The Sanctuary.
We talked a little bit yesterday about the Sanctuary and how the Sanctuary here on earth was patterned after the heavenly Sanctuary. How before the world began Jesus was part of the plan should we sin.
Creating humans was a great undertaking. You ask any doctor about how we're made inside and they'll tell you that the wonders of our bodies are just amazing.
While some like to think we formed from a microscopic organism in water to what we are now it just unbelievable. That we evolved from apes, just, well, I just have to shake my head. Then again even apes are amazingly created. All the various life forms we know are amazing in their own right.
We were made in the image of God. We're not the substance of God, not the nature of God in the Spirit form at all, but we are made in His image. We are made with the ability to choose right from wrong, we were given that gift. We were made a little lower than the angels, perhaps in that we are limited in our physical abilities and they are not?
While some people think that humans become angels, or angelic-like upon death isn't something I think is true. Angels are unique to what they are, angels aren't created from dead humans. Angels existed before humans did. We will never become angels, we will forever be human. We were created differently for a reason.
God in creating us planned us, planned how things would be and in that plan because he was giving us the ability to choose good from evil, He had to figure out what He would do with us should we choose evil. Yes, he could have wiped us out of existence instantly as a failed creation, but He didn't. We are that special Him, that important to Him, He loves us that much.
Yes, there was a time or two when wiping out the evil filled humanity seemed like a good course but even then it wasn't done because enough good remained in humans to keep them worth saving. Jesus was all part of that plan as Creator of humans with God.
Instead of arbitrarily just wiping all humans out of existence because they are prone to sin, He would step in and make it possible for them to be sinless in Him. He would atone for their sins and make things right again and when the sin-filled world was finally only those who are sinners still and haven't placed their hope and faith in Jesus and His ability to save them will be wiped out of existence. They'll have had every chance to be saved and rejected all of them.
The plan of salvation involves the Sanctuary.
The Sanctuary whose sole purpose of existence was to point to a sinless life in God. The plan that was made before the world was created had to be shown to people. There would be a process whereby they could realize on a personal level the outcome of their sinning, then when that was brought to a culmination in the reality of God's own Son being sacrifice to save us, then the earthly sanctuary would no longer be needed.
A progression... a teaching lesson... an example for all to witness.
Today we have all this history to learn from and know our place in the whole grand scheme of things.
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It's important for us to study the sanctuary, to learn all we can about the earthly sanctuaries based on the heavenly. It's important because there is a heavenly sanctuary whose sole reason for existing is to finish the work started by our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
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I want to take from a study I've found elsewhere to help out here to explain things better, so maybe we'll do that bit by bit each day.
It's from William Grotheer's Thought Paper. This man has a brilliant mind and brilliant insight into the Bible. God has blessed him with so much. No, he's not perfect, none of us are and I'm not worshipping him in any manner. There is only one worthy of worship and that is God.
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1981 May-- XIV 5(81) -- LET'S TALK ABOUT THE ATONEMENT - I
-- The word - atonement - is an English word coming from "atone," a word in Middle English meaning - at one. So we can say that atonement means simply to be at one again with a person from whom we have become estranged.
When applied to theology, it indicates the reconciliation between God and man, and man and God. There is only one thing that has separated between God and man, and man and God, and that is sin.
In the case of man's alienation from God, the Scripture states it very simply -
"All have sinned and come short of the glory of God." (Rom. 3:23)
Paul summarizes the condition of man by quoting from the Old Testament - "As it is written, there is none righteous, no, not one: there is none that understandeth, there is none that seeketh after God. They are all gone out of the way, they are together become unprofitable; there is none that doeth good, no, not one." (Rom. 3:10-12)
With God, the alienation was forced upon Him by man's actions, not by any action initiated by Him.
Isaiah declared - "Your iniquities have separated between you and your God, and your sins have hid His face from you, that He will not hear." (Isa. 59:2)
God is holy and righteous. The Psalmist sang that "righteousness and judgment are the basis of His throne." (Ps. 97:2 Heb.)
Sin - rebellion - on the other hand had challenged the very foundations of the government of God. Justice demanded that the traitors be executed. There is, however, another aspect to the character of God. His holiness and His righteousness emanate from a heart of love. Love devised an atonement that would meet the demands of justice, and thus secure the Throne, and would provide a means for the healing and restoration of the traitor.
Before we can understand the atonement devised by God, we must understand the sickness of man.
All sin represents degrees of insanity.
We continue in our rebellion because "the whole head is sick." (Isa. 1:5)
Sin originated with a created being whose mind became deranged.
The prophet stated of Lucifer under the symbolism of the king of Tyrus - "Thou has corrupted thy wisdom by reason of thy brightness." (Eze. 28:17)
How could a created being ever think that he could destroy an immortal God, and take His place?
But once in the pathway of insanity, this arch-traitor led our first parents into sin by a derangement of their thought patterns, a subversion of the higher nature to the lower.
The atonement must bring healing to the mind, and restoration of the glorious character lost through this deceptive derangement.
There is, however, that judicial aspect of judgment with which God had also to deal so that He could be at-one-ment with sinful man, and thus effect the healing of man.
"The wages of sin is death." (Rom. 6:23)
But who would be willing to die as a substitute, and who could die in such a capacity so that the demands of justice might be met?
There was only One, and that was the Son of God.
To Abraham who was bringing his "only son" as an offering to God, the Spirit encouraged his heart so that he could say to Isaac - "My son, God will provide Himself a lamb for a burnt offering." (Gen. 22:8)
And He did!
