Vayikra

So back to my statement about Christians saying that the sacrifices are no longer valid because of Messiah’s death.  According to what this word korban means that can’t be true because this offering or sacrifice was an enabler of the person who offered it to draw near to Yahweh.  Continuing with the Christian interpretation of this sacrifice being done away with; one must come to the conclusion that we can no longer draw near to Yahweh if this sacrifice has been done away with.  In my opinion, this doesn’t hold water.  We can draw near to Yahweh still today and it doesn’t make sense that YHVH would eliminate something that enables His people to draw near to Him.

Animal Sacrifices for today

I know what some of you might be thinking.  I am not saying that we can go out and get a lamb, goat or bull and slaughter it unto YHVH.  What I am saying is that it hasn’t been done away with; it’s on hold if you will.  In Christian’s effort to justify their disobedience to Torah, they say things like “so I need to run out and start killing animals or you go get some animals and start cutting their throats”!  There about four issues here.  The first issue is we are in the Diaspora i.e. in exile out of the Land.  The second is there is no temple.  The third is that you must have an altar in which to do sacrifices and lastly you have to have Levitical priests who administer the sacrifices properly for the individual.  So with all of that said as long as there is no altar, official priesthood and we aren’t in Yerushalayim; we don’t have to worry about ‘doing animal sacrifices’.

Now for those of you who think animal sacrifices will never happen again.  I encourage you to go study Ezekiel chapters 40-48 and here are some other Scriptures to ponder Isaiah 56:7; 66:20-23; Jeremiah 33:18; Zechariah 14:16-21; Malachi 3:3-4.  Now I don’t have all the details worked out yet on the future reinstatement of animal sacrifices but one thing is for sure when Messiah will be with us He will straighten it all out and it will be very clear to everyone.  So for now don’t take the easy road out and think well this was all done away with so why do I have to study this sacrifice stuff or study this ‘Jewish’ stuff; go back and study it because in the future you don’t want to be lost when we are doing all this what you might call ‘Jewish’ stuff in the Kingdom.  It’s best to be prepared now than have to prepare later.

Lay your hands on

Again animal sacrifice is a touchy subject to many when you begin to mention it.  Why do I think it is important?  Well many things can be said about it, but I would like to focus on one of those things for time’s sake.[ii] I find it very interesting that the person bringing the offering not only had to lay his hands upon the head of the animal but also slaughter it.  If you have never seen an animal slaughtered before I encourage you to watch first hand, not on a video but in person.  It is very sobering and it does something to you on your insides all the way down to your very being.

I believe many believers have lost out on what sacrifice is truly about.  What I see in the animal sacrifice system is this.  First, you had to bring your best animals to sacrifice.  You couldn’t bring blemished or animals that weren’t going to cost you anything.  There was a price involved.  Second you had to lay your hands on its head and cut its throat.  The whole point that I see in this is that this COST YOU; there was a price involved if you will.  Today folks run down to some steps and cry some crocodile tears and say I’m sorry and get up like nothing ever happened and go about their merry little way and some even go back and do the same thing that put them going down to the steps in the first place.  We have lost the sense of SIN costing us something.  Today there is no longer a price to be paid for sinning.  We just say oops I’m sorry get up and continue on with our daily lives thus clearly missing out on the real price of sinning.  I believe because we have been taught the sacrifices have been done away with; we have forgotten or have fallen into the dumbing down trap of not really seeing or understanding the price that was involved in sin in the first place.  May we return and really begin to grasp the real price that sin costs us and may we see the huge price that Messiah paid when he hung on the tree.  Please don’t take these animal sacrifices lightly or take sin lightly.  It costs and the price tag is a big one.

Thought for the Week

I call upon you, therefore, brothers, through the compassion of Elohim, to present your bodies a living offering – set-apart, well-pleasing to Elohim – your reasonable worship. Romans 12:1

Endnotes

[i] Jeff Benner, A Mechanical Translation of the Book of Exodus (College Station, TX:  Virtualbookworm.com Publishing, Inc., 2009)  437
[ii] Leviticus 1:4-5