Atonement is the exact opposite of the Feast of Shouting. It is a day to be afflicted, to mourn, to deprive yourself of food and water and entertainment. You read in the last lesson that Atonement commemorates a day when something terrible happened. It is the only day of its kind in the year.
The word translated as atonement is kaphar. It literally means “to cover”. Figuratively, it means to cover up sins, to hide them, cleanse them, forgive them, and so on. Now remembering why God makes a day holy – on that day, something important happened – what would you guess off the top of your head that Atonement represents?
To put it a different way, if atonement means “to cleanse sin”, when is the FIRST time God would have to cleanse sin? Why, on the FIRST day it was committed! Thus, a commemoration of cleansing sin would also be a commemoration of the first sin! Not the sin of Adam – but the REAL first sin. Who is the father of lying (a sin)? John 8:44. Who committed the first sin? 1 John 3:8.
But to prove that idea, and to understand it more fully, we need to study how Atonement was observed and what took place on that day. Start by reading Leviticus 16:29-34. Every year on the tenth day of the seventh month, the high priest entered into the innermost room of the temple. He was allowed to enter there only once a year, on Atonement. The ritual he performed on that day is described in the first part of Leviticus 16.
The priest does several sacrifices on this day, all of which are significant, but you’ll understand those another day. Today we focus on the two goats described in Leviticus 16:5-10. Notice these two goats are for a sin offering – to take away the sins of Israel. In verse 8 the priest casts lots – something like flipping a coin, a way for God to show Israel His choice in matters – to divide the goats. One will be for the Lord, and one will be a “scapegoat”.
The goat which God chooses is sacrificed to pay for the sins of the people, and the other goat is led off alive into the wilderness (verses 9-10). Leviticus 16:15-17 pick up the story of the Lord’s goat, which is sacrificed to PAY for the sins of the people. Who pays for our sins? Colossians 1:14, 1 Corinthians 6:20, etc. So this sacrificed goat can only represent Jesus, making atonement for our sins – covering them – with His blood.
Leviticus 16:20 picks up the story of the scapegoat, after the sacrifices have all been made, and the payment of Jesus’ blood is symbolically made. Now read carefully what the high priest does to this other goat in Leviticus 16:21-22. Notice that the sins are PLACED ON the goat. CONFESSED ON HIM. PUT ON HIS HEAD.
The Lord’s goat paid the PRICE for your sins, as your savior. But this second goat bears part of the RESPONSIBILITY for your sins, as the one ultimately to BLAME for your sins BECAUSE HE WAS THE FIRST SINNER and helped mankind learn how to sin! (Genesis 3).
Even the most wicked among us have been deceived by the devil (Revelation 12:9). On some level, we all have the same excuse Eve used when God asked her to give account for her sins in Genesis 3:13. And so God can forgive us – and punish the devil instead (Genesis 3:14) – for his part in our sins. That is what the scapegoat in Leviticus 16 represents.
But on the other hand, not even the most foolish among us are completely deceived. We all bear some portion of the blame for our actions. The more truth we understand, the more blame we bear when we rebel against it. The law requires you die for those sins (Romans 6:23). But Jesus voluntarily came and died in your place, so when you stopped sinning and repented, His blood could make an atonement for you. And it is these two parts of the atonement that are necessary for your forgiveness, and both are pictured in Leviticus 16.
You may be wondering why it was necessary to cast lots over the goats, to choose which one is the Lord’s goat and which represents the Devil. Simply because there are two Jesuses in the world today. One is the true Jesus, and one – by far the most popular one – is the false Jesus. If it were left up to popular vote to pick the true Jesus from the false, man would choose the false Jesus every time! And that’s exactly what Man has done, in nearly every church on Earth!
Satan is the master deceiver, and he will tell you whatever it takes for you to choose him. It is only by using the BIBLE that you can pick out the true Jesus from the false! GOD can show you the difference between them, and that is why GOD chose for Israel by having them cast lots each year! Only God, and His word, can help you see through those lies.
THE REBELLION
Most of Ezekiel 28 speaks of Satan and his righteous beginnings and sinful present and dismal future. An entire lesson will be devoted to that in the future, but for now we are interested in Ezekiel 28:15-16. Satan was PERFECT in all his ways. He wasn’t made evil. He was made righteous. But then iniquity (lawlessness) was found in him. He sinned. And so he was cast out of heaven. Was the Being who became Jesus present for this event? Luke 10:18. Is there a record of this event in the Bible? Revelation 12:7-9.
When Satan led that rebellion into heaven, from that day forward Jesus and Satan, who had up until then worked together closely, had to part ways. Jesus stayed in heaven with His Father, and Satan was cast to Earth – a wilderness that was, at that time, uninhabited (Leviticus 16:22).
There was a DAY that iniquity was found in the angel we now call the devil. Not a gradual change, but a SPECIFIC DAY that God recalls (Ezekiel 28:15). It was on that DAY that sin entered the universe for the first time, and for the first time there was a need for an atonement – a covering – for that sin. This is why Atonement is the saddest day of the year. Because all the unhappiness, sadness, suffering, and death in history happened because of the chain of events started on that day by the sin of Satan.
When people lose their loved ones they often lose their appetite for days or weeks. If we truly understood the depth and scope of the results of sin that has taken place since this day, we would as well. It was a dark day for the universe. The birthday of sin.