding. What this tells us is that the law in its Old Testament form was incomplete. It was insufficient. It was missing something. The way the author of Hebrews puts it in chapter 8 is that the priesthood and legal system served as “a copy and shadow of the heavenly things.” Remember, the physical points to the spiritual. He goes on to say in verse 7, “For if that first covenant had been faultless, there would have been no occasion for a second.” That is strong language! And then he ends the chapter in verse 13 by saying, “When He said, „A new covenant,‟ He has made the first obsolete.” The point is that eventually, the object lessons lost their value. They are not for us today.
What I want you to remember as we go through this wonderful book is that if you focus too closely on the particulars, you will miss the big picture. If you look at all the dietary laws and all you see are principle for healthy eating, you have just missed the point. There is something bigger going on. I have a pastor friend who lives in Red Hook, and he was telling me about his friend‟s house on Long Island. Apparently it was on the beach and had an amazing view, and the entire house was built around the great room that had a 7‟ X 11‟ window looking out at the bay. He would bring guests to this window and encourage them to just stand there and soak it in.
Let‟s say that I am the guest and he has just brought me into the great room, and we are standing there in front of the window and there is a gorgeous sunset – I mean the sky is on fire and there is a palette of colors in the sky no human could ever reproduce. And I walk up to the window and say, “Did you use cherry to trim this window out?” He says “yes, but look at that sky!” So I say, “This is incredible woodwork. Did you mill it yourself, or have it custom built?” He says, “I milled it myself, but look at this sunset. Have you ever seen such beautiful colors?” So I say, “I can‟t believe the patina on this wood. How did you get it? Did you use beeswax, or linseed oil?” He says, “It‟s neither – it‟s just matte varnish, but you really need to see this sunset before it is gone.” So I say, “How did you attach it to the wall? I don‟t see any nail holes – did you glue it up?” And he says, “No, I worked really hard to make sure the putty was an exact match.” Wouldn‟t that be sad? Yes, the woodwork is beautiful and intricate, but that is nothing compared to the sunset.
And that is the danger we need to be on the lookout for as we study the book of Leviticus – focusing on the particulars and not the big picture. Do people do this today? Absolutely! In my opinion, this is the weakness of the entire Messianic Jewish movement – a fascination with the Old Testament ritual which Jesus, Paul, and the author of Hebrews all said was deficient. There are women who will not be intimate with their husbands for 40 days after they give birth to a male child, and they won‟t be intimate for 80 days after the birth of a female child – because of the prohibitions in Leviticus. There are people who won‟t eat shrimp because of the prohibition in Leviticus. Are these sinful things? No, but they are illustrative of a deficient understanding of the whole of scripture. We have to be very careful about focusing on the woodwork around the window and missing the beautiful sunset.
Why did God see fit to include Leviticus in our Bible, especially since its focus is on a system of approaching God that is no longer relevant? Three reasons come to mind.
First of all, Leviticus reveals a holy God who can be approached only in the way He prescribes. You cannot come to God on your own terms. I don‟t care how smart you are, or how logical or illogical you think the Bible is, if you want to have a relationship with God, you are going to have to do it His way! That is the sunset we are going to be focusing on.
Secondly, Leviticus beautifully and simply illustrates complex spiritual truths. For instance, when Jesus died on the cross, He was taking care of our sins. Expressed that way, it doesn‟t say a lot. But when we study the scapegoat that was released into an uninhabited wilderness on the day of Atonement – what Jesus did with my sins when He was on the cross suddenly comes alive.
Finally, Leviticus forces us to have a greater appreciation of the New Covenant, enacted at Calvary, that conclusively deals with sin. My love for Jesus and His grace and the sufficiency of His sacrifice is fueled by and in proportion to my awareness of the ponderous, complex, deficient, Mosaic system.
Leviticus is not an easy book to read. One of the first things you will notice as you read the book that there is lots of repetition about things we don‟t do, nor are we expected or required to do them! Sacrifices, clean and unclean food, rituals for childbirth, priests, rituals for leprosy, rituals for death, feasts, rituals for mildew, rituals for offerings, and on and on the list goes.
Between the repetition and the emphasis on the culturally distant, at first glance there doesn't seem to be much there to hold our attention - much less apply to our daily lives. However, there are messages in these 27 chapters that are of great importance to us.
Leviticus in a Nutshell
The theme of Leviticus is “the holiness of God.” The word “holy” is used 57 times, and generally speaking, holy means “sacred,” “separate,” or “set apart.” That may be a little vague, so let‟s look at it this way. Holy is the opposite of common. If we were to apply it to dishes; paper plates, Styrofoam, and plastic utensils would be “common;” and fine china, crystal, and genuine silver utensils would be “sacred,” or “set apart,” or even “holy.” That is the root idea behind “holy.” Unfortunately, holiness is an abstract idea. If you were to ask three different people to describe it, you would most likely get three different answers.
Because of this, in the book of Leviticus, God gives His chosen people a series of object lesson that quantify holiness. In other words, He makes it tangible – it is attainable. So even though God is separate and not common (holy), by following the object lessons of Leviticus, God could be approached and communed with. The distant God could be brought near.
One other thing to remember about Leviticus is that it is very closely connected with Exodus. In Exodus, God chooses, delivers, miraculously provides for, and establishes Israel as a nation. The book ends with the people building a tabernacle to house God‟s glory, and in Ex. 40:34 we read that God filled the tabernacle with His glory, visible proof that God was near and present.
