The Peace Offering

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[Prayer] Father, we again turn to Thee with thanksgiving and praise for our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ and we thank Thee that Thou hast preserved for us the Holy Scriptures which give us so many beautiful pictures of his person and his work. We thank Thee to, Lord, that in the Old Testament there are beautiful adumbrations of all that he came to do and did in time. And we thank Thee too that we have a sure light upon the future as well. We praise Thee that he is the great prophet as well as the great priest and the great king and so we know that the things that he has spoken shall surely come to pass. And as we think of the first coming and realize how minutely the prophecies of the Old Testament found their fulfillment in him, we look forward with assurance and encouragement toward the future. Again, Lord, we pray Thy blessing upon us as we study in this hour and then in the hour that follows.

For Jesus’ sake. Amen.

[Message] Tonight our study is the peace offering, and we’re turning to Leviticus chapter 3. Now, let me try to review for just a few moments some of the things that we have been seeking to set forth in our first studies in typology of the Old Testament in the light of the Book of Leviticus. We’ve been saying that the principle features of typology are these; first a definition typology is the study of spiritual correspondences between persons, events, and things within in the historical framework of revelation. We said that the essential parts of typology are first correspondence. That is, there is a correspondence between the events of the Old Testament and the fulfillment in the New. Historicity we are not talking about allegory of things that are not really true and did not historically happen. Historicity and predictiveness and the predictiveness arises out of the fact that God works according to the patterns that are revealed in the Old Testament, and they find their fulfillment in the New Testament and, thus, the types of the Old Testament do point forward to the ultimate fulfillment. Correspondence, historicity, and predictiveness then are the essential parts of that definition.

Now, third, the basic presuppositions of typology are these and this is something we have not said anything about specifically. The Old Testament history, first of all, is divine salvation history. Remember, the writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews says, “In many parts and in many ways God spoke to the fathers by the prophets but in these last days he has spoken unto us by his Son.” In effect, he has said that the same God who spoke through the Old Testament has spoken through Christ and in the Old Testament he spoke in many parts and many ways. That’s an allusion to the various ways in which the revelation of the Old Testament came to us by vision, by dream, by speech, by institution, such as the tabernacle or temple, by the priesthood, by events such as the Exodus and the other events of the deliverance of the children of Israel out of Egypt on in through the wilderness and ultimately to the promised land. The Old Testament history is a divine salvation history. In fact, we know, of course, that all history is, ultimately, under the hand of God. The writers of the New Testament and the Old Testament recognize that all of human history is salvation history. To use a word that is very popular in contemporary theology it was heilsgeschichte or salvation history.

Second the Old Testament history is Christological. It all points forward to various facets of the life and ministry of our Lord Jesus Christ. Not simply his first coming but also his second coming. Remember on the Emmaus road he said, “Oh fools and slow of heart to believe the things that the prophets have written ought not messiah to have suffered and to these things and to enter into his glory and beginning at Moses and all the prophets he expounded unto them and all the Scriptures the things concerning himself.” Remember Luther said that a preacher should have a good memory and that is what he says in Luke chapter 24. He says our Lord himself that Old Testament from Moses on through is a revelation of the things that concern him.

Third the Old Testament history is pedagogical. That is it is divinely planned and it is divinely intended to teach us certain things. Let me just read one passage from Romans chapter 15 in verse 4, the Apostle Paul writes, “For whatever was written in earlier times was written for our instruction, so that through perseverance and the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope.” There are people who read the Old Testament, I’ll say more about this in a moment, and who claim that we are to look simply at the text of the Old Testament and read it as and seek its meaning only in the sense that the original recipients or the original author might have understood it to have.

Now, that is a logical and valid object of our interpretation of the Bible but the Bible says far more than it said in its historical setting so far as the understanding the ancients was concerned. The apostle states very plainly the Old Testament is pedagogical, it is divinely planned, and it is planned not only to instruct the Old Testament saints but the New Testament saints as well. He says the same thing in chapter 4, verse 23 and 24 of the same letter to the Romans and also in 1 Corinthians chapter 10, verse 6 and verse 11. He says those old things were types or examples for us upon whom the ends of the ages have come. Another thing the Old Testament history is partial and incomplete. Peter tells us that prophets of the Old Testament searched diligently into those things that the Holy Spirit had given them. They sought to understand the circumstances and the time at which these prophecies would come to pass. And it was said to them that it was not for them that they were given but for us in the present age so that it’s evident from that statement that the Old Testament history is partial and incomplete, it is designed to point forward to the coming of the Lord Jesus. It had a meaning in its historical context but it has a fuller meaning in the light of the New Testament revelation. And, finally, the Old Testament history has both an explicit and implicit force a kind of sensus plenior.

