THE DAY OF ATONEMENT
THE DAY OF ATONEMENT
Substance of a reading† Will you indicate the contents of the earlier chapters of this book?
Exodus closes with the tabernacle set up and filled with the glory of Jehovah. Wonderful scene! God, as dwelling there, would be approached and worshipped by man. This is the ground on which the teaching of Leviticus stands. The priesthood, although recognised as there, is not brought forward at the outset: it is God placing Himself in such a position as to be approached by those who loved Him. The priesthood had been instituted in connection with the construction of the tabernacle: this is assumed here, for without the priests the various offerings brought by the people could not be presented to Jehovah. It is God as in His abode ready (every requisite provided) to receive men according to their appreciation of Christ in the various lights in which He is viewed as walking here on earth, and offering Himself in death in devotedness to God. Later on Aaron and his sons are formally consecrated.
The fourfold view of the sacrifice of Christ, seen here in type, as set forth in the offerings, presents it in its completeness as before God; but each phase has to be apprehended in detail by us. The relative value of any given offering is according to the spiritual stature of the offerer. For example, a bullock offered as a burnt offering indicates a large appreciation, on
†Shorthand notes not being available, longhand notes, which were necessarily not so full, and in which the initials of the different speakers were not taken down, have been used.
[p. 2] the part of the offerer, of Christ as devoted unto death to God’s will. The man who offered the bullock, however, was not accepted to any greater extent than he who brought a turtle dove or a young pigeon, only the bullock was cut up into parts, and being so large, it would afford more sweet savour than the turtle dove or pigeon. The latter were not divided asunder. The man who has a large appreciation of Christ affords more pleasure to God practically than he who has a small one, although both are on the same footing before Him. The sacrifice of Christ is always the ground of man’s acceptance, and be our apprehension of this ever so small, faith in it gives title to draw near to God.
In the sin offerings the various animals set forth in type the responsibility of those who offered; these were not freewill offerings — they were specified; but this, of course, assumed ability to comply with the requirement. When a trespass offering was required, provision was made for extreme poverty.
Leviticus 8 sets forth the consecration of Aaron and his sons. It is Christ and the church viewed in relation to the testimony. They were to “abide in the door of the tabernacle of the congregation day and night seven days, and keep the charge of the Lord”. (Leviticus 8:35) This refers to the present time.
Leviticus 9 speaks of what occurs on the “eighth day”: it is a new departure — Christ in relation to Israel. On this day the glory will appear to Israel. Now it is hidden from them; Stephen saw it in heaven. We see it by the Spirit in the face of Jesus in the holiest of all. When Christ re-appears as King and Priest, typified in Moses and Aaron when they come out, verse 23, the glory will be seen by the congregation of Israel: “When all the people saw, they shouted, and fell on their faces”. Leviticus 9:24. I think this prefigures the highest point reached by them.
[p. 3] Leviticus 10 records the failure of the priesthood. It is human responsibility as seen in this high office; in this, as in every other phase of it, it ends in failure. The house of Aaron, however, was not set aside until the days of Eli. Then there was a change: the priest was to walk before the Anointed, 1 Samuel 2:35. The king would take precedence of the priest.
Chapters 11 to 15 furnish instruction which was to regulate the everyday walk of a people brought into relationship with God in His sanctuary. They were to be holy because He was holy, Leviticus 11:45. Chapter 11 is the discrimination of food. Persons we commune with in an individual way, and books we read, would come in under this heading. Chapter 12 is the birth of man; nature renders unclean. Chapters 13 and 14 deal with the discerning of leprosy and its cleansing.
Chapter 16 before us now stands alone. It is wider in its bearing, perhaps, than any other chapter in the Old Testament, except Exodus 25. It sets forth typically the ground, the blood being on the mercy seat, upon which God places Himself in relation to the whole universe in grace. In Exodus 25 the ark of the covenant refers to Christ personally, He by whom God effects everything; while in Leviticus 16 it is the efficacy of His death that is in view. It is universal in its bearing.