But that is only half the formula because now the sinful, unholy, rebellious people, separated from a holy God, needed access to their God. How could they do that? There were two critical things that had to happen. First of all, they had to be made aware of their sin. They had to know what was acceptable and what was unacceptable. And second, they had to then have a way to deal with that sin. Everything you read in the book of Leviticus has these two issues as their foundation – the knowledge of sin and then its antidote (cf. touching a dead body). We know this is true because of what Paul tells us explicitly in Rom. 3:20 when he says, “for through the law comes the knowledge of sin.” He then elaborates on that in Gal. 3:24 when he says, “Therefore the Law has become our tutor [education] to lead us to Christ [antidote], that we may be justified by faith.”
Memory Project: Lev. 18:1-5
Then the LORD spoke to Moses, saying, “Speak to the sons of Israel and say to them, „I am the LORD your God. You shall not do what is done in the land of Egypt where you lived, nor are you to do what is done in the land of Canaan where I am bringing you; you shall not walk in their statutes. You are to perform My judgments and keep My statutes, to live in accord with them; I am the LORD your God. So you shall keep My statutes and My judgments, by which a man may live if he does them; I am the LORD.‟”
Schematic of the book:
Chapters 1-16: How To Obtain Fellowship With God – Purification
Chs. 1-7: The sacrificial system – “how to draw near to God”
Chs. 8-10: The priestly system – “the mediators between God and man”
Chs. 11-15: The fellowship system – “clean versus unclean”
Ch. 16: The Day of Atonement – “the annual removal of sin”
Chapters 17-25: How To Maintain Fellowship With God – Sanctification
Chs. 17-20: Concerning daily living
Chs. 21-22: Concerning the priesthood
Chs. 23-24: Concerning the feasts
Ch. 25: Concerning the sabbatical and jubilee years
Summary of section #1 – sacrifice and purification culminate in atonement atonement
Summary of section #2 – sanctification culminates in rest
Chapters 26-27: Appendices
Ch. 26: Blessings for obedience and punishments for disobedience
Ch. 27: Guidelines concerning vows
Warnings about Leviticus
The follower of Christ today is faced with a tricky situation when he starts to interpret and apply the book of Leviticus. We acknowledge with Paul in 2 Tim. 3:16 that “all scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable.” We also acknowledge with Paul in 1 Cor. 10 that all the things that are recorded for us in the OT “happened to them as an example, and they were written for our instruction.” But what do we do with all the regulations in Leviticus? Do they apply to us today? Do we have to follow them? If so, why, and if not, why not?
Here is the principle I want you to keep in mind as we go through this book. We can‟t confuse the object lesson with the spiritual reality it represents. Let me say it again. We can‟t confuse the object lesson with the spiritual reality it represents. In the book of Leviticus, the visible and tangible always points toward the invisible and intangible. The physical leaven / yeast that grows and permeates the entire loaf of bread is an object lesson that illustrates the nature of sin (1 Cor. 5 and Gal. 5). Yeast is not intrinsically evil. The meat of the young goat boiled in it‟s mother‟s milk is an object lesson only. There is a bigger spiritual reality that God was drawing their attention to. It‟s not like something happened to the goat meat at the molecular level if it was boiled in it‟s own mother‟s milk that didn‟t happen if it was boiled in some other goat‟s milk.
How do we know that is true? Because of what Jesus said in Mt. 5:17-18. “Do not think that I came to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I did not come to abolish, but to fulfill. 18 "For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or stroke shall pass away from the Law, until all is accomplished.” Circle the words “fulfill” and “accomplish.” “Fulfill” means “to give the complete or true meaning of something.” It means “to provide the true significance of something.” The word “accomplished” means “to come into existence,” and indicates that something was missing, it is still outstanding. What this tells us is that the law in its Old Testament form was incomplete. It was insufficient. It was missing something. The way the author of Hebrews puts it in chapter 8 is that the priesthood and legal system served as “a copy and shadow of the heavenly things.” Remember, the physical points to the spiritual. He goes on to say in verse 7, “For if that first covenant had been faultless, there would have been no occasion for a second.” That is strong language! And then he ends the chapter in verse 13 by saying, “When He said, „A new covenant,‟ He has made the first obsolete.” The point is that eventually, the object lessons lost their value. They are not for us today.
What I want you to remember as we go through this wonderful book is that if you focus too closely on the particulars, you will miss the big picture. If you look at all the dietary laws and all you see are principle for healthy eating, you have just missed the point. There is something bigger going on. I have a pastor friend who lives in Red Hook, and he was telling me about his friend‟s house on Long Island. Apparently it was on the beach and had an amazing view, and the entire house was built around the great room that had a 7‟ X 11‟ window looking out at the bay. He would bring guests to this window and encourage them to just stand there and soak it in.
