Leviticus 16
THIS is one of the most solemn chapters in the whole Word of God, for here God was maintaining what was due to His majesty. It is a needful thing for us to learn something of the majesty of God. The two elder sons of Aaron, Nadab and Abihu, did what is most natural for us to do. They forgot the majesty of God, and what is due to Him when He is approached. They offered strange fire before the Lord, and the result was that judgment overtook them and they died.
God never forgets what is due to Himself. He loves the poor sinner, but He hates his sin. And when He brings us as sinners to know Himself in grace, He leads us into the knowledge of His thoughts about sin and what is due to it. God had said, “I will be sanctified in them that come nigh Me, and before all the people I will be glorified.” Chapter 10:3. Our hearts, so estranged from God and so accustomed to sin, have become so hardened that we forget who God is and what is due to Him. “Thou thoughtest that I was altogether such an one as thyself,” He says in another scripture. That is man’s thoughts. God has a right to say who shall approach Him and how they shall approach. He has found a way in which He can be approached acceptably so that judent does not overtake those who come, as it did with Aaron’s two sons. What is due to God is such a needed lesson for our day. Our blessing is in learning and bowing to that truth.
“Thus shall Aaron come.” v. 3. Here God is telling us how people should come near to Him. “With a young bullock for a sin offering, and a ram for a burnt offering.” God will be approached only on the ground of sacrifice. All who attempt to approach in any other way will find sooner or later that what overtook the sons of Aaron, will overtake them because God, ever patient and forbearing, never overlooks sin. He says as it were to the poor sinner, I am telling you of My majesty. I am telling you how hateful your sin is, but I at the same time am telling you of My love. My love led Me to find a way to deal with your sin as it deserved and yet save you.
So Aaron was to come with a young bullock for a sin offering and a ram for a burnt offering. The sin offering is Christ’s death meeting my need as a sinner. The burnt offering is Christ glorifying God in His death that has met my sin.
This was the great day of atonement. Atonement means a covering — there must be that which covers sin before God, while at the same time it cleanses the sinner. Thus atonement was made by death. That is why we get so much about the blood.
In the two goats, one lot was for the Lord, the other for the people. That is Christ’s precious death meeting the majesty of God, and at the same time the sinner’s need. The one upon which the Lord’s lot fell had to be dealt with first. God thinks first of His own glory.
Then in that live goat being led away into the wilderness, does not this remind us of Isaiah 53:66All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all. (Isaiah 53:6): “And the Lord hath laid on Him the iniquity of us all.” So here we have atonement and substitution. The blessed Saviour died an offering for sin, and so glorified God in death, that all His claims against sin were perfectly met. If no one had ever believed the gospel, if no one had ever been saved, God would have been fully glorified just the same.
But I am saved by that work. Christ died not only for God’s glory, but He has met my need as a sinner, He took my place, and bore my sins. So I can say Christ died for God’s glory but He died for me a sinner, too. The one is atonement, and the other is substitution.
ML-05/28/1972