The Day of Atonement — Keith Malcomson

I want you to go with me here tonight to Leviticus in the Old Testament, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Leviticus chapter 16, and we're going to go to part five of our series on penal substitution. You know when people attack the gospel and attack the cross and undermine the value of the blood, I get to fighting.

I want to tell you, my spirit gets stirred within me. My blood begins to boil within my body. You know why? Because that is our salvation, and when heretics and false teachers and compromised Christianity dares touch these things, I get very stirred over the gospel of Jesus Christ because the real gospel is the power of God unto salvation to all them that believe.

And so any damaging of the gospel destroys the power of God in the message of the Lord Jesus Christ. I take that very personally, very seriously, and I want to tell you, I fall deeper in love with Jesus when men attack the truth of the gospel because I think of what would have happened to me if I had never heard the real gospel.

The Day of Atonement in Leviticus 16

And so I want to take you to Leviticus chapter 16, just going to read two verses. I'd love to read the whole chapter. It is very powerful, but I'm going to dip into this chapter. I want you to understand this chapter.

I'm not going to deal with everything, though I'm sorely tempted to preach a few messages just on this one chapter, but I want to give you the heart of this chapter. And so we're here at part five of our series, and my message is the day of atonement.

Reading from Leviticus chapter 16, verse 21, an errand shall lay his hands upon the head of the live goat and confess over him all the iniquities of the children of Israel and all their transgressions and all their sins, putting them upon the head of the goat and shall send him away by the hand of a fit man into the wilderness.

And the goat shall bear upon him all their iniquities onto a land not inhabited, and he shall let go the goat in the wilderness. And then just read, and you don't need to turn to it, but I'm going to read one verse from 1 Peter chapter 2 and 24 in the New Testament.

Who his own self, talking of Jesus Christ, who his own self bear our sins in his own body on the tree, that we being dead to sins should live unto righteousness by whose stripes ye were healed. Let's pray tonight.

Father, I thank you for the word of God, the truth of your word. Lord God, it is powerful. Lord God, when not tampered with, not changed, not added to, Lord God, not compromised, not undermined, but when it's preached simply, Lord God, unaffected by the hand or the mind of man.

And Father, we pray for the power of your Holy Spirit right now in this room. Lord God, that your Holy Spirit will bear witness unto the written scriptures. We love the word of God. We love the truth of God.

And Father, we desire that your word would impact this city of Limerick. Lord God, that you'd bring the real gospel, the simple gospel of blood atonement. Lord God, to the hearts of sinners. Lord God, we plead with you for your grace and your mercy tonight.

Open our eyes, open our understanding, open our hearts, that we might perceive things taught by your Holy Spirit. In Jesus' mighty name. Amen. My message tonight, in the fifth part in this series, the day of atonement, the day of atonement.

We've just read in 1 Peter chapter 2 and 24 concerning Jesus Christ dying on the cross. Do you realize how often Christ's death on the cross is mentioned in the New Testament? If you remove that, you destroy the gospel.

Christ Bears Sin on the Cross

And you know, people may say they believe in the preaching of the cross or the message of the cross or the blood of the lamb. But one thing I've learned, if you don't preach on sin and you don't preach on the blood, and you don't preach on the cross clearly, continually, exactly, then I assure you, we destroy the power of the gospel.

This is at the very heart of the gospel. Who is own self bear our sin. The word bear there means to take up, to take up our sins. Jesus Christ bear our sins. Our sins were laid on Jesus Christ only in one place.

We are saying they weren't just forgiven. You were not just forgiven. God out of his love did not just forgive you. His character isn't just to forgive you and he forgave you. That did not happen. That cannot happen.

That did not happen. No matter what heretics teach. You know what the Bible says, not just once, not three times. Not in some proof text, but all through the scripture, constantly, all the time, emphasizing in clear words.

It says, Christ bear your sins. And so the word means to take up or to carry, to carry away, to remove from you. So you don't bear your sins anymore. He bear your sins. You don't bear them. You don't bear the consequence of your sin.

You won't suffer the penalty for your sin. The righteous judgment of God for your sin. We are told that Christ himself bear your sin, carried them and bear them away. In other words, removed your sin.

He actually took your sin, carried them and bear them far away. That is the gospel of Jesus Christ. The Christ on the cross. And it happened on the cross. Not in hell, not in Hades, not after his death on the cross.

It happened on the cross. He bear your sin on the cross. Your sin. What was Christ doing on the cross? He was bearing your sin. He was carrying your sin. Your sin was laid upon him on the cross. The exact same thing that we just read in Leviticus 16.