Let‟s say that I am the guest and he has just brought me into the great room, and we are standing there in front of the window and there is a gorgeous sunset – I mean the sky is on fire and there is a palette of colors in the sky no human could ever reproduce. And I walk up to the window and say, “Did you use cherry to trim this window out?” He says “yes, but look at that sky!” So I say, “This is incredible woodwork. Did you mill it yourself, or have it custom built?” He says, “I milled it myself, but look at this sunset. Have you ever seen such beautiful colors?” So I say, “I can‟t believe the patina on this wood. How did you get it? Did you use beeswax, or linseed oil?” He says, “It‟s neither – it‟s just matte varnish, but you really need to see this sunset before it is gone.” So I say, “How did you attach it to the wall? I don‟t see any nail holes – did you glue it up?” And he says, “No, I worked really hard to make sure the putty was an exact match.” Wouldn‟t that be sad? Yes, the woodwork is beautiful and intricate, but that is nothing compared to the sunset.
And that is the danger we need to be on the lookout for as we study the book of Leviticus – focusing on the particulars and not the big picture. Do people do this today? Absolutely! In my opinion, this is the weakness of the entire Messianic Jewish movement – a fascination with the Old Testament ritual which Jesus, Paul, and the author of Hebrews all said was deficient. There are women who will not be intimate with their husbands for 40 days after they give birth to a male child, and they won‟t be intimate for 80 days after the birth of a female child – because of the prohibitions in Leviticus. There are people who won‟t eat shrimp because of the prohibition in Leviticus. Are these sinful things? No, but they are illustrative of a deficient understanding of the whole of scripture. We have to be very careful about focusing on the woodwork around the window and missing the beautiful sunset.
Why did God see fit to include Leviticus in our Bible, especially since its focus is on a system of approaching God that is no longer relevant? Three reasons come to mind.
First of all, Leviticus reveals a holy God who can be approached only in the way He prescribes. You cannot come to God on your own terms. I don‟t care how smart you are, or how logical or illogical you think the Bible is, if you want to have a relationship with God, you are going to have to do it His way! That is the sunset we are going to be focusing on.
Secondly, Leviticus beautifully and simply illustrates complex spiritual truths. For instance, when Jesus died on the cross, He was taking care of our sins. Expressed that way, it doesn‟t say a lot. But when we study the scapegoat that was released into an uninhabited wilderness on the day of Atonement – what Jesus did with my sins when He was on the cross suddenly comes alive.
Finally, Leviticus forces us to have a greater appreciation of the New Covenant, enacted at Calvary, that conclusively deals with sin. My love for Jesus and His grace and the sufficiency of His sacrifice is fueled by and in proportion to my awareness of the ponderous, complex, deficient, Mosaic system.
Monday, January 3, 2011
Structural Steel
Structural Steel
2 Cor. 4:6-10
I’d like you to turn to 2 Cor. 4 this morning, and I want to speak to you about structural steel. Structural steel is what large buildings and skyscrapers are constructed of. It is the skeleton that holds the entire structure together and erect. For thousands of years mankind was limited in the size and height of what he could build, but with the advent of steel, everything changed. Steel is easily and quickly manufactured whereas wood takes years to be replenished. Steel is stronger than wood, it doesn’t burn, and it’s more flexible and easier to use than stone. So when the steel smelting process was perfected by Bessemer in the late 1800’s, its easy to see why steel became such a huge industry and why architecture was changed forever.
What does structural steel have to do with you and me? Well, in the same way that steel gives strength and stability to buildings, we need something to give us strength and stability in our lives. Steel is what allows a skyscraper to flex and sway during a hurricane (sometimes as much as 3 – 5 feet) without collapsing. Steel is what keeps a submarine from imploding when it is under 1.25 metric tons of pressure per square centimeter on a deep dive.
I don’t know about you, but those ideas appeal to me, because you don’t have to be alive for very many years before you figure out that life can be hard. This is why we sing the song, “It’s not an easy road I am called on to travel, for many are the troubles we bear.” We struggle with our spouse, we struggle with our children, we are under pressure from our bosses, we deal with debilitating physical problems, we have too much month left at the end of the paycheck, we suffer from the decline of our culture and nation, we are faced with tragedy in the lives of those around us, and the list could go on and on. I heard recently about a young mother who swerved to avoid hitting a dear and had a terrible wreck. She will probably be in a coma for months, if not years, and then face extensive rehabilitation, if she ever revives. How is her husband and five children supposed to cope with that?
As Job puts it, “ . . . evil does not spring from the soil, and trouble does not sprout from the earth. People are born for trouble as readily as sparks fly up from a fire.” His point is that difficulty and trouble and suffering and hardship and pressure is inextricably entwined with the human experience. No one is exempt. So as followers of Christ, how are we supposed to handle the pressures and stresses of life that we don’t have any control over?
This is where structural steel comes into play, and the Apostle Paul refers to it in 2 Cor. 4:6-10.
6 For God, who said, "Let there be light in the darkness," has made this light shine in our hearts so we could know the glory of God that is seen in the face of Jesus Christ. 7 We now have this light shining in our hearts, but we ourselves are like fragile clay jars containing this great treasure. This makes it clear that our great power is from God, not from ourselves. 8 We are pressed on every side by troubles, but we are not crushed. We are perplexed, but not driven to despair. 9 We are hunted down, but never abandoned by God. We get knocked down, but we are not destroyed. 10 Through suffering, our bodies continue to share in the death of Jesus so that the life of Jesus may also be seen in our bodies.
Even though Paul doesn’t use the phrase “structural steel” in these verses, he makes reference in verses six and seven to something on the inside that keeps us from collapsing or imploding when life hits us hard. So even though I can’t explain to you the “why” of difficulty, I can give you three truths that will add some steel to your life. The first piece of structural steel I want you to see is found in Jer. 31:3, and it is the truth that God’s love for me is everlasting.
