Past, Present and Future Aspects of Day of Atonement

Well, one benefit to the Day of Atonement is that I don't have to eat lunch on the way home. I don't have to spend so much time eating lunch.

Anyway, glad to see all of you today. We did have a note here that I failed to mention earlier.

This is just one of the people that we have been praying for, Bruce and Vicki Hackman, and they say, dear brethren, we'd like to thank you for your prayers on Bruce's behalf and continuous chemo and radiation. Today marks the halfway point. We ask for your continued prayers for relief from the protein that he's having and complete healing from God. He is great. God is great, and we know he heals, so thank you for your encouragement during this health trial. So, I will leave this over here on the counter, and that's where the schedules and other things are over there as well. Well, as all of you know, this is a unique holy day that we celebrate.

We're celebrating today, the Day of Atonement. It's amazing what God has us do, because not only are we coming to a service... I'm sorry to mess with my watch. I took it off, and then I remembered that this is here, so I can tell what time it is. I was thinking I won't have any idea what time it is, and I can't hardly see it under my cup. So, anyway, all of us are participating in this holy day more than usual. If we go to trumpets, then we go to services probably once or twice during that day, or if we go to the feast, and we're going somewhere, we go observe the Days of Unleavened Bread or Pentecost. We're going to a church service, and sometimes, I guess, Days of Unleavened Bread, we're doing things differently, and in the Passover, we're preparing for that. But we're really preparing for the Day of Atonement.

And we read here in Leviticus 23, and most of these are things that Tom referred to earlier in the sermonette, and yet I want to go through them a little bit more, because as you read here in Leviticus 23, you see an accounting of, actually, a listing of all of the holy days.

And you see in verse 1 and 2 that these are the appointed festivals of the Lord, that you should proclaim as a holy convocation my appointed festivals.

That's a wonderful thing to figure out, and that's what some of these people who were writing in were figuring out, that, well, what we've been doing is not authorized by the Bible, and we'd like to know what is it that the Bible said. Probably most of us knew nothing of the holy days before we started reading the Bible.

You know, we were doing something else. I certainly was. I didn't know anything about the holy days until I came to know that, well, you know, God does outline me. He does have something for us to do. And over in verse 26 it starts talking about today being a day of atonement. It's to be a holy convocation for you.

You shall deny yourselves and present the Lord's offering by fire. You should do no work during that entire day. It's a day of atonement. And I think it's interesting in verse 32. Now, all of us knew, of course, that that's what it says, that we're to deny ourselves, we're to afflict our soul, we're to fat, not have water or food during this 24-hour period of time. But I don't see this description in verse 32 in any of the other holy days. Now, obviously, it's talking about fasting.

But it says in verse 32, it shall be to you a Sabbath of complete rest, and you shall deny yourselves on the ninth day of the month, at even from evening to evening, you shall keep your Sabbath.

It even delineates, okay, you start. And see, that's when I happen to want to know I was starting last night in Kansas City at 7 30. I happen to want to know when that started, so that I know when to begin a fat. And then, of course, most of us will know this evening, you know, whenever the fast is complete, you know, we'll be aware of that time.

That statement, it says you shall deny yourself on the ninth day of the month at even. See, it points out that you're going to start the evening before. It doesn't say that about any of the other festivals. They all do start the evening before, they all start at sundown, and yet it reminds them. Reminds them, well, that's what you would be doing.

And so, all of us are taking note of the fact that we're fasting during this day. So, I wanted to just cover in the sermon today, I wanted to cover some of the past, some of the things that we see in the past, some things we've already read here, Leviticus 16. Leviticus 16 would be a primary chapter that you would connect to the Day of Atonement, because it goes through the ceremony that, again, we've had described in detail. But I want to cover a little bit of that.

I want to cover a little bit more of it. And then I also want to talk about what we presently do, and what the future holds, because in many ways, God ties all of these together. He ties together what He instituted in Israel. He set that up. Did it have the ultimate meaning, the ultimate fulfillment? No. It was something for them to do, as we read in Psalms, that you could offer all the offerings you want. That's not what I want. I want you. I want your heart. I want your involvement.