Now, that Latin expression sensus plenior you probably could translate without knowing Latin because census means of course sense and plenior from which we get English words like plenus, we get English words like plenty. So plenior happens to be a comparative adjective fuller, fuller sense. So the Scriptures of the Old Testament had the historical sense which the ancients saw as they read or they wrote but it also had a fuller sense and that fuller sense is a sense that comprehends instruction for us in the present time and also the typological sense.

Now, if you go to theological seminary, you will find some people saying that you should never read the New Testament truth into the Old Testament and, therefore, it would be wrong for us to see in the Old Testament things that are not specifically there in the text in a grammatical historical sense.

Now, there is a very wise kind of wisdom in that we should not run through the Bible at seeing all kinds of typological things that do not have any real support. But the idea that we are not to understand the Old Testament in the light of the New testament was something the apostles would have risen up against and shouted a “no” to because as they wrote the New Testament they wrote the New Testament in light of the teaching of the Old Testament seeing its fulfillment in Christ and giving us many things that many people did not see in the Old Testament and some don’t see still today but they did. You know, we could never fully understand Genesis chapter 3, for example, if we didn’t know the rest of the Bible. How could we understand the promise the first messianic promise in Genesis 3:15 in its fullest sense if we did not know the rest of the Bible? How could we possibly understand the significance of the fall and the significance of the serpent and his connection with sin if we did not know later passages in the Bible such as “He hath made him to be sin for us who knew no sin that we might become the righteousness of God in him.”

I think, it’s helpful to use a simple illustration to get over the point I’m trying to make. Let’s take a simple plant. Let’s just take any kind of plant like a camellia plant mine that have suffered so much in this weather over the past two or three weeks. Now, if you look at a camellia plant if you were an expert in camellias you would probably see a whole lot more than a neophyte. I am probably a neophyte. I see certain things but somebody else looking at the same plant can see a whole lot more. But if we were to take that plant or any part of it and put it under a microscope we would see even more. Now, when we put that camellia plant under a microscope do we really add anything to it? No we don’t add anything to it. Do we change it? No we don’t change it. We just see things there that we did not see before. It is not changed but we are looking at it with something that enables us to understand it more fully.

Now, when we read the Old Testament we are to read the Old Testament now first of all in the light of its context. That is we should look at it and seek to understand what it means in its grammatical historical context but we should not stop there. We should then look at it in the light of the fullness of the New Testament revelation. That is not imposition upon the text of something else. It is exposition of the text. It is the very same thing that the Lord did and the apostles did. You read commentaries today by Liberals and you will find them saying now the apostle says that this text has to do with Christ but there isn’t anything in the text that says anything about Christ and so the apostle either misunderstood it or he used an ancient hermeneutical method which we cannot in our enlightened day accept or things like this, but what the apostle was doing in many cases was reading that Old Testament passage in the light of New Testament truth and he was finding there it’s obvious. He’s finding their things that others have not found and in the final analysis I want to give you a piece of advice. It’s good to stand on the side of the apostles.

Now, we will say more about this as we go along and I’ll seek to illustrate it in various ways to show you that it is not a fanciful thing at all. I disallow myself all fanciful interpretation and later on I hope if I have time to give you an illustration of a fanciful interpretation.

But now, let’s come to Leviticus chapter 3, and here we have the third of the offerings that we have studying. Remember we studied the burnt offering in which the whole animal sacrifice was burned suggesting that the perfect obedience of the Lord in the offering of himself by which he expiated sin. Then we studied the meal offering in the second chapter and we saw that the meal offering illustrated the personal character of our Lord Jesus Christ who had infinite balance in his character much more so than any person who has ever lived and a great deal more than some of the outstanding apostles who were known in various ways in an unbalanced way. Peter was certainly unbalanced. John was unbalanced but our Lord Jesus has the perfect fine character the fine balance of the fine meal of the second of the offerings.

Now, tonight we come to the peace offering in which our Lord is seen as the reconciler of man with God. We read in Romans chapter 5 in verse 1, “Therefore, being justified by faith, we have peace with God.” Now, that truth, the fact that he has broken down the middle wall of petition and he has consummated peace between God and man, he has made peace by the blood of his cross. That is the great truth illustrated in the peace offerings. Remember these offerings all illustrate different aspects of the one work of the cross.