I. God’s Love For Me is Everlasting - Jer. 31:3
When life hits us hard, we are often tempted to wonder whether or not God really does love us. Maybe you don’t personally struggle at this level, but I assure you that many, many other people do. The Bible teaches unequivocally that “God is love,” and it is impossible for many people to reconcile a loving God with suffering and difficulty. If God really is a loving God, why does He let little girls be sexually abused by their uncle? The reason we think this way is because from a purely human perspective, love is most often demonstrated by acts of kindness and generosity and self-sacrifice. From a human perspective, acts of malice or evil or ill will are indicative of a lack of love. Because of this kind of thinking, when something tragic happens to us, our first inclination many times is to interpret that event through a purely human lens. And if we make that mistake, we will draw some very dangerous conclusions about God.
So the first piece of steel I want to share with you today is found in Jer. 31:3, which says, "The LORD appeared to him from afar, saying, "I have loved you with an everlasting love; Therefore I have drawn you with loving kindness." The point Jeremiah is making in this verse is that as he reflects on the history of Israel, he can see that God has a history of loving actions toward His people. It was an “everlasting love.” They were chosen out of all the nations of the earth to be God's special people. They were delivered from Egypt. They were sustained in the wilderness. They were miraculously installed in the Promised Land, they were providentially protected in their early years as a nation. So as far as Jeremiah could recall, God had a history of loving actions toward the nation of Israel.
And what is of great importance to us is that at the time Jeremiah wrote this, the nation of Israel was going through some very distressing times. These were not the glory days of Israel's history. Israel was not some wealthy, strong, unified, world power. They were weak and harassed and the rulers were corrupt and the economy was bad. Injustice was prevalent. And in that context, God comes to Jeremiah and says, "I have loved you with an everlasting love." God’s message to Jeremiah in this passage is that the presence of suffering / difficulty /the existence of injustice / hardship does not indicate a lack of God's love.
This is the kind of perspective we need to have, and when you think about it, it is a mature perspective, isn’t it? Think with me for a moment about a 6 year old who doesn’t want to go to school on a beautiful fall day. It is warm and sunny outside, he has been building a fort in the woods, and he has a new puppy he wants to spend the day with; and from his six year old perspective there is nothing worse, nothing more unfair, than being forced to sit still in a hot school room, with Mrs. McGregor, and memorize multiplication tables. In fact, in his six year old mind, he is going to perceive his father’s adamancy that he go to school as being unloving. And he may even tell his father, “When I’m a Daddy, I’m not going to make my children go to school.” This is typical of six year olds – they perceive enforced hardship as being unloving. Of course from our mature perspective as adults, we know that the unloving thing to do is to give in to the child’s desires.
We need to learn how to apply this perspective to God and His actions toward us. We need to grow up in our understanding of what love looks like. As Paul says in 1 Cor. 13:11, “When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, and I reasoned like a child. When I became a man [when I matured, when I grew up], I put childish ways behind me.” A mature perspective of love understands that trial and difficulty is not indicative of a lack of love.
If we think about it, regardless of our current difficult circumstances, we can recall the same kind of actions on God's part toward us, that Jeremiah could recall. God chose us for salvation. He delivered us from the power and penalty of sin. He has providentially protected and provided for us. In fact, as far back as we can see God had demonstrated his love for us. And we need to be careful to remember that the presence of tribulation in our lives does not indicate a lack of God's love (see also Rom. 8:31-39).
So our first piece of steel is that God’s love for me is everlasting. Look with me now at Romans 8 where we are going to see our second piece of steel. In verses 28 and 29 we see that God has an objective for my life, and that is that I become more and more like His Son, Jesus.
II. God’s Purpose For Me is Christlikeness
In verses 28 and 29 we read, “And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose. [Please don’t ever stop right here! The “good” of verse 28 is found in verse 29] For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son that He might be the first-born among many brethren; 30 and whom He predestined, these He also called; and whom He called, these He also justified; and whom He justified, these He also glorified.”
God has an objective for your life, and that objective is that you become more and more like His Son, Jesus. God is not content with you the way you are right now! Let that sink in. Let me make this real personal. God is not content with Murray in his present condition. He wants Murray to become more and more like His Son, Jesus. I don’t care how long you have been saved, I don’t care how mature you think you are, you have areas in your life where you need to grow to be more like Christ.
Because of this truth, because of God’s objective for us, God is constantly working in our lives to “conform us to the image of His Son,” to use Paul’s language. God wants Billy to look less like Billy and more like Jesus. God wants Loretta to look less like Loretta and more like Jesus. He has a variety of tools He can use to accomplish this – parents, spouse, pastor, obnoxious co-worker, children, in-laws, boss, the economy, your neighbor, the list is practically endless – one of them being difficulty. God often uses difficulty to conform us to the image of His Son.
Think with me about the significance of the words “all things work together for good.” “All things” is somewhat comprehensive, isn’t it? Does it include things like rape and unwanted pregnancy? Is that one of those “all things” that “work together for good?” I heard about a godly 18 year old young lady who was raped and impregnated. And now she is bearing in her body a constant reminder of the horror of that incident. And when this child is born, and she is not putting it up for adoption, she will daily be reminded of the trauma every time she looks at her baby. Does Rom. 8:28-29 apply to situations like this? Absolutely! Here is a truth worth writing down. “God will take you where you do not want to go, in order to produce in you what you could not achieve on your own.” Paul Tripp.
