Messiah In The Old Testament Episode 14
Messiah’s Sacrifice Isaac to Messiah
So, far we’ve seen the concept of father to son, father to son. Abraham to his son Isaac and before that Job for his children. Before that Adam to his son Abel and Cain and then later to Seth.
Now going on from Abraham, we’ve got Isaac and then we’ve got Isaac's son Jacob and then Jacob had 12 sons. Now we know from the Torah there are two specific sons out of those 12 sons that have to do with this whole concept of the sacrificial system. The one tribe is the tribe of Judah. That is, of course, the Royal Tribe. And then Judah taught it to Perez. Perez taught it to Hezron. Hezron taught it to Ram. Ram to Aminadab and then Aminadab to his son Nashon. Now Nashon was the leader of the tribe of Judah when Moses took the Children of Israel out of Egypt into the desert. Now the other family is Levi the son of Jacob. Levi, he had a son his name was Kohath. Then Kohath had a son who was Amram. Amram was then the father of Aaron and Moses.
Now Moses grew up in Pharoah’s palace, in Pharaoh's household. But we know from the story of Moses in the bulrushes and in his papyrus basket that he was given to his mother to nurse him, to be his wetnurse. And it said he was with his mother until he had grown. So, was that two years? Was that five years? Was that 10 years? We don't know. What we do presume is that Amram taught Moses the ways of the Jews and not only Moses but is his brother Aaron. And then we know after Moses left Pharaoh’s household and he ran away into the desert after he was discovered killing one of the Egyptians. He ran away and he met Jethro, the priest of Midian. And more importantly Jethro's daughter Zipporah who became his wife. Jethro as a priest of Midian, we know that Jethro offered burnt offerings to the LORD. And Jethro would've had opportunity and Zipporah to teach Moses about sacrifice, burnt offerings to God. So, Moses would've been schooled and of course Aaron
would've picked it up from his father Amram. Now we also know that Abraham taught his son Ismail. It's Ishmael for Christians and Jews, but for Muslims it’s Ismail and Ibrahim.
And Ismail is a story in the Quran similar to what we read about Isaac and Abraham. God gave Ibrahim a dream or a vision and he was to go sacrifice his son Ismail on Mount Moriah. So, he gathers up his son and while they're on their way they are met by Satan. Now this part is not in the Quran. Satan tempts Ibrahim to not go and sacrifice his son. He tempts him actually three separate times. Each time the angel Jabril or Gabriel comes to Ibrahim, and he tells him pelt Satan with stones. So, Abraham throws stones at Shaitan and chases him away. And this happens three separate times in three separate locations. And this is where we get the tradition of throwing the stones against the three pillars during the Hajj in the city of Mina, based on this stoning of Satan. So, then Ibrahim offers Ismail on the altar, but God provides a ram, and the story goes on. So, this has led not only to the stoning, throwing the stones at the pillars during the Hajj.
But also, on the very last day of the Hajj there is a Festival. And it is a festival which is called Eid Al-Adha which literally means the celebration or festival of the sacrifice. And it's the sacrifice of Ibrahim sacrificing Ismail. And at the end of the Hajj on the Eid you're supposed to sacrifice the ram. And this still happens worldwide. If you're wealthy enough to afford a ram, you sacrifice, you slit that ram’s throat, you skin it and you roast it and you feed it to your family. Not only your family but also portions of the ram are given, it is one of the pillars of Islam, to the to the needy and the people who are in need of food. Now moving on, we know that on Mount Sinai, God gave specific information to Moses.
And we talked last time about all the laws that were given to them the 613 laws, you know the 248 positive and the 365 negative. And then not only did he get the Torah, but he also got the oral tradition as well.
We’re not going to any more detail about that other than God gave Moses specific instructions.
And we read last time in the book of Exodus the Ceremony for Ordination. Now in Leviticus there's an actual description of how that all went down and how Moses conducted the ceremony. That's found in Leviticus 8:1-30
The LORD said to Moses, “Bring Aaron and his sons, their garments, the anointing oil, the bull for the sin offering, the two rams and the basket containing bread made without yeast, and gather the entire assembly at the entrance to the Tent of Meeting.” Moses did as the LORD commanded him, and the assembly gathered at the entrance to the Tent of Meeting.
