The Law of Atonement

Hebrews and Leviticus 16 as the Background for Christ’s High Priesthood

We continue in our study of the book of Hebrews by studying out of the book of Leviticus, chapter 16. That is why I requested the change in our reading this morning. We are in Leviticus, chapter 16. You may recall that last time that we were studying out of Hebrews, I indicated that I felt that there was a need, as we enter into the heart of that study, to review the Old Testament background of the ministry of the High Priest, since Jesus is being presented to us there in the book of Hebrews as a faithful High Priest.

Well, we need to have some idea of what the High Priest did, and especially the issue of the offering of atonement and the entering into the holy place, the holiest place, or as is often rendered in English, the holy of holies, but that's just a Hebrew idiom.

That's a way of referring to the holiest place. The priest entering into that holy place on Yom Kippur, the day of atonement, or literally it's Kippurim, the day of atonements, because as we saw in Leviticus 16, a number of atonements were made there.

But I felt it would be very important for us to review this material so that when we go back into Hebrews chapter 7, we will have the appropriate foundation to really appreciate what is being said there.

Nadab and Abihu: God Must Be Treated as Holy

So, our study this morning out of Leviticus chapter 16, let us ask the Lord to bless our time together. Once again, Father, we truly desire your presence with us by your Spirit. We need your Spirit to lift up our hearts and our minds, to free us from distraction, to help us to understand what your Word has said throughout many generations.

Help us now be with us to your honor and glory. We pray in Christ's name. Amen. Many a person has, with good intention, begun a study of the Bible, reading through the Bible from the book of Genesis, only to founder upon the rocks of Leviticus.

Maybe some of you have actually experienced that. I've talked to people who maybe in January, when it's the time to make resolutions, January, when it's the time to make sure that Brother Warren has a job for a while by joining a gym.

Many people do in the month of January. I'm right, aren't I? They join in that month of January. They're going to make a difference. And many Christians go, you know what? I need to read through the Bible.

And so I'm going to start with Genesis. And they get themselves a Bible reading plan. And they make it through Genesis. There's some interesting stories in Genesis. And they might even make it through Exodus, because I mean, you know, the parting of the Red Sea and all sorts of neat stuff going on in Exodus.

And then they hit Leviticus. And they start reading about offerings and wave offerings and wheat offerings and the examination of people with leprosy to see if they can come back into the congregation.

And all of a sudden, getting up early before work becomes so very difficult to do. And so as a result, when you have a background in the New Testament that comes directly out of the book of Leviticus, well, it can be very difficult for a lot of modern evangelicals to follow the argument.

But the problem is, especially now as we're right in chapter 7, about verses 20 -22, and we're having the discussion of Jesus as a faithful high priest, and the contrast of Jesus' high priesthood, the Melchizedek priesthood versus the priesthood of Aaron, and the fact that there were many priests under the Old Covenant, but there's only one under the New Covenant because he doesn't die.

He doesn't have to pass his priesthood on to someone else. As we encounter that material, I felt that it was necessary that we have this background, that we do some foundational work. And so we have read this rather lengthy chapter.

And in the few minute moments that we have this morning, we will survey it so that we have an understanding of what it is that the writer to the Hebrews could assume was in the minds of his listeners.

That needs to be in our mind too, if we are truly going to enter into the depth that is offered to us by the book of Hebrews. But please note something about the beginning of this chapter. Now, the Lord spoke to Moses when?

After the death of the two sons of Aaron. So, I think we need to go back just a little bit. Let's go back to chapter 10. Go back to Leviticus chapter 10. We need to be reminded of this because God gives the instructions for the atonement, the day of atonement, the yearly day of atonement, after this incident.

Now, Nadab and Abihu, the sons of Aaron, took their respective firepans and after putting fire in them, placed incense on it, and offered strange fire before Yahweh, before the Lord, which He had not commanded them.

And fire came out from the presence of Yahweh and consumed them, and they died before Yahweh. I'm reading the word, the Lord, in its Hebrew pronunciation. Then Moses said to Aaron, It is what Yahweh spoke, saying, By those who come near me, I will be treated as holy.

And before all the people, I will be honored. So Aaron therefore kept silence. Moses called also to Mishael and Elzaphan, the sons of Aaron's uncle Uziel, and said to them, Come forward, carry your relatives away from the front of the sanctuary to the outside of the camp.

