Among the many deep lessons God has set before us in the chapters of Leviticus, which we have been reading, He has told of the full result of the dying of Jesus. Chapter 16 does this; it is the foundation or center of the whole book of Leviticus, on which all the rest depends. Here then it is not so much God forgiving individual sins, as it is His putting away sin, having provided a special place of nearness to Himself for the Church—those who receive the Lord Jesus into their hearts in this present day of grace, between Pentecost and the Lord’s coming to take them to His heavenly home.
The high priest and his house are covered by one offering, much greater in value than the offering for the people of Israel, and this superior sacrifice is offered first, and the blood taken on the priest’s first going behind the veil, or curtain. Let us watch him. He carries a vessel containing some of the bullock’s. blood, a censer of burning coals from the altar, and his hands full of sweet incense. He draws the veil to one side, and enters the small room set apart as the Holy of Holies, where the emblems of God’s presence are. It is the first time he has been there for a year.,
Quickly dropping the incense on the fire in the censer, clouds of perfumed incense rise to hide the mercy seat upon the ark. Then the priest takes of the blood with his finger, and sprinkles it on the mercy seat, and seven times in front of the mercy seat. This done, he quickly goes out again, for the priest of old could not stay in the Holy of Holies.
An offering is made separately for the people of Israel. Two young goats are taken; one of them is now killed (verse 15), and its blood is taken within the veil, as was the bullock’s blood. The holy, the tabernacle, and the brazen altar are purified by blood.
After all this has been done, the live goat is brought, the high priest lays both his hands on its head, and confesses over it the sins of the children of Israel (verse 21). Then the goat is sent away, in type bearing their sins to a land not inhabited.
The high priest and his house represent Christians, the heavenly people for whom Christ died. There is but one offering, one sacrificial death, “The death of the cross” for all, whether ourselves of this day, or those of an earlier, or a later time, but the prominence given to the bullock for Aaron and his family agrees with the special place of privilege and nearness to God given to believers now; while the living goat, sent away, when the high priest comes out of the tabernacle, pictures the restoration of the people of Israel at a day which will be when the Lord comes to the earth again.
Sending the live goat away, is God’s way of telling us of His putting away sin out of His presence, but we who are believers in the Lord Jesus do not need to wait till Israel sees and believes, but by faith now we believe and rest in the knowledge that God has put away all our sins, never to bring them up again.
The work which took the sins away, of Israel as of the Church, was all done by the Lord Jesus on the cross, 1900 years ago.
Once every year (verses 29-34) the day of atonement was repeated, on the tenth day of the seventh month.
How far at a distance from God these Israelites were, also without the knowledge of forgiveness of sins, and of an offering which has perfected forever those who have believed!
For us, the word is, “Having therefore, brethren, boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way, which He hath consecrated for us, through the veil, that is to say, His flesh . . . let us draw near with a true heart, in full assurance of faith.” Heb. 10:19-2219Having therefore, brethren, boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus, 20By a new and living way, which he hath consecrated for us, through the veil, that is to say, his flesh; 21And having an high priest over the house of God; 22Let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience, and our bodies washed with pure water. (Hebrews 10:19‑22).