When Aaron presents the bull for his sin offering and makes atonement for himself and his household, he is to slaughter the bull for his own sin offering. Sermons I. THAT GOD ADMITS VICARIOUS SUFFERING INTO HIS RIGHTEOUS REALM. The innocent goat would shed its blood, would pour out its life, that the guilty human souls might not die, but live. It was a Divine appointment, and shows clearly that the propitiatory element was allowed by the Holy One of Israel. The vicarious principle has a large place in the kingdom of God on earth. Involuntarily and also voluntarily we suffer for others and others for us. Man bears the penal consequences of his brother's sin. He does so when he cannot avoid so doing; and he does so frequently with his own full consent; indeed, by going far out of his way on purpose to bear it. Vicarious suffering runs through the whole human economy. But there is only One who could possibly take on himself the penalty of the world's sin - only One on whom could possibly be "laid the iniquity of us all." That one is the spotless "Lamb of God," that Son of God who became sin for man; he, "for the suffering of death was made a little lower than the angels," and took on him a mortal form. "Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows;... he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities," etc. (Isaiah 53:4, 5; 1 Peter 2:24). II. THAT THE SACRIFICE OF CHRIST AVAILS TO REMOVE COMPLETELY ALL CONDEMNATION. When the children of Israel saw the live goat, over whose head their sins had been confessed, being led away into the waste wilderness where it would never more be seen (verse 22), they had a very vivid assurance made through their senses to their soul that "their transgressions were forgiven, and their sins covered." No such dramatic assurance have we now, but we may have the utmost confidence that our sins are forgiven us "for his Name's sake;" that "there is no condemnation to us who are in Christ Jesus," to us "who have redemption through his blood, even the forgiveness of sins" (Acts 13:39; Romans 5:9). Trusting in the slain Lamb of God, we may see, by the eye of faith, all our guilt and all our condemnation borne away into the land of forgetfulness, where God will remember it no more for ever. III. THAT NO SACRIFICE WILL AVAIL ANYTHING WITHOUT ACTIVE PARTICIPATION ON OUR PART. Useless and unavailing altogether the slaying of the one goat and the sending away of the other without the act of confession and the imposition of hands by the high priest (verse 21); this part of the solemn ceremonial was essential; apart from that everything would have been vain. And without our personal spiritual participation the sacrifice of the Lamb of God will be all in vain. 1. There must be the confession of our sin; a confession of sin which springs from contrition for sin, and is attended by a determination to put all sin away (repentance). 2. Faith in the Divine Redeemer. "Our faith must lay its hand on that dear head of his." 3. And this must be the action of our own individual soul. Whatever guidance and encouragement we may gain from the ministers of Christ, we ourselves must repent and believe. - C.
Because of his issue he is unclean. 1. We learn, in a very striking manner, the intense holiness of the Divine presence. Not a soil, not a stain, not a speck can be tolerated for a moment in that thrice-hallowed region.2. Again, we learn that human nature is the ever-flowing fountain of uncleanness. It is hopelessly defiled and defiling. 3. Finally, we learn, afresh, the expiatory value of the blood of Christ, and the cleansing, sanctifying virtues of the precious Word of God. When we think of the unsullied purity of the sanctuary, and then reflect upon nature's irremediable defilement, and ask the question, "However can we enter and dwell there?" the answer is found in "the blood and water" which flowed from the side of a crucified Christ — a Christ who gave up His life unto death for us, that we might live by Him. (C. H. Mackintosh.) (J. A. Seiss, D. D.) (J. M. Gibson, D. D.) y: — We get here an illustration of that which so often occurs in the law of Moses, viz., that duties of the lowest, humblest order are urged on the people by the highest and noblest sanctions. Common work may be dignified by great motives. It will be regarded by a wise Christian man as a part of his duty which is by no means to be neglected, to maintain order and unsullied cleanliness in person and home.