The Story of God: Animal Sacrifices
Leviticus 1:1-5
As we are going through this series on the Story of God, there’s one truth I hope is becoming more and more clear – and more and more encouraging -- to you: that God’s ultimate purpose is to display His glory, so He can share with us, His created beings, the joy He has in beholding His glory.
But as the story of God unfolds, you could easily think God’s purpose has been derailed. Because ever since Genesis 3, everyone turns his or her back on God. Adam and Eve, everyone before Noah’s Flood, everyone with the
Wrong. In the mystery of God’s sovereignty, God has purposefully allowed sin to spread through the world – because our sin will produce an even greater display of His glory – which will bring those He saves even more joy in beholding His glory.
And one way to see this even greater display of His glory – is by studying the animal sacrifices that were practiced in the Old Testament. That’s what I want us to think about this morning. So let’s start by looking at what role did animal sacrifices play in the nation of
To answer this, let’s turn to Leviticus 1. If you need a Bible, go ahead and raise your hand and we’ll bring one to you. Leviticus 1 is on page 82 in the Bibles we are passing out. In the book of Leviticus we read how Moses gave
Here’s how these sacrifices worked. We saw last week how God gave Israel His Law. And in His Law He reminded them how He had delivered them from
So if you were an Israelite, what would do when you realize that you have stopped relying on God – that you had turned you back on God and sinned against God? Maybe you had lied about something – showing that you were not relying on God to take care of you. Maybe you coveted your neighbor’s wife – showing you were not relying on God to satisfy your heart.
So what would you do when you realized you’d stopped relying on God – you’d turned your back on God and sinned against God? The answer is given in Leviticus 1:1-5 –
1 The LORD called Moses and spoke to him from the tent of meeting, saying,
2 "Speak to the people of
3 "If his offering is a burnt offering from the herd, 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.
4 He shall lay his hand on the head of the burnt offering, and it shall be accepted for him to make atonement for him.
5 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.
I see four specific steps in these verses:
First, you would admit your guilt before God. Look again at v.3 --
"If his offering is a burnt offering from the herd, 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.
Because of your sin, you can’t be accepted before the Lord. You are guilty before God. Why? Because through Creation and God’s delivering you from Egypt you would have experienced how God loves you, forgives you, guides you, provides for you, and satisfies your hearts with His presence. You would have known this.
So when you turned your back on God – there was no excuse. The reason you would have turned your back on God is the same reason we do today -- it’s the wickedness of creatures wanting to rebel against their Creator. And this rebellion stirs righteous anger in God, and until something is done about this anger, we are not acceptable to God. So the first step would be to admit your guilt before God.
So if your sin has stirred righteous anger in God against you, how can you ever be acceptable to God? That’s seen in the second step -- you would bring an animal symbolizing a perfect substitute. You can see that also in v.3 –
"If his offering is a burnt offering from the herd, 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.
God has said that when you have sinned, you should bring an animal which will symbolize a perfect substitute. It must be perfect – without blemish. So, depending on your financial resources, you could bring a bull, a goat, a lamb, or even a bird. Let’s use a lamb to picture this, since I think the lamb was most common.
So you’d bring a perfect lamb. And this lamb will picture how you can be forgiven by God even though God has righteous anger against you. So how can you be forgiven? That’s the next two steps:
Third -- you would symbolically transfer your guilt to this perfect substitute. You can see that in v.4 –
He shall lay his hand on the head of the burnt offering, and it shall be accepted for him to make atonement for him.
God says to lay your hand on this perfect lamb, and symbolically transfer your guilt onto this perfect lamb. That pictures how God has made a way for your guilt to be transferred to a perfect substitute. So you would put your hand on the head of this lamb, symbolically transferring your guilt. Now the guilt is no longer on you; it’s on the perfect substitute.
But that’s not enough. God’s wrath against your sin must be expressed in punishment. Your sin must be punished for His wrath against you to be appeased. So -- fourth, you would kill the perfect substitute. You can see that in v.5 –
Then he shall kill the bull [or goat, or lamb] 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.
You would cut the lamb’s throat, shed its blood, kill it. And your action of killing the perfect substitute brings God’s punishment for your sin upon the lamb. The lamb would give up its life in your place. The lamb would be punished in your place. The punishment deserved by you for your lying, or your lusting, would be poured out upon the lamb. And in punishing the lamb, God’s wrath against your sin would be propitiated – assuaged – appeased – absolutely gone. And you can once again be accepted by God, loved by God, welcomed with open arms by God.
This is what you would do whenever you realized that you had sinned against God by slandering someone; or by neglecting His Word; or by not forgiving someone; or by being impatient with your wife. Whenever you realized you had sinned against God – you’d bring an animal sacrifice to the tent of meeting – and take these four steps:
You would admit your guilt before God;
bring an animal symbolizing a perfect substitute;
symbolically transfer your guilt to this perfect substitute;
and kill the perfect substitute.
