When I was a child Saturday night was get-ready-for church time. All the kids got baths, and the girls had their hair put up in curlers or pin-curls. The boys went to the barber with Dad Saturday afternoon so all they had to do was put their heads on their pillows and fall asleep.

We drifted into dreamland to the sound of Dad shining up our shoes with his brush and polish. Mom’s iron thumped on the ironing board as she pressed our best clothes. We always dressed up for church.

I continued that tradition with our children until sneakers replaced leather shoes and our kids developed their own ideas about what to wear to church.

The Levites are Dedicated

Getting all cleaned up and nicely dressed before appearing before God probably began in the part of the Bible we are reading now. In Numbers 8:5-7 God told the Levites to wash, shave and put on clean clothes before they came to serve in the tabernacle. God wanted holiness and purity when the priests came before him. He wanted their complete obedience.

Two young bulls were brought with the Levites to the dedication ceremony. One was to be offered with the finest flour mixed with olive oil as a burnt offering. The second was a sin offering.

The Levites themselves became an offering to God as they stood at the entrance to the tabernacle. The Israelites laid their hands on them and offered them to God in place of all of the firstborn sons of Israel. They became a wave offering, which meant they belonged with the tabernacle from then on.

God set apart all of the firstborn sons of Israel for himself when he struck down all of the firstborn sons of Egypt. Instead of requiring every family to bring their firstborn son to serve as priests, God selected the tribe of Levi to serve him in their place

The Wave Offering

A wave offering was passed before the Lord, but remained whole and useful, unlike other offerings that were consumed by fire. When the first fruits of the harvest were brought to God each year, they were presented as a wave offering and instead of being offered on the altar, they became food for the priests.

The Levites were “waved” before the Lord to indicate that they belonged to him.

The Second Passover

 A year had passed since Israel left Egypt and it was time to celebrate the Passover again. God had said this celebration would always be on Israel’s calendar, at twilight on the fourteenth day of the first month.

Some of the Israelites were concerned about participating in the second Passover because they had become unclean through contact with a dead body. Moses took their concern to the Lord and came back with his command.

The Israelites who were unclean due to contact with a dead body, or Israelites who were traveling away from home at Passover, were to defer their observance to the fourteenth day of the second month. Then they were to fulfill all of the regulations for Passover.

Those who were able to celebrate Passover, but chose not to, were to be cut off from their people. Not being part of the community was a severe punishment, but it was a sin that could be atoned for, too. Thank God that he made ways for people to return after they went astray.

Foreigners who lived among the Israelites also joined the Passover celebration. They were regarded as part of Israel during this most sacred time of remembrance.

The Offerings

As we begin to study the types of offerings God called for at the tabernacle, keep in mind that in Christ all of these offerings were fulfilled at once. People could not safely approach God without making offerings to him. He said, “No one is to appear before me empty-handed.” Exodus 23:15. When people came to worship, they always brought an offering.

When we come before God as believers in Jesus, he is our offering. He stands between us and God as the burnt offering, the sin offering, the fellowship offering, and the grain offering. Because of what Jesus has done for us we don’t have to make special preparations to enter God’s presence. When we have Jesus, we have it everything we need.

The Burnt Offering

The burnt offering had nothing to do with sin and everything to do with a desire to be in relationship with God. It was a satisfying “meal” offered purely to please him.

“It is a burnt offering, a food offering, an aroma pleasing to the Lord.” Leviticus 1:9b

How could people know God unless they could come to him? When they came they had to offer themselves completely. They brought a bull or a lamb or a goat or a bird that represented them, and when it was offered the offer-er and the offering became one. As God received the offering, he received the one who offered it.

God savored the aroma of the burnt offering because it represented to him the faith of the person who was offering their whole life to him.

The burnt offering differed from the sin offering in that the animal that was slaughtered to atone for sin was taken outside the camp to be burned. We will see more about that in tomorrow’s reading.

The Grain Offering

The grain offering was an expression of gratitude. It consisted either of fine flour mixed with olive oil and incense, or unleavened bread baked with olive oil. It could also be whole heads of grain that were roasted, crushed and mixed with olive oil and incense.

A handful of the grain offering was put onto the altar and burned as a fragrant offering to please God. The rest of it was given to Aaron and his sons. It was regarded as a most holy part of the food offerings presented to the Lord.

No yeast or honey was allowed in the grain offering. Yeast was a fermenting agent that may have symbolized sin. Honey was acceptable to God, but not in offerings that were to be burned. (Honey may have been used in pagan rituals that were offensive to God.)

The Fellowship Offering

The fellowship offering was also called the peace offering. It was a voluntary offering that could be given when someone wanted to praise God for his goodness. Other times it was offered to mark the fulfillment of a vow, as when Hannah brought her son Samuel to live in the house of the Lord at Shiloh (1 Samuel 1:24-28). Or it could be offered in gratitude after the Lord delivered someone from dire circumstances.

The animal could be male or female, a herd or flock animal, but it had to be without defects. The only parts that were burned on the altar were the internal organs and the fat that surrounded them. The person making the offering shared the rest of the meat with the priests and anyone else the giver wanted to include. They ate it in the Lord’s presence after burning the part that belonged to him.

The Gospel in the Offerings

 Andrew Jukes, a 19^th century curate in the Church of England, wrote a masterful explanation of sacrifices and offerings in his book The Law of the Offerings. He points out that in the sacrifices we see a parade of images that help us understand what Christ has done for us. Jesus was the burnt sacrifice, wholly pleasing to God. He was the sin sacrifice taken outside the camp to be destroyed as a substitute for sinners. He was the fragrant grain offering given in gratitude to the Father. He was the peace offering around which we gather to have fellowship with God and one another.

Jukes puts it this way: “The [sacrifices] are, in fact, a set of pictures or emblems directly from the hand of God, by which He would teach his children things otherwise all but incomprehensible. In the [sacrifices], if I may be allowed the expression, God takes his son to pieces.”

When we consider these sacrifices and offerings we see the significance of what Christ did for us. We were so lost in our sins that we should have died, but in Christ, God has secured our eternal life.