What Israel couldn’t do
Before turning to Israel’s sacrifices and story, we must remember what has already been made clear.by Cody Anderson Corinth Missionary Baptist Church
From the beginning, man proved unable to restore himself to God.
Sin is not just a mistake to try and correct, but it is the condition we cannot overcome ourselves.
Then the law was given. This was not the remedy either, but a revelation that we cannot maintain a right relationship with God.
As Romans tells us, it brought the knowledge of sin, exposed God’s holiness, and our failure to meet it.
What man could not do and what the law could not accomplish, set the stage for Israel to rid sin through sacrifice and obedience.
Maybe the people of God could come up with a system to cover sin and reconcile man back to God.
The sacrificial system along with obedience gives some good news and some bad news.
The good news being it did produce some obedience and some covering of sin for a time. The bad news is that it was temporal.
The sin covering only lasted for a while and required a revolving door of sacrifices. While obedience for a moment was obtained, it was incomplete.
Remember sin isn’t only something we do, it is who we are at our very core. The sacrifices and attempts of obedience could not completely achieve these fixes.
God commanded the sacrificial system and therefore it is good, but it is limited by design.
Hebrews 10:3-4 says, “But in these sacrifices there is a reminder of sins every year. For it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins” (ESV).
These offerings would provide reminders that their sin costs. These sacrifices were not solutions to the debt incurred by their sins.
Day after day and year after year, all the blood spilled was not enough to take away the sins of the people.
Isaiah 1 tells how God viewed the sacrifices offered by the people.
God voiced disgust not in what was being brought, but in how it was brought.
The multitudes of offerings and the rams being offered were a front for the people. The people were bringing the offerings with the wrong intentions.
The people were not remembering for long their sin that cost the blood of the sacrifice, and they were not repentant.
They simply went through the motions expecting God to do His part while flippantly doing their part.
This ritual without repentance would not reconcile them to God but drive them farther away.
When we read Micah 6:6-8, we see what God wanted out of the sacrifices.
God wanted the heart to be pure, do justice, love kindness, and walk humbly. The heart of man is what needed to change.
It was never about the amount of sacrifices or the kinds of offerings. Each offering was meant to turn the heart back to God.
Since the beginning of sin, man twisted everything that was good and used it in ways they thought would benefit them instead of glorifying God.
Israel had the law, sacrifices, covenants, and promises, yet they could not achieve righteousness through them.
Their pursuit of God, while at times seemed sincere, was executed by the wrong means.
They tried to work their way to God instead of an act of faith in God.
Romans 9:31-32 states, “Israel who pursued a law that would lead to righteousness did not succeed in reaching that law.
Why? Because they did not pursue it by faith, but as if it were based on works” (ESV).
While the sacrificial system was temporary, it was also anticipatory.
The sacrifices couldn’t remove the sin they covered. The rituals performed couldn’t transform the heart.
The obedience achieved was not perfect.
The altar kept burning, sacrifices kept coming, and the guilt remained.
Israel found themselves in a system that would never end because their hearts would not change.
The people did not need just another lamb for sacrifice.
They needed a once-and-for-all sacrifice to remove their sins and not just cover them.
They needed the gift of faith brought by the shed blood of the Lamb of God.
They needed their dead hearts brought to life.
A life that would result in what man, the law, and the sacrificial system all could never produce – a life of faith.