I want to engage people in growing toward my divine family. But what we read here in Leviticus 16 is a ceremony that, in some ways, was a community affair. It was not that the whole community was involved, but they were supposed to be aware. And directly, the Levites and the priests, and directly the high priests. Most importantly, the high priest, because he was the one primarily involved in going into this Holy of Holies only once during the year. And then, what was he supposed to do?

Let's look in chapter 16 of Leviticus and read through some of this, a little more of what we've already read through. See, the people, when you look at verse 29, the people were already involved in this because it talks about them fasting in verse 29.

You know, they were, I guess, whether they even liked it or wanted it or not, they were involved by fasting. And I know, of course, even the Jews today, you know, they generally fast, at least many of the different sectors of group Jews, would be fasting on today. Maybe all of them are.

I don't know that they really liked that all that well. I know I've had at least one, I probably mentioned before, one individual that I knew was going to be observing the day the Yom Kippur, as he would call it, but he would tell me, I hate that. Hate having to do that. I hate, you know, this was the week before, and I was, you know, getting something done in his store, and he was telling me about the Yom Kippur, and what he just, oh, I just cannot stand it that that's going to be coming here in the next few weeks. I hope that isn't our attitude. You know, that probably was the attitude of quite a few Israelites, oh, I don't look forward to this, because, you know, they had a little understanding or no understanding for the most part. But then you find that Aaron was told in verse 2 of chapter 16, Moses told your brother Aaron not to come at any time in the sanctuary inside the curtain before the mercy seat that is upon the ark. So he had a special role in coming into this ceremony he was going to perform. And then in verse 6, or let me back up, he used to take with him, or from the congregation of Israel in verse 5, two male goats for a sin offering and one ram for a burnt offering. And so this was what he was to take with him. He was actually to take something for himself because he himself was impure. He himself was a sinner. He needed a sin offering for himself. And then in verse 6, or it says he was going to take these two other goats, and it says, Aaron shall offer the bull as a sin offering for himself, and shall make atonement for himself and for his house. And he shall take the two goats and set them before the Lord at the entrance of the tent of meeting. And he shall cast lots on the two goats, and one of them is going to be indicated for the Lord, and the other one will be indicated for the Azazel. And that's that's why my new Revised Standard even translates it. It doesn't say scapegoat, so it doesn't give you that confusion because that's essentially all that is. It creates a little confusion or misunderstanding about what this is about. Because in actual fact, you know, this is a remarkable ceremony, a remarkable service that God gave in order to teach amazing spiritual truth, and actually to teach even how much it is that God has to be involved in us coming to see our need for him.

He has to be involved in calling and drawing us, and this is even indicated in this little service.

You know, the Lord is going to determine which one of these is for me, which one is for the Azazel.

And it goes on in verse 9, he shall present the goat on which the lot fell for the Lord and offer it as a sin offering. But the goat on which the lot fell for Azazel, it shall be presented alive before the Lord to make atonement over it, that it may be sent away into the wilderness to Azazel.

So, see, the atonement had something to do not only with the goat that was signifying the Lord, and who was going to be slain for the people, but also something about this other goat, and about the Azazel, and about his part in sin. See, this is actually what the Day of Atonement is about. It's how God deals with sin. He forgives sin, and he casts aside the cause, the root cause of sin, the deceiver who has gotten Adam and Eve, the very beginning, to go the wrong direction, and hence has deceived all the rest of us. So, let's drop down to verse 15.

It shall slaughter the goat of the sin offering, that is, for the people, that is, the goat that was signified to indicate the Lord, is to do that and then take the blood. And in verse 16, make atonement for the sanctuary because of the uncleanness of the people and because of their transgressions and their sins. See, this is what atonement was about. It was dealing with sin, and for the people, they could feel, once a year, somewhat cleansed. They could feel that. They could say, okay, we had the Day of Atonement. We could feel a little better about our sins. And then they go ahead and continued sin. And see, that is pretty much the ceremony. And of course, in verse 20, when he had finished among the holy place, or excuse me, finished atoning for the holy place and the tent of meeting and the altar, then he shall present the live goat, and Aaron shall lay both his hands on the head of the live goat and confess over it all the iniquity of the people of Israel and all their transgressions and all their sins, putting them on the head of the goat and yet sending it away, sending it into the wilderness by means of someone designated for the task, a fit man, and the goat will bear on itself all their iniquity to a barren region, and the goat will be set free in the wilderness. Now, it doesn't say anything about whether or not the goat dies or gets lost or gets eaten by a lion. And of course, Tom was mentioning a number of things that, you know, the Jews, you know, read into that and maybe gain some insight and maybe not. I don't know. Some of it is certainly interesting. And yet, what a profound ceremony for God to institute and to have his people observe on a regular basis for many, many centuries, many years, and yet, of course, have little more understanding about it than, well, that's just where it came from. That's the past. So, let's look at the present. Presently, of course, you can say, well, that's what the nation of Israel, that's what the community of Israel was doing. And that's what they did up until the time of Jesus and then the ending of the temple. And I'm not sure too much about how much their practice has even kept up with this in the last 2,000 years. I'm not too familiar with that.

