Atonement for the Holy Place

Reformation Baptist Church

After declaring what sacrifices needed to be made, God now relates to Moses who is to instruct Aaron how those offerings are to be made. First, Aaron must sacrifice a bull as a sin offering for himself and his family. The writer of Hebrews makes it clear that this is a testimony of the ineffectiveness of the offerings because if they could take away sin, then it would not need to be continually offered., The true sacrifice, Jesus Christ, as the sin offering takes away the sins of His household, the household of faith. Then the High Priest needs to burn incense in the Holy of Holies to produce a cloud over the mercy seat. The picture of incense is the picture of prayers, so it is through the petitions of Christ that His offering was accepted and that we receive mercy. Then he sprinkles the blood of the bull on the mercy seat, because it is only through the shedding of blood that we can receive mercy. Next, he goes out again and kills the goat that is the sin offering for the people. He carries that blood back to the mercy seat which is a picture of Christ's death allowing Him to go to the mercy seat, but it also brings believers into the presence of God. The final thing that is also done is the anointing of the altar of burnt offering as a picture that Christ not only made a way for believers to come to the Father, but He also made the judgment of damnation and the righteousness of that judgment more obvious. We have been given these shadows so we can understand more about the substance of what Christ did.