Sacrifice and Enjoying God's Favor Pastor Larry Kroon Wasilla Bible Church February 05, 2012 The Scriptures encourage us to train ourselves in the words of the faith, the words of the good doctrine that we follow. We're talking here about more than just simply adding to our Christian vocabulary with correct spelling and proper pronunciation, and precise definition. We're talking about being actually trained in the truth, where certain words are words that we get a functional grip on, we begin to practice the reality of which they speak, and it begins to shape us and to form the way we feel, the way we think, and the way we act. The promise is, is as we do that it'll make a qualitative difference both in this life and in eternity. With that promise we have focused in this particular series of sermons on training ourselves in a particular word, one of the grandest terms in the faith, one of the grandest terms in all of Christian doctrine, the term 'redemption'. And our target is to make sure that we train ourselves in that term. And part of that for the next three weeks in this particular series we are going to be looking at that term as it's presented in the Old Testament. We're gonna track the three main themes that are identified with that concept, and the reality of redemption as it is presented in the Old Testament. Now after that we'll go on to the New, but the next three weeks we're just gonna concentrate on the Old Testament. And we're gonna put a little chart in front of you that helps as we work through this, and as we talk about redemption in the weeks ahead we are going to...(there we go [gets image on screen])...we're going to be looking at that reality. The simple, functional definition here is that redemption refers to the payment required for sinners to 1) enjoy God's favor; 2) to enter God's family; and 3) to experience God's freedom. Those are the three threads throughout the Old Testament that are identified with the reality of redemption. When we speak of redemption it's a payment being made so that sinners can enjoy God's favor, God's family, God's freedom. Today we're gonna concentrate on that first one: that in redemption the payment is made that enables sinners to enjoy God's favor. Key word we're gonna identify with it, the key word we're gonna link with it so we can understand the payment in this context and the Old Testament perspective, is the word 'sacrifice'. That leads us to one more definition today. It's the last one we'll have today, and that's the definition of sacrifice. I wanna make sure we have a good biblical understanding of what that means when we use it, speaking of redemption. A sacrifice is a costly offering of devotion that can make a sinner pleasing to God. A couple of elements here...1) it is costly. A sacrifice must be something that costs. It must be something that is dear to you, and valuable to you. And it's an offering that is an expression of devotion, a heart commitment. It is not simply going through motions. So it's costly, used to express devotion in such a way that it makes a sinner...the offering itself is not what we're looking at here, but the sinner...becomes pleasing to God. And the idea of pleasing here is that sinner becomes someone that God enjoys. We can define it; it's better to just see how it's used and how it's presented in Scripture in the Old Testament. And so I'm gonna take us to one of the stranger books for us in our time, in our culture, in the Bible. It's the book of Leviticus. And I often see when people decide they're gonna read through the Bible they start with Genesis. they get through Exodus, and they hit Leviticus...and they come to a dead stop. But that's where we're gonna go today. And I wanna take you to the first chapter of Leviticus, and we're gonna have an extended reading here, something not often done where you stop and just read out loud out of Leviticus. This is a book that was written for the Israelites as they came out of the land of Egypt. They had been there as a slave people. God, under Moses, had rescued 'em out of slavery, takes 'em out into the wilderness, and forms them into a nation under Moses. And part of that is getting them organized as a people who's gonna lead, who's gonna follow, how they're gonna be arranged in tribes and how they're gonna march in order all those sorts of things. But they're also being trained and organized and put together in terms of how they're going to worship; how they, as sinners, will make the appropriate offerings and sacrifices to be pleasing to God. The book itself is entitled 'Leviticus' because it's the Levites, the priests, who would be in charge of teaching the people, administrating, and applying it as the Old Testament Israelites worshiped in this way. So let's go to Leviticus 1. I'm gonna encourage you, if you have your Bible with you, to turn there with me and follow along. And as I said, I'm gonna have an extended reading here because I want you to feel the full impact of what was required and what was expected, of how a person in the Old Testament paid the required price to enjoy the favor of God. It starts off like this:
The LORD called Moses and spoke to him from the tent of meeting, saying, Speak to the people of Israel and say to them, 'When any of you brings an offering to the LORD, you shall bring your offering of livestock [that's cattle] from the herd [cattle] or from the flock [a sheep]. If his offering is a burnt offering from the herd [that is, it's a bull], he shall offer a male without blemish. He shall bring it to the entrance of the tent of meeting, that he may be accepted before the LORD. He [that is, the worshiper who's brought the animal] shall lay his hand on the head of the burnt offering, and it shall be accepted for him to make atonement for him. Then he shall kill [remember, this is the worshiper]...then he shall kill the bull before the LORD, and Aaron's sons the priests shall bring the blood and throw the blood against the sides of the altar that is at the entrance of the tent of meeting. Then he shall flay the burnt offering [that is, the offerer]...he shall flay the burnt offering and cut it into pieces, and the sons of Aaron the priest shall put fire on the altar and arrange wood on the fire. And Aaron's sons the priests shall arrange the pieces, the head, and the fat, on the wood that is on the fire on the altar; but its entrails and its legs he shall wash with water. And the priest shall burn all of it on the altar, as a burn offering, a food offering with a pleasing aroma to the LORD. That's if you brought a bull from the herd. There's instructions likewise for if you brought a sheep from the flock, and they read very similar. It says If his gift for a burnt offering is from the flock, from the sheep or goats, he shall bring a male without blemish, and he shall kill it on the north side of the altar before the LORD, and Aaron's sons the priests shall throw its blood against the sides of the altar. And he shall cut it into pieces, with its head and its fat, and the priest shall arrange them on the wood that is on the fire on the altar, but the entrails and the legs he shall wash with water. And the priest shall offer all of it and burn it on the altar; it is a burnt offering, a food offering with a pleasing aroma to the LORD. Now some people were so poor they could not afford, they did not have, a young bull to bring or a lamb from the flock. So they were allowed to bring birds, small birds. It says If his offering to the LORD is a burnt offering of birds, then he shall bring his offering of turtledoves or pigeons. Now, these were so small the offerer and the priest can't both get involved in the processing of it. And so it simply says, And the priest shall bring it to the altar, wring off its head, and burn it on the altar. Its blood shall be drained out on the side of the altar. He shall remove its crop with its contents and cast it beside the altar on the east side, in the place for ashes. He shall tear it open by its wings, but shall not sever it completely. And the priest shall burn it on the altar, on the wood that is on the fire. It is a burnt offering, a food offering with a pleasing aroma to the LORD. This is the most basic of all the Israelite acts of worship, most basic of all the sacrifices. Walk through it so you can picture it once again. If you desire to come and get God's favor, to seek His blessing upon you as a sinner, you would come to the temple area (or the tabernacle area is being described here), and you would be met as you came by a priest who would examine the animal that you brought, whether it was from the flock or the herd. He would examine it and would make sure that it was perfect, that there were no blemishes this was the best of the best. And then you, not the priest, but you would take that animal and you would bring it to the side of the altar; and you would kill it, and you would skin it, and then you would cut it in pieces. You would give those pieces to the priest who would put it on the altar, and then you would clean the entrails and you would clean the hind legs, and you would wash them so they were clean, and give them to the priest. And he would put them likewise on the altar...and it would all be burned. In an agrarian culture that depended upon its flocks and its herds for survival this was a costly sacrifice...and every bit of it would just go up in smoke. And then you would leave...and that was worship. Now, there would be psalms sung as this was happening. There would be prayers said. The priest would speak to you, you would speak to the priest. But fundamentally, this is what was happening. You look at it; there's a key element in here, and as we read through it you can miss it, so I wanna make sure we highlight it. In terms of understanding what was happening here, verse 3 is central. It says If his offering is a burnt offering from the herd, he shall offer a male without blemish. Just perfect animal. He shall bring it to the entrance of the tent of meeting, and then here's the phrase, that he, that is the offerer, the worshiper, the sinner, may be acceptable before the