I’ve forgotten whether I’ve used this illustration or not but when I was in the insurance business I frequently had to make inspections of buildings. And in order to inspect a building for fire and insurance purposes the first thing that you had to do was to take a good look at the building from all directions. So you never went to the building went in the building and began in the inside of the building. You frequently would not get a true general broad picture of the building. So the first thing you did was look at it from the north from the south from the east from the west, observing its parapets, observing its exposures and so forth. Then you would go into the building to look at the various other possible problems that the building might have from the standpoint of fire insurance. These are just different ways of looking at the one work of the Lord Jesus. In the burnt offering, we see one aspect. In the meal offering, we see another.

Now, in the peace offering, we still see a still third type of work that our Lord Jesus did. Let me read the first 5 verses to save a little time.

“Now if his offering is a sacrifice of peace offerings, if he is going to offer out of the herd, whether male or female.” That’s interesting in the first offering remember it had to be male but now in the mean time feminism has come in and its, “whether male or female, he shall offer it without defect before the Lord. And he shall lay his hand on the head of his offering and slay it at the doorway of the tent of meeting, and Aaron’s sons the priests shall sprinkle the blood around on the altar. And from the sacrifice of the peace offerings he shall present an offering by fire to the Lord, the fat that covers the entrails and all the fat that is on the entrails, and the two kidneys with the fat that is on them, which is on the loins, and the lobe of the liver, which he shall remove with the kidneys. Then Aaron’s sons shall offer it up in smoke on the altar on the burnt offering.”

Now, the reason it said on the burnt offering is because remember in Israel a burnt offering was offered in the morning and a burnt offering was always offered in the evening daily. These offerings were often. So naturally since the burnt offering was already on the altar the peace offering would be on the burnt offering, which is on the wood that is on the fire. It is an offering by fire of a soothing aroma to the Lord.

Now, I don’t have time to read the 7th chapter but in the 7th chapter beginning at the 11th verse and if you are taking notes from that verse 11 through the end of the chapter the law of the peace offering is given. And the striking feature of it is, and we’ll say more about it in a moment, is that after the fat of the animal is offered then the flesh is taken and the offerer eats the flesh of that sacrifice. So he makes an offering and then he sits down in a sacrificial meal, a kind of covenantal meal and feeds upon the flesh. The fat having been removed the separable fat having been removed. So we have here then an offering that is followed by a feast in which the offerer feed upon the animal itself.

Well, now let’s look at one or two points. We read in verse 1. This is, incidentally, in the chapter just as in chapter 1 there are three kinds of offerings. That’s why I’m not going to read the rest of the chapter. The first 5 verses we have the offering of the herd and then in verse 6 through verse 11, we have the offering from the flock. And then in verse 12 through 17, the offering of a goat. And while there’s some minor differences the major points are made in the first 5 verses.

Now, he says first of all. Oh, I should comment on this first on the name of the offering. “Now if his offering is a sacrifice of peace offerings.” Literally the Hebrew expression zebach shelem is an expression that means sacrifice of now this term shelem the noun that is used here is a word that is ordinarily used in connection with the noun zebech which mean a sacrifice. It only appears once in the singular and even then its meaning is a little disputed. It may mean peace offering in Amos chapter 5, the only other place where it is found in the singular. Here it’s the plural and most feel that the essential idea of this, incidentally, you can see it’s related to shalom which means peace and therefore, some translate this sacrifice of pieces. Probably the word that really means all that ensues in blessing from sacrifice that is a sacrifice for God. So it refers to the entire round of blessings and powers that are given to man in salvation. So the peace offering is a sacrifice of salvation and the Septuagint, the Greek translation of the Old Testament renders it just that way here. It renders it through thusia solterion which means a sacrifice of salvation. So let’s think of it that way as a word meaning very broadly a sacrifice of salvation. It is the equivalent in the New Testament of Romans chapter 5, verse 1, where remember we read, “Therefore, being justified by faith, we have peace with God.” So the sacrifice of salvation or the sacrifice of peaces is a sacrifice which is to issue in a right relationship with God “peace with God.”

Now, we Christians often speak about peace and we usually refer to the fact that it is desirable in our Christian life to have a piece of God in our hearts. We all have heard Bible teachers distinguish between the piece of God and peace with God. Peace with God is primary and fundamental. It is the removal of the barrier of the penalty of sin. That comes by virtue of the blood that was shed on the cross. The piece of God is conferred upon us through the Holy Spirit as we by his grace seek to please him through obedience through the word of God. Well this is peace with God before us here. The sacrifice of peace offerings the sacrifice by which we come into a right relationship with the Lord. That’s the typical meaning of it.

