Day of Atonement (Leviticus 16)

On the day of atonement, the high priest, by Himself, did all the work required by God to make atonement for the sins of the children of Israel. While the high priest did this work, the people were outside of the tabernacle. There was no man with him when he went in to make atonement until he came out and had made atonement (Lev. 16:17).

When you consider the fulfillment of this ceremony by the Lord Jesus Christ, our eternal High Priest, does this give you the greatest peace and joy in your soul, to know that Christ, by Himself, propitiated God and purged our sins (Heb. 1:3; 9:12)? Christ made atonement on one day. He made it by Himself. The people were outside. No man was with Him. When He came out, when He rose from the grave, He had made atonement for all the sins of all the people of God.

This is the Gospel. God was pleased to appoint one Mediator, one Surety, to anoint one High Priest for all of His elect people, for all of eternity. All that they did by sinning became His debt of sin to pay. All that He did in obedience and sacrifice became their righteousness before God. It was all done by Christ on the cross, all complete and perfect when He cried, “It is finished” (John 19:28-30; Heb. 9:12; John 10:11, 15; Rom. 8:32)!

To know Christ in His atoning work by the God-given persuasion of faith, to see that He made atonement for His people, and to trust Him alone in that work as all of my satisfaction and cleansing and covering of all of my sins before God, is to be free from all condemnation and to possess eternal life in Him. It is to see the glory of God (John 5:24; 2 Cor. 4:6).

On that day, the high priest was to take two goats from among the children of Israel. Both made up one sin offering (Lev. 16:5). He was to present both goats before the LORD at the door of the tabernacle (Lev. 16:7) and cast lots on the two goats. He was to offer the goat on which the LORD’s lot fell as a sin offering. The other goat was the scapegoat (Lev. 16:8).

Thus, the atonement Christ made by His blood accomplished two things in one day. God was propitiated; sin was “expiated.” To propitiate God means to satisfy God in justice and thereby appease His wrath. To “expiate” means to take away, to cleanse, to blot sins out of the account God maintains (Isa. 44:22). It means God forgives the sins of His people on the just ground that He received full payment from Christ for them (Matt. 20:29; 26:28; 1 Pet. 1:18-20; Acts 20:28). The two goats of the one sin offering represent these two aspects of atonement: propitiation and cleansing. “On that day shall the priest make an atonement for you, to cleanse you, that ye may be clean from all your sins before the LORD” (Lev. 16:30).

Can there be any greater news to a sinner than this? Christ, by Himself, purged our sins. He blotted them out in the account of God. He removed them from God's accounting. He cleansed our record in God's sight. Proof that He did so is that He now sits on the right hand of God (Heb. 1:3). Because our High Priest sits as King on His throne as God-man, His glorious high throne is our great sanctuary (Jer. 17:12). We have access to God by Him (Eph. 3:12). He is our refuge from all condemnation (John 8:11; Rom. 8:1, 34). God communes with us in the sanctuary of His throne of grace where Christ offered Himself. We see the Son of God in His glory, and the Father in Him (John 6:56; 2 Cor. 4:6; Heb. 1:3).

The high priest killed the goat of the sin offering. He took coals from off the altar and put them in a censor. He filled his hands with incense beaten small, and brought it within the veil that covered the holy of holies. Upon entering the holy of holies, he put the incense on the coals, so that a cloud of incense covered the mercyseat that was upon the ark of the testimony, which is also the ark of the covenant. The incense cloud had to cover the mercyseat or the high priest would die. With the cloud of incense covering the mercyseat, the high priest entered into the holy place and sprinkled the blood of the sin offering upon the mercyseat, the “propitiatory.” The blood sprinkled on the mercyseat made atonement for the holy place because of the sins of Israel.

Christ fulfilled this law when He entered heaven once, with His own blood, and obtained eternal redemption for us  (Heb. 9:12). Christ obtained our redemption when He answered God as our Surety with Himself as the ransom price of our redemption by His blood (1 Pet. 1:18-20), when He made intercession for His people, when He was accepted for them (Isa. 53:10-12). After the high priest made an end of reconciling the holy place, he was to “lay both his hands upon the head of the live goat, and confess over him all the iniquities of the children of Israel, and all their transgressions in all their sins, putting them upon the head of the goat, and shall send him away by the hand of a fit man into the wilderness: And the goat shall bear upon him all their iniquities unto a land not inhabited: and he shall let go the goat in the wilderness” (Lev. 16:21-22).

The high priest confessed all the sins of all the children of Israel over the head of the goat that was sent away into the wilderness. See Christ our great High Priest in this law of God. He is not only the High Priest, but He is the Lamb of God who bore our sins (Gen. 22:8). As High Priest, He willingly took our sins from us and made them His very own. He confessed our sins as His own before God (Psa. 31:5, 10; 40:6-8, 12; 69:5-7; Matt. 26:28; 1 Cor. 5:7; 2 Cor. 5:21; 1 Pet. 2:24). God imputed all the sins of all of His people to Him. God laid our sins on Him (Isa. 53:6). Christ was thus made sin (2 Cor. 5:21). Our Savior bore the guilt of them and felt the shame of them before God (Matt. 26:39-44). He was made sin for us by God’s sovereign act of imputation (Rom. 5:12-19). Our High Priest, the Lamb of God, owned our sins willingly. The High Priest of our salvation confessed all of our sins upon His own head. He died. Our body of sins died then with Him. He was buried. Our sins were then buried with Him. By these, He removed our sins from us as far as the east is from the west (Psa. 103:12; Rom. 6:3-11). Thus, Christ, our High Priest, the Lamb of God, made atonement to God. He is therefore now seated because the work is complete and perfect.

Do you now see by this scripture that all of your justification before God is what Christ did by His offering of Himself to God for His people? Do you see that the success of atonement depends only on Christ crucified, and what God thinks of Him? God is satisfied with Him. Does His atonement satisfy you? Is He your only access to God? Is He all your coming to God? Do you come to God now and always by the blood of Jesus in full assurance of faith (Heb. 10:14-23)? Is He your only hope (1 Tim. 1:1)? Is this the truth that compels you to trust and love Him? Is He your life (Gal. 2:20; Php. 1:21)?

The day of atonement in Leviticus 16 is a God-given picture of the atonement Jesus Christ made to God for the sins of His people, the elect of God. Scripture calls them “the children of promise” (Rom. 9:6-8; Gal. 4:28), “the true circumcision” (Php. 3:3; Rom. 2:28-29), “the Israel of God” (Gal. 6:16). All who flee for refuge to Christ in their conscience, looking only to Christ in His finished work; all who come to God pleading Christ crucified as their propitiation (Rom. 3:25), their sin covering, their only cleansing for sin before God, the only answer in their conscience and in the Day of Judgment; all they are the Israel of God. They are God’s elect. They were ordained to eternal life (Acts 13:48). That is why they believe. They were given faith to see and persuade them and compel them to gladly embrace Christ crucified, risen and reigning as all.

May God give you and me this most precious faith to rest the entire weight of our souls on Christ’s obedience in His atoning work as our everlasting righteousness before God. May we find joy and peace in believing Him (2 Cor. 4:6).

Rick Warta