The gospel refers not only to man, but also to the creation. The Lord commissioned the apostles to “preach the glad tidings to all the creation”. Mark 16:15. Paul said it had been “proclaimed in the whole creation which is under heaven”. Colossians 1:23. In preaching the gospel, Paul presented the mercy seat. We should learn how to preach from the example set by the apostles; the Lord taught them how to preach. The more you advance spiritually the more you get into sympathy with God. His grace goes out to the whole creation.
[p. 4] He made a covenant not only with man, but also with the beasts and the earth itself, Genesis 9. The rainbow was the token of this covenant, and it reappears in Revelation 4. When the throne of God resumes its public connection with the earth, the creation, as represented in its four active heads, “the living creatures”, is seen identified with it. They are living creatures; this fact coincides with the covenant, and are replete with divine instinct. They are in full sympathy with Him who sits upon the throne, and speak His praise day and night. The enthroned elders celebrate His creatorial rights in regard to all things.
Romans 8 looks on to the final deliverance of the creation: it is a wonderful thing to be imbued with what God has in His heart. This marks the evangelist; he feels for every part of the creation as groaning under the influence and effects of sin. He is sensible of man’s misery, and his effort is to enlighten him with the knowledge of God, for it is in this way alone that he can be relieved.
The blood on the mercy seat presents a very different thought to the blood of the paschal lamb on the door of the Israelite in Egypt. In the latter the individual is sheltered from the universal judgment: the blood marks off the believer in God’s eye from the world. The Red Sea prefigures God’s judgment of the world; the world was judged morally in the death of Christ. Baptism marks the believer off before man’s eye as apart from the evil system in which Satan rules and the flesh lives, and in its moral import is the believer’s acceptance of God’s judgment of the world, and is thus a testimony to the world that it is judged; but this can have moral force only as the believer walks in the Spirit. The Spirit brings demonstration to the world “of judgment”. What is in view in the early part of Exodus is to deliver man from the influence of Satan, and to put him into relationship with God on the ground of righteousness;
[p. 5] but in Leviticus 16 God is seen not only in relation to man, but to the whole universe, through the blood on the mercy seat.
As to the order of His ways in Exodus, the people were dealt with in pure grace up to chapter 19. God may intervene for our deliverance apart from any thought of state in us, but He will not own us as in relationship to Him as His people unless we judge the world and separate from it: “Come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing: and I will receive you, and will be a Father unto you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty”. 2 Corinthians 6:17. Whatever God’s thoughts were as to Israel, the people were not His congregation properly till they had crossed the sea. Baptism severs us publicly from the world; we cannot be regarded as in God’s congregation until baptised. Baptism in its moral force is “the washing of regeneration”, and it corresponds to the cleansing judgments which will usher in the world to come; the order of things which will be according to God, and with which He will identify Himself. He will be God of that world.
Salvation takes place here on earth: it is in Christ, and has become effective for man through elements which God has introduced down here, and which operate subjectively. The elements are “the washing of regeneration and the renewing of the Holy Ghost” Titus 3:5. In Titus 2 the grace of God has brought salvation to all men, and in chapter 3 we learn how it is effected practically. “According to his mercy he saved us, by the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Ghost; which he shed on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Saviour”. Titus 3:5. The pouring out of the Spirit refers to Pentecost — “Poured out on us”. It is collective, and it is through Jesus Christ our Saviour. The same thing will take place, in principle, in the millennium, Joel 2: 28, 29.
[p. 6] Chapter 16 stands alone. It is God, as it were, upon His throne as supreme in the universal order of things which He has created, and the infinite value of the sacrifice of Christ as meeting Him there in respect of sin in the creation. Man as such could have no possible footing in His presence apart from what spoke of the death of Christ — the blood, and His personal excellence — the sweet incense. Aaron could not enter into the holiest “at all times” to enter without the blood and the sweet incense would involve certain death. “That he die not” indicates God’s holy judgment of man in the flesh. He who was made in the likeness of God, a creature in which the Creator could take pleasure, has become, through sin, so utterly unfit for the divine presence that judgment only is his portion there. This chapter shows that God would give man a footing before Him, but only as in Christ, whose blood witnesses to the removal, according to God’s holy judgment, of the man that had offended. The blood was sprinkled upon the mercy seat, and before the mercy seat. The majesty of God had been offended: this is the first great fact to recognise. The blood of Christ being placed before God, He has become propitious toward man and toward the whole creation. The throne is rendered favourable to men. In preaching, this should be made clear. The blood on the mercy seat speaks of the death of Christ: the veil was rent when Christ died.