So, we’ve got the entire, the entire assembly of all the Israelites, all the tribes are there. Everybody is there watching this ordination ceremony.
And they're all standing in front of the tent of meeting.
Moses said to the assembly, “This is what the LORD has commanded to be done.” Then Moses brought Aaron and his sons
Aaron had four sons. forward and washed them with water.
So, this was a ceremonial washing to purify Aaron and his sons.
He put the tunic on Aaron, tied the sash around him, clothed him with the robe and put the ephod on him. He also tied the ephod to him by its skillfully woven waistband; so, it was fastened on him. He placed the breastpiece on him and put the Urim and Thummim in the breastpiece. Then he placed the turban on Aaron’s head and set
the gold plate, the sacred diadem, on the front of it, as the LORD commanded Moses.
So, he dressed Aaron first of all, in his very elaborate and very elegant high priest outfit.
Then Moses took the anointing oil and anointed the tabernacle and everything in it,
So, the utensils, the altars everything the tabernacle was anointed with the anointing oil.
and so consecrated them. He sprinkled some of the oil on the altar seven times, anointing the altar and all its utensils and the basin with its stand, to consecrate them. He poured some of the anointing oil on Aaron’s head
And the oil obviously dripped down and so Aaron is dripping with oil. He's now anointed and consecrated.
and anointed him to consecrate him. Then he brought Aaron’s sons forward, put tunics on them, tied sashes around them and put headbands on them, as the LORD commanded Moses. He then presented the bull for the sin offering,
So, remember, Moses was to bring a bull and two rams. These were the ordination animals, the bull, one ram, second ram. Each of them have a purpose.
He then presented the bull for the sin offering, and Aaron and his sons laid their hands on its head.
So, you can imagine, here’s Moses with the bull.
And Aaron puts his hand on his head. And his son Nadab, Abihu, Ithamar, Eleazar they all put their hands on the bull's head. And then Moses takes the ceremonial knife and Moses slits the bull's throat. And he took the blood that was draining from him. And remember they collected it in a basin.
Moses slaughtered the bull and took some of the blood, and with his finger he put it on all the horns of the altar to purify the altar.
So, he’s using this bull as a means of purification. He's painting the horns of the altar with his finger.
He poured out the rest of the blood at the base of the altar. So, he consecrated it to make atonement for it.
So, now the altar is consecrated. The altar is sanctified. It is pure.
Moses also took all the fat around the inner parts, the covering of the liver, and both kidneys and their fat, and burned it on the altar. But the bull with its hide and its flesh and its offal he burned up outside the camp, as the LORD commanded Moses.
So, the good bits he took and burned them on the altar and the nasty bits he took and burned outside the camp.
So, there's a concept that there is good bits and there is bad bits. The good bits include the kidneys, the liver, the covering, the fat covering which is basically the omentum and the diaphragm. These are the good bits. The bad bits are all intestines, the pancreas, what's referred to as the offal, the hide, the backbone, the head, the tail, the hooves, all that stuff were taken outside and burned. So, now the bull has been disposed of and were moving onto the next animal which was the sacrificial ram.
He then presented the ram for the burnt offering, and Aaron and his sons laid their hands on its head.
Just like the bull. The same picture. Now they are all holding the lamb with their hands. There is probably not a lot of room on a ram’s head for five hands to be on there, but they did it.
Then Moses slaughtered the ram
Slit his throat, collected the blood.
and sprinkled the blood against the altar on all sides.
So, he splattering blood all over the altar.
He cut the ram into pieces and burned the head, the pieces and the fat. He washed the inner parts and the legs with water and burned the whole ram on the altar as a burnt offering, a pleasing aroma, an offering made to the LORD by fire, as the LORD commanded Moses.
So, the second ram was purely a burnt offering to Elohim, to honor Elohim, to go up as a pleasing aroma to please Elohim.
He then presented the other ram,
Which is specifically named. This is called the Ram for the Ordination. Now in our last episode I referred all the animals as ordination animals which they are. But the second ram was specifically called in Leviticus
the ram for the ordination, and Aaron and his sons laid their hands on its head.
Just like before.
