The "Joy" of Sacrifice

[00:00:05] Speaker A: I have titled this week's message the Joy of Sacrifice, which honestly sounds like a pretty significant contradiction, does it not? Joyful, Beautiful. Seriously, these are words. I'm not talking about sacrificial giving or sacrificial living. We're talking about blood and death and fire and burning flesh and smoke. Hardly images that strike us as joyful. And if you are one who thinks it sounds beautiful, you are not one of the animals involved in the process. If you ask them, they might have a different perspective. Would they call this joyful? Clearly, we do have a little bit of a difficulty with this verbal, this adjectival description of the sacrifices. Joyful association. Now, why? What is this about? Well, we acknowledge that God instructed Israel as we read last week. To do What? In Exodus 25:8, to build me a sanctuary that I may dwell among them. And how exactly is that dwelling accomplished? Last week we spoke of it. Build him a sacred space. Follow the directions, follow the instructions. Right. And now in the Torah, anyway, as we begin the book of Leviticus, it is built. It is actually there. It's standing. Now, what we're hoping for is an ongoing interaction between God and the people. How is that accomplished? Well, today we open the instruction book for how that is accomplished. It's called Leviticus, Right. It says, the answer is clearly laid out. Draw near to me through sacrifice. Now, on the surface, if that's how God says it should be, then it should be done. And that's enough, Right? That's certainly pretty straightforward. But it's not that easy. It's not that easy. When we talk about sacrifice, we're immediately confronted with very deep challenges to our modern mindset. When we talk about it, it's a massive story filled with complexity, layers upon layers of theological interpretations, thousands of years of conclusions drawn apart from Torah and Judaism. And that is to say, there are many objections at the top of the list. God never liked it. People say God hated it. He said it all over the place, right through the prophets. Isaiah 1:13 as an easy example. I'm taking it out of context here for sure, to make my point. Bring no more vain offerings. Incense is an abomination to me. It says in Isaiah. So they say God never liked it. Why would you still be talking about it? And to further complicate the issue, we often hear the claim, particularly from modern Christian theology. But it's not just a modern idea, that one of Jesus primary purposes for coming to the earth was to end the sacrificial system, to put an end to it, to this Barbaric blood thing that went on. Right. He came to undo that. Well, actually, he didn't. He didn't come to do that. As a matter of fact, in our Gospel reading for today, we're reading Yeshua telling his disciples about forgiveness. If you're coming to the altar, you bring your sacrifice and you realize that your brother has something against you, you should go and be reconciled first. And then what? Bring your sacrifice. That doesn't line up very well with the idea that he is getting rid of it. Not to mention that for some 40 years after his death, his disciples continued to participate in that. Not to mention that his mother brought a sacrifice as part of her Levitical obligation as a mother in childbirth. Not to mention the fact that Yeshua was in the temple all the time while the sacrifices were going on. But that's another message entirely. Behind all of this lies an even deeper confusion. And it's the heart really of what I want to address with you today as we move into this book. Leviticus Vayikra in Hebrew, or as it was originally known, Torat kohanim, the law of the priests. That's how it was originally referred. There is a fundamental problem that. That what so many people think they know about sacrifice is wrong. There is an abundant joy in this process, but it is misunderstood, it's mischaracterized, it's misclassified. And that has caused the world in large part to be blinded to something extraordinary about it, that it accomplishes something very powerful. It's relevant to Passover. It's still relevant to us today. And I want to revisit it. There is joy in sacrifice, Literally sacrifice. Not your sacrificial living or your sacrificial giving. There's joy in that too, literally blood and sacrifice. But so many have missed this purpose. So today, as we step into Leviticus, I want to clearly see three important things. First of all, how is it has been misunderstood that sacrifice is simply about sin, guilt, and God's anger, number one. Number two, what the sacrificial system is actually about joyful intimacy and attraction. And three, how understanding what sacred space means in the economy of God brings clarity to all of it. So this is very straightforward. You ready? Kelly, are you ready? Okay. Let's identify the problem. If you ask most followers of Jesus, what's the primary purpose of sacrifice? What do you think they would say? Covering your sins? Atonement. All good. They probably say it's about sin, it's about guilt, it's about escaping God's wrath. It's about there's even a bigger theological word for it, expiation. You know this word making amends, making atonement. And it makes sense actually, doesn't it? When you consider some of the actual names of the sacrifices, the. The sin