Readings for today: Leviticus 15-18
I still remember the first time I celebrated the Day of Atonement. I was with my grandmother in Beijing, China. She belonged to a religious group that made it a point to celebrate all the Jewish high holy days and festivals. Each year, they would host “feast sites” around the world where church members could go to celebrate the Feast of Tabernacles and the Day of Atonement. It was a day of self-denial. It was a day of prayer and fasting. It was a day when we basically engaged in little to no activity. I was twelve years old and I have to admit I found it very strange. I wasn’t sure I understood all the reasons why non-Jews would engage in Jewish religious practices. As I got older, I learned that my grandmother was part of a Christian cult who believed they had “replaced” Israel on some level. Not only that but they preyed on the elderly and widowed - my grandmother was both - and stole millions from the people who belonged to their “church.” It was a textbook case of spiritual abuse and my grandmother would eventually die, in part, from the guilt and shame of being part of it.
Though the views of the religious cult were abusive, manipulative, and highly destructive; they gave me my first introduction to God’s time. God’s time is not like our time. It is not time as it ticks away on a clock or watch. It is sacred time. It is heavenly time. It is time oriented around the first commandment which is to worship God alone. In the passage we read today, we are introduced to God’s time. He sets up the Day of Atonement. A single day every year where the high priest would make a special sacrifice for the sins of Israel. Listen to how Leviticus describes it again, “This is to be a perpetual statute for you. In the seventh month, on the tenth day of the month, you must humble yourselves and do no work of any kind, both the native citizen and the foreigner who resides in your midst, for on this day atonement is to be made for you to cleanse you from all your sins; you must be clean before the Lord. It is to be a Sabbath of complete rest for you, and you must humble yourselves. It is a perpetual statute. The priest who is anointed and ordained to act as high priest in place of his father is to make atonement. He is to put on the linen garments, the holy garments, and he is to purify the Most Holy Place, he is to purify the Meeting Tent and the altar, and he is to make atonement for the priests and for all the people of the assembly. This is to be a perpetual statute for you to make atonement for the Israelites for all their sins once a year. So he did just as the Lord had commanded Moses.” (Leviticus 16:29-34 NET) Incredibly enough, this day is still observed by faithful Jews all over the world. It’s called Yom Kippur. A day set aside for prayer, fasting, and confession of sins. It’s a day to remember the grace and forgiveness of God and concludes with the blowing of the shofar which signifies hope for the future.
Day of Atonement. Weekly Sabbath. Annual feasts and festivals to govern the life of Israel once they arrive in the Promised Land. These festivals serve as a regular reminder to the people that it is God on whom they depend. He is the one who provides the rain and sunshine that allows their crops to grow and their herds to flourish. The weekly Sabbath reminds us that life does not depend on us or our hard work but on the work God is doing all around us. The Day of Atonement reminds us that no matter how deep we plunge into sin, God’s grace is deeper still. As Christians, we believe the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus fulfills the true meaning of these ancient feasts, including the Day of Atonement and the Sabbath. This is why we no longer celebrate them or offer animal or grain sacrifices. However, that doesn’t mean we don’t hold to sacred time. Christmas, Easter, Advent, Lent, Pentecost, and Epiphany. These are the Christian feasts and festivals we honor and celebrate because they help us center our hearts around the life of Jesus. We do continue to keep the Sabbath holy - though it is now held on the first day of the week because of the resurrection - for Jesus is worthy of all praise, honor, and glory. We continue to orient our lives around God’s time in order to remember all He has done for us.
Readings for tomorrow: Leviticus 19-22