And that's why I've tied these together. They're not separate. They're not two different things. They're connected. They're absolutely connected in a profound way. Christ bearing your sin, your sin being laid on Christ on the cross.

That's what happened on the cross. Your sin were laid upon him. He died for your sin, suffered for your sin, bear your sin. What was Christ doing on the cross? He was bearing your sin. He lifted your load of sin.

He bear it. He carried it away at the cross. What happened on the cross? Carried all of your sin far away. Never to be carried by you ever again. Never to be suffered. You suffering the consequence of your sin.

That's what happened on the cross. And so tonight we've already dealt with in the weeks before. We dealt in Genesis 4 about Abel's sacrifice. In Genesis, a remarkable story. And there's lots of pictures of that in Genesis.

Then we looked at Exodus chapter 12. How that the day of Passover, what happened there? And now we're coming to Leviticus. Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus. And I can keep you in Leviticus about 10 weeks. I want to tell you, but I'm going to condense it here.

Leviticus and Hebrews: The Old Testament Explains the New

Some of you may be sceptical, but I'm going to condense it here very briefly. And so when you come to Leviticus, don't separate it from the New Testament. There are probably about 90 references from Leviticus in the New Testament.

And in fact, more than that, the book of Hebrews is joined at the hip to Leviticus in the Old Testament. In other words, if you read Hebrews in the New Testament, you can't understand it unless you read Leviticus.

Unless you understand Leviticus, you will never understand the book of Hebrews in the New Testament. Hebrews is written on the basis of Leviticus. The writer of Hebrews and the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, it's all there.

Hebrews is written with the understanding that you possess Leviticus, that you read Leviticus, that you study Leviticus, that you have to understand Leviticus. If you remove Leviticus or you're ignorant of it or you don't know about it or don't understand it, you will never have the key to Hebrews.

Hebrews will be a closed book. And so you go into the Old Testament to Leviticus and Leviticus opens up an entire New Testament book for the church. You can't comprehend it. You don't understand it or you'll only understand it very vaguely here and there.

But Hebrews is a commentary, an explanation and an application of Leviticus. It is an absolute... Remember what I said before, the New Testament's a commentary and it's the best commentary in the Old Testament.

And the Old Testament is a commentary on the New Testament. Do you want to understand the New Testament? Do you want to understand the four Gospels? Do you want to understand the book of Acts and Hebrews and Romans and the letters of Paul?

Do you really want to understand them? Then read the Old Testament. You know why? There are keys. There is insight. There is understanding that you don't get in the New Testament. You only get it in the Old.

Only if you read the Old and you meditate on the Old and you understand the Old does the New actually open up. They're dependent on one another. What was the Bible of the New Testament church when it was first birth?

It was the Old Testament scriptures. That's what their Bible was. They preached from it. They taught from it. They shared it. They carried it. That's what they had. And then the New Testament was built on top of that.

Types and Shadows of Christ in Leviticus

And so we look at Leviticus here. Listen to me. Leviticus is a book filled with types, pictures, shadows. Absolutely filled. So much so, I actually went, should I preach three messages? And I went, no, no, no.

Let's just condense it into one here tonight to give you an understanding of the book. Types is a word I use often. I use words like types and shadows. Remember how Candice shared that a pastor's wife in this city began to mock my use of saying types, shadows, pictures, even the word redemption.

A pastor's wife in the city mocked, tolerated the mocking of using words like redemption. So at a lady's Bible study, someone could say, I don't know why we use the word redemption. And yet a pastor's wife would think that's okay and tolerate it and not lift their voice against it.

My wife comes back with tears rolling down her face saying, how could a pastor's wife or how could someone be tolerated that ever says that? A lady's Bible study where that sort of trash and rubbish is spoken about, mocking types.

Let me tell you, that shows gross ignorance in the church of our day. Absolute gross ignorance. And I get very concerned, really do. Let me tell you that Leviticus is filled with types. Yes, the word types.

And you know what? The word types is the Greek word tupos, which is used 16 times in the New Testament. Tupos is our English word types. What is a type? It's that when you go to Leviticus, there are certain people, there are certain events, there are places, there are ritual that God himself has molded.

He molds them there. He molds these events, things happening, even people or their clothing. He molds it in order to give insight into the New Testament gospel. So hundreds, thousands of years before, God is molding, His Holy Spirit is molding these pictures, these types, these shadows.