So they came forward and carried them still in their tunics to the outside of the camp, as Moses had said. Now listen to what happens here. Then Moses said to Aaron and to his sons Eleazar and Ithamar, Do not uncover your heads, nor tear your clothes, so that you will not die and that he will not become wrathful against all the congregation.

But your tinsmen, the whole house of Israel, shall bewail the burning which Yahweh has brought about. You shall not even go out from the doorway of the tent of meeting, or you will die. For Yahweh's anointing oil is upon you.

So they did according to the word of Moses. Now, this then becomes the context, and I point us to it. Because once again, it's one of those passages we don't like. Let's just face it, there are certain passages in the Old Testament that we don't like.

We don't like the idea of God striking the sons of Aaron dead. And we especially don't like the context in which it happens. I mean, modern man could really excuse Nadab and Abihu here. We don't really know exactly what happened here.

It says they offered strange fire, which Yahweh had not commanded them. They did something. They entered into the holy place. They became innovative in worship. And my goodness, innovation in worship is the watchword today, is it not?

I mean, we want innovative worship. We want to come up with a new way of doing things. And that's all Nadab and Abihu did, but fire comes out of the presence of Yahweh and consumes them. And they died before the Lord.

Now again, we don't know exactly what it was. I don't like the incense that God told us to use. This smells much better. We'll do that. I don't know. They did something in the worship of Yahweh that was not commanded.

And Moses said to Aaron, the first thing Moses says to Aaron, don't strike us as overly comforting words. It is what Yahweh spoke, saying, by those who come near me, I will be treated as holy. And before all the people, I will be honored.

So Aaron, therefore, kept silent. Your son's dead and you keep silent. In fact, the command comes through Moses that certain of the family were not even to enter into the normal grieving at the loss of a family member.

Don't tear your clothes. They would tear the front of their garments to expose their heart, the breaking of their heart to other people. They would let their hair become disheveled to show their mourning.

Not for you, Aaron, and not for your sons. The rest of the people outside in the camp, they can do that. They can mourn what has happened. You cannot. It bothers us. If we're honest with ourselves, if we're honest in our conversations with one another.

But let's be honest. How many of us have ever actually seen a sacrifice? Anybody here? I saw one recently. There's not in person, but the way that most of us see things more today. I saw it on YouTube.

There was a fascinating video of a Jewish group standing before the wall in Jerusalem and they sacrificed a goat there. That wasn't fun to watch. I think pretty much all the ladies and most of the men would be just a little bit squeamish when the throat of that animal was slit.

And the blood was collected. That's probably why we don't like Leviticus. Because the tendency of modern man is to look upon these things and to only see them at the surface level. Oh, this is barbaric.

Oh, this is bloody. Haven't we gotten past all of this? It's strange for people who at least once a month gather together and partake of an ordinance that represents the shedding of blood and the giving of life to think like that.

But we compartmentalize things. I certainly did not agree with the glorification of the death of Christ in the Mel Gibson film. But the fact of the matter is the sacrifice of Christ was a very ugly thing from the world's perspective as well.

There was a lot of bloodshed. And yet what bothers people is that here you have this priesthood and you have God saying to a man, he just struck the man's sons dead for what seems to us to be just messing up.

It was just a little mistake. Well, we don't know that. God says, by those who come near me, those who have been given this tremendous privilege to actually enter in to the holy places of God, I will be treated as holy.

I will not be treated like just any other God. I will not be treated in such a way that mankind can think that, well, I can just sort of make up the rules as I go along. God will give me that freedom.

Before all the people, I will be honored. So Aaron therefore kept silent because Aaron understood. Didn't mean his heart wasn't breaking, but he understood that God will be treated as holy. And that for mankind to make up the rules as he goes along, for mankind to ignore the very commandments of God himself as to how he is to be honored, how he is to be treated as totally other, holy, is to in fact bring great disrepute upon the name of God.

And in fact, is that not the very nature of the worship of the nations? Is that their worship is designed to please them rather than to reflect an obedience to God's own command? That's the very nature of pagan worship.

And that's what God's worship was not to be. So you see, the reason that. Chapter 16 is given. Is so that Aaron may understand the exact circumstances under which he is to enter into the holiest place.

