if you would go ahead and turn
in your Bibles to Leviticus chapter 5 and that's where our Bible
study will be this morning and while you're turning there I
will say that anytime that I go to the Old Testament I always
look and consider Luke chapter 24 and that is when our Lord
had risen from the grave and his disciples were scattered
and they were heartbroken and anyway Mary Magdalene and Mary
the mother James and they had went down to the tomb and the
Lord was not there and the angel told him that they had a rose
And then later in that, our Lord is with his disciples. And he
gives them these words, O fools and slow to heart to believe
all that the prophets have spoken. Ought not Christ to have suffered
these things and entered into his glory? And then our Lord
says, and beginning at Moses and all the prophets, he expounded
unto them. in all the scriptures, the things
concerning himself. So anytime that I open the word
and I go to the Old Testament, we always go looking for Christ. And it has been said that if
you were to take a thread and a needle with a scarlet thread,
and you were to run it through the scriptures, through this
whole book here, that that scarlet thread would be like Christ,
because that scarlet thread would touch every page in this book.
And so it is that in every page of his word, it speaks to us
of Christ. Now, while you're there, I'm
gonna read a passage of scriptures here in Hebrews, and then we'll
keep it in mind as we study Leviticus. And in Hebrews chapter nine,
I'm gonna read three verses beginning in verse 12. Neither by the blood
of goats and calves But by his own blood he entered in once
into the holy place, having obtained eternal redemption for us. For if the blood of bulls and
goats and the ashes of a heifer sprinkling the unclean sanctified
to the peering of the flesh, how much more shall the blood
of Christ, who through the eternal spirit offered himself without
spot to God, purge your conscience from the dead works to serve
the living God? So as we read here in Leviticus, we are reading of the Levitical
sacrifices, and we're gonna read verses one through 10, and then
we will look at these passages of scripture. Now beginning in
verse one, Leviticus chapter five. And if a soul sin, and hear the voice of swearing,
and is a witness, whether he hath seen or known of it, if
he do not utter it, then he shall bear his own iniquity. Or if
a soul touch an unclean thing, whether it be a carcass of an
unclean beast, a carcass of an unclean cattle, or the carcass
of unclean creeping things, and if it be hidden from him, he
also shall be unclean and guilty. Or, verse three, if he touch
the uncleanness of man, whether uncleanness it be that a man
shall be defiled withal, and it be hid from him, when he knoweth
of it, then he shall be guilty. Or, if a soul swear, pronouncing
with his lips to do evil or to do good, whatsoever it be that
a man shall pronounce with an oath, and it be hid from him,
when he knoweth of it, then he shall be guilty of one of these. Verse five. And it shall be,
when he shall be guilty in one of these things, that he shall
confess that he hath sinned in that thing. And he shall bring
his trespass offering unto the Lord for his sin which he hath
sinned, a female from the flock. a lamb or a kid, and a kid is
a female goat, of the goats, for a sin offering, and the priest
shall make an atonement for him concerning his sin. And if he
hath not able to bring a lamb, then he shall bring for his trespass,
which he hath committed, two turtle doves or two young pigeons
unto the Lord, one for a sin offering, and the other for a
burnt offering. And he shall bring them unto
the priest, who shall offer them, which is for the sin offering
first, and wring off the head of his neck, but shall not divide
it asunder. And he shall sprinkle of the
blood of the sin offering to the side of the altar, and the
rest of the blood shall be wrung out at the bottom of the altar.
It is a sin offering. And he shall offer of the second
of the burnt offering, according to the manner, and the priest
shall make an atonement for him for his sin, which he hath sinned,
and it shall be forgiven him. Now, if we look back at the first
four verses of this chapter, and what I want to do is I want
to give you a summary of those first four verses. And basically
in verse one, what he is saying that if a man is obligated to
be a witness in a matter and he is not, then he's sinned. In other words, if there is a
circumstances, if there are issues and say that I know that Luke
done something or that Luke did not do something and I'm silent
in that manner, then I am guilty. Now it may be that I am angry
with Luke and the thing may have Luke in trouble, but still I
am to bear witness of the thing that I know. So the gist of this
first verse is that a man is obligated to be a witness. And then secondly, in verse two,
it is speaking of a man that touches a dead carcass of an
animal. And this is of the Levitical, the laws. Now we know that we
ourselves, in our day, in this day of grace, that these things
are given for examples, as pictures, and for us to touch an animal,
we're not clean. But ceremonially, in the Levitical
law, if a man touched an animal, that was dead, and it was an
unclean animal, that he became defiled. And then thirdly, in
verse three, it speaks of a man that touches a dead body of a
person. whether it be a bone or whatever. If he touches a dead person,
then he's to fault. And then in verse four, it says,
it basically is saying this, if a man promises or swears to
do something that is either impossible for him to do or it's unlawful
for him to do according to the scriptures, then he is guilty. So that is a summary of these
first four verses. But I think we can even have
a more simpler summary for ourselves. And if you look at verse one,
and I wanna go through verse one through four, and I wanna
read the first of this verse and the last of this verse to
get the sense. And if a soul sin, Now read the last of the verse,
then he shall bear his iniquity. Verse two, or if, and then the
sin is told, look at the last of the verse, he also shall be
unclean and guilty. And then in verse three, or if,
and it speaks of the sin, the last of the verse, then he shall
be guilty. And again, verse four. Or if,
and then the last of the verse, then he shall be guilty of one
of these. And the summary of these first
four verses is this. If a man sins, then he shall
bear his iniquity. He shall be guilty. If a man
sins, he shall be guilty and he shall bear his own iniquity. Now notice in these four verses
that we're not talking about murder and idolatry or blasphemy
or idolatry meaning idol worship. The gist of these sins in our
text is, I should have spoken up and said something, but I
didn't. And I didn't know that a frog is an unclean beast. And so a man sees a little toad,
and he reaches to pick up what was dead. Well, that man had
sinned. Or it may be that someone goes
in, and they're caring for a loved one, and they're sick. And then
they touch them and try to roll, hey, Mom, are you OK? And she's
dead. And then, you know, I should
have not promised to pay, you know, this debt. I told him I'd
pay him tomorrow. I don't have the money. Well,
those are the jests of these sins. And we consider these maybe to
be lighter sins or less serious sins or accidental sins. But
let us remember the words of Job, or actually it was Bildad
and Job, how then can man be just with God or how can he be
clean that's born of a woman? Behold, even the moon and it
shineth not, yea, the stars not pure in his sight. These sins,
all sin separates us from God. And that is the thing that I
would have us to see this morning in the first part of this chapter
is that any sin, we become separated We are separated from a holy,
holy God. But then we look at the requirement
for these sins. There is yet a remedy, and look
with me at verse six. We'll start with verse five.