"God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son." (John 3:16) "The Lord laid on Him the iniquity of us all . . . His soul [was made] an offering for sin." (Isa. 53:6, 10)
Thus the first great question of the Atonement found an answer - How can God be just, and yet justify the sinner? (See Rom. 1:16-17; 3:24-26)
((({Ro. 1:16 For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek.
{1:17} For therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith: as it is written, The just shall live by faith.
Ro. 3:24 Being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus:
{3:25} Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance
of God
{3:26} To declare, I say, at this time his righteousness: that he might be just, and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus.))))
We can, therefore, from the viewpoint of God - and only from that viewpoint - speak of the Cross as an atonement.
The Cross is an atonement only in this phase of the relationship - God becoming at one with man.
In the cross man is provided by God what could be called a "second chance," but which is in reality an opportunity to escape his corporate involvement in the first choice made for him by the father of the race, for "by the offence of one judgment came upon all men to condemnation." (Rom. 5:18)
The significance of this atonement with man on the part of God is illustrated in covenant-history.
Israel was assembled before Mount Sinai. They had heard the voice of God proclaim His law amid thunderings and lightenings. They listened carefully as Moses read "the book of the covenant" which he had prepared under the direction of God. To what they heard, Israel responded -
"All that the Lord hath said will we do, and be obedient." (Ex. 24:7)
In this book of the covenant had been written as its preamble the requirement of God for singleness of worship on the part of Israel. It read -
"Ye have seen that I have talked with you from heaven. Ye shall not make with Me gods of silver, neither shall ye make unto you gods of gold." (Ex. 20:22-23)
Within forty days following the ratification of this blood covenant, and the solemn commitment of Israel, they gave their adoration to the "golden calf" of Egyptian devil worship. They repeated the sin of Adam and Eve in giving their loyalty and allegiance to the enemy of God.
The reaction of God to this apostasy was swift. Moses was immediately informed by God as to what was happening in the camp below, and was told that He no longer considered them His people. (Ex. 32:7)
{32:7} And the LORD said unto Moses, Go, get thee down; for thy people, which thou broughtest out of the land of Egypt, have corrupted themselves
Moses after returning to the encampment of Israel from his dialogue with God in the Mount, removed the "tabernacle" of meeting without the camp. (Ex. 33:7)
{33:7} And Moses took the tabernacle, and pitched it without the camp, afar off from the camp, and called it the Tabernacle of the congregation. And it came to pass, [that] every one which sought the LORD went out unto the tabernacle of the congregation, which [was] without the camp.
Then he told the people - "Ye have sinned a great sin: and now I will go up unto the Lord, peradventure I shall make an atonement for your sin." (Ex. 32:30)
{32:30} And it came to pass on the morrow, that Moses said unto the people, Ye have sinned a great sin: and now I will go up unto the LORD; peradventure I shall make an
atonement for your sin.
The result of this interceding of Moses, and the exchange that took place between him and God is given in God's final answer to Moses' pleadings -
"The Lord said to Moses, Write thou these words: for after the tenor of these words I have made a covenant with thee and with Israel." (Ex. 34:27)
Israel's commitment was not secured to this covenant. It was a covenant by which Moses stood as surety for Israel's compliance, and through which God could once more become atonement with Israel.
It was a "type" covenant of the "atonement" achieved by Christ for man to effect God's reconciliation with man. God became at one again with humanity in Christ Jesus. Even, as God talked with Moses face to face (Deut. 34:10)
{34:10} And there arose not a prophet since in Israel like unto Moses, whom the LORD knew face to face,
So Christ in His glorified humanity is in the very presence of God to speak for man. (Heb. 4:14-15)
{4:14} Seeing then that we have a great high priest, that is passed into the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast [our] profession. {4:15} For we have not an high priest
which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities; but was in all points tempted like as [we are, yet] without sin.
The fact should not be overlooked that at the time when Israel was forfeiting their rights as God's people in the worship of the golden calf, and demonstrating the inability of man to keep any covenant to which mentally he would agree, God was giving to Moses "the plan" by which man can become at-one with God.
The sanctuary and its services, which were to operate as "types" under a type-covenant, were being revealed to Moses. (See Ex. 24:18-32:1)
This second aspect of the atonement - man becoming one with God begins at the same point - the Cross. Here his healing begins for in the Cross he comes to see the real significance of where his mental derangement will lead. If God had only the judicial aspect of the atonement in mind to effect the redemption of man - justification - Gethsemane would have sufficed. There the cup was accepted, and there the blood first touched the ground. (Luke 22:44)
{22:44} And being in an agony he prayed more earnestly: and his sweat was as it were great drops of blood falling down to the ground.
Thus Gethsemane could have become the antitypical Altar. Why then the Cross?
The Cross brings to our poor deranged and dull senses that sin is the will to kill God.
Jesus had told the Jews that the lusts of their father the devil they would do. Being a murderer from the beginning - desiring to kill the Immortal Potentate, Satan would have them do that very thing to God's Son in whom all the fulness of the Godhead dwelt. (John 8:44) When we truly perceive what sin really is, our thinking is rearranged, and we see in Him whom we have pierced, our Sacrifice and Substitute.
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I'm going to stop here even though the first part in the thought papers goes on.
I think this is enough to digest for one day. :)
May God bless and keep us and guide us as we seek to understand more fully all He has done and is doing for us, and all He will do.
In the name of His all merciful Son, by the grace of Jesus Christ our Savior.
Amen.
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