He himself molds them and he's going to use them as a commentary on doctrine many years later. And so in the New Testament, we see the fulfilment of types. The word tupos means to keep striking a thing, keep marking a thing until it's the shape that you want it to be.

So God is working over. In Leviticus, as we read it, He takes Aaron and He works Aaron over. He beats Aaron into shape, his clothing, his words, his action, his ceremony. And he beats Aaron into shape to be a type that he's going to use in the book of Hebrews.

So we see this as a work of God, where God molds it. It's also a shadow of the real. So what's a type? It's a shadow of the real that's yet to come prophetically or in the future or eternally. This is a thing of time.

It's passing. But God uses it. And you know, the actual thing is called the anti-type. The shadow or the type is just a type, but the anti-type is the real thing, the fulfilment or what it is focused on.

This word type means model, to make a model, to mold something, to make an image, a representation or an example. This word typus is often used in the New Testament for an individual who is an example of what we all should be.

That is a type. That's what it is. And so when you find in Leviticus types, you're actually going to see something carefully molded. It's an example. When you look at it, you're going to begin to see how things are going to be or ought to be.

As well, the word shadow. Listen in Hebrews chapter 10, verse 1. Do you hear that? In the Old Testament, the law has a shadow or is a shadow of good things to come. The law gives you a shadow. Now, what's a shadow?

It's a reflection of the real. So the law and its shadow is not the real thing. The law gives you a shadow. It presents you with a shadow. So you look at a shadow and you get a vague idea. It's not perfect.

It's not exact. But when you look at a shadow, you begin to see what is going to come. And so in Hebrews chapter 10, which is the Leviticus of the New Testament, it talks about a shadow. The law having a shadow of good things to come.

When you look at the shadow in the Old Testament, in the law, in Leviticus, in the Old Testament. There's a shadow and you can look at the shadow and get an idea. You know, if you ever see a shadow of a beagle dog, you're going to get an idea.

There's a beagle dog lurking around the corner. You can actually identify. It may not be clear or distinct or colored, but I tell you, you get an idea of what's just around the corner. And it says, not the very image of the things.

So there's a shadow and an image. An image is the exact thing. It's not exact, but it's a shadow. So in Leviticus, you get types, you get shadows. Also in Hebrews 9 and 11, it uses the word figures, figures, which means symbols.

And it says the tabernacle in the Old Testament, when you walk into the temple, that is a figure. It says that in the book of Hebrews. So when you go back to the Old Testament and you get all the teaching, you know, some of those chapters in Exodus and Leviticus, and it starts telling you all about the curtains and the colors and the hooks.

You know, us men have great trouble with that. Maybe you ladies find it easier. But you know, when you begin reading about that, it's actually saying it's a figure. It's symbolic. It actually means something.

The ritual in Leviticus means something. And you're going to find out in Hebrews, in the New Testament, these things are figures. The entire Old Testament is a figure. The tabernacle is a figure. The priesthood is a figure.

What does that mean? They are symbols to teach you. So you begin to see that the whole Old Testament is symbolic in order to teach you. Then you have the word pattern. Pattern. We're going to get into this, but I want you to hear this.

The word patterns in Hebrews 9 .23, and it talks about the tabernacle being a pattern of what's true in heaven. So when you put all this together, types, shadows, figures, patterns, these are all important words.

Blood Sacrifices and the Pattern of the Gospel

So you go back into Leviticus and you get blood, a lot of blood. You get sacrifices. You get priests. You get ritual. You get a way of doing things. You know what the Bible's saying? All of these are types and shadows of the Lord Jesus Christ, of the gospel and the New Testament.

And you know what? If you may say, but I understand Jesus and the gospel. I promise you there's an awful lot you won't understand unless you go back and study. It's a commentary on the Lord Jesus Christ.

It's teaching all about Christ. Can you imagine having a manual to teach you about Jesus to explain what happened on the cross? I would go as far as to say by the New Testament by itself, you won't fully understand the cross.

You cannot. There's certain things explained and taught in the types and shadows and in the prophecies of Isaiah 53 you don't find in the New Testament. You see, the Old Testament is the Bible of the first church.

It's what they preach from. It's what they taught from. It's what the gospel was proclaimed out of, the Old Testament. You know, that early church in Jerusalem as Pentecost and revival came and the church began to build.

Do you know the apostles preached every day, every night from house to house and in Solomon's promenade. And as they preached and taught, they taught from Leviticus and they taught from Genesis and Exodus and all the way through the Old Testament, they took a hold of Leviticus and they began to teach.