So what does this have to do with having reinforcing steel in our lives when going through difficult times. Here is the connection. Purpose in life is what makes the difference between living and simply existing. Having a sense of purpose takes us from simply weathering the storm to actually battling our way through it and coming out on the other side. Having a clear cut sense of purpose is what gives sense and rationality to the difficulty. And we need to remember that God has a purpose in mind for us when difficult times come – He is using this difficulty to make me more like His Son Jesus. This truth is another piece of steel in your life. There is purpose behind the difficulty – it is not random. There is purpose behind the diagnosis of fibromyalgia. There is purpose behind the child drowning. There is purpose behind the hunting accident that takes a young man’s life. All things work together for good because they conform us to the image of Christ.
I read a very interesting illustration of how this works in a prisoner’s account of life in a Nazi death camp. Every day the Jews of this particular camp were forced to do backbreaking, disgusting labor by combining a large city’s raw sewage and garbage. They would distill this to make a fuel additive. And even worse than the nauseating smell was the realization that they were fueling the Nazi war machine. And the man who was telling about this said that even though it was inhumane beyond our ability to comprehend, the men of the prison camp did their work every day. One night the Allies bombed the plant where this fuel was made, so the next morning the camp commandant had them spend the day simply loading carts with sand, carting it to the other side of the compound, and unloading it. And that was it for the day. The next morning, he had the men move the sand back to its original place, and that was it for the day. The next morning, he had them move it back to the other side of the compound - and they were through for the day.
After several days of this purposeless work, men in the compound started breaking down mentally. Dozens actually committing suicide. Some would attempt to escape from the prison in broad daylight, only to be gunned down by the guards. Some men would throw themselves into the electrified fences only to be electrocuted in a terrible sizzling flash. And the man who was giving this account said the reason these men started committing suicide was because the camp commandant took away their sense of purpose. He said that as vile as the work was in the sewage plant, and as repulsive as it was to the men to actually be helping the enemy, at least there was a rationale and a purpose behind what they were doing, and they were able to live. They didn’t have that when they were moving sand. And when the sensibility of their labor and their purposefulness was removed, they lost their will to live.
As unpleasant as difficulty is, there is purpose behind it. There are some things you will never learn when life is good and everything is going the way you want it to. As Charles Stanley says, “In the valley, we discover the character of God in a way we never would on the mountain peak.” Those of you who have been through the valley know what he is talking about. Peter talks about this truth in 1 Peter 4:13 when he talks about “sharing in the sufferings of Christ” and how suffering creates a closeness with Jesus and an identification with Jesus that non-sufferers don’t have.
Difficulty has the potential to conform us to the image of Christ, or to change us from being so much like ourselves to being more like Jesus. We need to keep this in mind when we are going through difficult times. And we have a choice to make in the face of difficulty - we can resist God’s purpose and pay the serious consequences, or we can join ourselves to God’s purpose and make it our purpose with the result that we won’t simply exist but rather forge our way through the difficulty and come out on the other side a better person.
So the two pieces of steel I’ve shared with you so far are that God’s love for you is everlasting and God’s purpose for you is Christlikeness. The final piece of steel I want to share with you this morning is found in 2 Cor. 12, verses 7 - 10, and here we are going to see that God’s grace for me is sufficient.
III. God’s Grace For Me is Sufficient
The context of these verses is important. Apparently, the Apostle Paul had some kind of physical ailment that he felt was slowing him down in his service for the Lord. From various indicators in his other letters, this ailment had disfigured him in some way and probably had something to do with his eyes. But whatever it was, he felt like he could serve God better if he were healed of this problem. With that background, let’s start reading half way through verse seven, " . . . for this reason, to keep me from exalting myself, there was given me a thorn in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to buffet me-- to keep me from exalting myself! 8 Concerning this I entreated the Lord three times that it might depart from me. 9 And He has said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness." Most gladly, therefore, I will rather boast about my weaknesses, that the power of Christ may dwell in me. 10 Therefore I am well content with weaknesses, with insults, with distresses, with persecutions, with difficulties, for Christ's sake; for when I am weak, then I am strong.”
Did you see God’s answer to Paul. He said, “Paul, I’m not going to deliver you from your distress.” That doesn’t sound very kind, does it? Would God really say to us, “I’m not going to heal you. I’m not going to give you a better job with a higher income. I’m not going to give you a sweet, loving, understanding, considerate spouse.”? The answer is “yes.” But he continues with, “I will give you the strength (“grace”) to bear it.” We see the same basic idea in Hebrews 4:15 - 16. In speaking about Jesus we read, “For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but One who has been tested in all things as we are, yet without sin. 16 Let us therefore draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and may find grace to help in time of need.
There are two important points to remember here. First of all, Jesus understands what you are going through (v. 15). Secondly, because of His ability to understand our sufferings, we can go to Him with confidence and He will give us the grace we need to bear up under our difficulty.