Moses slaughtered the ram
Slit his throat, collected the blood in a basin.
and took some of its blood and put it on the lobe of Aaron’s right ear, on the thumb of his right hand and on the big toe of his right foot. Moses also brought Aaron’s sons forward and put some of the blood on the lobes of their right ears, on the thumbs of their right hands and on the big toes of their right feet. Then he sprinkled blood against the altar on all sides.
So, more sprinkling of blood on the altar.
He took the fat, the fat tail, all the fat around the inner parts, the covering of the liver, both kidneys and their fat and the right thigh. Then from the basket of bread made without yeast, which was before the LORD, he took a cake of bread, and one made with oil, and a wafer; he put these on the fat portions and on the right thigh
So, he is laying the bread parts on top of the fat parts and the right thigh then
He put all these (pieces of the Ordination Ram) into the hands of Aaron and his sons and (they took these bits and they) waved them before the LORD as a wave offering. Then Moses took them from their hands and burned them on the altar on top of the burnt offering as an ordination offering, a pleasing aroma, an offering made to the LORD by fire.
So, now Aaron and his four sons have been ordained as priests. And we said in our last episode that this not only happened for Aaron and his sons who were the first priests. But it happened for every single priest that came up after them that needed to be installed for service in the tabernacle. So, everybody had to be ordained at some point. So, this
ceremony was repeated over and over and over as a new crop of priests came up the ranks.
He also took the breast—Moses’ share of the ordination ram—and waved it before the LORD as a wave offering, as the LORD commanded Moses. Then Moses took some of the anointing oil and some of the blood from the altar and sprinkled them on Aaron and his garments
So, the oil and the blood, he’s shaking them and sprinkling of all of their nice clean beautiful garments.
and on his sons and their garments. So, he consecrated Aaron and his garments and his sons and their garments.
Not only were they sanctified and purified by the blood on their earlobes and their thumbs and their big toes, but also the clothing was consecrated by the splattering of blood. Now moving on. This will be the final ceremony that we are going to talk about, and we talked about it in our last episode as well.
If you’ll remember, there were certain commandments that if you violated those commandments, you would be guilty of what's called a Karet Sin. Karet means to be cut off or separated from or die an early death. If you committed those sins, you would be cut off from the assembly. You would not be able to go to temple. You would be cut off from God. You would not have access to God's forgiveness. And you were basically condemned to a solitary life, and you would have no share in the afterlife, the benefits in the afterlife. So, you were beholden as a worshiper to redeem yourself from that Karet Sin. We talked about the possible Karet Sins, not being circumcised and one of them was eating leavened bread during the Passover. So, let's say I ate leavened bread. I was guilty of the sin, and I was cut off from the assembly because somebody saw me eating bread made with yeast during Passover. So, now I was cut off. I couldn't go to temple. I couldn’t go
participate in the festivals. So, to get back into everybody's good graces, I would bring the sin offering.
So, the sin offering now is what we’re describing. And this has a direct tie into our Messianic Prophecy. And that's why we’re hammering this point to this degree. Once you were guilty of sin that required a sin offering, the first thing you needed to do was repent. And part of the repentance process was to recognize your sin. Obviously if you don't recognize that you sinned then there's no such thing as repentance. So, you recognize your sin. You repent of that sin. You turn away from that sin. You say I'm never going to eat chametz on Passover ever again. I turn away from my sin. So, then you would go to your flock. If you didn't have a flock, you would have to buy something from somebody else's flock. But you would choose from your own flock the choicest ram.
Then you take that ram, and you would carry it to the tent of meeting, and you will go out in front of the temple, and you would bring that ram for your sin offering. So, then you would take the lamb, you would lay your hand on the ram’s head, then you would publicly confess your sins. So, this is the additional repentance thing you’re not only repenting you’re confessing your sins. You're making your sin public as a means for you to now be able to get rid of that sin.
So, the next thing you do is you slit that ram’s throat yourself. So, you take the ceremonial knife, while your hand is on the head, you confessed your sin and now you slit that ram’s throat. You feel the life of that ram go out of him as he bleeds to death in the basin that's being held there collecting all of his blood. You experience the death. And that is important not only ordination ceremony, and we talked about that in our previous episode, but it's essential for any sin offering that you experience the death of the animal. It is very important. So, now that blood was taken, the blood was taken into the temple where the altar was, and the priest would take the blood.