Notice what it says in verse to tell your brother Aaron that he shall not enter at any time. I think the New King James, as Brother Jim read it, was just at any time. Maybe this is what happened, is that the brothers got puffed up.

And they wanted to show how they could enter into the very holy place of God at any time they wanted to. In any way they wanted to. Maybe that's what happened. But the point is that this text provides the instructions as to how the high priest is to enter into the holy place and when.

You'll notice at the end of the chapter, the specific timing. The establishment of Yom Kippur, the day of atonement or Kippurim, the atonements is provided by God. He gives the day. It's not up to the people of Israel.

Well, you know, we want to change that. No. We want to do it differently because it's raining that day. Doesn't matter. This is the day that God ordains for the giving of the atonement. Now, let's again be honest with ourselves.

As we read through this, after about the third sacrifice, the mind starts to wander. Might have gotten drawn back in by this scapegoat thing because that's where the phraseology comes from. But, you know, sprinkling blood seven times the finger here and then putting upon the horns the altar here.

And then you go out here and you put it on this altar and you've got these sacrifices and you've got the bull and you've got the goats. And it's just strange to us. It's difficult to see in our minds.

And yet, what we need to recognize is that all of this is given by God as a shadow, a picture. And none of this, the death of Nadab and Abihu, Leviticus chapter 16, none of this will make any sense if we don't see.

How seriously God takes sin. I honestly think that one of the primary reasons that the entire doctrine of atonement itself. But especially those things that pointed to it in the Old Testament. It's rarely the focus of the attention of evangelicals today.

And you say, well, what do you mean? Every church you walk into has got a big old cross up there and they sing about the cross. What's we saying about the cross today? Yeah, but how many people in evangelical churches today spend any time at all in a given week considering the Old Testament types and shadows and the New Testament fulfillment, especially in the book of Hebrews, in regards to the holiness of God and his wrath against sin.

The cross is a quick escape ticket out of hell. But it's very rarely seen as the ultimate demonstration of God's holiness, God's grace. And where the holiness and God's wrath against sin meets his grace in the one place that is the cross of Calvary.

There's a lot of reasons for it. And we see it right here. Now, notice what happens. God promises to appear in the cloud over the mercy seat. Aaron is to create this cloud of incense. Now, some read it that the cloud of incense that Aaron creates when he brings the coals of fire in and he puts the incense upon and it creates this cloud over the mercy seat.

The mercy seat is that place where you have the angels' wings that form this spot over the Ark of the Covenant. Sadly, about the only way I can illustrate this for you is to remind some of you of Indiana Jones.

It wasn't a half-bad representation. That would be the mercy seat. And it's on the Ark of the Covenant. And there is to be incense that creates a cloud that covers over that. Now, some people say that that's the cloud.

Other people interpret that this is the cloud that God would appear in during the wanderings of the people of Israel. Whichever. God appears in the cloud above the mercy seat. But since Aaron is entering into the place where God is covenanting to meet with his people, to be with his people in that place, what does it mean?

What's the word for God with us? Emmanuel. So God is covenanting to be with his people. But hopefully you can step back. Remember what Jim read from Leviticus 16. Hopefully you can step back for a moment.

What's the primary thrust of this whole chapter? Why does Aaron have to offer so many offerings and put blood here and blood there? Notice the first offerings are not for the people. Who are they for?

They're for Aaron. He has to make atonement for himself. Now think about this. Wouldn't the high priest probably be one of the holiest people in Israel? You would hope so. Certainly called to be that way.

Called to be holy. Separated under God. And yet, every year, the high priest has to repeat the same ritual. I'm not trying to gross anybody out. But think about what he had to do. That blood on his hands is still warm.

It's the hot blood of an animal that just died. And he has to smear it here. Well, he can still see where he smeared it last time. And he has to sprinkle it here. Well, he can still see the dried remnants of the last time.

And he is told that these first sacrifices are all for him to cleanse his own sin and to cleanse those items, the altar and the mercy seat, from what? The impurities of the people of Israel. The impurities of the people of Israel?

Sin is such a stench in the nostrils of the holy God that there has to be atonement made simply because these things have been around sinners. The impurities of their thoughts, their deeds, their actions.

