Tag: Sacrifices

Morning Musing: Exodus 28:36-38

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“You are to make a pure gold medallion and engrave it, like the engraving of a seal: Holy to the Lord. Fasten it to a cord of blue yarn so it can be placed on the turban; the medallion is to be on the front of the turban. It will be on Aaron’s forehead so that Aaron may bear the guilt connected with the holy offerings that the Israelites consecrate as all their holy gifts. It is always to be on his forehead, so that they may find acceptance with the Lord.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

Hats have played a more important role in human cultures than we often consider. Used to be, hats were considered an essential part of a person’s wardrobe. And, the hat you wore said a great deal about who you were and the status you held in society. Still today, many professions have specific kinds of hats associated with them. It should come as exactly no surprise, then, that one of the pieces of the garments for the Israelite priests is a hat. Very little time is spent on the hat itself, though, in favor of its significance. Let’s explore the priestly turban and why the Gospel is so good.

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Morning Musing: Exodus 22:29-30

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“You must not hold back offerings from your harvest or your vats. Give me the firstborn of your sons. Do the same with your cattle and your flock. Let them stay with their mothers for seven days, but on the eighth day you are to give them to me.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

There’s an awful scene from the beginning of the movie Braveheart where William Wallace has just gotten married and some English soldiers arrive in town and learn about the wedding. The soldiers demand their rights of jus primae noctis (“the right of the first night”) as extended to them by King Edward “Longshanks” the ruler of the land. This meant they were entitled to sleep with a woman on her wedding night before she and her new husband have the opportunity to come together. The actual history of the practice is a bit murky, but it was basically part of a ruler’s demand of the first and best of his people. Reading this next law, I’m reminded of that scene. God here demands the first and best from His people. How is this any different from what the English soldiers in Braveheart did? Let’s explore that together.

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Morning Musing: Exodus 12:21-23

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“Then Moses summoned all the elders of Israel and said to them, ‘Go, select an animal from the flock according to your families, and slaughter the Passover animal. Take a cluster of hyssop, dip it in the blood that is in the basin, and brush the lintel and the two doorposts with some of the blood in the basin. None of you may go out the door of his house until morning. When the Lord passes through to strike Egypt and sees the blood on the lintel and the two doorposts, he will pass over the door and not let the destroyer enter your houses to strike you.'” (CSB – Read the chapter)

Blood is really important. That’s true physically, of course, as we die if we lose too much of it. It’s also true in various other symbolic ways. Relationally speaking, we talk about blood relatives versus those who are just relatives by marriage. Familialy, there is the saying that “blood is thicker than water,” meaning we are going to have closer relationships with our family members than non-family members. When they put ratings on movies, part of what determines how restrictive of a rating a particular film gets is how much blood gets splattered across the screen. Bloody violence gets rated higher than non-bloody violence (think Deadpool versus Star Wars). Blood has also long played an important role in our religious practices. This was the case in the first Passover. Let’s talk about why and what is going on in this next part of the story.

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Digging in Deeper: Hebrews 10:1-4

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“Since the law has only a shadow of the good things to come, and not the reality itself of those things, it can never perfect the worshipers by the same sacrifices they continually offer year after year. Otherwise, wouldn’t they have stopped being offered, since the worshipers, purified once and for all, would no longer have any consciousness of sins? But in the sacrifices there is a reminder of sins year after year. For it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

For the last several weeks we have been talking through the author of Hebrews’ argument that the new covenant Jesus made between us and God by His sacrificial death is greater than the old covenant God made between Him and Israel and which was rooted in the Law of Moses. The author has offered one look after another into the old covenant’s various points of weakness and shown how the new covenant resolves them. Here in chapter 10, as he is drawing near the end of this line of argument, he starts out with a statement that is perhaps the most direct he’s been so far. It’s hard to fathom how much a shock this would have been to his original audience. Let’s talk about it.

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Morning Musing: Hebrews 9:11-12

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“But Christ has appeared as a high priest of the good things that have come. In the greater and more perfect tabernacle not made with hands (that is, not of this creation), he entered the most holy place once for all time, not by the blood of goats and calves, but by his own blood, having obtained eternal redemption.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

Last time, we talked about the fact taht the old covenant ministry, rooted as it was in the law, never really accomplished what we most needed it to accomplish. We’ll address that point a great deal more directly in a couple of weeks, Lord willing, as we get into chapter 10. That revelation, though, prompts a rather nagging question: How can we get our hands on what we most need? The author of Hebrews begins to answer that question here. Our next several conversations are going to be all about how the new covenant was made including, next week, a three-part look at specifically why it is better than the old. And rather than taking it in big sections like we bit off last week, I’m going to do my best to break it down into smaller bits. Let’s talk about the new covenant God made with us in Christ and how it came to be.

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