Scapegoat

TODAY’S SPECIAL: Isaiah 53:2-8


TO CHEW ON: "We all, like sheep, have gone astray,
    each of us has turned to our own way;
and the Lord has laid on him
    the iniquity of us all." Isaiah 53:6

It was the most important day of the year, the Day of Atonement. Everyone came to the holy gathering bathed and in clean clothes. Men, women, girls and boys had watched the High Priest make the offerings. Now it was time for the last event.

A hush came over the crowd as one of the priests led a goat to the High Priest. The High Priest laid his hands on the goat’s head. Then he confessed the peoples’ sins: “We have been selfish. We have been proud. We have not honored our parents. We have been jealous. We have lied. We have stolen...” On and and on he went. As he named the sins, his hands on the goat's head were a picture of laying all those sins on the goat. This goat was called a scapegoat.


When the priest was finally finished, he gave the goat to a servant. The servant took it to the desert and there released it to die. After the goat was gone, there was a party. Everyone felt happy. Their sins had been paid for for another year.


When Isaiah said, in today’s reading, “...the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all,” he was thinking about that scapegoat. Only this time the “him” was not a goat but a person. This part of Isaiah was another prediction about what would happen in the future. He was telling about a time a person would bear all our sins just like that goat did. Did it come true? Yes. Jesus was the scapegoat Isaiah was talking about.

The wonderful thing is that Jesus took the sins not only of the people living at His time. He carried the sins of everyone, past, present and future. When He died on the cross, He was carrying my sins, and yours too!

"Christ on the Cross
Eugene Delacroix, 1798-1863

There is only one thing we must do now to have our sins forgiven and to be a friend of God’s. We must accept that what Jesus did was for us! Have you done this? If you haven’t you can, right now. If you have, then why not celebrate, like the Israelites did at the end of the Day of Atonement?

PRAYER: Dear Jesus, thank You for taking all my sins on You. Amen.

SUPERSIZE IT: Taking your place
Has anyone else ever taken a punishment or penalty you deserved?

Who was it?

What had you done?

How did this make you feel?

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Unless otherwise noted, all Scripture quotations are taken from THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

Adult readers - DAILY DEVOTIONS FOR ADULTS  are available too at Other Food: daily devo's. 

God's Parties

TODAY’S SPECIAL: Leviticus 23:1-8

TO CHEW ON: "Speak to the Israelites and say to them: ‘These are my appointed festivals, the appointed festivals of the Lord, which you are to proclaim as sacred assemblies.' ” Leviticus 23:2

What do you do on special days? Match the holiday with an activity that may happen then:



God also gave the Israelites special days to celebrate. They were called feasts. In some ways they were a lot like our holidays. The Israelites were to take the day off work and they often ate special food.

But these feasts were also different. Most of our celebrations are only a day or a weekend long. Some of the Israelites' feasts lasted a whole week or longer. And while our celebrations are often all about us – what gifts we’ll get, what we’ll eat, how much fun we’ll have – the Israelites’ holidays helped them focus on God.

Some of them, like the Passover, helped them remember how God had helped in the past. Others, like the Feast of First fruits, were times they gave God the first things they harvested. This reminded them that they depended on God now. In fact, every one of their holidays had something to do with God and their friendship with Him.

"Songs of Joy" by James Tissot

The feasts and holidays God told the Israelites to celebrate show that God knows our need for a break. But how we use the free time is our choice - and an important one. Do we use days off, like Sunday, only for our own pleasure? Or do we think about God on such days, and spend time getting to know Him better?

PRAYER: Dear God, thank You for the variety of holidays through the year. Help me to use these special days in a way that pleases You. Amen.


MORE: Feast List
Complete a list of the feasts or holidays God told the people to celebrate. (In the brackets is the month they would celebrate the feast on our calendar):

- Leviticus 23:3 [1.] __________________ (Once a week all year long)
- Leviticus 23:5 [2.] __________________ (March or April)
- Leviticus 23:5 [3.] __________________ (March or April)
- Leviticus 23:9-14 Feast of First Fruits (April)
- Leviticus 23:15 Feast of Weeks (or Pentecost) and the Harvest Festival (June)
- Leviticus 23:23 Feast of Trumpets (September/October)
- Leviticus 23:27 [4.] _________________ (September/October)
- Leviticus 23:34 [5.] _________________ (September/October)

Answers

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Unless otherwise noted, all Scripture quotations are taken from THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

Adult readers - DAILY DEVOTIONS FOR ADULTS  are available too at Other Food: daily devo's. 

Blood Sacrifice

TODAY’S SPECIAL: Leviticus 17:11

TO CHEW ON: "For the life of a creature is in the blood, and I have given it to you to make atonement for yourselves on the altar; it is the blood that makes atonement for one’s life." Leviticus 17:11

Moses had been up on the mountain with God for a long time and God had told him many things. One of the things God gold Moses was a way to deal with sin.

What is sin? It is missing the target. If we think of doing everything God has said we should do, and not doing anything God has said we shouldn't do as the target, sin is missing that target.



For example, when God told Adam and Eve not to eat of the special tree in the garden and they did – that was sin. And when God told the people they were not to worship any other God but Him and they made a calf idol and worshiped it – that was sin. God gave the people a list of rules (we call them the Ten Commandments) which told them what was sin for each area of life, from how they treated parents and neighbors to how they treated God. The trouble was, no one could keep all these rules.

The punishment for breaking these rules – even one of them – was death. Period.

But on the mountain, God told Moses that He would make a way for the people to come back into His good favor – make atonement. It was a way they didn’t have to take the punishment of death themselves. They could substitute the blood of an animal. The blood would show that the animal had died (for no living thing, human or animal, can live without blood going through its body). The blood showed that the death penalty had been paid – for now. God accepted as a temporary punishment for sin, the death of an animal instead of the death of the sinful person.

Bringing the lamb as an offering - Picture from CC-Art.com

PRAYER: Dear God, thank You for making a way for people to be right with You – through animal sacrifices, and then through Jesus. Amen.


MORE:  Sin’s Wages
God’s punishment for sin hasn’t changed. Paul, in the New Testament book of Romans calls this punishment ‘wages.’ Those wages are still death. Every one of us earns these wages every time we sin. But Someone – not an animal – took the punishment of death for the sins each one of us has committed.
1. Who was that Someone? (I Corinthians 15:3) ____________
2. What penalty did He pay? _____________

Here is a verse to memorize. It will remind you of sin’s wages and God’s gift to us through Jesus:

For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
- Romans 6:23

Answers

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Unless otherwise noted, all Scripture quotations are taken from THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

Adult readers - DAILY DEVOTIONS FOR ADULTS  are available too at Other Food: daily devo's.