And we can read the rest of the Old Testament and we see a whole lot of impure actions. We see murder and bloodshed and all sorts of idolatry. And we have people coming into the temple precincts once the temple is built.

Remember, this is the tabernacle here. But once the temple is built, people come in there and they're mixing the worship of the Baals and the Ashtaroth with the worship of Yahweh. They're the people who have hard hearts.

They don't hear the messages of the prophets. And so an atonement has to be made. An atonement has to be made for Aaron. And then an atonement has to be made for the impurities, the people of God, sanctifying the altar.

And then we're ready for the sacrifice of the sins of the people. But then, a simple sacrifice, even the multiple sacrifices, is not enough because it's just a shadow. A mere animal can't be enough here.

It's a mere shadow of what's to come. There has to be something more to complete the picture of how serious sin is to God. And so you have this strange scapegoat. That's how the New King James and New American Standard render it.

It's Azazel in Hebrew. There are some who would argue that this is actually named for Lucifer, for Satan, the enemy of God. And some make the argument that we shouldn't translate it as scapegoat but should actually maintain the name Azazel because in later Jewish mythology, this became an important demon.

I wouldn't have to worry about that too much, but just so you know that. But the reality is that you have a goat for Azazel. And hands are laid upon its head and the specific transgressions and sins of the people of Israel are confessed upon this goat.

Now there's two of them. A lot is cast. One is chosen to be sacrificed. The other is chosen to become the scapegoat. And once again, try to picture this. Don't let it just go flashing through your mind, but picture what it looked like.

Aaron in his white robes, these specific robes he's only to wear that day. They're holy unto the Lord. And he has already begun the process of cleansing the holy place. He's performed sacrifices, and now the blood's still upon his hands.

Here comes the scapegoat. Stupid animal. Stupid in the sense that doesn't know what's going on. Probably doesn't even have enough sense to go, man, I'm the lucky one. Because the other one got sacrificed.

But here, one of the leaders of Israel, holy man, lays those hands upon the head of this animal and confesses. We as the people of God have had idolatrous thoughts. We've gone after the pagan gods. We've questioned your goodness and your mercy.

We've forgotten what you've done for us. We've shed innocent blood. We've been sexually impure. It cannot be an enjoyable experience for anyone. For Aaron? For the man who's standing by to take the scapegoat into the wilderness?

Or for the people who have gathered outside to worship? Who cannot see what's going on, but because it's in the Word of God, they know what's going on. Maybe in other contexts, they've heard it described by the priests, but confession is made.

And then that scapegoat is taken out into an uninhabited place. Now, we have the advantage of thousands of years. We have the advantage of the prophets who come later. And we have the advantage of the New Testament.

And what we see in that further revelation is that this is not, well, you know, I've got the sacrifices, and I just want you to do more weird things. The reason God is doing this is because these types and shadows are insufficient in and of themselves to give us a full-orbed picture.

So we need different snapshots. And so we have the giving of life in sacrifice. We have the life represented in the blood. We have the costliness of forgiveness seen upon the horns of the altar. We have atonement being made for sin.

It's a picture of what is to come, because as I keep saying, the high priest keeps seeing the former blood. He has to keep doing this, and so it's a reminder of sin. But you have that giving of life, and now you have a picture of what God promises to do with sin.

That wonderful promise from the psalter. I will remove your sins from you as far as the east is from the west. Have you ever tried to measure that distance? You can only go... Can you go so far east you're going west?

No. You can go east forever. On a globe, anyways. There is no measurable distance. God removes the sin of the people. But He only does so when there has been confession of the sin. So, the scapegoat. Symbolically, the sins are placed upon the scapegoat.

And he is taken out into an uninhabited place. A place far removed from the people of God outside of the camp. As a picture, that what is taking place this day is what is necessary for the people of God to have fellowship with God.

What separates us from fellowship with God? It is sin. The reasons that we probably don't spend as much time thinking about these things and the sacrifices and the priesthood and stuff is because we don't take sin all that seriously.

I mean, God will forgive us. We say, oh, Lord, sorry for my sins. But you know, when you have to go through all the stuff that they had to go through here, regularly, repetitively, it sort of brings home pretty strongly God has wrath against sin.