LORD. And that term 'acceptable' is a strong one. It means 'that you may be a pleasure to God', that you would be one who, in front of God, brings joy to Him. The next verse goes on and says how this is gonna transpire. It says he shall lay his hand on the head of that burnt offering; once that priest says 'yes, this is a perfect animal' you'd put your hand on it. Now we're not talking about a little touch from far away. You would go up, you would put your hand on him, and you would lean on him and make it very clear that this is the animal that you have brought for you. And it, that animal, shall be acceptable, pleasing, for you, for the person who is offering it, to make atonement for him, to make payment it the idea. In fact, it could be literally translated 'to make ransom for him'. It would become the payment by which you could enjoy the favor of God; that once that payment was made God would be so pleased with you, and His joy at what you are and what you are doing would be so great that you would enjoy His goodness flowing into your life. That's how a sinner came to enjoy God's favor. Don't know if we can fully appreciate, at our time and our place, how central this was in Old Testament worship. This is the most general and basic of all the Old Testament sacrifices. It was the one that every morning the priests in the temple would offer a burnt offering just like this on behalf of the whole nation; and then every evening the priests would offer a second lamb on behalf of the nation to make it acceptable before God, so that Israel could enjoy God's favor. This was done every day, twice a day, every month, every year. On days like the Sabbath, special days like the Sabbath, not only would they do morning and the evening sacrifices there were four other burnt offerings they would make during that day. And then when they came to the new moon, the start of a new month, they would offer not just the morning sacrifice and the evening sacrifice; there were nine other burnt offerings they would make that day the priests offering on behalf of the nation so Israel could enjoy God's favor. And that doesn't even get into the special high holy days like Passover and the Day of Atonement. This was constantly going on at the center of Israel's worship at the temple. And then, if you as an individual desired to enjoy God's favor you brought a lamb and did the same thing. This burnt offering was kind of like...if you think of it in a hygienic way, it was kind of like washing your hands before you ate. There was a basic act, keeping a right relationship with God. Now, if you did something that was very specific and wrong you would also be called upon to bring a sin offering. Similar to if you had been washing your hands throughout the day, but then you were out in the garage and you got your hands all gooey and you had to go in and wash 'em again. That's what the sin offerings and guilt offerings were like. If you knew you had done wrong, you needed to go offer an animal kill it, skin it, cut it up, and watch it burn. This was so basic to Israel that when it came time for a child to start studying the Scriptures, the first book they would have the child study was the book of Leviticus. They wanted to make sure that the first thing their child understood about their relationship with God, and being right with Him, and enjoying His favor...that the first, most basic thing they understood was sacrifice. And so they would teach 'em the book of Leviticus, and they would use the other stories and books to explain to 'em why that was so important. But they started with this book. Which raises the question: If that was so central in Israel, why don't we do it? I mean, why don't we have set up out in our parking lot a huge altar, and every time you come to church you're bringing an animal with you to kill, to skin, to cut up and burn? Why, when it's time to teach your child about God, and a right relationship with God, why don't you start by reading the book of Leviticus? Answer: It's one word...actually it's one name, and it's Jesus. The book of Hebrews in the New Testament...and we're going to come back to this text later in our series...but in the book of Hebrews the writer is talking about the Old Testament and the New. Near the end of the book he's commenting about Jesus, and he speaks of Him this way. He says, He entered..., Jesus entered,...once for all..., one time for all time, one time for everyone. He entered one time...into the holy places... ; and here we're not talking about the Old Testament tabernacle or temple. We're talking about God's very presence in the unseen realm, in the heavens. Jesus entered once for all into the holy places, not by means of the blood of goats and calves by by means of His own blood, a reference here to the cross. And here comes the important last phrase:...thus..., or in so doing,...securing an eternal redemption. In other words, on that cross when Jesus died and He said, It is finished, He had made the payment required for sinners to enjoy God's favor for all time. For all time, and for all who would put their hand on Him in faith. For all time. That's why we don't offer sacrifices day after day, week after week, month after month, year after year. Think about it. For fourteen hundred years Israel did this, and all of a sudden, one day, because of who He was and the offering He made of Himself, the need for sacrifices stopped. Interesting way to think of the law at this point, the book of Leviticus, and it's a helpful way. Older translation speaking of that Old Testament law and Leviticus and the other books like it, says 'Therefore the law has become our tutor, our teacher, our trainer' (our guardian is the way one translation puts it). 'Therefore the law has become out tutor, our teacher, to lead us to Christ so that we may be justified by faith, we may be set right with God, through faith in Him.' You have to understand, when we talk about sacrifice and redemption and being pleasing to God, and we talk about Jesus offering Himself as the eternal redemption, those are all strange concepts. We can't figure 'em