(C. Clemance, D. D.) We are here taught the disgusting constancy with which our original, deep-seated corruption will naturally discover itself. In all situations, towards all persons, at all seasons, this filthiness of the secret soul may be traced. In ver. 4 the man is represented as unclean when he lieth down to sleep, or even to rest at noon. Ah! yonder lies a sinner, and the very ground under him is accursed. His very pillow may shortly become a spear under his throat; just as Jonah's rest soon became a tempestuous sea. A friend comes to see him and gently wakes him, but touches his couch in so doing, and becomes thereby unclean (ver. 5); for the man is all polluted. However amiable the friend you visit, yet, if still in his unhealed corruption, your intercourse with him spreads its baleful influence over you. You have insensibly been injured by the contact. Oh, how we should watch our souls in mingling with a world lying in wickedness l Oh, how holy, how marvellously strong in holiness was Jesus, who breathed this polluted air and remained as holy as when He came! If the man leave the spot, and another occupy it, that other has seated himself in the sinner's place (ver. 6), and the memory of his sin is not gone. He is in contact with a polluted thing. As when one of us now reads the details of a sinner's career, and our mind rests thereon, we are involved in this sin. If a physician (ver. 7) or an attendant touch the sick man's flesh, he is in contact with sin, and becomes polluted. This legal consequence of any actual contact with the defiled shows us, no doubt, the danger and hazard of even attempting to aid the polluted. It is at the risk of being ourselves involved in their sin. Therefore it must be watchfully done, not boldly and adventurously. You breathe an impure atmosphere: proceed with caution. If (ver. 8) any even accidental touch occur — as if the diseased man spit or sneeze, so as anything from him reaches the bystander, pollution is spread. An accidental word, a casual expression, an unexpected look, may suggest sin; and if it does, forthwith wash it all away ere evening comes. "Let not the sun go down upon thy wrath." Leave no stain for a moment upon thy conscience. When the man rides forth, lo! yonder is a sinner; and his saddle is polluted; and the mattress he spread on the floor of his tent for a temporary rest in his journey (ver. 10) is so polluted that the attendant who lifts it is defiled. Oh! sad, sad estate of man! In going out or coming in, in the house or by the way, his inward fountain of sin flows on unceasingly, and the Holy One of Israel follows him with His eye to mark him as a sinner. Nay, if he put his hand forth (ver. 11) to touch any one-to give him a friendly welcome, or aid him in any work, he conveys pollution, unless he have first "rinsed his hands in water." The sinner, whose natural heart is still unhealed, cannot do even a kind act without sin — his only mode of doing so would be "washing in clean water." And the vessels he uses (ver. 12)must be broken or rinsed in water; even as the earth, on which the sinner has stood as his theatre for committing evil shall be broken in pieces by the fire of the last day ("All these things shall be dissolved," 2 Peter 3:11), the trial by water being already past.(A. A. Bonar.) A full atonement is required for our inward, secret sins, as much as for open and flagrant sins. The sinful vision that our fancy spread out before us for a moment must be washed away by blood. The tendency which our soul felt to sympathise in that act of resentment or revenge must be washed away by blood. The hour, or minutes, we spent in brooding over our supposed hard lot must be redeemed by blood. The selfish wish we cherished for special prosperity in some undertaking that was to reflect its credit on us only, is to be washed away by blood. The proud aspiration, the sensual impulse, the world-loving eye or soul cast on earth's glories, must be washed away by blood. The darkness, ignorance, suspicion, and misconception we entertain toward God and His salvation, retest be washed in blood. "Behold, Thou desirest truth in the inward parts, and in the hidden part (hidden region of the soul) Thou shalt make me to know wisdom" (Psalm 51:6).(A. A. Bonar.) All those details of Divine precept, by which every person and article anywise brought into contact with the unclean man or woman became unclean, bring out the truth that impurity is an essentially communicable evil. It is so physically; "let sinners look to it." It is so spiritually. How guilty in the very last degree are those who drive a nefarious trade in corrupt literature! How shameful to put indecent thought into print to pollute the young! How demoralising to the soul, how displeasing to God, how scrupulously to be avoided, the questionable conversation that borders on the indelicate and impure! (see Ephesians 5:3, 4, 12; Colossians 3:8).