And the priest would sprinkle the blood on the altar, would pour out some of it on the horns of the altar, and then dump the rest of it at the base of the altar. So, now you got this dead animal basically in your arms. You’ve got your hand on it and you slit his throat, you’re kind of holding it and he collapses in your arms. So, now that ram has to be processed. So, the first thing that happens is the skin is removed from the animal. So, the animal is skinned. And in that process the hooves are removed, the tail is removed, and a lot of the excess stuff is cut off along with the skin.
Then the fat on the inside of the skin, which is the basically the suet or the subcutaneous fat is all removed. That is sacred to God. So, that is set apart, set aside and that's going to be going on the altar as a pleasing aroma to God. So, then the next thing you do is you slit your ram down the middle through the chest all the way through the belly. And you open your Lamb, or your ram up. And then there are several things that you need to harvest from your ram.
The fat covering, which is the fat apron that covers the entrails, that omentum then is removed and set aside with the subcutaneous fat. And then you remove the kidneys with any fat around them and you remove the liver with any fat around that, that then is all set aside. Then you remove the diaphragm. All the rest, the offal, which is the intestines, the pancreas, the lungs, all the things that you're not going to be either eating or burning on the altar, those are all set aside. And those can be carted off outside the camp and burned as a sin offering outside the camp. So, now you’ve got the carcass, free of all the innards. All the good bits are set aside.
And then you get some water, and you wash out the inner parts of your carcass. Then you collect all the meat from the carcass. And there's different cuts of meat, the four quarters, obviously the front legs and back legs, but then there's also the loins and other places where were you take meat off of the carcass. All this meat then is collected, a portion of that meat is then set aside.
And the first thing you do is you take all the fat, the organs you collected, the diaphragm and you take some salt. You put salt on it. And you burn that on the altar [as a] sweet aroma to God. Then you take that meat portion, and you burn that as well. That's completely burned. That's an offering to God. Now it doesn't say that you take a whole quarter, it just says you take a portion of the meat. It could be just a little teeny segment of loin. I don't know how much they put on there. But that was burned and given as a sacred offering to God. Then all the rest of the meat, then was handed over to the priest. And the priest took that meat and the male priest, not your female offspring, not your wife, anybody who was not a priest was not able to eat it. Your children couldn’t eat it. It was only eaten by the priest in the temple. So, that was the classic sin offering. At the end of that you, of course, had no meat in your hands, but you were relieved from your sins. You were then redeemed, and you could go back to Temple and could celebrate the festivals and you could have restoration between you and God. You would be holy now again in the eyes of God. So, I am going to read now from my book Messiah in the Old Testament.
Adam and Eve were created in perfection. They were created in the image of Elohim and bore his likeness. God provided everything for them to live, grow and thrive in the Garden of Eden. It was a lush garden full of diverse vegetation and animals. They had trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food.
And we talked about this in previous episodes. They had everything they needed.
They lacked nothing. When Adam and Eve disobeyed God and ate from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, they crossed over from their perfect life in paradise [they crossed over] to suffering toil and death.
Now it wasn't instantaneous death. Remember the snake said, “Oh you shall not surely die.” They didn't die instantly. They died slowly. In fact, we know that it took Adam almost a millennium before he died into Lamech's lifetime.
They lost their covering of the glory of Elohim, thus exposing their nakedness and shame. Adam’s crude fig leaf covering
And we pointed out all the bad points about wearing fig leaves.
It was not a sufficient garment for the new harsh conditions they faced.
Remember they’re going to face thistles and thorns and had to work the ground.
Elohim replaced their leaves with animal skins. This was a far cry from the glory that they once wore.
When they were in the garden, not realizing they are naked, covered with God's glory. Far cry, but animals were certainly superior to fig leaves.
Animals gave their lives to provide clothing for Adam and Eve. This was the next casualty on the slippery slope of sin, death and destruction.
Remember, first casualty was the loss of their blessing. Remember we had a table that showed the blessings in Eden and then the curses that they traded for outside of Eden.
Many more lives were to be destroyed before Messiah would come to redeem the whole mess. The importance of blood is explained in the Levitical law.
We went through this in almost excruciating detail, looking at the importance of blood in the Levitical Law.