So think of all the animal sacrifices that would have been offered in
So what did these sacrifices actually accomplish? You might think that when you killed that lamb, your sins were actually being paid for before God. But that’s not the case. Look at Hebrews 9:13-14 (1006) --
13 For if the blood of goats and bulls, and the sprinkling of defiled persons with the ashes of a heifer, sanctify for the purification of the flesh,
14 how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without blemish to God, purify our conscience from dead works to serve the living God.
So all that the blood of goats and bulls did was purify the flesh. All they accomplished was some sort of outer, ceremonial cleansing. In themselves they were not able to purify anyone’s conscience.
So in themselves the animal sacrifices did not remove anyone’s guilt before God, they did not pay anyone’s guilt before God. So how were Old Testament believers able to be forgiven for their sins? The answer is in the next verse – v.15 –
15 Therefore he [Jesus] is the mediator of a new covenant, so that those who are called may receive the promised eternal inheritance, since a death has occurred that redeems them from the transgressions committed under the first covenant.
The sins of believers committed under the first covenant – during the Old Testament – were paid for by Jesus’ death on the Cross. That’s how Old Testament believers were able to be forgiven –through what Jesus would do. Jesus’ death retroactively paid for their sins.
So when Old Testament believers brought the animal sacrifices, crying out to God for forgiveness, admitting their guilt, bringing an animal symbolizing a perfect substitute, symbolically transferring their guilt to this perfect substitute, and killing the perfect substitute – what would happen? They would experience complete forgiveness for their sins; they would feel God’s love poured into their hearts once again; they would experience complete acceptance before God – not because of anything that happened with that animal – but because of what would happen with Jesus hundreds of years in the future.
But this raises another question – What’s the point of all these sacrifices? Think about it. Thousands and thousands and thousands of animal sacrifices. 1500 years worth of animal sacrifices which didn’t actually pay for sin. Why not just send Jesus who would pay for sin?
There’s at least two reasons. One is because God wanted to intensify
If you were an Old Testament believer offering animal sacrifices, you would have seen that your forgiveness required a perfect substitute, that none of these animals is the perfect substitute, and yet you were completely forgiven by God. So every animal sacrifice you offered throughout your life – hundreds of them – all raise the question – where is the perfect substitute?
And as a nation
So think of how stunning it would have been to hear John the Baptist shout out –
Behold the lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!
Let me show you that so you can see it for yourself. It’s in John
The next day he saw Jesus coming toward him, and said, "Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!
Jesus is the perfect substitute, who really does take away the sin of the world.
And why was Jesus here? Look at John 3:16-17—
16 "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.
17 For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.
God provides the perfect substitute in His own Son, Jesus. The animal sacrifices all raise the question – where is the perfect substitute – and the answer is – God has given Him to us – in His own Son, Jesus.
The highest display of God’s glory is His mercy – and there’s no higher mercy than this: God our Creator, provides His own Son to be the perfect substitute for His rebellious creation – and God punishes him in the place of sinners.
But there’s another reason God wanted there to be thousands of animal sacrifices: because God wanted to help us understand how Jesus’ death gives us forgiveness. The animal sacrifices are a powerful picture of how Jesus’ death brings us forgiveness – in the same four steps I described earlier. Let’s go through them as we prepare to celebrate Communion.
First, we need to admit our guilt before God. We have all been guilty before God. Just like an Old Testament believer would have understood that his sin rightly deserves God’s just anger and punishment, and that unless something changes his sin will mean he can’t be accepted by God – so with us. We need to admit our guilt before God.
Then second, we need to understand that God has provided the perfect substitute – Jesus. Jesus was fully God and fully man. And even though he was a man and knew human weakness, He never sinned. He’s the only human being who has always perfectly trusted the Father. That’s why Jesus is the perfect substitute.
Then third, we need to transfer our guilt, by faith, to this perfect substitute. An Old Testament believer laid his hand on the lamb, symbolically transferring his guilt to the lamb. In the same way we transfer our guilt onto Jesus, by asking Him to bear our sin and guilt and punishment.
And fourth, we need to understand that, if we are trusting Jesus, then His death paid the punishment for all our sin. My sin was punished as God poured His wrath out upon Jesus on the Cross. If I am trusting Him, then He absorbed into Himself all the punishment I deserve for all my sins.
So if I am genuinely trusting Jesus, then all of God’s wrath against me has been poured out on Jesus, all my sins have been forgiven, and I am completely loved, accepted, and embraced by God.
So let’s do this now as we celebrate Communion together.