Time to Celebrate

Suppose we were visited by aliens from outer space. Imagine that you were given the task of providing these visitors with the resources on how to celebrate Christmas. And suppose for a minute that you chose to do this by writing the instructions down without making any use of video. I guess what you'd come up with would be as dry as Leviticus 23. And there would be a great contrast between the dryness of what you had written - and the event itself - which is full of life and joy and fun.

Leviticus 23 lists the different weekly or annual festivals that the people of Israel are to celebrate. Further details, for the priests, are given in Numbers 28-29.

Built into the rhythm of life of the people was this regular pattern of stopping, of remembering and reflecting on what God has done, of giving thanks, and celebrating together as community.

We used to live in Edgware, where there is a significant Jewish community. And this week the Jewish community are celebrating the Feast of Tabernacles (Lev. 23:33-44). In the Sainsbury's car park there will be shed - put there as a temporary dwelling, a booth. As you walk around you will see temporary shelters outside shops or in gardens. A community celebrating a week long festival - giving God thanks for the harvest, and remembering their wilderness wanderings following the Exodus.

In contrast our Harvest Festival seems a bit lame.

But God wants us to stop, he wants us to remember, he wants us to give thanks, he wants us to celebrate. And the fact that so often we're too busy to stop - maybe even too busy as a family to sit down one day a week and eat together - maybe this is an indication to us that things are maybe a little out of balance.

So what?

One of the questions we should regularly ask as we read the Bible is 'so what?' What difference is this going to make to me when I'm back at work on Monday morning, or out with friends on Friday evening.

Sometimes we need to search a bit deeper to find the answer to that question - but we should still ask it.

So what have we learnt about the Tabernacle and the Priests and the Sacrifices over the last couple of weeks and what difference does it make?

Leviticus - really!

My last two posts were a bit lacking in background. They were the diagram of the Tabernacle (find here) and a chart detailing the five offerings listed in Leviticus 1-7 (find here). 

This autumn, on Sunday mornings, we're following the Israelites on their journey from Sinai, where God gave Moses the 10 Commandments, to their arrival at the borders of the 'promised land' where Joshua replaced Moses as the leader of the people. It's a journey that took forty years and stretches from Exodus 20 right through to the end of Deuteronomy - a journey that we're going to cover in twelve weeks.

It's a journey that takes in Leviticus and Numbers - books that don't often appear in lists of 'my top ten favourite books in the Bible'. For many Christians their only encounter with Leviticus comes late February or early March as part of a 'Read the Bible in Year' programme. Up until that point it has been quiet a discipline to read 3-4 chapters a day, but at least in Genesis and Exodus there are some interesting story lines to follow even if some of the detail is a bit alien. Then second half of Exodus got to bit dull with all the details of how to build the Tabernacle, and then building the Tabernacle, and what the priests should wear - but there was still a bit of narrative thrown in along the way to help us progressing (e.g. the story of the Golden Calf).

But then we hit Leviticus with the blow by blow details of how to sacrifice a goat and what to do with the fat around the kidneys; and when to burn the skin on the altar of burnt offerings, or when the priest could keep it for himself, or when it needed to be burnt up in a ceremonially clean place outside the camp. And that's all before we hit sections on mildew and defiling moulds. But for those who make it through Leviticus their reward is ... Numbers.

Maybe it is not surprising that many stop at this point. If you miss a couple of days suddenly you have to wade through 90 minutes of law, which seems alien and irrelevant to us and so far removed from the stories we know from the gospels and Acts. Or alternatively we skip large sections and wait for the story to pick up again in Joshua - but then how do we make sense of all the ethnic cleansing...maybe we just should wait until later in the year and pick up the reading programme when it reaches Matthew and Mark.

So why are we looking at this section this term and what do we hope to get out of it?

One reason for looking at this part of the Old Testament is because all of the Bible is 'God breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness' (2 Timothy 3:16). We will encounter God in these chapters - even if it appears, at first sight, that the God we discover is very different to the God of the New Testament.

Another reason is because when we come to the NT, Jesus, the disciples, and most of the people who made up the very early church were Jewish, and therefore their lives and their worldview was shaped by these chapters in the Hebrew Bible and the encounters that we read about here between God and his people. The more we understand these books the better we will understand the writers of the NT - what they thought about God, what they thought about the world, what they thought about themselves.

The Bible is many different books, brought together, in a collection that tells one big overarching story. We won't properly understand the end part of the story if we don't better understand the bits nearer the beginning.

Sacrifices in Leviticus

This morning at CBC we're continuing our teaching series 'From Sinai to the Promised Land', and we're looking at Priests and Sacrifices. I will come back and add a bit more to this post later, but here is a table that details each of the five main offerings in Leviticus and how each is to be offered and what it is for.