out on our own. They're matters of revelation that God has to tell us. And He was using the Old Testament as one of the longest object lessons in all of history, to make sure that when He presented Jesus at the proper time, at the right moment, and John the Baptist could point by Jesus as He walked beside the water among other people, and John could point at Jesus and say, There is the Lamb of God,...after fourteen hundred years of offering sacrifices continually there was a group of people at that time and that place there was a group of people that understood exactly what was meant. That's the sacrifice that'll make payment so we can enjoy God's favor. I went to a concert last Sunday night. It was my idea of a date night. It was a noble idea...symphonic concert at the Atwood Center. And I said, 'You know, this would be kind of a classy thing.' So after forty years I decided to do something classy with Marlene. So we went to a concert, and it was gonna be Mozart's 41 st Symphony, followed by Holst's 19 th Opus. And we got there, and I had managed to find the cheapest seat in the very back balcony. So we're right up against the wall looking at this, and the first half was gonna be Mozart's Symphony, and then we were gonna have Holst's. And as that one...as the Opus was gonna be done there was gonna be a planetary visual display of slides. And I sat down and 'ok, this is gonna be good', Marlene's sitting next to me, and I get the program. And it was introducing Mozart's...I think you'd like to hear this read. See if you can follow with me. This is introducing the last part of the Symphony. It says The lovely, elegant Andante features a super blending of winds and strings. The inspired use of muted violins adds an intimate touch. The dignified yet playful Minuet with its subtly witty trio section sets up the complex and exciting finale, a marvel of contrapuntal writing. For the opening theme of the Finale Mozart chose a favorite tune, one which he had already successfully used in two Masses. He brilliantly features this melody in a fugal setting. Downs notes that the Finale quickly abandons fugal style for a richly symphonic working out in which Mozart's dazzling contrapuntal sleight of hand serves only to emphasize the joyful play of forces that characterize the rest of the symphony and to fuse them into an incandescent climax. The culmination of the work is the magnificent Coda in which Mozart manages to display all the main tunes of the movement simultaneously in what becomes five-part counterpoint, capping the Finale's audacious complexity and excitement. This dazzling conclusion never ceases to astound both audiences and the performers. I don't know...i was asleep at the end. Now, not everybody was asleep. I mean, somebody was...some people were...there was an individual I met out in the foyer who was profoundly moved by it. In fact, he was a person from our church! And I would name him, but Mark Doner would be a little embarrassed if people heard this about him. But I come out, and I'm walking, and I look over there and I think, 'Oh, this is the most disastrous date night!' I'm looking about and here's Mark, and he's out of the main flow of traffic, and he's over there like this [puts his hands over his face], and I come over there, and 'Can you believe that?' and he looks up and 'No, can you?' [in a crying voice]. And I'm thinking, 'Oh, no.' And he was! He was totally gripped and emotionally wrung out by that concert. Now, when we're done training in redemption I want you to be emotionally engaged like Mark, and not asleep like me. To do that we're gonna avoid the big words. We're gonna skip the glowing descriptions. And we're going to keep a very, very gripable, functional approach to this. And we'll repeat it, and we'll go back to it; just like a team, we're going back to practice the drills. We'll keep this in front of you, that redemption refers to the payment required for sinners to enjoy God's favor, to enter God's family, to experience God's freedom. And the starting point is sacrifice. And I know there will be theologians among you that will say, Larry, you've gotta be a little more precise. That word's a little too vague. We've gotta nuance a little bit more. We've gotta be more glowing when we describe about it. No, we don't. Just get this grip this simple reality and begin to train yourselves in it. And that's why, throughout this series, I added a third column to the little chart that we'll fill in as we go. Each week there'll be another way to practice the reality of redemption in your life, something specifically to do that helps shape you with that truth. This particular week is one of the easiest. In fact, we will do it before we even leave today. One of the most basic ways to practice the reality of redemption is by taking Communion, the oldest tradition of the church...where Jesus, the night He was betrayed, met with His disciples and He gave them bread and He said, Eat this in remembrance of Me, gave them of the cup and said, Drink this in remembrance of Me, in both cases reminding them that His body was broken, His blood was shed in sacrifice for them so that they could enjoy the favor of God. And that has shaped the church ever since. We come together as God's people in this most basic act of ritual, and it is not to give a sacrifice. It is to remember the one given.