But presently, who is God dealing with? Well, he's dealing with a group that he calls spiritual Israel. He calls the Israel of God. In Galatians 16, it says, talking about the Church of God, that we're the Israel of God. And, of course, you read in Romans about it being a person who is actually acceptable to God, who's one whose heart has been circumcised.

And so, it starts about being a spiritual Jew or a spiritual Israelite. Now, that's talking about the Church. That's talking about all of us as we acknowledge our need to be cleansed. See, a lot of people can think about their lives and they can maybe acknowledge some sins and they can consider how we ought to be a better people. And yet, each of us have been brought to a point in our lives where we see, even as I read in these letters that are so revealing, we see that we've been deceived. We've seen that we've been duped. We see that we have been wrong and we wish to be rectified. We wish to be justified before God. We wish to be forgiven. We wish to please God with our actions and with our attitudes. I want us to look at 2 Corinthians chapter 4. There's a lot of different verses that we could use that would indicate the description of how it is that God has been very merciful in intervening in our lives. Here in 2 Corinthians chapter 4, it says in verse 1, therefore, since it is by God's mercy that we are engaged in this ministry, we do not lose heart. Paul wrote to the people in Corinth, said, you know, we've got some trouble, we've got some struggles, and we get discarded, we get pushed away, we get rejected by different people as we preach the gospel. But he said, we're not going to worry about that. We have renounced the shameful things that one hides, and we refuse to practice cunning or to falsify the Word of God.

But by the open statement of the truth, we commend ourselves to the conscience of everyone in the sight of God. And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing.

So he's going to describe how it is that he saw, how it is that he understood the deception that people needed to be brought out of. And he goes on to say in verse 4, in their case, in the case of those who are perishing, the God of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. And we don't proclaim ourselves, we proclaim Jesus Christ as Lord and ourselves as your slaves for Jesus' name. For it is the God who said, Let light shine out of darkness, who is shown in our heart. See, he has opened our heart, our mind, our eyes, our ears to the fact that we were deceived.

And that, of course, was part of the representation of the goats in the past. There were two goats.

They couldn't tell the difference. They couldn't say which one was which. God had to say, This one is it. And the other one will be cast aside. And yet what Paul writes about is God's intervention in people's minds. And, of course, the delusion that the God of this world brings into this world. And yet God, our Father, has shown in our heart to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. Our understanding and our relationship with Jesus Christ is the most important thing in our life. It's going to cause us to thrive in our lives and in our outlook and in our relationships with others. Let's look at Titus chapter 3. Titus chapter 3, wherever Titus is, flipped through here. Actually, I glued my Bible back together the other day.

And I did a fair job because James and Hebrews, which were falling out, are now stuck in. But I can't read some of the words.

Minor detail. I know that Titus is in here somewhere. Hebrews, James, Timothy, Titus, Philemon. Now, here it is. It's only one page, you know, two pages. Anyway, kind of hard to find.

But amazingly, again, here in chapter 3, you know, we have come to see that we have been blinded, and that we have been brought out of that deception, and been brought out of that to be able to see a glorious light. And that light is reflected in the face of Jesus Christ.

And here in chapter 3, verse 1, it says, Remind them to be subject to rulers and authorities.

And so Paul is telling Titus how he is to conduct himself and what he should teach. Remind them to be subject to rulers and authorities, to be obedient, to be ready for every good work, to speak evil of no one, to avoid quarreling, to be gentle, to show every courtesy to everyone.