Look with me at 1 Cor. 10:13. “No temptation [“test” or “trial” is probably a better translation] has overtaken you but such as is common to man; and God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted [tested, or tried] beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will provide the way of escape also, that you may be able to endure it. By virtue of the fact that you are in the situation you are (whether it is chronic pain, or deep depression, or spiteful children, or some addiction, of financial pressure), you know you can handle it with God’s help. God will give you the grace you need to endure the hardship. I don’t know about you, but I find this verse to be one of the most comforting verses in the Bible, because it assures me that there are some things I’ll never have to face. God knows what I can and cannot handle, and the promise of 1 Cor. 10:13 is that God will not ever give me difficulty beyond my capacity to handle with His help.
So what are the three pieces of steel? 1) God’s love for me is everlasting. 2) God’s purpose for me is Christ-likeness, and 3) God’s grace for me is sufficient. Do you see how these truths can act as steel in your life? This is the kind of stuff that allows you to sway without collapsing when you are hit hard. These truths enable you to endure pressure without imploding. It is my prayer that if you are struggling for any reason this morning that you will find the truth of God’s Word to sustain you and comfort you and enable you to be faithful.
Note: I'd like to thank Dr. James Berg, faculty member of Bob Jones Seminary, for the headings I used in this message. He actually deals with four principles in his lecture on Four Stabilizing Truths, adding the point that God's Word is the final, right answer.
2 Cor. 4:6-10
I’d like you to turn to 2 Cor. 4 this morning, and I want to speak to you about structural steel. Structural steel is what large buildings and skyscrapers are constructed of. It is the skeleton that holds the entire structure together and erect. For thousands of years mankind was limited in the size and height of what he could build, but with the advent of steel, everything changed. Steel is easily and quickly manufactured whereas wood takes years to be replenished. Steel is stronger than wood, it doesn’t burn, and it’s more flexible and easier to use than stone. So when the steel smelting process was perfected by Bessemer in the late 1800’s, its easy to see why steel became such a huge industry and why architecture was changed forever.
What does structural steel have to do with you and me? Well, in the same way that steel gives strength and stability to buildings, we need something to give us strength and stability in our lives. Steel is what allows a skyscraper to flex and sway during a hurricane (sometimes as much as 3 – 5 feet) without collapsing. Steel is what keeps a submarine from imploding when it is under 1.25 metric tons of pressure per square centimeter on a deep dive.
I don’t know about you, but those ideas appeal to me, because you don’t have to be alive for very many years before you figure out that life can be hard. This is why we sing the song, “It’s not an easy road I am called on to travel, for many are the troubles we bear.” We struggle with our spouse, we struggle with our children, we are under pressure from our bosses, we deal with debilitating physical problems, we have too much month left at the end of the paycheck, we suffer from the decline of our culture and nation, we are faced with tragedy in the lives of those around us, and the list could go on and on. I heard recently about a young mother who swerved to avoid hitting a dear and had a terrible wreck. She will probably be in a coma for months, if not years, and then face extensive rehabilitation, if she ever revives. How is her husband and five children supposed to cope with that?
As Job puts it, “ . . . evil does not spring from the soil, and trouble does not sprout from the earth. People are born for trouble as readily as sparks fly up from a fire.” His point is that difficulty and trouble and suffering and hardship and pressure is inextricably entwined with the human experience. No one is exempt. So as followers of Christ, how are we supposed to handle the pressures and stresses of life that we don’t have any control over?
This is where structural steel comes into play, and the Apostle Paul refers to it in 2 Cor. 4:6-10.
6 For God, who said, "Let there be light in the darkness," has made this light shine in our hearts so we could know the glory of God that is seen in the face of Jesus Christ. 7 We now have this light shining in our hearts, but we ourselves are like fragile clay jars containing this great treasure. This makes it clear that our great power is from God, not from ourselves. 8 We are pressed on every side by troubles, but we are not crushed. We are perplexed, but not driven to despair. 9 We are hunted down, but never abandoned by God. We get knocked down, but we are not destroyed. 10 Through suffering, our bodies continue to share in the death of Jesus so that the life of Jesus may also be seen in our bodies.
Even though Paul doesn’t use the phrase “structural steel” in these verses, he makes reference in verses six and seven to something on the inside that keeps us from collapsing or imploding when life hits us hard. So even though I can’t explain to you the “why” of difficulty, I can give you three truths that will add some steel to your life. The first piece of structural steel I want you to see is found in Jer. 31:3, and it is the truth that God’s love for me is everlasting.
I. God’s Love For Me is Everlasting - Jer. 31:3
When life hits us hard, we are often tempted to wonder whether or not God really does love us. Maybe you don’t personally struggle at this level, but I assure you that many, many other people do. The Bible teaches unequivocally that “God is love,” and it is impossible for many people to reconcile a loving God with suffering and difficulty. If God really is a loving God, why does He let little girls be sexually abused by their uncle? The reason we think this way is because from a purely human perspective, love is most often demonstrated by acts of kindness and generosity and self-sacrifice. From a human perspective, acts of malice or evil or ill will are indicative of a lack of love. Because of this kind of thinking, when something tragic happens to us, our first inclination many times is to interpret that event through a purely human lens. And if we make that mistake, we will draw some very dangerous conclusions about God.
