Sunday Service

The Altar of Burnt Offering Exodus 27:1-8 INTRODUCTION: Have you ever gotten yourself into a sticky situation where you found yourself asking the question: “Okay, now what do I do?” Like the story I heard about these two guys who were fishing for bass on the Cooper River a few years ago The fishing was kind of slow, and they notice this small alligator floating along the edge, so one of the guys cast the lure right in front of the gator, and the gator lunged at the lure that was loaded with treble hooks, and it was man against nature. And after a lengthy battle, the fisherman and his buddy somehow hauled the ancient reptile into their Jon-boat. It was about 4 feet in length – not so big, but not so small either. At first, it just lay there, catching its breath I suppose. But before the guys could figure out the stupidity of what they had done, that 4-ft alligator got his second wind and started flouncing around with his mouth wide open looking for a human leg to sink his teeth into. That was one of those sticky situations that had those two erstwhile anglers asking, “Okay, now what do we do?” Stupidity has a close cousin called sin. Like stupidity, the result of sin is a sticky situation in which we all find ourselves. We’re all in the same boat wondering, “Okay, now what are we going to do?” Our theme over the last number of weeks has been Building Altars, which is about building a life of worship, and this morning I want us to look at The Altar of Burnt Offering, also known as: THE BRONZE ALTAR: As we saw last week, when God brought his Chosen People out of Egypt, he made a covenant with them to be a One-God people, a people who would worship and serve him as the One, True and Living God. This covenant was based on the Law he gave Moses on Mt. Sinai that set them apart and provided a framework for life in relationship with him, with one another, and the world. And this life in relationship was first and foremost, a life of worship, and the quality of this life in relationship was based on the quality of their worship as prescribed in the Law. And it wasn’t until the Law was fulfilled by the Lord Jesus as the Perfect Lamb of God that the purpose of the Law was finally and fully understood. Paul tells in Romans 3 that the purpose of the Law was to teach us what sin is. “Obviously, the law applies to those to whom it was given, for its purpose is to keep people from having excuses, and to show that the entire world is guilty before God.  For no one can ever be made right with God by doing what the law commands. The law simply shows us how sinful we are.” Why is this important? It’s important because if God’s people are to be set apart from the world to have a relationship with him, something has to be done to provide for our sins. Otherwise, we’re no different from anybody else. We’re all guilty sinners in search of solution to the power and consequences of sin. So in the Law, God provided for a solution. He provided what we refer to as the sacrificial system, and essential to this sacrificial system was the Bronze Altar. READ EXODUS 27:1-8. Let me highlight a few key points about this altar: • First of all, it’s huge! It’s about 15 ft. square and 4 and a half ft. high, and it was placed in the courtyard where the people would gather for worship. • Second, notice its construction. It was made of acacia wood and overlaid with bronze. It was hollow in the center for the burning of wood, and a bronze grate went on top on which the animal sacrifices were placed. It was just what it sounds like – and you grill masters probably picked up on this quickly. It was a large outdoor grill where meat was not only cooked, but also consumed by the fire until only the ashes were left. It’s why the Bronze Altar was also called the Altar of Burnt Offerings. So in over-simplified terms, here’s how it worked: • Burnt offerings were made for a variety of purposes and on various occasions – twice daily, on the Sabbath, and other special holy days. • The primary purpose of burnt offerings was to make atonement for sins, which means to make payment for sins. Why? Because sin carries the penalty of death. “The wages of sin is death.” • So, the worshiper would bring only an animal of the highest quality – without spot or blemish. He would place his hand on the animal’s head – identifying with it and surrendering his sins to the animal in the attitude of repentance, separating himself from his sins, so that when the animal that now bore the sins of the worshiper was killed and placed on the altar as a whole offering and consumed by the altar fire, the sin-debt of the worshiper was paid, he was forgiven, and his relationship with God was restored. But this was a process that repeated itself over and over and over again. • You might be thinking: “Wow! That’s kind of hokey and really bloody. How was that supposed to work?” Well, it did work to a degree. It did what God designed it to do to a point. It was designed to teach God’s people about sin, but it was never designed to make man righteous, or right with God, because it was powerless to set people free from the power of sin. That’s why these sacrifices had to be offered on the Bronze Altar time after time after time, over and over and over. • And what happened is this: The sacrificial system became nothing more than a lot of religious activity on the part of the people and the priests to the point that God himself grew sick and tired of the emptiness of their worship and sacrifices. READ ISAIAH 1:11-13. Later, of course, God brought his judgment to bear upon his people, but always with the promise of a new day and a new covenant through a Promised Messiah. So remember what I told you several weeks ago: Things we see in the Old Testament are foreshadowings of the things we see in New Covenant, and one of the most important foreshadowings is the foreshadowing of: THE CROSS AND THE SUBSTITUTIONARY SACRIFICE OF JESUS: There is a reason we don’t have Bronze Altar in our New Testament Churches, and there’s a reason we aren’t lined up at the door with our lambs and bulls, and it’s because the Bronze Altar has been replaced by Calvary’s cross, and the countless lambs and sheep and goats and bulls have been replaced by the one death for all time by the One Lamb without spot or blemish – the Perfect Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world. Now think about his now – Think about how the Old Testament worshiper would bring his best animal and present it to the priest, and how he would place his hands on the animal’s head with the idea that his sins would be transferred to the animal, and then the priest would slaughter the animal and place the whole animal on the Bronze Altar where it would be completely consumed by the altar fire. That animal was put to death to take the place of the worshiper. Listen. His sins were atoned for, but he was still under the power and curse of sin. So this was a never-ending process, repeated over and over. But, according to the Bible, God had something better planned. As the book of Hebrews tells us, that something better was a better covenant based on better promises. Listen to this: READ HEBREWS 9:22-28. RESPONSE: The thing I want you to understand this morning is this: Under the Old Covenant, and animal died and his blood was shed, and his body was burned on a bronze altar as a substitute for a person’s sins. But what is the life of an animal worth compared to the life of a man? The animal was an unwitting sacrifice. It had no idea what was happening. He didn’t have a say in the matter. There was no love involved in its death. On the other hand, Jesus knew exactly why he was sent into the world. He knew exactly what he was sent here to do. He knew that the Father loved the world so much that he was sent as the Perfect, Sinless Son of God to died on the cross as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. As Paul says, “He who knew no sin became sin for us.” The Scripture says, “And on him was laid the sins of us all.” That’s the grace of God. He took our place on the cross. He paid it all, and all to him we owe. Sin had left its crimson stain, but his blood has washed it white as snow. During WWII, a prisoner in Auschwitz somehow managed to escape, and couldn’t be found. In retaliation, the officer in charge decided to execute 10 prisoners. One of them was a young Polish army sergeant, who began to weep bitterly, crying, “My wife and my children!” In that moment, a Franciscan priest who had been arrested and sent to this infamous prison camp for assisting the Jews, pushed his way to the front and yelled, “A request!” “What do you?” snarled the officer. “I want to die in this man’s place,” he replied. After a moments thought, the officer announced, “Request granted,” and the priest was shot dead on the spot. One life exchanged for another. Heroic deaths like this are rare, but there is one, singular, heroic holy death, one life offered to save us all. “The wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.”