Where it is used to cleanse the altar to cleanse and the priests [remember] in the ordination ceremony. The blood spilled from the sin offerings cleansed the worshiper, covered their guilt and sin, and restored their connection to their community. This first shedding of blood in the garden of Eden to cover sin and its shame, is a representation of the sin offering made by the priests. Elohim instituted this practice making the very first sacrifice himself. Messiah will make the final sacrifice offering himself up as a suffering servant, once, for all the sins of Israel. Messiah’s spilled blood will cleanse us from all unrighteousness just as the blood of the sacrificial lamb cleansed the Israelites. Messiah will clothe us in righteousness and make us presentable to God. In doing this, Messiah will restore fellowship between God and man.
Now, one of the main points I want you to get out of our discussion today is that all of these sacrifices, starting in the garden, culminating in the Levitical sacrificial system which continued up to A.D. 70 when the temple was finally destroyed. All of this is temporary. If I sinned, I sacrificed my sin offering, my ram. I went through all that rigmarole we just talked about and walked away without my ram, but received forgiveness. Then if I went out and sinned again. Let's say I ate leaven the next Passover. Then I would be guilty of the same thing all over again and my previous sacrifice meant nothing. I’d have to go through it all over again. Over and over and over, it was just endless, endless, endless sacrifice, slaughter, blood. It was it was a system that I'm pretty confident I would not want to live in a system like that. I'm glad we moved beyond that and we’re now in the system where we have direct access to God, and we don't have to go through the temple priest and the blood of the Lamb in order to get forgiveness. Now, I’ve very carefully stayed out of the New Testament, but there are a couple of passages in the book of Hebrews which so directly address the sacrificial system and this whole concept of the sacrificial system being a temporary fix and
over and over, endless sacrifices pointing to Messiah and his one single sacrifice. I just couldn't resist the temptation. I just have to read them to you. So, we’re going to go to the New Testament book of Hebrews.
Specifically, Hebrews 5:1-6. Messiah is specifically addressed in this passage.
Every high priest is selected from among men and is appointed to represent them in matters related to God to offer gifts and sacrifices for sins. He is able to deal gently with those who are ignorant and are going astray since he himself is subject to weakness. This is why he has to offer sacrifices for his own sins, as well as for the sins of the people.
And we know from the books of Exodus and Leviticus that there were two rams every day that were sacrificed by the high priest for the sins of the people, the Israelites. And he also offered personal sacrifices for his own possible sins. And there were these daily rituals that they all did. And that's what Hebrews is referring to. This is why he has to offer sacrifices for his own sins as well as for the sins of the people.
No one takes this honor upon himself;
You couldn’t be a self-proclaimed high priest.
He must be called by God just as Aaron was. So, Messiah also did not take upon himself the glory of becoming a high priest. But God said to him, [God said to Messiah] You are my son; today I have become your father.
This, of course, is Psalm 2:7. We know this Psalm, the second Psalm is an absolute glorious Messianic Psalm, and we will get to it in a future episode. Obviously, we are a ways away from the Psalms right now. We are still in early Genesis. But this verse in Psalms is referring to Messiah
You are my son; today I have become your father. Remember, we
talked about the whole concept of Trinity. God the father, Messiah as the Son and the Holy Spirit.
And he says in another place, “You are a priest forever, in the order of Melchizedek.”
This is Psalm 110:4, another Messianic passage. It is just amazing how this whole thing it's woven together.
Going on in Hebrews 7:26-28 this all gets wrapped up.
Such a high priest [referring to Messiah now] meets our need - one who is holy, blameless, pure,
Messiah when he comes will be holy, blameless and pure.
Set apart from sinners exalted above the heavens. Unlike other high priests, he does not need to offer sacrifices day after day, [after day after day] first for his own sins, and then for the sins of the people. He (Messiah) sacrificed for their sins once for all when he offered himself up.
Messiah is that final sacrificial lamb.
For the law appoints as high priests men who are weak; but the oath, which came after the law appointed the Son who has been made perfect forever.
