Sermon Tone Analysis

Atonement.

For about the last 2 years, I have been doing a series on Elijah and Elisha; and so, have been concentrating on the Old Testament for a while now.

The New Testament has been a bit neglected; so, I thought that I should atone for my sins and do a bit in the New Testament.

Now, there is an interesting word that we don’t use too much; one with theological associations: “atone”.

What do I mean when I say that I am going to “atone” for my neglect of the New Testament?

I mean that I am going to correct my error, make up for my failure, redress what is wrong.

It is a word used exclusively with regard to sin, failure.

[P] You can see that it came from “at one”, make one, unite, reconcile.

But that is its old, obsolete, meaning; the word, actually, now, means “to make amends”.

So, I am going to “make amends” for my neglect of the New Testament.

So, I get out my hard-working computer [P] and get it to look up in the New American Standard Bible, [P] the one that I use.

No more Old Testament, I am going to make it only look up in the New Testament [P].

And seeing I have been talking about “atone”; I get it to look up that word [P].

I mean, it is a good theological, Biblical sounding word.

Just to be clear; when it looks up “atone”; it is finding “atone”, “atonement”, “atoning”, “atoned”, the lot.

Now my computer is going to tell me all about atonement in the New Testament.

And, surprise, surprise!

[P] There is absolutely no mention of atonement in my NASB New Testament!

Does that shock you?

Here is this theologically pregnant word; and it is not in my Bible.

Well, at least, it is not in the New Testament.

If I do the same thing again [P]; only this time I do “all passages” [P], search the whole Bible; I get 94 results!

[P] All in the Old Testament.

Why am I messing about, showing you computer searches?

To make a point: there is no atonement in the New Testament!

[P] The question is: why?

I mean 94 hits in the Old Testament – this was a significant theological issue; and it just disappears!

Well, we are probably all familiar with the “Day of Atonement” – a special festival in the Jewish calendar.

Even if we don’t know Jewish festivals, most of us can remember 1973 and the Yom Kippur war.

The Arab nations surrounding Israel made a surprise attack; and they caught them by surprise by launching the attack on Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, when there was a big holiday in Israel, no buses were running, soldiers were on leave.

“Yom” means “day”; “kippur” means atonement.

The Hebrew word means “cover” [P].

Religious Jewish men will wear a “kippa” [P] – it covers their head.

On the ark of the covenant there was a cover, [P] a lid, called the “kapporet”, (just file that fact away; I will come back to it) – it is the same root: to cover.

Noah’s ark was covered with pitch – that is where the root of the word comes from: from the word for “pitch”.

The day of atonement was a day of “covering”.

Covering what?

Well, we all need covering!

You cover something that you do not want to be seen or known.

Every so often we hear in the media of a “cover up” [P].

Some of us will remember “Watergate”; but it still goes on – the Russians allegedly were involved in influencing the US elections; they don’t want it to be known and so there is a “cover-up”.

In fact, there is a long precedent of humans covering up – it dates way back.

If there is stuff you are ashamed of, something you’ve done, wrong, something that you know you shouldn’t have done; what do you do?

You try to cover it up.

It goes way back to the very beginning!

[P] [Genesis 2:15–17 Then יהוה God took the man and put him into the garden of Eden to cultivate it and keep it.

יהוה God commanded the man, saying, “From any tree of the garden you may eat freely; but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat from it you will surely die.”

Genesis 3:1–11 When the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was desirable to make one wise, she took from its fruit and ate; and she gave also to her husband with her, and he ate.

(they did what they were told not to, they disobeyed) Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they knew that they were naked; (felt shame) and they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves loin coverings.

(they tried to cover up what they had done – rather ineffectively) They heard the sound of יהוה God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of יהוה God among the trees of the garden.

(they didn’t want to be seen).

Then יהוה God called to the man, and said to him, “Where are you?”

(as if He didn’t know!

You can’t hide from God) He said, “I heard the sound of You in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; so I hid myself.”

And He said, “Who told you that you were naked?

Have you eaten from the tree of which I commanded you not to eat?”] His sin was obvious; it couldn’t be hidden from God.

But God did cover Adam and Eve’s shame – the first death that ever occurred was what it took to cover sin.

And it was יהוה who did it: the Author of life, effected the first death, in order to cover human shame.

[Genesis 3:21 יהוה God made garments of skin for Adam and his wife, and clothed them.]

It takes the shedding of blood to cover sin, to atone for it.

But it is not just back then.

If we get caught doing something that we know we should not be doing, what do we do?

[P] The traffic cop stops you; what do you immediately do?

Frantically try to think up an excuse why you are doing more than the speed limit: “It’s a medical emergency”, “I didn’t see the sign”, “the accelerator got stuck”!

Who ever says to the cop: “I knew the speed limit but deliberately and wilfully went faster, I have done wrong.

I am fully to blame!”

We can’t bear admitting our fault!

We try to cover it.

We cannot tolerate the guilt of having done wrong; so, a covering for sin is needed.

This is what the Day of Atonement was all about: once a year, every year, two goats were selected; one was sacrificed as a sin offering, [P] all the sins of the nation were confessed and laid onto the other which was driven out into the wilderness bearing the sin of the whole nation.

Blood from the sin offering was taken by the high priest right into the holiest place of the tabernacle or temple and put on the kapporet, the atonement cover.

And atonement was made for the nation for another year.

Sin was covered over for another year.

The psalmist could say: [P] [Psalm 32:1 How blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered!]

But that is the thing when something is covered.

Yes, you cannot see it; but it is still there!

[P] Does anybody remember this stuff?

Before the days of word processors and “CTRL Z”, if you made a mistake, you would “twink it out” – paint this white stuff over it.

It covered up your mistake, no more ugly scribbling out.

But you could scrape it off, get a bit of acetone and remove it – the mistake was still there underneath.

It had not been removed.

It was just covered up.

Look, I am finally getting around to making my point!

[P] Why is there no atonement in the New Testament?

Because sin is not covered – it is REMOVED!

[P] [Psalm 103:12 As far as the east is from the west, So far has He removed our transgressions from us.] Hallelujah!

Sin was covered on the “Day of Atonement” but it was not removed.

[P] That goat never got rid of the sin.

It was a ceremony stipulated in the Law but it could never remove sin.

In actual fact, it did the opposite!

It served to remind of sins! [Hebrews 10:1–4 For the Law, since it has only a shadow of the good things to come and not the very form of things, can never, by the same sacrifices which they offer continually year by year, make perfect those who draw near.

Otherwise, would they not have ceased to be offered, because the worshipers, having once been cleansed, would no longer have had consciousness of sins?

But in those sacrifices there is a reminder of sins year by year.

For it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins.]

A better sacrifice was needed!

A totally different order of sacrifice.

The Old Covenant never removed sin, nor could it – it just covered it.

A New Covenant was needed!

Not the blood of bulls and goats: [P] [1 Peter 1:18–19 knowing that you were not redeemed with perishable things like silver or gold from your futile way of life inherited from your forefathers, but with precious blood, as of a lamb unblemished and spotless, the blood of Christ.]

Here was a Lamb that could remove sin! Praise His Name! [P] [John 1:29 The next day he (that is John the Baptist.