Now, looking at the details of the peace offering. He says first of all in verse it should be a male or female without defect before the Lord. Now, we just go through some of this because we’ve already seen a great deal of this in connection with the burnt offering but when we read that the animal should be without defect before the Lord to what does that point? Well, of course, it points to the Lord Jesus as one who is without blemish and without spot. Turn over with me to 1 Peter chapter 1, and let’s read verses 18 and 19. 1 Peter chapter 1, verse 18 and verse 19. By the way, we will see here illustrated how the apostles of the New Testament used phraseology taken from the Old Testament teaching us thereby that those passage in the Old testament really did point to Jesus Christ though his name was not mentioned in Leviticus chapter 3 at all. Listen to what he says in 1 Peter 1:18, “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.”

Now, of course, he refers to the Passover lamb here but the same expression is used throughout in these animal sacrifices that point to the Lord Jesus. They are to be without blemish. Now, the meaning of that is simply that the animal without blemish is to be a figure, an illustration of the sinlessness of our Lord Jesus Christ. He was without blemish. He did no sin in him. There was no sin. He did not know evil at all. Not only that but our Lord was impeccable that is not taught by this. I’m adding this. This says simply he should be without blemish. Our Lord not only was without sin but as we said in the exposition of chapter 1 he could not sin.

Now, it’s very important that our Lord Jesus be not only perfect man but also God. And that is why men such as H.C.G. Moule has said that, “a savior not quite God is like a bridge broken at the farther end.” So the Lord Jesus in order to be our sacrifice truly redeeming us from sin must be sinless and he also must be divine or he must possess deity but the stress of this passage is upon the sinlessness of our Lord. We read in verse 2, “He (that is the offerer) shall lay his hand on the head of his offering.” And we pointed out that what that meant was he should put his hand on the offering in token of his identification with it and that the meaning of that was that the sin of the offerer now is imputed to the animal that is to be sacrificed. So in this case the offering of the herd the man who brought the sacrifice brought the animal to the priest. He reached out. He put his hand. He pressed it down. The Hebrew word really means to press down upon and he put his hand upon the head of the animal thereby identifying himself with the animal in his sinlessness, so that the animal to be slain is slain under the judgment of God for sin. So the laying on of hands was symbolic illustrative of the imputation of our sin to our substitute, the Lord Jesus. Remember “He hath made him to be sin for us him who knew no sin that we might be made the righteous of God in him.” Then we read, “After he lays his hand upon the head of his offering he shall slay it at the doorway of the tent of meeting.” So the man who brought the offering was also the one who slew the offering not the priest but the man who brought the offering.

Now, the slaying of the animal we pointed out was a reference to the slaughter of the animal in sacrifice. In fact, the word that is used is the word shachat which is different from the word for a sacrifice of peace offerings. It is a word that really means to slaughter. The other word, incidentally, is rarely if ever used of the slaying of the animals it’s used of the sacrifice but not of the actual slaughter. This the word that was used and is used in the New Testament of the lamb that was slain, slaughtered. Remember I tried to stress this because there’s been a lot of teaching to the effect that it does not make a great deal of difference how our Lord dies and that the blood is rather insignificant. That is not true. It is wrong to say that the blood of Jesus Christ is not significant. It is significant. I tried to just bring that out as shockingly as I can by saying that if our Lord died of a heart attack he could not be our savior because the Scriptures say not simply that he must die but he must die a violent death as a sacrifice and that is why the blood is important. So we read here “And he shall slay the animal.” That means he shall slaughter it.

Now, what is meant by that? Well the slaughter of the animal is designed to represent the penal sacrifice by substitution. The slaughter of the animal which has had sin imputed to it is, therefore, a payment for sin for sin brings death. So it is a penal sacrifice. That is it’s a sacrifice in which a penalty for sin paid. Modern theology does not like this at all. They like to talk of our Lord as being a substitute not meaning exactly what an evangelical would mean by it. But they do talk about substitution or simple Christians can be fooled by that because they think the term substitution explains the essential things about our Lord’s death, but they little know how clever and tricky modern theologians are. They are just as slick and slithery as a serpent and I almost wanted to say slimy but I take it back. [Laughter] But it is true, nevertheless, and so they speak of Christ as our substitute and gullible Christians who haven’t thought very much say ah they must be orthodox and listen to the other things that they say, but if you read them closely and carefully and fully you will find they also say we cannot believe in a God who would require that the penalty for sin due someone else would be placed upon another person and, therefore, we refuse to believe in the penal sacrifice of Jesus Christ. But you see this is exactly what happens here. He is slaughtered as a sacrifice to whom and sin has been imputed to the animal and so the animal bears the penalty for the sin of the one who is offering the sacrifice. And, of course, implicit in this also is the doctrine of substitution for the animal dies instead of the offerer. So we have a penal sacrifice by substitution and it is taught, I say, extremely plainly. “All we like sheep have gone astray,” Isaiah said. “We’ve turned everyone to his own way and the Lord hath laid upon him the iniquity of us all.” That’s a beautiful expression of what is happening right here.