(W. Clarkson.) Biblioth. Bibl. All this mystically teaches us to beware of courting or choosing the conversation of those that have received any tincture of vice, and not to contract acquaintance with any persons who we have reason to believe are not on good terms with God. There is such a venomous contagion in vice and immorality that familiarity with sinners does, of itself, make a man an associate in their practices: so saith the son of Sirach (Ecclesiasticus 13:1), and thus the apostle commands (1 Timothy 5:22).(Biblioth. Bibl.) That plain speaking and plain dealing, such as we find here, was necessary, is amply proved by the history of the ancient world, and of the modern world too. The Bible is the only book that has exercised any considerable effect in keeping men and women pure. There are many books, where everything offensive to the ear is studiously avoided, which nevertheless are very poison to the soul. In the Bible, on the other hand, while there is not a little that is offensive to the ear, there is absolutely nothing that is poisonous to the spirit, unless the spirit has been poisoned already; for we must remember that while "to the pure all things are pure," "unto them that are defiled and unbelieving is m thing pure, but even their mind and conscience is defiled." There is absolutely nothing in the entire Bible that will not exert a holy and purifying influence on those who read it in the right spirit. And as a historical fact, such has been the result among those who have made these Scriptures their companion and counsellor. The Jews alone among the nations of antiquity had even the conception of purity as we understand it now. Consider for a moment whence we derive those exalted notions of purity which are widely prevalent in modern society, especially among Christian people. Even the purest and the best of Greek philosophers, those who in other respects have come nearest to Bible ethics, are wofully behind in regard to personal purity of heart and life, some of them tolerating and others approving that which enlightened Christian sentiment utterly condemns. Let any one fairly investigate the genesis and "evolution" of our modern ideas of chastity and purity and he will find that they are traceable chiefly to the Hebrew Scriptures as their source. And so the remarkable fact will present itself that to these very Scriptures, and largely to those parts of them which the corrupt imagination of certain cavillers finds an indecency which is all its own, we owe that very sentiment of delicacy which makes it impossible for us to read them aloud in public or in the family.(J. M. Gibson, D. D.). People Aaron, Israelites, MosesPlaces TemanTopics Aaron, Atonement, Bring, Bull, Bullock, Death, Household, Kill, Offer, Offering, Ox, Present, Sin, Sin-offering, Slaughter, SlaughteredOutline 1. how the high priest must enter into the holy place11. The sin offering for himself 15. The sin offering for the people 20. The scapegoat 29. The yearly feast of the expiations Dictionary of Bible Themes Leviticus 16:11 6648 expiation Library August 9. "He Shall Lay Both his Hands Upon the Head of the Live Goat, and Confess Over Him all the Iniquities of the Children of Israel; Transgressions and Sins" (Lev. xvi. 21). "He shall lay both his hands upon the head of the live goat, and confess over him all the iniquities of the children of Israel; transgressions and sins" (Lev. xvi. 21). As any evil comes up, and the consciousness of any unholy thing touches our inner senses, it is our privilege at once to hand it over to the Holy Ghost and to lay it upon Jesus, as something already crucified with Him, and as of old, in the case of the sin offering, it will be carried without the camp and burned to ashes. There may … Rev. A. B. Simpson—Days of Heaven Upon Earth The Day of Atonement The Day of Atonement The Fact of the Redeemer's Return was Foreshadowed in the Ritual on the Annual Day of Israel's Atonement. The Great High-Priest. Fifth Sunday in Lent Parable of the Pharisee and Publican. The Intercession of Christ The Call of Matthew - the Saviour's Welcome to Sinners - Rabbinic Theology as Regards the Doctrine of Forgiveness in Contrast to the Gospel of Christ Sundry Exhortations. The Cavils of the Pharisees Concerning Purification, and the Teaching of the Lord Concerning Purity - the Traditions Concerning Hand-Washing' and Vows. 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