For we ourselves, and this is what I wanted to point out, we ourselves in verse 3 were once foolish, and we were once disobedient, and led astray, and slaves to various passions and pleasures, and passing our days in malice and envy, and despicable, and hating one another.

He says that's the way we were. That's the way human nature is. That's the way everybody, all of us, fit into the category in some way, to some degree.

And in verse 4, it says, When the goodness and loving-kindness of God our Savior appeared, He saved us not because of any works of righteousness that we have done. He didn't save us because we're just so much better people.

So much better than everybody else out here up and down the street. And we are. Now, I've got a neighbor that's far better than I am. I can tell by watching him. He acts better. He does better things. Well, with God's help, hopefully, I can do well. Now, he's a good man. You know, he doesn't understand the truth yet, but he's a very good man. He's a very capable individual and a very seemingly loving and concerned and thoughtful person.

God will eventually open his eyes, even as we see described here, where he says, When the goodness and kindness of God appeared, not because of any works of righteousness that we have done, but simply according to his mercy. We're all part of the Israel of God because of the mercy of God. We've been allowed to come to know something and to be aware of something now and in this age before. There's going to become a great transition, a great change. There's going to be a thousand years of totally different society. There's still going to be some more deception happen after that. It's not going to be completely gone, and God will be controlling that.

And yet, ultimately, we're going to be a part of God's family. But he says, He saved us according to his mercy through the water of rebirth and the renewal by the Holy Spirit.

And so he provides us with an understanding and an appreciation for his plan. See, that plan is revealed in the Holy Days. It's revealed in what we observe as we fast and draw close to God. That's another part of what I wanted to mention here in this kind of present section.

You know, we're fasting, not again because we're told to do it. Now, maybe you are. I don't know.

I hope not. I hope you're not doing it because you just have to. And yet, in some ways, we do have to kind of be told we wouldn't necessarily just pick the time frame. Maybe we might pick a better time frame for us. And I know I have fasted at times. And I know that, you know, you can fast for shorter periods of time. You can fast, I don't recommend, longer periods of time than a day.

And yet, normally, you know, we kind of fast from evening to evening because that's what we do with this. You can do it other ways. I mean, you can do it from the early morning to the next morning. I've tried different things, and some things work better than others because this happens to be the way you feel or the way I feel anyway. But see, God tells us that He wants us to fast today.

And then we do it, and we should come to see that, well, we do it because we want to do it and because we want to be close to God. That's why we're doing it. We can see this here in James, chapter 4. That was a new part of the Bible that I have glued in now instead of falling out.

But here in James, chapter 4, it says in verse 5, do you suppose that it's for nothing that the Scripture says God yearns jealously for the Spirit that He has made to dwell in us? Do you think that verse makes any sense? James 4, verse 5, do you suppose that it's for nothing that the Scripture says God yearns jealously for the Spirit that He has made to dwell in us? That He desires. He wants, not just our sacrifice, not just our, as we gave earlier, an offering, not just our fasting during the day and knowing that, well, that'll end tonight. He wants our heart. He wants to relate to us. He goes ahead to say here, but He gives in verse 6 all the more grace, where He says God opposes the crowd, but He gives grace to the humble. See, He so desires for us to learn to relate to Him that He helps us by directing that we fast at least once a year. And of course, He tells us that we should learn to fast at other times throughout the year. But He goes on to say in verse 7, submit yourselves therefore to God, resist the devil, and He will flee from you. So for spiritual Israelites, those of us who collectively make up the body of Christ, who acknowledge the need to be cleansed, the need to be forgiven, well, then we have a job. We have a role here, it says. In verse 7, to submit yourself to God, resist the devil, and He will flee. Draw, in verse 8, near to God. And God will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners. Purify your hearts, you double-minded. You hear, He says that we need to humble ourselves. Verse 10, humble yourselves before the Lord, and He will lift you up.

See, what is it that God really wants? Well, He wants us to relate to Him as His children. He wants us to relate. He wants us to commune with Him. And He wants us to live with a faith and trust in God that is a growing, a growing concept in our minds, where we relate, we commune, and then we live our lives with faith in God. See, I think it's fascinating to see that as He talks about this, He says, you know, as you draw closer to God, then you are being purified. You are being cleansed, and you are learning a humility that there is no other way.

