Fri, 31 March, 2006: Today’s Bible readings.
1 “If his offering is a sacrifice of peace offering, if he offers an animal from the herd, male or female, he shall offer it without blemish before the LORD. 2 And he shall lay his hand on the head of his offering and kill it at the entrance of the tent of meeting, and Aaron’s sons the priests shall throw the blood against the sides of the altar. 3 And from the sacrifice of the peace offering, as a food offering to the LORD, he shall offer the fat covering the entrails and all the fat that is on the entrails, 4 and the two kidneys with the fat that is on them at the loins, and the long lobe of the liver that he shall remove with the kidneys. 5 Then Aaron’s sons shall burn it on the altar on top of the burnt offering, which is on the wood on the fire; it is a food offering with a pleasing aroma to the LORD.
6 “If his offering for a sacrifice of peace offering to the LORD is an animal from the flock, male or female, he shall offer it without blemish. 7 If he offers a lamb for his offering, then he shall offer it before the LORD, 8 lay his hand on the head of his offering, and kill it in front of the tent of meeting; and Aaron’s sons shall throw its blood against the sides of the altar. 9 Then from the sacrifice of the peace offering he shall offer as a food offering to the LORD its fat; he shall remove the whole fat tail, cut off close to the backbone, and the fat that covers the entrails and all the fat that is on the entrails 10 and the two kidneys with the fat that is on them at the loins and the long lobe of the liver that he shall remove with the kidneys. 11 And the priest shall burn it on the altar as a food offering to the LORD.
12 “If his offering is a goat, then he shall offer it before the LORD 13 and lay his hand on its head and kill it in front of the tent of meeting, and the sons of Aaron shall throw its blood against the sides of the altar. 14 Then he shall offer from it, as his offering for a food offering to the LORD, the fat covering the entrails and all the fat that is on the entrails 15 and the two kidneys with the fat that is on them at the loins and the long lobe of the liver that he shall remove with the kidneys. 16 And the priest shall burn them on the altar as a food offering with a pleasing aroma. All fat is the LORD’s. 17 It shall be a statute forever throughout your generations, in all your dwelling places, that you eat neither fat nor blood.”
In Leviticus, Moses is recording for us the rules for how to approach God under the Old Testament sacrificial system. God lays out very explicit regulations on what to do under the ceremonial law. In today’s passage we see the rules for the peace offering.
What do we learn from this?
The peace offering was a celebration of God’s blessing, as the person who brought the offering got to share in eating the animal that was sacrificed. It was not done in response to some sin, but was symbolic of fellowship with God, and thus it is sometimes called a fellowship offering. It was a celebration of being at peace with God.
But even in this peace offering, there is an element of atonement. The person bringing the offering was to lay his hand on the head of the animal, clearly displaying the concept that the animal represents the person bringing the sacrifice. This animal dies in their place, showing that they know they deserve to die because of their guilt before God, but another is substituting for them and bears the penalty for them.
Where is Christ in this passage?
We are not naturally at peace with God. We are born sinful and under God’s wrath. The only way we can be at peace with God is for someone to bear the guilt of our sins. That is the whole point of the animal sacrifices in the Old Testament. An animal couldn’t bear the sins of a person then anymore than it can now. But the animal sacrifice showed that there was going to be a sacrifice of a substitute that would truly pay the price for sin.
The sacrifice that would come would be the perfect substitute, symbolized by the requirement that the animal be without blemish. This perfect sacrifice personally bears the penalty for sin, and grants peace before God. This sacrifice is Jesus Christ.