Now, one other thing, notice that having slain the animal then the priest begins his work. We read, “He shall slay it at the doorway of the tent of meeting, and Aaron’s sons the priests shall sprinkle the blood around on the altar.” So priestly mediation begins to take effect as soon as the animal is slain by the offerer. I suggest that the meaning of this is that it is we who have crucified our Lord Jesus and we are looked at as those who have had a human part in the slaughter of our Lord Jesus. You’ve heard me enough on Sunday in Matthew to know of course that there were others who had a part in the sacrifice of Christ too. The Father put our Lord to death. The children were involved in it. The men were involved in it. Satan was involved in it and he gave himself voluntarily. So there were different ones who had a part in the slaughter of Christ but it is taught that we the offerer is the one who slays the sacrifice stressing, I think, how guilty we are in our sin.

Now, you might think well I did not live two thousand years ago and, consequently, I am not guilty of the death of Jesus Christ. But then if you say that you just do not realize how deep you are in sin. The weight of sin that presses upon us is so great that given the opportunity we would have done exactly what the chief priests and the scribes or Pilot or Herod or any of the other characters of the New Testament would have done. You just do not know how great is the weight of sin. If that thought should ever come into mind. Then we read in verse 3, “And from the sacrifice of the peace offerings he shall present an offering by fire to the Lord, the fat that covers the entrails and all the fat that is on the entrails.” The thing I want you to notice here is that expression an offering by fire. The fat is taken off of the animal all of the separable fat. You notice that the flesh is not burned in the peace offering. It’s the fat and the fat is placed upon the altar and it is burned.

Now, the fact that I started to say something about the offering by fire but I forgot to say something about fat so I better say something about fat and come to that offering by fire. I don’t know. Now do you rarely here me say this, of course, but I don’t really know what is the full significance of the fat. Now, I know that we have an expression that we used today about burning fat. You know when you go on a diet you can live for a good while on what you have stored away. And so you burn up fat by the exercise of energy. And it is the opinion of some Bible students that the fat is designed to represent the energy of the devoted will of our Lord Jesus Christ. In the case of the animal, an illustration of the energy of our Lord fully devoted to the will of God. Well that makes sense to me. I’m not sure, however, that we may not be pressing it a little too much but if that is the meaning it certainly fits with theology of the New Testament. So the fat is burned for the Lord.

Now, we do read in verse 16, “All fat is the Lord’s.” And verse 17, “It is a perpetual statute throughout your generations in all your dwellings: you shall not eat any fat or any blood.” The fat belongs to the Lord. Well now that would be very fitting because the thing that pleased about our Lord Jesus is the perfection of his sacrifice the perfection of his obedience the perfection of the submission to the will of God. It is an offering by fire.

Now, fire in the burning of the pieces on the altar is illustrative of judgment. We all know reading the Bible that fire is illustrative of believer’s judgment and its also illustrative of the ultimate judgment the lake of fire. But even our own works Paul tells us in 1 Corinthians 3, “Shall be tried by fire to see of what sort they are.” So the burning of the pieces of fat signified the judgment of God poured upon our Lord Jesus who beautifully was doing the will of God. Well what do you expect from that.

We read in the 5th verse that Aaron’s sons shall offer up in smoke on the altar on the burnt offering which is on the wood that is on the fire. It is an offering by fire of a soothing aroma to the Lord. We said in the exposition of the 1st chapter that that Hebrew expression reyach nuwach is an expression that means an odor of rest and it suggests very plainly that the offering is pleasing to the Lord. It is satisfying to him and thus it expresses the satisfaction that the Lord Jesus has brought to the Father in that he has paid the price which God holiness and righteousness demanded of us who are sinners. So we have a beautiful expression then of a penal satisfactory offering by virtue of substitution which satisfies the holy claims of God against us. It’s a beautiful illustration then of the saving work of the Lord Jesus.