Does God just inject humility into us? No, I don't think He does. I think that's learned over a period of time. And, of course, we should ask that God would allow us. And, of course, when we fast, we learn how limited we are. We learn how hungry we get or how thirsty we are.

Somebody forgot the water up here today. See, that's, you know, we think, you know, we're very physical, we're very limited, and yet it doesn't take very long to get our attention.

Our stomachs start growling, and, you know, we start getting dry mouth. And if you talk very long, it gets even drier. But, you know, God wants us to humble ourselves. He does things for our benefit and for our good. He wants us to humble ourselves. And then, of course, you know, we are accepting what Tom read about in Hebrews 9, about the sacrifice, the ultimate sacrifice of Jesus that was given for us, blood that was shed to purify us, and not just to cleanse us, not just wipe off the dirt, but to purify our heart. Purify our conscience from dead works is what it says in Hebrews 9, verse 14. He says that's what we really need to be cleansed of. And, of course, that's why, in a sense, that we are, you know, we are fasting. We're fasting so that we're reminded of our need of God. And we're reminded of how much, you know, without God, that we are, we are just simply dead. We will die. We don't have food and water for several days, a number of days. We die. We expire. But God uses all of that for our benefit. Maybe one other verse here, Matthew 6. You know, whenever the Matthew, chapter 6, Jesus, of course is saying this.

Okay? It's in Matthew 9. In Matthew 9, that's why I couldn't find it here, but in Matthew 9, verse 14, the disciples of John came to him and saying, Why do we in the Pharisees fast often, but your disciples don't? Jesus said, Well, the wedding guests cannot mourn as long as the bridegroom is with them, can they? The days will come when those bridegroom will be taken away, but then they will fast. See, his disciples didn't need to fast. They were watching the Son of God. They were watching the Son of Man exemplify everything they needed to know or learn about God. Now, they needed to understand him better. They needed to relate to him better. They needed to commune with him better. They could learn that, but he says, When I'm gone, that's when people will fast. That's when people, my disciples, will fast because they will see a need to draw close to me.

And when they are close to me, then they are able to achieve a remarkable thing.

See, we ought to be praying about people becoming aware of the work that the church is doing, that God is doing through the church today. We don't know who, you know, we'll call next.

We don't know how many people God might deal with here before the end of the age. That end is coming.

We don't know how much God is going to do, but we certainly do want to do our part in order to make that a reality. So, in a sense, this is kind of the present sense of what I wanted to point out today about the Day of Atonement. We've been brought to an understanding of our deceived state. We have been shown we can be forgiven, and then we can be brought out of that deception by acknowledging it and then fighting against it, and by truly drawing close to God. And finally, as far as the future, we know here in Revelation 20, and actually, this chapter is an unbelievably remarkable chapter. I was reading all of these last chapters in Revelation here recently, and chapter 21 I can read, but I don't understand anything about what it's talking about, because it's talking about the new heavens and the new earth. And that's just kind of beyond my understanding at this point. Chapter 22, you know, it's kind of a concluding chapter to the Bible, to the book of Revelation, but to the Bible. But chapter 20, you know, it reveals so much about what all of us invest our lives in, working toward the kingdom of God, working toward a thousand-year time on earth when Jesus will be ruling, and we can be serving with him. And it talks about Satan's interaction with that. We'll read a part of that. And it talks about a white room judgment, and a time that would lead up to ultimately a second death for those who refuse, who absolutely refuse after having all the information and knowledge that they need from the Word of God, who refuse to obey God. Well, God also has a solution for that. A second death is a permanent solution. And yet how is it that this Day of Atonement ties together this goat that was symbolized for the Azazel and was accused or blamed for sin in the world, which he is. He's the cause of sin. He deceived Adam and Eve to begin with. And yet he's going to be banished. He's going to be, in a sense, used. He's going to be banished or bound and then ultimately banished. Here in chapter 20, it says in verse 1, I saw an angel coming down from heaven. This is right after we read in chapter 19, Jesus Christ returning to the earth. I saw an angel coming down from heaven, holding in his hand the key to the bottomless pit and a great chain. And he sees the dragon, that ancient serpent who was the devil and Satan, and bound him for a thousand years.