You know why? Because the cross is there and there's an explanation of what Jesus done on the cross. When you come to Leviticus, you have the words of God. Now, I don't like red letter Bible. Some of you do.

You go to the New Testament, you find the words of Jesus and it's in red. I don't like that, OK? Because it's not more important than the rest of the text. But some people really like it and say, oh, those are the words of Jesus direct from his lips.

Can I tell you, there's one book in the entire Bible that has more direct speech from God than any other book in the Old Testament or the New Testament and doesn't even come close to this one book. Have you guessed which book it is?

It is Leviticus. Ninety percent of the text of Leviticus is direct speech. It is the words of God himself. And listen, it says often in Leviticus, And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying this,. Or it may say, The Lord commanded Moses.

Do you know Leviticus is filled with blood sacrifices? And it wasn't borrowed from paganism. The entire book is God commanded these sacrifices. It is filled with different kinds of sacrifices. Some of them are bulls.

Some are goats. Some are lambs. Some are birds. Not just a lamb anymore. Now in Leviticus, you get an entire book filled with sacrifices. And you're told in detail what each one of them is for. And you're told in detail how you're to do this, what it represents, what it accomplishes.

And there's all these sacrifices given in great detail. And you know, as it does that, I want to tell you that did not come from paganism. Don't tell me that Israel picked a blood sacrifice. I know none of yous are, but I'm telling you, heretics out there.

And they try to say the pagan world influenced Israel. No, it did not. It didn't. And I want to tell you, we might as well throw our Bible away if someone believes that. If they re-believe that, then there's nothing to this book.

But I want to tell you, God spoke to Moses and he taught on the ritual, every sacrifice, everything that would happen in great detail. It was the exact word of God. And he says, don't add to it. Don't take away from it.

When you build a tabernacle, build according to my pattern. I don't want your suggestions, Moses. I don't want your ideas. I don't want you to change anything. I want you to build a tabernacle. Every color, every size, every type of metal.

Don't you dare change anything. And you know what we do in this generation of the church? Leaders think they can change things. They think they're bigger than Moses. They think they're better than Paul the Apostle.

Paul was given the master plan for the church. He was given the plan. He didn't write the plan. God gave him a plan. Said, there, that's what the church is going to look like. Preach according to this.

Don't add to it. Don't improvise with the leadership. Don't change the name away from elders or bishops or overseers. Don't you play around with this. I tell you what it's to look like. Don't add to it.

Don't take away. Don't improvise. Don't bring your ideas in. Just leave it alone. Absolutely alone. And so saints of God, as we come to Leviticus, it's remarkable. We're going to deal in Leviticus 16 with the day of atonement.

From Genesis to Leviticus: The Narrowing Focus of Sacrifice

When you go to Genesis, you see Genesis, and we've already seen this with the skins for Adam and Eve, blood was shed. We see the sacrifice that Abel offered up. It was in place of him. It was for his sins.

In Genesis, and you know what you get in Genesis? You get the worldwide perspective from the creation of all mankind. The entire world needed blood sacrifice to walk with God. In Exodus, that we dealt with last time in chapter 12, you have the Passover.

Now it's not worldwide anymore. Now it's a nation, Israel. So worldwide, they needed blood sacrifice. But in Exodus, you have an entire nation, the nation of Israel. And we saw in Exodus, it's a lamb for an entire nation, an entire people, a ransomed nation, and it has a national scope.

But here in Leviticus, it gets narrower still. In Leviticus chapter 16, it focuses on ministry. It focuses not on the nation now. It focuses on one tribe, one family, the family of Levi or the family of Aaron.

And so the book of Leviticus is named after the Levite priests, after this family, the family of Levi, that's where we get Leviticus from. But you know what? It's not just about the Levites. It's about the entire priesthood.

It's about real ministry. You know what Leviticus says? It's a manual for ministry about blood sacrifice and atonement and substitution and the dangers of not being washed in the blood of the lamb and how the wrath of God will come and the consequence of your sin will catch up with you.

You see, Leviticus does teach penal substitution, not just once, not just in one shadow, but time and time and time again. It gives you lots of pictures. It gives you lots of teaching. It gives you lots of shadows.

And the whole thing is about what Jesus Christ done on the cross for your sins. And in fact, Leviticus was given as a book in one month. It covers a period of one month, whereas Exodus covers a period of about 300 years.

And then Genesis covers a far greater period of time. But here you have a period of one month. And I want to tell you in Leviticus, it is very restricted. It is very distinct. You have exact detail on what you do with everything.

