The Sacrificial System and Why it Matters

A couple of years ago, I listened to a series of four teachings by Dan Lancaster (from the organization First Fruits of Zion, FFOZ) entitled, "What About the Sacrifices?" It is a deep dive into the sacrificial system from Leviticus, looking at all of the various elements of it, and attempting to help us 21st century folks understand it better. I would bet that most of us, myself included, have heard very little about the sacrificial system from our pulpits, and that our understanding of it is shallow at best. About a year ago, I came across a book entitled "Jesus and the Forces of Death" and again, it dealt heavily with the sacrificial system, with an emphasis on the ancient Israelite understandings of clean/unclean and pure/impure. Very recently I have found myself in conversations about this topic again and so as I am prone to do, I want to write out what I've learned so that I am clear in my own mind about the details of the system as well as the importance I feel there is in understanding the sacrificial system as a modern Gentile.

First - there are a few different types of sacrifices:

• The 'Old Offerings' - 'Old' here is meant to denote those offerings which were happening before the construction of the tabernacle/temple. These offerings were typically made at individual altars (for example Exodus 20:22-24) prior to the building of the tabernacle/temple:
  
  
• Burnt Offering (Korban Olah) - this is a voluntary (typically) sacrifice brought on the part of the worshipper who wishes to show complete devotion to God; it could also be an appeal for forgiveness or favor; it is the equivalent of presenting a gift to God. No part of the animal was reserved for consumption as in other sacrifices.
  
  
• Grain Offering - this is sometimes referred to as the 'cereal' offering or even the 'meat' offering, even though meat doesn't mean the same thing as we mean it today, it just referred to the 'meat' of the grain, which was the best part. This is a remembrance offering, or a memorial offering if you will. It is to remember the covenant made at Mount Sinai between God and Israel. Some of it was to be dedicated to God, but some of it is to be consumed by the worshipper, and some part of it was to be for the priests. It is a ceremonial meal offering of sorts, a literal communion with God. Read about all of the stipulations in Leviticus 2.
  
  

Random Thought

I was watching a documentary about Mark Cavendish on Netflix last night - fantastic documentary about a professional cyclist who was a winning machine, lost his edge, had to rebuild himself from the ground up, and when ended up winning again (sorry, spoiler alert). Anyway - when he finally does win again after this 5-year process of rebuilding himself, he gets off his bike, sits down on the street and weeps.

My thought is this: one of the greatest feelings in the world is crying from a place of joy. I can remember two instances of this in my own life. One was when I was in elementary school. I was playing baseball and I wasn't very good. I hit a homerun in a game and got back to the bench and I was so happy I started crying. To this day, I have no idea why I remember that.

The second one was when I finished my second marathon. It was a moment I had thought about many times in the preceding year. For that marathon I had a time goal and had put SO much work into it. Running twice a day at times, logging huge mileage weeks, doing the ice baths, doing the long 15-18 miles training runs...just a lot of effort...and then I achieved the goal I had set out to achieve. I crossed the finish line and was walking out of the chute and was so happy (and relieved) that I started crying. That feels so good!

Like I said, random thought.

Sorrow as a Living Psalm

 "Make place for my anguish in the temple of your compassions, O Christ, that my sorrows might abide there as a living psalm, and that my movement through these hours might be as an embodied liturgy, my deep needs received as petition, your ears ever hearing what I will not have words even to ask." - Every Holy Moment, Volume II, A Liturgy for those shocked by loss

A few days ago I witnessed, up close, the most emotional pain I have ever seen someone experience, and hopefully the most I will ever see someone experience. In the midst of that crucible, someone read the words I've quoted above and I found them profound. Particularly it was the idea that simply breathing can be a psalm; where moving through time, hour by hour, can be liturgical. I thought of Psalm 46:10, "be still and know that I am God."

Tangentially related story:

A few years ago, I was introduced by a friend to the band "If These Trees Could Talk" and they have a song entitled, "The First Fire". There is a guitar solo in that song that became a prayer for me - it's an instrumental song, no words. After hearing that song, I asked the friend that introduced me to them if he thought that such a thing could serve that purpose and he said, "absolutely". I cannot describe why that guitar solo feels like a prayer, but when I hear it, I feel my heart opening up to God.