I should not like to limit the force of the gospel to man; its immediate application is to him, but it refers to the whole creation. We are the firstfruits of the creation. Here we have the universal effect of the death of Christ; and to be an evangelist according to God one must understand the teaching of this chapter. The scope of it is seen in verse 33, “he shall make an atonement for the holy sanctuary, and he shall make an atonement for the tabernacle of the [p. 7] congregation, and for the altar, and he shall make an atonement for the priests, and for all the people of the congregation”. Leviticus 16:33. We cannot set forth all the truth at once, but we should seek, in ministering, to indicate it in its entirety, for the object in preaching ought to be to set the soul of man in the light of God, and of all that vast system of things which He has before Him. Hence, as it is in Christ God shines out, and as it is in Him that every divine thought is taken up and maintained immutably in Man, He becomes, of necessity, the subject of all testimony.
Reconciliation refers to all things being taken up in Christ as Man on the ground of redemption. God is complacent in all. Propitiation is in the death of Christ; it refers to God as offended and dishonoured by man’s sin. But reconciliation has reference to His affections; He had lost man, and now He has recovered him in Christ. We are before Him in Christ in all His acceptability. The headship of Christ involves reconciliation. Headship is asserted by love. Christ, having died for all, has established an incontestable claim over all. He is Head by God’s appointment, but He is also Head in virtue of what He is in His own Person, and He recovers everything for God subjectively by the mighty influence of His love. As Head He makes known the love He bears to us, as having died for us, so that we become captured by Him in our affections, and led in triumph by Him to the Father.
Aaron here, as clothed in these holy linen garments, represents Christ as viewed in that infinite personal purity and dignity which qualified Him for the mighty work to be accomplished. He is not here clad in His garments of glory and beauty which speak of the varied excellences and glories which shine in Him as Man, and in which He appears before God in the service of the sanctuary; and in which others are associated with Him, they being clad also in garments [p. 8] of glory and beauty. But in the chapter before us it is the great work of atonement that is in view, and in this He is alone. “And there shall be no man in the tabernacle of the congregation when he goeth in to make an atonement in the holy place”, Leviticus 16:17.
Aaron’s house, as we know, represents the assembly. It is not, however, seen as associated with Him in service, Aaron’s sons set forth this side as His house, the assembly is that which is the first interest of His heart. A man’s house, or household, is his chief interest. The bullock accords with this: it speaks of the largeness, or greatness, of the offering of Christ. He gave Himself for the church, Ephesians 5. In result there will be a full reciprocation on the part of the church to the love thus shown. The goat for the sin offering represents the sacrifice of Christ in regard to Israel. There can be no change in Christ, of course, but a goat is not of the same value as a bullock, therefore, I think, Israel’s relative place in the Lord’s heart is indicated.
It is very noticeable that there is no scape bullock. This gives rise to a very important distinction between the position of Christians now and that of Israel in the future. They will know forgiveness only when they see Jesus; that is, when He reappears to them. Their sins have been put away, as our own, in His death, but they will not know this until He returns. We know forgiveness by the Spirit. “The Holy Ghost also is a witness to us”. Hebrews 10:15. Indeed, it is not only so, but we, by the Spirit, are enabled to “see Jesus crowned with glory and honour”. Hebrews 2:9.
Verse 2, “I will appear in the cloud upon the mercy seat”. Leviticus 16:2. God takes a public place in the creation as its eternal centre. It is not the appearing of the glory at the door of the tabernacle: this will be to Israel. God appears in Christ; His glory shines in the face of Jesus. Now the glory is attractive: it is in the [p. 9] face of the lowliest Man that ever trod the earth, The smallest child would be attracted by the face of Jesus. The glory is really the spirit of the new covenant: the Lord is that Spirit, and we are privileged to behold His glory. The new covenant speaks of God’s love, and God’s glory is the shining out of Himself in Christ. It is in the face of Jesus Christ, and the knowledge of it is to shine forth in the saints down here — at least it shone forth in Paul.