So the first piece of steel I want to share with you today is found in Jer. 31:3, which says, "The LORD appeared to him from afar, saying, "I have loved you with an everlasting love; Therefore I have drawn you with loving kindness." The point Jeremiah is making in this verse is that as he reflects on the history of Israel, he can see that God has a history of loving actions toward His people. It was an “everlasting love.” They were chosen out of all the nations of the earth to be God's special people. They were delivered from Egypt. They were sustained in the wilderness. They were miraculously installed in the Promised Land, they were providentially protected in their early years as a nation. So as far as Jeremiah could recall, God had a history of loving actions toward the nation of Israel.
And what is of great importance to us is that at the time Jeremiah wrote this, the nation of Israel was going through some very distressing times. These were not the glory days of Israel's history. Israel was not some wealthy, strong, unified, world power. They were weak and harassed and the rulers were corrupt and the economy was bad. Injustice was prevalent. And in that context, God comes to Jeremiah and says, "I have loved you with an everlasting love." God’s message to Jeremiah in this passage is that the presence of suffering / difficulty /the existence of injustice / hardship does not indicate a lack of God's love.
This is the kind of perspective we need to have, and when you think about it, it is a mature perspective, isn’t it? Think with me for a moment about a 6 year old who doesn’t want to go to school on a beautiful fall day. It is warm and sunny outside, he has been building a fort in the woods, and he has a new puppy he wants to spend the day with; and from his six year old perspective there is nothing worse, nothing more unfair, than being forced to sit still in a hot school room, with Mrs. McGregor, and memorize multiplication tables. In fact, in his six year old mind, he is going to perceive his father’s adamancy that he go to school as being unloving. And he may even tell his father, “When I’m a Daddy, I’m not going to make my children go to school.” This is typical of six year olds – they perceive enforced hardship as being unloving. Of course from our mature perspective as adults, we know that the unloving thing to do is to give in to the child’s desires.
We need to learn how to apply this perspective to God and His actions toward us. We need to grow up in our understanding of what love looks like. As Paul says in 1 Cor. 13:11, “When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, and I reasoned like a child. When I became a man [when I matured, when I grew up], I put childish ways behind me.” A mature perspective of love understands that trial and difficulty is not indicative of a lack of love.
If we think about it, regardless of our current difficult circumstances, we can recall the same kind of actions on God's part toward us, that Jeremiah could recall. God chose us for salvation. He delivered us from the power and penalty of sin. He has providentially protected and provided for us. In fact, as far back as we can see God had demonstrated his love for us. And we need to be careful to remember that the presence of tribulation in our lives does not indicate a lack of God's love (see also Rom. 8:31-39).
So our first piece of steel is that God’s love for me is everlasting. Look with me now at Romans 8 where we are going to see our second piece of steel. In verses 28 and 29 we see that God has an objective for my life, and that is that I become more and more like His Son, Jesus.
II. God’s Purpose For Me is Christlikeness
In verses 28 and 29 we read, “And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose. [Please don’t ever stop right here! The “good” of verse 28 is found in verse 29] For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son that He might be the first-born among many brethren; 30 and whom He predestined, these He also called; and whom He called, these He also justified; and whom He justified, these He also glorified.”
God has an objective for your life, and that objective is that you become more and more like His Son, Jesus. God is not content with you the way you are right now! Let that sink in. Let me make this real personal. God is not content with Murray in his present condition. He wants Murray to become more and more like His Son, Jesus. I don’t care how long you have been saved, I don’t care how mature you think you are, you have areas in your life where you need to grow to be more like Christ.
Because of this truth, because of God’s objective for us, God is constantly working in our lives to “conform us to the image of His Son,” to use Paul’s language. God wants Billy to look less like Billy and more like Jesus. God wants Loretta to look less like Loretta and more like Jesus. He has a variety of tools He can use to accomplish this – parents, spouse, pastor, obnoxious co-worker, children, in-laws, boss, the economy, your neighbor, the list is practically endless – one of them being difficulty. God often uses difficulty to conform us to the image of His Son.
Think with me about the significance of the words “all things work together for good.” “All things” is somewhat comprehensive, isn’t it? Does it include things like rape and unwanted pregnancy? Is that one of those “all things” that “work together for good?” I heard about a godly 18 year old young lady who was raped and impregnated. And now she is bearing in her body a constant reminder of the horror of that incident. And when this child is born, and she is not putting it up for adoption, she will daily be reminded of the trauma every time she looks at her baby. Does Rom. 8:28-29 apply to situations like this? Absolutely! Here is a truth worth writing down. “God will take you where you do not want to go, in order to produce in you what you could not achieve on your own.” Paul Tripp.
So what does this have to do with having reinforcing steel in our lives when going through difficult times. Here is the connection. Purpose in life is what makes the difference between living and simply existing. Having a sense of purpose takes us from simply weathering the storm to actually battling our way through it and coming out on the other side. Having a clear cut sense of purpose is what gives sense and rationality to the difficulty. And we need to remember that God has a purpose in mind for us when difficult times come – He is using this difficulty to make me more like His Son Jesus. This truth is another piece of steel in your life. There is purpose behind the difficulty – it is not random. There is purpose behind the diagnosis of fibromyalgia. There is purpose behind the child drowning. There is purpose behind the hunting accident that takes a young man’s life. All things work together for good because they conform us to the image of Christ.