1. All offerings were to be ‘without defect’ in the case of animals, and the ‘finest’ in terms of flour etc. Only the best is acceptable.
2. The person bringing the sacrifice was to slaughter it just outside the entrance to the Tent of Meeting - that is, in the Courtyard of the Tabernacle.
3. The altar was the Altar of Burnt Offerings mentioned in Exodus 27. Mention of the Alter above always refers to the Altar of Burnt Offerings. When the Altar of Incense is intended this is mentioned in full. There was a horn on each corner of the altar. This altar was in the courtyard of the Tabernacle. (Not to be confused with the Altar of Incense which was inside the Holy Place (not to be confused with the Holy of Holies.)) 
4. Slaughtering, skinning, cutting up were usually roles for the individual bringing the sacrifice.
5. Arranging meat on the altar, handling the blood and burning was the role of the priest.
6. This was the curtain that separated the Holy Place from the Holy of Holies.
7. Regulations about the who, where, what and when of the Fellowship Meal are given in Leviticus 7

Offering	Read	Sacrifice	Ritual	Elements	Instructions	Purpose/additional notes
Burnt Offering	Lev. 1:1-17; 6:8-13; 8:18-21; 16:24	Bull or ram (a)	Present at entrance to Tent of Meeting (b)  Lay hands on head and slaughter (d) Ram - slaughtered at N side of altar. Skin & cut into pieces. Wash internal organs and legs	Blood	Priest: Splash against sides of altar (c)	Voluntary offering; atonement for sin.
				Skin	Kept by priest
				Head, fat, meat	Burn on the altar (e)
				Washed organs, legs	Burn on the altar
		Dove, pigeon (for the poor)	P: Bring to altar and wring off the head	Blood	Drain on side of altar
			Remove crop and feathers	Crop and feathers	Throw with the ashes, E of altar
			Tear open		Burn on the altar
Grain Offering	Lev. 2:1-16; 6:14-23	Finest flour, olive oil, incense. Without yeast or honey. Always add salt.	P: Take handful of flour, oil and all incense		Burn on the altar	Voluntary offering
				Rest	Belongs to the priests. Eat without yeast in the sanctuary area
Fellowship Offering	Lev. 3:1-17; 7:11-36	Male or female cow, sheep, goat	Lay hands on head and slaughter at entrance to Tent of Meeting.	Blood	P: Splash against sides of altar	Voluntary offering; thanksgiving; communal meal
				Internal organs with fat, kidneys, liver. (Lamb’s tail)	Burn on the altar
				Breast, right thigh	Priest’s share
				Rest of the meat	Eaten by the people (ceremonially clean) as fellowship meal (g)
Sin Offering Lev. 4:1-5:13; 6:24-30; 8:14-17; 16:3-22	Priest	Young bull	Lay hands on head and slaughter at entrance to Tent of Meeting.	Blood	Dip finger and sprinkle seven times in front of curtain of sanctuary (f)	Mandatory atonement for unintentional sin
					Put some on horns of Altar of Incense
					Pour rest at base of Altar of Burnt Offering
				Fat, kidney, liver	Burn on the altar
				Skin, flesh, head, legs, organs, intestines	Burn outside camp in ceremonially clean place
	Whole Community	Young bull	Elders lay hands on head and slaughter	Priest performs as above
	Leader	Male goat	Lay hands on head and slaughter	Blood	Priest - put on horns of altar, rest poured out as above
				Fat	Burn on altar
				Meat	Eaten by priests, in sanctuary area
	Individual	Female goat/lamb	Lay hands on head and slaughter	Priest performs as for leader
		2 doves/pigeons (for the poor)	First bird (sin offering): P: Wring its neck	Blood	Splash on side of altar
					Drained at base of altar
			Second bird: burnt offering
		Finest flour, no oil or incense (for the very poor)	As grain offering
Guilt Offering	Lev. 5:14-6:7; 7:1-10	Ram		Blood	Splashed against sid of altar	Mandatory atonement for unintentional sin requiring restitution. Make restitution + 1/5 and give to priest. Make atonement.
				Fat, kidney, liver	Burn on altar
				Meat	Eaten by priests, in sanctuary area

The Tabernacle

Last week in our series 'From Sinai to the Promised Land' we looked at the Tabernacle. Here is a simple diagram of the layout of the Tabernacle.

Watch Again

There were several videos that were played in yesterday's service and some of you might want to watch some of them again.

Here they are:

First there is Krish Kandiah's urgent call to action in the light of the developing refugee crisis in Europe:




Then there are the Soul Survivor B and Momentum recap videos:






Did you spot the brief appearances of a number of young people?

The music that was used during Communion was Matt Maher & Matt Redman's 'Remembrance'. To listen to this song again, for chords, or for links to Spotify or iTunes visit the Worship Together website by clicking here.