offering, the guilt offering. That seems to point directly to the idea of dealing exclusively with sin. Now, Yom Kippur as another example, right? It seems one sacrificed, one carrying away our sins. That partly reinforces this idea of sacrifice. But here's the issue. This is a very narrow view. As so often happens with things surrounding Jesus, there's a very narrow view and this is causing the myths of something crucial. Revisit what I've already visited once today and spent all last week on Exodus 25:8. Let them build me a sanctuary that I may dwell among them. What is the point of building it? This is not a trick question. Let them build me a sanctuary that I may dwell among them. What's the point of building it? Thank you. Good job, guy from Alabama. That's a surprise. Here's the first necessary perspective. I love you. Remember that the heart of the sanctuary, thus sacrifices outlined in Leviticus, is not actually about removing or taking something away. Instead, it's actually about producing something essential. Intimacy, closeness, connection. The word for sacrifice in Hebrew, Korban. What does it mean if you saw 5 Minute Torah? Darren and I don't compare notes on anything we ever say. He's basically said, what I'm going to say to you. He said it in five minutes, I'm going to do it in an hour and a half. Korban, it means draw near. Karov from the word Hebrew. That's the root. The idea of sacrifice is very obvious. Coming closer, not pushing something away or taking away, in its primary indication, to bring God closer to humans and to bring humans closer to God. In essence, the sacrificial system was a means of communion with God. It was, as we saw happen with the Tabernacle, an invitation for his Shekhinah, his divine presence, for the glory to dwell. The Talmud and the Torah, they clearly emphasize this picture. When Aaron offers the sacrifice in Leviticus 9, the glory of the Lord appeared to all the people. When, after Aaron brought a sacrifice, the glory appeared. When done properly, sacrifices draw God near. The Talmud vividly illustrates this idea. Abraham was looking for some affirmation of the covenant promise to God. I mean, from God to the people. And God replies by pointing to the merit of the daily offerings, saying that through their merit, the entire world would be blessed. Wow. Why? Because his presence would Dwell among them. In other words, sacrifices upheld creation. They secured God's favor and presence among the people of Israel. Notice there's nothing in this idea about anger, appeasing anger, guilt, punishment, just God showing up in joyful connection. But what about sin? What about sin? What about it with these sacrifices? Well, it certainly matters. And I'll explain that. Tragically, when Israel abandoned faithfulness, Ezekiel describes how the presence of God departed from the people left. In other words, sacrifices were really good. They brought God and sin undid the good, and it defiled not just the temple, but the very land. And the land then vomited the people out like it had done before. There was an exile that was caused by sin. God's presence departed. To truly grasp sacrifice, we have to understand two crucial ideas. Sacred space where God literally dwells, and the true nature of impurity. According to the Torah, these two concepts will clear up confusion. So let's look at this. A crucial insight from rabbinic theology, from Judaism, modern sources. The Torah, if you can read it properly, is the difference between ritual impurity and moral impurity. And this stuff gets very deep and I'll do my best to keep you awake, but you got to understand it. Ritual and moral impurity and how each of those relates to the sacrificial system in God's presence. I've taught on it before, but I know that this is the kind of lesson that people need reiterated, needs repeating Hebrew term tame ritually or impurity. It can arise in two ways. It can be contracted from natural things, right? Processes like contact with a corpse, skin disease, bodily emissions. That's a fantastic fun part of Leviticus 11:15. Bodily emissions, childbirth. You can contract this impurity. It's not a sin. It's a temporary state of uncleanness. And it does something. It bars people from entering into the sacred spaces of God. That may sound completely outlandish to you if you approach it from a modern Christian mindset, but that's what the Torah says. That's what God's word says. You couldn't approach, you couldn't eat sacrificial foods. You had to be purified through immersion or offering. Ritual impurities. Let me explain them. Are in many ways symbolic of something. Our mortality or death. Death in contrast with God's holiness, which is purity and life. Even sin offerings. Hattat would be better called purification offerings, but in large part to cleanse the sanctuary from this ritual impurity. For example, after childbirth, a woman finds herself in a state of impurity. A woman would bring a burnt offering. She'd bring a sin offering, not because birth is sinful, but to reintegrate her into sacred space by purifying a ritual defilement. Now, in modern times, we have some great scholars. Can't agree with everything they say. There's no one you can agree with everything they say. Even your spouse. Right? Except mine. Sorry, I was about to get in trouble. I could see it on the face. Jonathan Clowens, Jacob