Daily Scripture Reading Leviticus 4:22-35
In order to be a church that faithfully preaches the full counsel of God, a church has to accurately preach what the Bible has to say about sin. Unfortunately, many churches have chosen to avoid that topic, so the first thing they need to do to faithfully preach the full counsel of God is make a decision to actually address the subject.
Once a church is willing to preach about sin, it needs to do so accurately and biblically. Today’s passage shows that the Mosaic Law differentiated between intentional and unintentional sin. That is a distinction that also applies to us today, and must be addressed in order to accurately preach the full counsel of God.
The early chapters of Leviticus explain the rules and regulations the Israelites had to observe when bringing sacrifices to the tabernacle. First, there were the rules for burnt, grain, and peace offerings. Then chapter four explains the procedures for sin offerings.
Lev. 4:22 ¶ ‘When a leader sins and unintentionally does any one of all the things which Yahweh his God has commanded not to be done, and he becomes guilty,
Notice the words “leader” and “unintentional”. These verses apply to sins that were accidental, not done on purpose, and explain how leaders needed to deal with their unintentional sin.
Lev. 4:23 or if his sin which he has committed is made known to him, he shall bring for his offering a goat, a male without blemish.
The words “is made known to him” indicate it is possible for a person to sin without knowing he is sinning.
Lev. 4:24 Then he shall lay his hand on the head of the male goat and slaughter it in the place where they slaughter the burnt offering before Yahweh; it is a sin offering.
Take note of the word “male”. Sometimes the rules in Leviticus specified whether the sacrifice needed to be a male or a female. Sometimes, the Israelites had the freedom to decide which to bring.
Lev. 4:25 Then the priest shall take some of the blood of the sin offering with his finger and put it on the horns of the altar of burnt offering; and the rest of its blood he shall pour out at the base of the altar of burnt offering.
Lev. 4:26 And all its fat he shall offer up in smoke on the altar as in the case of the fat of the sacrifice of peace offerings. Thus the priest shall make atonement for him in regard to his sin, and he will be forgiven.
Don’t miss the word “atonement”. Even though the sin was unintentional, it was still necessary to atone for the sin.
Lev. 4:27 ¶ ‘Now if anyone of the common people sins unintentionally in doing any of the things which Yahweh has commanded not to be done, and becomes guilty,
The words “common people” let us know we are now reading the rules the common people needed to follow when dealing with sin. The word “unintentionally” shows that once again the rules only applied to accidental sin, not sin that was done on purpose.
Lev. 4:28 or if his sin which he has committed is made known to him, then he shall bring for his offering a goat, a female without blemish, for his sin which he has committed.
In this case we see the word “female”, indicating that, while a leader needed to bring a male goat, the common people needed to bring a female goat.
Since a leader sinning would be graver than a common person sinning, it is normal to think offering a male goat is a greater punishment than offering a female goat. However, sacrificing a female is more costly than sacrificing a male because when you sacrifice a male, you are sacrificing one animal. When you sacrifice a female, you are sacrificing the female animal plus all the animals the female could have given birth to over the next several years.
The loss of a male animal does not affect your ability to grow the size of your herd, because you only need one male animal to impregnate the female animals. However, the loss of a female animal reduces your ability to grow the size of your herd because that is one less animal to give birth to more animals.
Lev. 4:29 And he shall lay his hand on the head of the sin offering and slaughter the sin offering at the place of the burnt offering.
Lev. 4:30 And the priest shall take some of its blood with his finger and put it on the horns of the altar of burnt offering; and all the rest of its blood he shall pour out at the base of the altar.
Lev. 4:31 Then he shall remove all its fat, just as the fat was removed from the sacrifice of peace offerings; and the priest shall offer it up in smoke on the altar for a soothing aroma to Yahweh. Thus the priest shall make atonement for him, and he will be forgiven.
Lev. 4:32 ¶ ‘But if he brings a lamb as his offering for a sin offering, he shall bring it, a female without blemish.
Lev. 4:33 And he shall lay his hand on the head of the sin offering and slaughter it for a sin offering in the place where they slay the burnt offering.
Lev. 4:34 And the priest shall take some of the blood of the sin offering with his finger and put it on the horns of the altar of burnt offering, and all the rest of its blood he shall pour out at the base of the altar.
Lev. 4:35 Then he shall remove all its fat, just as the fat of the lamb is removed from the sacrifice of the peace offerings, and the priest shall offer them up in smoke on the altar, on the offerings by fire to Yahweh. Thus the priest shall make atonement for him in regard to his sin which he has committed, and he will be forgiven.
Just as the Mosaic Law made a distinction between intentional and unintentional sin, so too Jesus made that distinction in one of His parables. In the gospel of Luke we read the following:
Luke 12:47 And that slave who knew his master’s will and did not get ready or act in accord with his will, will receive many beatings,
Luke 12:48 but the one who did not know it, and committed deeds worthy of a beating, will receive but a few.
Also, while on the cross, Jesus asked the Father to forgive those who crucified Him because they did not know what they were doing (see Luke 23:34). Paul received mercy for his acts of blasphemy and persecution because he acted in ignorance (see 1 Timothy 1:13). Paul told the Athenians that God overlooked the times of ignorance (Acts 17:30).
In order to be a church that faithfully preaches the full counsel of God, a church has to accurately preach what the Bible has to say about sin. Once a church makes the correct decision to preach about sin, it also needs to differentiate between intentional sin and unintentional sin.
Does your pastor ever address the difference between intentional and unintentional sin?
Thanks for visiting Bible Mountain. If you have already joined my email list, thank you and please tell others about Bible Mountain. If you have not joined my email list yet, please do so now. In order to join, go to Bible Mountain dotcom, click on subscribe, and that will take you to a page where you can sign up. Your email address will not be sold nor given away. Once again, thanks for visiting Bible Mountain.
“Scripture quotations taken from the (LSB®) Legacy Standard Bible®, Copyright © 2021 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. Managed in partnership with Three Sixteen Publishing Inc. LSBible.org and 316publishing.com.”