A Question

Here is a question I've really been wrestling with lately: Given that the writers of the epistles/letters were not intending to write Scripture (they all considered "scripture" to be the Tanakh/Old Testament, among other writings), can we equate their words with the words of the Tanakh? Put another way - can anything (literally, anything) that is written or said in the New Testament be understood independent from the Tanakh? To put an even finer point on it, if someone is espousing a theological idea that they have taken from the New Testament, but that idea doesn't have some kind of root in the Old Testament, could that idea have even possibly existed in the minds of the writers of the New Testament?

I guess what's really bothering me lately is when I hear some teaching about something Paul wrote, or something James wrote, and the speaker then draws some conclusion that couldn't possibly have been the case because it would require a completely different understanding than the person writing it could have possibly had. Take 'election' for example, because in my opinion this is one of the most poisonous Christian doctrines out there. Election, in OT terms, is meant to refer to Israel. Always. There are no exceptions. So when Paul talks about election, he's talking about Israel - or at the very least, he is using the metaphor of God's election of Israel (to special service and calling) to illustrate that it is God who saves someone, or gives someone a special role, not the other way around. In other words, the entire idea of election in the NT cannot be new. Paul is in the midst of a conversation that is already on-going, addressing a people who are likely familiar with the Tanakh, and is using ideas that would have been familiar and understandable to his audience. It is our job to figure out what the conversation is, who he's addressing, and what ideas he's drawing on in order to say what he says. So often though, the work is skipped over, and the applications are made sloppily. As Gentile disciples, we have to do the work.

Christian Nationalism and Supercessionism

As the political rhetoric in the United States continues its descent into utter, irretrievable ridiculousness, the new label of the Left to describe Republicans is "Christian Nationalists". No one seems to be able to put their finger on exactly what a Christian Nationalist is, but hey, in the modern age you have to shoot first and ask questions later. I got to thinking about this label today in light of some of the theological things I've learned over the past few years and it seems to me that the idea of Christian Nationalism, if it even exists, grows in large part out of Supersessionism, that is, the idea that God has transferred his promises from Israel to the Church. More specifically in this case, it is the idea that somehow the United States of America is at the center of God's plan for the earth.

The Aroma of Life and the Aroma of Death

 "For we are to God the pleasing aroma of Christ among those who are being saved and those who are perishing. To the one we are an aroma that brings death; to the other, an aroma that brings life. And who is equal to such a task? Unlike so many, we do not peddle the word of God for profit. On the contrary, in Christ we speak before God with sincerity, as those sent from God." 2 Corinthians 2:15-17

 

Sometimes I have a little extra time on my hands and I read a few articles at The Gospel Coalition website and today I saw one on obedience. I have been thinking about obedience lately and so that article was particularly timely. I typically find myself reading TGC articles with a pretty critical eye, but I found the author's thoughts to be very much in-line with my own. Somewhere along the way, obedience became a 4-letter word in the Church but obedience really lies at the heart of what it means to be a disciple. Jesus didn't say 'do whatever you want and follow me'. He said, "If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me." I've been in more than a few conversations over the years around this topic and inevitably someone will say, "well, we want to be careful to avoid legalism..." Even when I've heard preachers speak on obedience, you will often hear them qualify their remarks with something about avoiding legalism. Having said that - it seems like we are far closer to license than we are to legalism in our modern age. I know that's true for myself. We seem much more apt to excuse our own choices than we are to veer towards legalism.

Confession

I feel completely callused towards geopolitics and even to suffering in the world. I see what's happening with Russia/Ukraine, I read about what's happened in Turkey/Syria and truthfully, I just don't care. I want to care, I want to feel for the people who are suffering the effects of a devastating earthquake or who are feeling the ravages of a war that has been going on for over a year, but I don't. Then I start to wonder to myself, should I care? Should I care about things that I wouldn't otherwise know about except for the availability of information and which in no way affect my daily life? I don't know the answer to that question, it's just a question that crosses my mind.