Do you know when men begin to teach about the cross and change it and say, and it doesn't matter what you believe, as long as you believe God loves you and Jesus died on the cross, that's enough. Oh no, it's not.

Oh no, it's not. Do you realize when you come to Leviticus, which is a manual to give you depth and breadth and understanding of the cross, you now come to a very distinct, detailed understanding of the cross.

It's very clear. And you know why it says it's so important that you understand this? Because life and death rest on these details. If you change it, you're going to be in real trouble. You'll either not be forgiven or your life is going to come under a death threat.

I want to assure you, one of the most important statements in Leviticus is be holy for I am holy. It covers the entire book and it's quoted in the New Testament more than any other verse. Be holy for I am holy.

Leviticus is a holiness book. It's about the holiness of God. It's about you being holy. It's about God hating unholiness and desiring holiness amongst his people. So what does he do? He gives you an entire book about blood sacrifices because that's how it comes around.

Justification, Sanctification, and the Hinge of Leviticus 16

Let me take you into the book here. Chapter 16, that chapter in Leviticus from chapter 1 to 27 is the heart of the entire book. In fact, the entire book pivots upon that one chapter. Chapter 16 is the hinge of two parts of the book of Leviticus.

Chapters 1 to 15 in Leviticus speak about the way to be accepted by God. It's about justification by faith or having your sins forgiven. Chapter 1 to 15 before chapter 16, all those chapters are about how you get right with God.

It's filled with blood sacrifice. It gives an entire system of sacrifice principles in great detail showing you how can a man be right with God? How can a sinner walk with a holy God? All those chapters are given so you can understand it.

But then afterwards from chapter 17 to 27, it's all about how we walk with a God like that after we've been forgiven. That's sanctification. And so from chapter 17 to 27, you have chapter after chapter after chapter all about holiness.

How do you walk holy after you've been forgiven? And you know what? These two things, justification and sanctification are joined in chapter 16 with the day of atonement. That's what joins these two things.

The entire book revolves around this. So your entire acceptance with God brings you to the day of atonement and your entire walk with God and holiness. It begins with the day of atonement. You know the day of atonement was more important than the day of Passover.

We think a lot about Passover and today is actually Passover. Today, this day, according to the Jewish calendar. But you know what? Passover wasn't as important as the day of atonement. The day of atonement was the most important day in the Jewish calendar because every year when you get to it, you know what?

If God doesn't accept your sacrifice on that day, you're in trouble that year. And so there's only one day in which the entire nation gets accepted by God, forgiven by God, and you're okay for another year.

That's what Leviticus 16 actually was all about. In Leviticus 17 verse 11, listen this carefully. For the life of the flesh is in the blood and I have given it so to you upon the altar. Now listen, he gives the blood.

The life is in the blood. That's where the real life of God is. God gives it on the altar in the tabernacle to make an atonement for your souls. For it is the blood that maketh atonement for the soul.

I want you to say it's blood shedding that makes atonement. That word atonement is used 16 times in this chapter. That's very, very important. 16 times in chapter 16, the word atonement is used. It's actually the word kaffir and it's what we know today as Yom Kippur, the feast of Yom Kippur in Israel.

It's celebrated every single year. It is the day of atonement that they remember. You see, Passover is looking back to the nation coming out. It was the birthing of the entire nation. A lamb was shed, was killed.

His blood was shed. But you know, when you come to the day of atonement, this is every year you've got to be accepted. Every year a sacrifice has to be made or you're in trouble. What does kaffir mean?

The word atonement in this entire chapter. There's an atonement for Erem. There's an atonement for the priesthood. There's an atonement for the building. There's an atonement for the altar. There's an atonement for the nation.

In fact, there's no salvation without an atonement. Without Yom Kippur or without kaffir, this word kaffir, you have nothing. You're in serious trouble. What does the word atonement mean? It means you're forgiven.

It means to be cleansed from your sin. It means that a payment is made or a ransom. Very important you understand that. Atonement means somebody has paid a great price. Somebody has paid a price that you can be forgiven.

That you can be made clean from your sin. And also the word kaffir means to avert wrath or judgment or punishment. So in this word atonement that fills this entire chapter, you know what? You have the day of atonement.

You have a day of forgiveness, a day of ransom. A day when somebody pays a price to avert the wrath of God, the judgment of God. Because God is a holy God. This is the actual day of atonement. And this is a day still practiced with Israel.