God takes note of it. And it separates us from our God. Because He is the very opposite of sinful. He is holy. From this, the importance for Christians to regularly remind ourselves of the holiness of God.

When we simply dismiss the Old Testament revelation as no longer relevant to us, say that's the law, we're under the law, we're under grace, we don't have to worry about that. We cut ourselves off from the most vivid illustrations of God's holiness.

Not only do we cut ourselves off from a full understanding of what Hebrews is going to tell us, how Jesus is the fulfillment of all these things, how His priesthood is greater, how He doesn't have to pass His priesthood onto someone else, and how He has entered into the holy place for us.

Transcended all of this. But most importantly, when we have a less than biblical understanding of the holiness of God, the result is we are in danger of accepting substitutes for God's one way of salvation that will never save anyone.

The Seriousness of Sin and the Need for Divine Atonement

In a matter of weeks, I will be engaging in debate, yet once again, with representatives of Roman Catholicism. And I was listening to the man and I will be debating. I've debated him five times. I was listening to that man just recently as he was on someone else's program.

And he was promoting his viewpoints, overthrowing the ultimate authority of Scripture, manhandling church history. But in the process, I could not help but be struck yet once again with how man-centered Rome's Gospel is.

How it confines in human actions things that could actually somehow have some kind of salvific effectiveness before an allegedly holy God. And I was reminded of our study through Hebrews. And when we think of what Rome teaches about merit, when we think of what Rome teaches about indulgences and purgatory and the role of our own suffering and bringing about our own salvation, I was reminded yet once again, human religion never takes sin as seriously as God's truth does.

It never does. It always lessens it. Oh, it never gets rid of a discussion of it. I mean, you've got to use sin as your means of controlling people. I mean, that's the whole essence of Roman sacramentalism.

The sacraments are the means by which the hierarchy controls the grace of God and the people of God. But it never takes sin really seriously because it says that sin can be atoned for in such unbiblical ways.

That's the very essence of human religion. And I would like to suggest to you that when you take what the Bible says about the holiness of God seriously, when you really understand God's complete otherness, and hence the depravity of sin, the depth of sin, the fact that sin is a stench in the nostrils of a holy God, then you need to have a means of reconciliation between sinners and God that is absolutely divine.

It cannot be a mere mixture of man's efforts and God's efforts. It cannot be God's grace sort of cooperating with man's efforts. It has to be God's work, and it has to be perfect. And you only find that in a truly biblical understanding of who Jesus Christ was, not merely some good teacher, good preacher, just a prophet, who He was, and what He actually accomplished on the cross of Calvary.

Anything less than that, and you will not truly have an answer in regards to the holiness of God. Now, note, that after all of these activities of Aaron, Aaron had a busy day that day. The making of atonement, the cleansing of the impurities of the people of God, this was only to happen on a particular day.

God establishes for His people a specific day of atonement. And it's to happen over and over again. I want you to hear that and remember that because it's going to become central to the argument of the book of Hebrews.

It is a repetitive sacrifice. It didn't just happen one time. But who was it for? As we read this text, for example, of the need for Aaron to wash himself multiple times. There's washings here. The man who leads the scapegoat out after he has released the scapegoat into the wilderness.

What must he do? He has to wash himself before he goes where? Back into where? The camp. The camp. The bodies of the sacrifices, where are they to be taken? Outside the camp and burned there. Who is this sacrifice for?

Is it for anyone outside the camp? Is it for anyone outside of those who draw near to worship? Was it for the Babylonians? The Romans? The Greeks? The Assyrians? No. This annual atonement for the people of God is to be in the 7th month, 10th day of the month.

It was to begin by a humbling of your souls. Not doing any work. There was to be a Sabbath day that wasn't... It was to be a day of rest, but since it was the 10th day, it wouldn't always fall on that last day of the week.

So this was a special Sabbath, a high Sabbath. And so there's a specific people that are involved here. A specific people to whom God has made revelations and has made covenantal relationship. This wasn't some general kind of, well, you know, I'm going to have my priests do a sacrifice and so everybody will be covered by it.

Those who drew near to worship, those who observed God's covenant, they were the ones for whom this sacrifice was made. There's a clear delineation. And when verse 30 says, for it is on this day that atonement shall be made for you to cleanse you, you will be clean from all your sins before Yahweh.