Milgram. He has a Leviticus commentary, two volumes. It's like 5,000 pages. But Milgram in particular illuminates how the temple sacrifices maintained Israel's relationships with God by upholding a status that allowed God's Shekhinah to dwell. He showed that the sacrifices were very, very distant from the idea of appeasing God's divine anger. Okay, in the Levitical texts, sacrifices and these things, they're not punitive, they're not substitutionary. And you look at them in the big picture, it is purificatory. How's that? It's a lot of syllables. Purifying it is like the blood acts like a ritual detergent. If you want a real easy, memorable thing. The temple installations were ritually cleaned. The people were clean, the temple space, they were cleaned. Rabbi Sacks, as always, offers a very beautiful statement that what therefore bars us from entering the holy is anything that reminds us or others of our mortality. The fact that we are born and one day we'll die. Contact with death, even birth, it has this. Both therefore make the person come into this state. Now, special, though different processes of purification had to be undergone by those who had come in contact with the dead, or a mother who had given birth. This is one of the weirdest ones, right? It really is. The woman who had just given birth was therefore Tamea, not because of the sins of Eve or her sins, but because of the birth. Like death, it's a signal of mortality. How can that be? I'll tell you in a minute. But those things, death and mortality, have no place in the temple space which celebrates God's everlasting life and his promises of life. There is the presence of the Immortal One. So when we approach him, we are not in that state. Again, we could ask, why blood? Why blood? That's weird, right? Maybe. But again, when we understand this way, that many of these had to do with death. The supreme source of impurity is death. Childbirth is life. Yet in this day and age, it was very, very dangerous for the mom, for the baby, there were high rates of mortality. Could it be a brush with death? Of course. It's only in modern times that childbirth became something that we treat pretty casually. Menstruation, the loss of an egg, meant death. Why? Why was a woman who had her period considered unclean? Because the loss of the egg is a life was created from that which held the promise of life. You understand that skin disease, a leprous individual, is compared to one who walks about as if they're dead. They're like one who is dead. Thus, we can answer this question. Why blood? That's weird. Where is the life? Where is the life? The life, the Torah says, is in the blood. Thus, when we are confronting these areas of death and our mortality, it is only the life in the blood. If I take all of your blood out of you, I can take two of your legs, two of your arms. I can do all kinds of things to you. I won't, and you'd still live. But if I take your blood, you will not make it. Why? Life is in the blood. Thus, that's why we find blood, the polar opposite of death and mortality, is in the blood. And it's not so crazy when we see it that way, is it? In God's house, life washed away. Death and its associations, on the other hand, was the issue. And I'll skim through this one because it's a little easier to understand. On the other hand, you have ritual impurity and you have moral impurity. They are not the same. Grievous sins. Idolatry, sexual immorality, bloodshed, murder. These are inherently sinful. They generate impurity of a different order, one that can defile the land and alienate the divine presence of God. And here we get to the meat of the matter, no pun intended. What the sacrifices invited, that is God's presence. Sin, moral impurity caused the departure of the presence. And unlike ritual impurity, here's something so strange. Someone who is caught up in moral impurity can walk right into the temple space and offer a sacrifice. Moral impurity does not produce ritual defilement. Sinners, in contrast to those who are ritually impure, are not excluded from the sanctuary. Sounds weird. It's true. A person who committed a grave sin could still enter. They could offer a sacrifice. But here's the key. That sacrifice would do nothing to eradicate their moral impurity. How is that accomplished? One word. It's very easy. Repentance. Repentance. Teshuvah. It's such a huge word, not just in Judaism, but in the very expression of Yeshua's calling, right, Repent for the kingdom of God. Is at hand. The Torah warns that these sins, these moral impurities, pollute the people's camp. They pollute the land itself. And if left unchecked, God checks out of his sanctuary for sure. In extreme cases, only punishment national exile could purge the land of these levels of impurities. In the system of kurbanot, which are the sacrifices, we see these categories addressed differently. Sacrifices, highly effective for ritual and inadvertent impurity, but they do not directly purge the high handed moral sin. There was no sacrifice one could bring for idolatry. The Torah prescribes what is known as karet, being cut off. Human beings have the power through their actions to contaminate the sanctuary and force God out. That is to undo what Exodus 25:8 says. Build me a place that I can come and dwell. You can pollute it and you can push him out. This interplay explains