We're gonna practice it three times in this series this Sunday, a month from now, and then Good Friday. My goal as we go through this if we do this right this truth will become gripable, so gripable that when we gather as a congregation with all our children on Good Friday you will be able to explain it to your child. It'll be that gripable. Gonna ask the men to come forward that will be serving Communion, and then we'll have some music here at the same time as we go through this last part of our service. We're gonna take our time with it. We'll serve the Communion, we'll have the music. And as we do so, it's a different thing in our culture, that a group this large [will] just stop and just simply think about someone, and remember Him. But then, it was different in the past to sit and offer sacrifices continually. The difference is crucial we're not giving a sacrifice...we're remembering it. The procedure is very simple. The mechanics are not complicated. I will simply read a passage of Scripture, then I'll lead us in prayer, and the men will pass the elements. If you desire to participate with us, if you're a person who has put your hand of faith on Jesus as your sacrifice and you wish to express that faith by taking Communion with us, you're welcome to do that. You don't have to be a member here, you don't have to go through an interview or anything like that. It's just simply if you're here and Jesus is your sacrifice we invite you to express that faith in taking Communion. As the men pass the elements we encourage you to just take of the bread and take of the cup. And you can eat that and drink that right then as it's being passed, or you can just hold it for a few moments if you wanna be reflective and pray. It's a quiet time for us as a congregation. The music will play. Once everyone's served and had an opportunity to participate, then the men will come back and collect the cups and we'll finish with two songs as we come to the end of our service today. The passage of Scripture I'll read for you is found in the book of 1 Corinthians, where the Apostle Paul is explaining Communion to a church that got very caught up in the things they were doing, the important things they were doing for God. And he calls 'em back to this table, and he does so with these words. He says I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus on the night when He was betrayed took bread, and when He had given thanks, He broke it, and said, This is My body which is for you. Do this in remembrance of Me. In the same way also He took the cup, after supper, saying, This cup is the new covenant in My blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me. For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until He comes. 1 Corinthians 11:23-26 Let us pray. Our Father in heaven, We come as a people not bringing sacrifices, but remembering the sacrifice. And we thank You, Father, for that Savior You sent, that Son You sacrificed, the Lord You raised, the King You've exalted, the Redeemer who will return. And Father, we pray that as we take this Communion and remember Him the way He asked to be remembered in this simple act of obedience that, Father, You would quicken our hearts in a world where faith grows weary, where hope fades, and hearts shrivel into self-absorption. We pray that as we remember Jesus Your Spirit will touch ours, and our faith will be strengthened in the reality of Him and the redemption He as made possible, that our hope would be refreshed and renewed, and focused on Him and no one else, and our hearts would be engaged to care for You, to care for one another, and to care for this community the same way that our Redeemer cares. In the name of Jesus we pray. Amen. Grip the reality of our Redeemer and enjoy the favor of our God. Amen.