That was a promise given to a specific people. It was not some type of general peanut butter atonement. And this then becomes the picture that the book of Hebrews picks up and says fulfilled in Christ.

That's where we need to understand it. But we dare not remove the same emphasis on the holiness of Yahweh that is here when we see its fulfillment in Hebrews. If anything is to be said, Hebrews heightens this.

Why? Because it says it's impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sin. This was but a picture. And so if the picture so highlighted the holiness of God and His wrath against sin, what should we say about a fulfillment where it's Yahweh Himself?

Remember Hebrews 1? What do we see in Hebrews 1? Who takes on human flesh? Who's described in Psalm 102, 25 -27? Who's described as the Son in Hebrews 1, verses 10 -12? It's Yahweh who is common human flesh.

He is the One who makes the sacrifice. If that doesn't convince you how seriously God takes His holiness.

And our sin, what could?

The Permanent Statute and the Final Fulfillment in Christ

So a statute is made. Notice what it says right at the end of the chapter. Now you shall have this as a permanent statute to make atonement to the sons of Israel for all their sins. Notice who it is. The sons of Israel for all their sins once every year and just as Yahweh had commanded Moses, so He did.

That says permanent. Yeah. It was permanent. It was fulfilled in Christ. That's what makes it permanent. See, people say, oh, that means that Jesus isn't... No, Jesus is the fulfillment of these things.

He finished it by completing what it was pointing to. Why? There's nothing to go back. What's the whole point of Hebrews? There's nothing to go back to. I know there's great pressure for you to go back to the temple, offer sacrifice, blaspheme Christ, but there's nothing to go back to.

The offerings that you yourselves are being pressured to offer were pictures of what has now been fulfilled in Christ. Once a year, an inescapable reminder of sin. Does it not make perfect sense? Does it not make perfect sense that as that high priest offered again the offering?

Let's say you had a high priest who some people have real longevity. And he started as a young high priest and he's been at it for a long time. He's been doing this for 40 years. 40th time he comes in.

40 years! Offering the same sacrifice. Don't you think it crossed his mind as that warm blood dripped from his fingers onto that altar yet again? This is pointing to something more. This isn't actually removing sin.

Because if it did, why am I coming back again and again and again? There's the blood from 20 years ago. There's the blood from 30 years ago.

It has to be a greater fulfillment. It makes me wonder about the high priest.

Who entered into the holy place the year after Jesus' death, who maybe had heard Jesus speak. And I'm sure they tried to keep it as quiet as possible, but I'm sure the high priest knew all about what happened to the veil.

Could he see the repair marks as he entered in? What did he think? I don't know. But I do know that once that veil was torn from the top to the bottom, the way into the holy place was opened. It was man's religion that stitched the veil back up.

It was no longer God's religion. It was man's religion. Because when God has given commands like this, and then He fulfills them, to go back and refuse the fulfillment is to reject God's own testimony, which He had verified by raising Jesus from the dead.

Can you see now how to someone who knew this, someone that if you looked at them and said, well, you don't want to be a Nadab, do you? They would have known what you were talking about. They would have understood the holiness of God demonstrated in the death of Nadab and Abihu, the death of Uzzah later in 2 Samuel.

They would have understood the offerings and the blood. And they would have even understood the smell of the offerings, the burning flesh. And hence, they would have felt the weight of what the writer of the Hebrews will say about a final High Priest who can bring about perfect redemption because when He enters into the holy place, He enters in having obtained eternal redemption.

Prayer for Reverence, Repentance, and Christ-Honoring Holiness

Let's pray together. Our gracious God, as we have handled Your Word this morning and have recognized how ancient it is, how many thousands of years ago You gave Your people these ordinances. They were pictures.

They were foreshadowings. And yet, as we have contemplated these things, we have been struck again by Your holiness. Lord, we confess that we take sin far too lightly. We rejoice in the salvation You've provided for us in Christ.

We know we can never bring about our own salvation, but we confess, Father, that far too often we make confession, but our hearts do not recoil from our sin. Forgive us even this. By Your Spirit, make us to be serious about Your truth, about Your Gospel, about Your holiness.

Make us to hate our sin. May we truly honor and glorify Christ by living in light of what He's truly accomplished for us upon the cross of Calvary. We pray these things in His name.