why so many sacrifices focus on unintentional sins. Impurities, those could be fixed by offerings, whereas deliberate sins required the much higher path. So contrary to the majority opinion that I mentioned before, the sacrificial cult, and we can use that word, it just means an order of things in a religious environment. The sacrificial cult or system was not an automatic get out of jail free card for those who willfully disregarded God's instruction. The temple offerings ritually cleansed Israel on an ongoing basis, handled the spiritual fallout of their human frailties. The Torah's ethical demands. That was supposed to be what was going to help Israel's moral state and not evict God's presence. But both of those things, ritual and moral purity, were essential to maintaining covenantal intimacy. That's a part of what the sacrifices were supposed to do, especially the purification offerings. That is how Israel came into the place to meet God. A fitting dwelling place for the Holy One. Sin undoes sacrifice, drives away the Shekhinah. Properly performed sacrifice attracts, maintains the divine presence. That's pretty clear, right? No amount of sacrifice can bring the presence of God back when it has been driven away. It is repentance and sacrifice in that order after repentance, atonement. Through this lens we look at, we can see this misunderstanding. So what is sacrifice? If it's not that, what has been purported to be, what is it? Sacrifice is a divine attraction. And I've made that clear. And I don't mean that in some kind of magical sense where you wave your hands and say a few words and the fairy dust brings God in. It's a divine attraction in sacred service that creates this Environment. The sanctuary is God's home. God will not abide in a polluted home. He likes a clean house. That's it. The Midrash teaches us that all of Israel's temple service was aimed at bringing God and Israel close together. It's the very. That's what. When Rashi reads Leviticus, God's calling to Moses with affection, he's inviting him into the divine presence and he's saying, this is how we're going to do it, man. This is how we're going to do it. My friend, teach the people, show them. Every sacrifice then is supposed to be in some sense an answer to that call. It's a gesture from Israel to say, God, we seek closeness with you. And that is so different than the prevailing idea. That suggests Israel's performing these things because God is angry and will not be pacified until something bleeds. That's not consistent with God. And that brings a new sense to the word atonement. Atonement. At one ment. At one ment. Coming together. The sacrifices, there's no way we can deny this. They looked a lot like other sacrifices from the ancient Near East. There are some very clear parallels. They look like these other ancient cults, but internally their meaning was transformed. Humans were not feeding the gods, our God. They were not pacifying our God's wrath. It was about God feeding the soul of his people through these things. That's a very big difference than putting some, God forbid, a baby on an altar as some kind of sacrifice to pacify an angry ancient Near Eastern Canaanite God. The prophets criticized sacrifice. That's very true. Why did they do that? Because of the heart behind it. With the expectation that sacrifices are an end of themselves in and of themselves as a solution to a sin problem. They were indeed a source of joy and favor. The psalmist over and over, celebrating bringing a sacrifice into the house of God, welcoming God's presence. Solomon, at the dedication of the temple. They have this incredible feast, right? The nation feasted on these offerings. Great joy in the presence of the Lord. And we have this covenantal intimacy because the offerings expressed love and joy and loyalty and gratitude. And let me speak very briefly to one common objection, particularly in a modern sense. Yeah, okay, fine. But it still seems weird. Okay, yuck. You're saying that's not consistent with God? Blood and guts and like splashing. Blood and limbs cut off and burning. It's so barbaric, it's disgusting. How could God possibly like that? Question. Have you ever eaten a hamburger, A steak, a Chicken sandwich. Have you ever been to the slaughterhouse where that meat was killed and prepared for you to eat it? You want to talk about barbaric? It ain't pretty in so many ways. And yet, while I know that there are vegetarians and vegans who object to meat on moral grounds, I understand it. Most of the people who would level that complaint about the barbaric sacrificial system will be happy to level it over a nicely seasoned and seared T bone steak that they're demolishing without a sacrifice thought. What's the point of that? One of the most significant over significantly overlooked considerations of this system is that they are not simply sacrifices in the commonly expressed mode which I just told you about. With only a few exceptions, we talk about the olah, the complete burnt offering. It's all sent up except the skin. But with, with very few exceptions, many, almost all of the sacrifices were about in some way a portion of food for the priest, for his family, for the people who brought the sacrifice. In contrast to classic sacrifices which are completely consumed, these korbanot in large part were a celebratory meal that