I read a very interesting illustration of how this works in a prisoner’s account of life in a Nazi death camp. Every day the Jews of this particular camp were forced to do backbreaking, disgusting labor by combining a large city’s raw sewage and garbage. They would distill this to make a fuel additive. And even worse than the nauseating smell was the realization that they were fueling the Nazi war machine. And the man who was telling about this said that even though it was inhumane beyond our ability to comprehend, the men of the prison camp did their work every day. One night the Allies bombed the plant where this fuel was made, so the next morning the camp commandant had them spend the day simply loading carts with sand, carting it to the other side of the compound, and unloading it. And that was it for the day. The next morning, he had the men move the sand back to its original place, and that was it for the day. The next morning, he had them move it back to the other side of the compound - and they were through for the day.
After several days of this purposeless work, men in the compound started breaking down mentally. Dozens actually committing suicide. Some would attempt to escape from the prison in broad daylight, only to be gunned down by the guards. Some men would throw themselves into the electrified fences only to be electrocuted in a terrible sizzling flash. And the man who was giving this account said the reason these men started committing suicide was because the camp commandant took away their sense of purpose. He said that as vile as the work was in the sewage plant, and as repulsive as it was to the men to actually be helping the enemy, at least there was a rationale and a purpose behind what they were doing, and they were able to live. They didn’t have that when they were moving sand. And when the sensibility of their labor and their purposefulness was removed, they lost their will to live.
As unpleasant as difficulty is, there is purpose behind it. There are some things you will never learn when life is good and everything is going the way you want it to. As Charles Stanley says, “In the valley, we discover the character of God in a way we never would on the mountain peak.” Those of you who have been through the valley know what he is talking about. Peter talks about this truth in 1 Peter 4:13 when he talks about “sharing in the sufferings of Christ” and how suffering creates a closeness with Jesus and an identification with Jesus that non-sufferers don’t have.
Difficulty has the potential to conform us to the image of Christ, or to change us from being so much like ourselves to being more like Jesus. We need to keep this in mind when we are going through difficult times. And we have a choice to make in the face of difficulty - we can resist God’s purpose and pay the serious consequences, or we can join ourselves to God’s purpose and make it our purpose with the result that we won’t simply exist but rather forge our way through the difficulty and come out on the other side a better person.
So the two pieces of steel I’ve shared with you so far are that God’s love for you is everlasting and God’s purpose for you is Christlikeness. The final piece of steel I want to share with you this morning is found in 2 Cor. 12, verses 7 - 10, and here we are going to see that God’s grace for me is sufficient.
III. God’s Grace For Me is Sufficient
The context of these verses is important. Apparently, the Apostle Paul had some kind of physical ailment that he felt was slowing him down in his service for the Lord. From various indicators in his other letters, this ailment had disfigured him in some way and probably had something to do with his eyes. But whatever it was, he felt like he could serve God better if he were healed of this problem. With that background, let’s start reading half way through verse seven, " . . . for this reason, to keep me from exalting myself, there was given me a thorn in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to buffet me-- to keep me from exalting myself! 8 Concerning this I entreated the Lord three times that it might depart from me. 9 And He has said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness." Most gladly, therefore, I will rather boast about my weaknesses, that the power of Christ may dwell in me. 10 Therefore I am well content with weaknesses, with insults, with distresses, with persecutions, with difficulties, for Christ's sake; for when I am weak, then I am strong.”
Did you see God’s answer to Paul. He said, “Paul, I’m not going to deliver you from your distress.” That doesn’t sound very kind, does it? Would God really say to us, “I’m not going to heal you. I’m not going to give you a better job with a higher income. I’m not going to give you a sweet, loving, understanding, considerate spouse.”? The answer is “yes.” But he continues with, “I will give you the strength (“grace”) to bear it.” We see the same basic idea in Hebrews 4:15 - 16. In speaking about Jesus we read, “For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but One who has been tested in all things as we are, yet without sin. 16 Let us therefore draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and may find grace to help in time of need.
There are two important points to remember here. First of all, Jesus understands what you are going through (v. 15). Secondly, because of His ability to understand our sufferings, we can go to Him with confidence and He will give us the grace we need to bear up under our difficulty.
Look with me at 1 Cor. 10:13. “No temptation [“test” or “trial” is probably a better translation] has overtaken you but such as is common to man; and God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted [tested, or tried] beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will provide the way of escape also, that you may be able to endure it. By virtue of the fact that you are in the situation you are (whether it is chronic pain, or deep depression, or spiteful children, or some addiction, of financial pressure), you know you can handle it with God’s help. God will give you the grace you need to endure the hardship. I don’t know about you, but I find this verse to be one of the most comforting verses in the Bible, because it assures me that there are some things I’ll never have to face. God knows what I can and cannot handle, and the promise of 1 Cor. 10:13 is that God will not ever give me difficulty beyond my capacity to handle with His help.
So what are the three pieces of steel? 1) God’s love for me is everlasting. 2) God’s purpose for me is Christ-likeness, and 3) God’s grace for me is sufficient. Do you see how these truths can act as steel in your life? This is the kind of stuff that allows you to sway without collapsing when you are hit hard. These truths enable you to endure pressure without imploding. It is my prayer that if you are struggling for any reason this morning that you will find the truth of God’s Word to sustain you and comfort you and enable you to be faithful.
Note: I'd like to thank Dr. James Berg, faculty member of Bob Jones Seminary, for the headings I used in this message. He actually deals with four principles in his lecture on Four Stabilizing Truths, adding the point that God's Word is the final, right answer.
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