Now if you look at the logo and we will put it up, the logo at the beginning of every show shows two animals. The first is a lion. It is a very proud, triumphant lion. The lion has a scepter in his paw, and he has a crown on his head. That lion is symbolic of Messiah, who will come as a conquering king. Prophesied many, many, many times in the Tanakh. The conquering King who will come and set up his eternal kingdom. The other animal standing in front of the lion, smaller than the
lion, diminutive. He does not have a scepter. He does not have a crown. All he has is his fur and his humble self. This is symbolic of Messiah who comes as the Lamb who will take away the sins of the world. The Lamb who will be sacrificed, once, for all the sins of Israel. Once, for all the sins of all mankind. That is our high priest. Messiah will be our high priest. And he will bring closure to this centuries long divide between God and man. And he will bring communication directly. You won't need the temple priests. You will be able to pray directly to God. He will restore fellowship between God and man. Now, in our next episode, we’re going to get into the story of Cain and Abel. There's a lot of stuff there. It doesn't seem like there should be very much because of the small number of verses involved. But there is a concept which we are going to develop which actually started in the garden with the fall and will continue on. We know that the death of Abel at the hands of Cain was the third casualty which happened after Adam’s sinful act in the garden and Eve’s sinful act in the garden. And these casualties just keep coming and coming and coming. If you read on into the Tanakh, you'll find story after story after story of deceit and murder. And it’s just a big mess. What Adam and Eve created in the garden turns into just a ginormous mess. So, join me next time as we search all the Scriptures in the Tanakh looking at our Messianic Prophecies. And we will now in our next episode reveal the prophecy concerning Cain and Abel. So, join me then.
Thank you for watching our show today. We hope that you enjoyed watching it as much as we enjoyed bringing it to you. Now, after watching this episode you might be saying to yourself, “Who is this Messiah that Dr. Smith is talking about?
Is he talking about the Christian Messiah? Is he talking about Jesus Christ, the Son of God, who was born of the Virgin Mary. And then lived a blameless and holy life on the earth, And then was tortured and crucified. And after he died he then was resurrected from the dead after three days. Then after people witnessed this, he was then taken up bodily by Elohim into heaven from the Mount of Olives.
Or is Dr. Smith talking about the Muslim prophet Isa. Isa Ibn Maryam, the messenger, who was sent by Allah to bring a message to the people. The Quran says he that lived a holy and blameless life, was born of the virgin Mary. He fulfilled all the Jewish prophecies in exact accordance. But one difference, instead of being crucified, he then was taken up by Allah into heaven before the Romans laid hands on him. And he awaits there now in the fourth heaven where at the end of days at the day of judgment he will be revealed to all.
Or is Dr. Smith talking about the Jewish Messiah? The Messiah who has not yet been revealed, that the entire Jewish world is waiting for his revelation. Now, the beautiful thing is that you can hold to any of these beliefs. And we can all still learn together about Messiah. We can learn about our Christian Messiah. We can learn about our Jewish Messiah. We can learn about our Muslim prophet Isa who will be revealed. It doesn’t matter what you believe. You can even be an atheist or agnostic and still learn from this program about Messiah. Now, I have to admit I am a Christian so I approach things, obviously, from a Christian point of view. And I promise you, as we reveal these prophecies, which I believe have all been fulfilled through Jesus Christ. Or will be fulfilled when he comes back, returning in the clouds in the same way he was taken up. I believe that all of this is true, but I promise you I will do my very best to present these prophecies from a neutral point of view. And try to keep my Christian bias to a minimum. Obviously, it will pop up from time to time but I will try to stay only in the Tanakh and try not to get into the New Testament very often. Now, if you want more information about Messiah, we have resources for you.
We have a website which is findingmessiah.org. Now, on that website you are going to find several resources. You will find links to all the videos, all the episodes that we have created so far. You will find links to download the transcripts of any of these episodes. And then you will find a section where you can get more information about Messiah through frequently asked questions. And then there is a section for
donation. If you want to come alongside our ministry at Finding Messiah.
Now, there’s going to come a time in this series where you are going to be confronted with the question: What are you going to do with Messiah? Who do you believe Messiah is? Which of these Messiahs do you believe Dr. Smith is talking about? And Messiah will become real to you if you look at all the information presented and come to your conclusions. So, join us as we continue our journey through the Old Testament Scriptures looking for all the Messianic Prophecies. And join us next time as we reveal those to you.