you shared with God. In other words, an invitation to dine with God. A powerful relational tool, a connection point. God's symbolic participation was indeed joyful in the sacrifice, celebratory. And so we can ask, why would God choose that method of connection? It wasn't about blood and guts and gore or pacifying an angry God. It was an invitation. God was the honored and invited guest at the table of Israel. We are about to celebrate Passover, the Pesach. The sacrifice was in its original form a form family meal with God to be remembered, sanctified, celebrated. And even in then this loss of life and the cleaning of the animal and the offering up and the burning and all that stuff, even in that in a very tangible way, it was experienced as life in a literal nourishing sense. Now let me ask you a question that's better than a hamburger, isn't it? A meal with God, with a sanctified and special meaning behind it. And so let me express one last very beautiful thing about the sacrifices, particularly the sacrifices known as the tamit offerings, the daily, the morning and the evening offerings. Jewish tradition says these sacrifices were a huge part of sustaining, inviting, sustaining God's people presence. They are defined in the Torah. These are God's words. Reah nihoach. What is it? It's a pleasing aroma. Who doesn't like the smell of a great brisket? That's not what it means. A pleasing aroma that meant that when these things went up, God receives that and says, these are my people. Not about guilt and blood. And where is all that stuff? Someone says, where is it? It's in there. The sin offering, the guilt offering blood, sin, pacification of anger, propitiation, transferring guilt, all that good stuff. Where is it? Well, let me tell you that for all of the sacrifices, God wasn't angry because they hadn't done anything wrong, they hadn't sinned. Was he furious with the woman who just gave birth to the beautiful baby girl waiting there, all right, 66 days, and then if she doesn't bring it, yeah, I'm going to kill her. That's so ridiculous. Strike her down? Of course not. Yet she had to bring a sacrifice. And if we see sacrifice primarily through the dark lens of sin, guess what? You miss the beautiful message about the connection and the intimacy and the joy. And these Korbanot, they function in the realm of intimacy, and it has something to do with Yeshua in a very unique and important way. So let me say this. These Korbanot were never meant to be dreadful obligations that Israel hated. That's not what we have here. They were not empty rituals. They were not get out of jail for free cards. They were certainly not all of the things that a millennia of theology have attached to them or mistakenly taught them to be. Now, for reasons that I can't fully explain, God chose this way as a means of connection. And for Israel, the moments were beautiful. They were literally joyful, filled with the tangible presence of God. And as I told you last week, and we're discussing now, that's how God chose to show up. So today we're unraveling something. Sacrifice isn't about calming anger. It's about welcoming. It's not what you're pushing away, but what you're inviting in. It's about intimacy. It's about closeness. It's about, here's a famous word, communion. Now, you might say, great. That's really good to know. Let's read Leviticus as history. Let's find some symbolic meaning for our modern lives. And thank God that we don't do this anymore. But really, what does any of this have to do with me? Someone asks, what do I do with this? What do I. What difference does any of this make? And there's a deeper mystery and perhaps the greatest challenge to our modern mindset. God isn't finished with these yet. Even if we're not doing them now, God is not finished with these yet. When we open the pages of Ezekiel 40 and 48 chapters, we see a prophetic vision. We see a third temple with sacrifices reinstated. Rambam wrote, speaking of the Messianic age. The Messianic king is destined to arise in the future, reestablish the Kingdom of David, rebuild the temple, gather the dispersed of Israel in his days. All laws will return to their original state. Korbanot will be offered again the Shmita, the sabbatical, the Yovel, the Jubilee. All of that's coming back. And then he says, anyone who doesn't believe this or does not await his coming not only denies the prophets, but denies the Torah and Moses, our teacher. Question Sacrifices restored in the presence of Jesus. How can this possibly be? He was the ultimate sin offering that should do away with it. And more importantly, why? Why would this happen? And all that I've said so far has been in preparation for those questions. Third Temple sacrifices and as we move forward towards celebrating Passover, Uncover the answers Right now? No Next week. [00:36:38] Speaker B: Shabbat Shalom I'm Darren with Shalom Macon. If you enjoyed this teaching, I want to ask you to take the next step. Start by making sure you subscribe to our channel. Next, make sure you hit the like button on this video so that others know it's worth their time to watch. Last, head over to our website to learn more about Shalom Macon, explore other teachings and events, and if you're so inclined, contribute to the work that we're doing to further the Kingdom. Thanks for watching and connecting with Shalom Macon.