You know the only problem with Israel today? They don't shed the blood of any animal. You know Israel today has no Passover lamb, no sacrificial system. They have no blood. They have no atonement as an entire nation.

If you ever evangelize a Jew, I mean a real Jew, a religious Jew, a moral Jew. You know what you need to say? Where's your lamb? You remember what Isaac said to his father Abraham as they went up to make sacrifice?

He says, where is the lamb? That's a very important statement. You ought to ask any Jew, where is your lamb? Where's your Yom Kippur? Why is it the entire nation of Israel stood trembling going, we've got to be accepted?

And why is it now that your nation has no lamb, has no blood, has no sacrifice? The entire salvation of the nation depended on blood sacrifice. Do you see how in scripture from Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, the sacrifice of an animal, whether a lamb or some other animal, actually affected the entire history of the people?

Aaron's Personal Preparation as High Priest

Let me take you, and I've got three points here I want to give you here tonight very briefly. First of all, you have personal preparation. Look at verse one to verse six with me. Personal preparation.

See for this day of atonement, one man was to make atonement. One man was chosen for this task. It was to happen only on one day of the year. It couldn't happen any other day. No other man could do it.

Only Aaron, the high priest. He was chosen. He was prepared. He was taught. He was the man that spent all year long making himself ready to make this sacrifice because the entire nation depended on him getting it right.

Can you imagine that? If you've ever seen the movie of Luther and Luther's there offering his first mass and he gets so nervous, he spills the juice. He spills the blood of Jesus. That's a terrible thing for a Catholic priest to do.

And his father goes berserk on him because he went and spilled the blood of Jesus at his first Holy Mass when he was consecrating it and turning this wine into the blood of Jesus. Can you imagine Aaron going, the entire forgiveness of the nation depends upon me.

I get one chance at it one day of the year and it's got to be in a certain place, done in a certain way or else it gets rejected. If I don't do this right, God's wrath comes down on the entire nation.

Saints of God, what a responsibility. You know, when you come to this chapter, it begins Leviticus 6, what does it say? And the Lord spake unto Moses after the death of the two sons of Aaron when they offered before the Lord and died.

This had happened just before the Day of Atonement. It's in Leviticus chapter 10. You know what happened? His sons were prepared for ministry. They are the young generation. And you know what they've done?

They began to improvise. They said, we can change the worship. We are a new generation with new ideas. And it says they offered up strange fire in the presence of God as they made sacrifice. You know what happened?

The heavens opened up, fire came down and God consumed his two sons. God killed these two men. You know, the book of Leviticus is all about blood sacrifice. But I want to tell you, it shows the sin of men.

It shows the seriousness of sin. How deadly sin is. That if you don't do things according to the blood, according to God's will, you're on dangerous ground. You're on very dangerous ground. In ministry, in your Christian life, you better get the gospel right.

You better have your faith in the blood of the Lamb. You better understand what was accomplished on the cross. You better make sure you're clothed in the righteousness of God. You better make sure that Jesus took your place on the cross.

That he suffered your wrath and that you are now set free through his work. It's so, so important. Here is Aaron coming to do this Day of Atonement. And his two sons have just been killed. They've been killed and yet he still has to minister.

He still has to come into the house of God. And the Lord said unto Moses, speak unto Aaron thy brother, that he come not at all times into the holy place. So you can't just come anytime. You can't come anyway.

God is very specific in what he'll accept. You know those people who say God can just forgive all of your sin. Out of the whim of his heart. No, he can't. He's very exact. I demand blood. I demand sacrifice.

I demand that it happens on the altar. Don't change the gospel. I will not forgive you apart from what happened on the cross. Apart from the blood of Jesus. There's no forgiveness for you. I won't excuse your sin.

Unless you go to Calvary, there is no other gospel. It's all there on the cross. Jesus dying for sinners. Bearing your sin. Carrying your sin. Carrying your punishment on the cross. Don't change the word of God.

And so he had to come into a place. Thus shall Aaron come into the holy place with a young bullock for a sin offering and a ram for burnt offering. This is my first point, personal preparation. Before Aaron could make the day of atonement and offer a sacrifice for the nation.

Do you know what he had to do? He led a bullock and a ram. As his own sacrifice. Because he's a man. He's a sinner. He's someone who himself needs a sacrifice before he offers a sacrifice for the nation.

And so in one hand, he is pulling a bullock, which is a male calf, for a sin offering. For his sin. So blood has to be shed for sin. I'm sorry to say simple statements. But when the truth gets attacked, I've got to say this very clearly.