A totally different setting is going to be here on this earth during that thousand years.

Now, can we even realize that if somebody made the statement the other day, I don't remember where I saw it if it was on TV or if maybe one of you said something or I heard this and it made so much sense, is that in a sense, it's hard for us to realize that we live in a world and Satan's wavelength is so prevalent. It is everywhere. It's kind of like water to a fish. You know, a fish is in the water. He's just swimming around. It's just everywhere! If he's a live fish, not like Max's fish, a live fish, if he's going to stay alive, he's in the water.

And he can't live without that. It's got to be around him. And see, he knows little or nothing, except maybe whether he's wet or not. And yet, all of us, we don't know how prevalent, even though we know that, it's just so normal today for everything to be infected with Satan's nonsense and deception and wrong. It's just so normal. We would know what it would be to be pulled out of the water. But that's what's going to happen for any fish. He's going to be pulled out of the water. He's going to be put in a setting where Satan's deception and his broadcasting will be diminished. It will be curtailed. I can't imagine, with people still alive, that they can't perpetuate that song. That's surely going to be the case as you go into the beginning of a millennium.

But at least it's not going to have that same impact. So here it says, that the dragon, the devil, Satan, will be bound for a thousand years and throw him into a pit, lock and seal it over him so that he can deceive the nations no more until the thousand years are ending. And it says in verse 3, after that, he's going to be let out for a little while. So it doesn't appear, I mean, it appears he's going to be restrained. It appears he's going to be contained. It appears he's not going to be allowed to continue to infect people and society as Christ teaches, and we help Christ teach what needs to be known in order to pursue a relationship with God. And yet you find, verse 4 through 6, it talks about us reigning with Christ.

And down in verse 7, it says, when those thousand years were finished, Satan will be released from his prison, and he'll come out again to deceive the nations of the four corners of the earth. Amazingly, and again, who's in charge of this? Well, God is. He's the one who allows what happens regarding Satan. Satan is not running the ship. He is simply doing whatever he's allowed to do, and he has such anger and such hatred and such hostility for God that even in the insane imagination that he would have any success, which clearly he's not going to have success. He's doomed. His fate is already determined, and yet he perpetuates this deception.

And he goes out and deceives people and gathers them for battle. He arms them again, and they march over the breadth of the earth, surround the camp of the saints, the beloved city, and yet fire comes down and consumes them all. That didn't go anywhere. That deception, however long that takes, whatever it involves, however that's going to happen, it's going to come to a quick conclusion.

And then it says, the devil who had deceived them was thrown into the lake of fire and sulfur where the beast and false prophet were, and they'll be tormented day and night forever and ever. See, that ends up being a final casting aside. He'll be contained and then allowed to come out a little bit more, and then ultimately cast into a wilderness that will come into outer darkness, I guess you could say. Whenever you study the universe, you see that there are plenty of outer spaces that we can't even imagine. We can't fully understand. We can kind of see certain things, and yet there is darkness far beyond even anything that we see, and certainly anything that would affect any human being. But see, that's what the future application of the Day of Atonement is about, the entire world. See, initially it was involving a community in Israel. Today it involves the spiritual Israelites, the members of the Church of God. Ultimately, it's going to involve the whole world. The whole world is going to be relieved of the deception that Satan has caused. And so, as we look into the future, we have a great deal to be thankful for, and certainly we want to be appreciative of understanding how it is that God is going to bring those about.

It's not a matter that he hasn't predicted what he's going to do. Whether we fully understand that or not, that's another thing. But he does tell us what it is that he's going to do. And like I said, about Revelation 21, how that's going to come about, that is kind of in understandable. It's difficult to be able to quantify in ways that I understand. And yet, you know, he says that's even yet beyond. I'm dealing with sons and daughters, and I'm dealing with drawing people into a relationship with me, and I'm dealing with people that I want to relate to and commune with and truly love as my sons and my daughters in my divine family. And then we will, you know, together then go forward in achieving the remainder of that plan, whatever that happens to be.

So I hope that all of you have not only a good day of atonement, but that you also have a wonderful Feast of Tabernacles and last great day. And I will be back here in services with you again two weeks, three weeks, three weeks from now, not two weeks, three weeks from now. And I again hope that you have a wonderful day of atonement.