Now, the second type of offering is of the flock and the only reference I think that we need note in the next verses is the reference in verse 11, “Then the priest shall offer it up in smoke on the altar as food, an offering by fire to the Lord.” Now isn’t that striking? The sacrifice is called food for Jehovah. Now, you read through the Old Testament and you will find that the offerings were called bread for Jehovah. They are called food for Jehovah. Why? Because the thing that pleases God is the Lord Jesus Christ. We do not please him except in so far as he is seen in us. A holy God cannot ever be satisfied in unholy men. So that whenever he is satisfied with us it is because there is a manifestation of our Lord Jesus in us. So the sacrifice is food for Jehovah that’s why he kept saying this is my beloved Son in whom I’m well pleased. He found his food. He found his bread in the perfect obedience of the Son of God. And, incidentally, he still does today. We are accepted in the beloved, of course, and all of our life in sanctification is pleasing to the Lord only in so far as Christ is seen in us.

Now, the third type of offering is the offering of the goat and I want to conclude by just making one or two comments about the most striking feature the peace offering. Now, if you turn over to the 7th chapter for just a moment if you have some time tonight before go to bed or before you go to look Johnny Carson, well read the 7th chapter beginning at verse 11 through verse 34, for here we have the law of the peace offering. But notice the 15th verse, “Now as for the flesh of the sacrifice of his thanksgiving peace offerings, it shall be eaten on the day of his offering; he shall not leave any of it over until morning.” What then does that signify? Why it signifies this. That when a man brought the peace offering, he offered the fat on the altar but the flesh was reserved for a meal. Two pieces of the flesh went to the priests. Now, the priests, they got the choice cuts. They did. That was the way they lived. They didn’t have any other way to live. So they lived off of the sacrifices that individuals brought. They got the breast and they also got the right shoulder. They had the brisket. They had the tenderest part. It was given to the priest. Now don’t make any application that, therefore, you should give the best part to the preacher. This is in the Levitical economy. He’s not saying that. So don’t think that I’m trying to suggest that to you. In God’s sight, however, the priests were very important and the best part went to them.

Incidentally, when they did this they took one of the pieces they took the breast and it was waved before the Lord. Now, to wave something before the Lord they put it in their hands and the priest put his hands under the hands and he took it and the altar was over here and he did it this way in signifying that it was to be offered on the altar. That is that was its intended destination which it didn’t reach. That is it was the mind of the offerer to do that. So he kept doing it this way. He did it horizontally. Now, when the right shoulder was he it was done this way. He put in his hands, the priest would do his hands vertically. So it’d be vertically and then horizontally. Some of the ancient interpreters said you see a beautiful picture of the cross because what had is a horizontal bar like this and then the vertical and what is there is a cross, a beautiful picture of the cross.

Now, that is probably carrying typology to far. It’s very interesting. It’s striking very interesting. When we get to heaven, we find out Moses may say I did intend that. Now, well he wouldn’t know he intended it but somebody may have said Moses did write that and we now know it was intended to be that but that would be, I think, carrying typology a little too far. But here is the striking thing after they offered the fat then the remainder of the flesh of the animal which was not given to the priest other than the right shoulder and the breast that was the offerers and he was required to sit down and eat it that day. So he sat down at a table and fed upon the sacrifice. What a beautiful picture of the believer who having come having brought his offering having gone through in a typical way all that is involved in the saving work of the Lord Jesus now sits down to feed upon Christ enjoying the piece that is brought to him by the sacrifice of the peace offering.

Notice too, it is the altar first and then the table; for the altar the sacrifice suggests the payment of the penalty and then the penalty being removed we’re able to sit down in the possession of a salvation with the Lord. This also Adam writes, of course, the Lord’s Supper in a very interesting way because at the Lord’s Supper that’s what we do because Christ has suffered and has paid the penalty as our offering now we sit at the Lord’s Table and feed upon him. That’s a very striking thing and that’s the characteristic the most characteristic thing that the peace offering is made the individuals sit down and feed on the lamb or the animal itself.

Well our time is up we’ll have to stop. Next time we shall undertake the exposition of the sin offering.

Let’s bow in a word of prayer.

[Prayer] Father, we thank Thee for Thy word how rich and how beautiful are these Old Testament pictures of our Lord Jesus Christ. How great was the work that he did. How important it must have been to Thee to put all of these details in the word of God hundreds of years before our great savior came. Help us, Lord, to identify with him and then feed upon him as our great sacrifice.

For his name’s sake. Amen.