And it shall be, when he shall be guilty in one of these things,
that he shall confess that he hath sinned in that thing. And
then there's a remedy. Look at verse 6. And he shall
bring his trespass offering unto the Lord for his sin which he
hath sinned. And look what it says. A female
from the flock, a lamb or a kid of the goats, and that kid represents
a female, for a sin offering, and the priest shall make an
atonement for him concerning his sin. Now, the first thing
I want us to note that though we looked at these sins and we
kind of, you know, they're, yeah, they're sins, you know, but it's
not like murder. It's not like some of those things,
but notice that something must die, that the sinner is required
or was required to bring a sacrifice to die. Something must die, the
guilty must be punished. And that's what we read in the
first four verses. If a man sin, then he shall bear his iniquity. If a man sin, then he is guilty. And then we see that for that
sin and that for that guilt, blood must be shed. And then we say, well, why does
blood, why must blood be shed? You ever think about that? I
mean, why does blood have to be shed? Why does there have
to be blood involved in these sacrifices? Well, the scripture
says that life is in the blood. And God told Cain, when Cain
slew his brother, he said, thy brother's blood crieth unto me
from the ground. Thy brother's life, his blood,
crieth for me from the ground. God told Adam, in the day that
ye eat thereof, ye shall surely die. And for Adam, the Lord killed
or shed the blood of an animal. Now blood was shed so that a
robe could be put on Adam. And then also God said to Israel,
when I see the blood, I will pass over you. So the consequences
from sin, all of this goes, and everywhere we read through the
scripture where there is death associated with sin, every bit
of it goes back to that those words that God said to Adam,
the day ye eat thereof, thou shalt surely die. The penalty
for sin is death. And the penalty for sin is blood. So then the sentence of death,
the shedding of blood is upon all sin. In Romans chapter 6,
23, it says, the wages of sin is death. And so, in our text,
there is a guilty sinner who has sinned, but then we find
that there is a substitute. Now, as we said at the beginning,
we know that this substitute and this sinner is a picture.
And it is the Lord, like in Luke 24, when he took his disciples
and took them back through the Old Testament, that he is showing
us how God saves sinners. These things are a picture. These
things are an example to us of how God saves sinner. And then let's look at verse
six, he says, and he, the sinner, shall bring his trespass offering
unto the Lord for his sin which he hath sinned, a female from
the flock. a lamb or a kid, again, meaning
a female, of the goats, for a sin offering, and the priest shall
make atonement for him concerning his sin. Now, is there something
in this verse that kind of strikes you odd in the sacrifice? It does me. A female. female. Now we know that when
when the Lord brought Israel out of Egypt there was a Passover
lamb and what did the scripture say concerning that Passover
lamb? That that Passover lamb would be a male without blemish. It had to be a lamb of the first
year of and a male without spot or blemish. And I think maybe
for all of us that one of the most precious pictures of our
Lord Jesus Christ is him as the lamb. The book of Revelation
is about the lamb of God. And so when we read of a lamb
and we think of that male lamb, we think of our Lord Jesus Christ,
do we not? but here we read of a female. And then it speaks, and then
if you look in Leviticus chapter one, it speaks of the burnt offering,
and Leviticus one is about the burnt offering, and it says of
the burnt offering, it has to be a bull. Now a bull is a male,
and a bull is strong, and in these things we see how Christ
is represented. for us. It's either, it must
be a bull, the burnt offering, or a male of the flock, being
a lamb of the first year, or a young bull, a male of the flock,
I'm sorry, a bull, a male of the flock, or a a fowl, there also had to be
a fowl. Now, of all these things we see,
and we think about that, and we see that male pictured there,
and we see how that could be crossed. But when we read about
the female, how is it that that could be crossed? Turn with me to John chapter
three, And I wanna look at another passage
that brought this same question to my mind. In John chapter three, And again,
I wanna apply this same question to this text that we're looking
at, this female, talking about this female. In verse 14, it
says, as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even
so must the Son of Man be lifted up. And what Moses is saying,
or what our Lord is saying is just like Moses lifted up that
serpent, so must Christ himself be lifted up. And whoever seen
that serpent lifted up was saved. Now, to me, for a long time,
I had a hard time seeing how a serpent, a brazen serpent,
could represent the Lord Jesus Christ. How can a serpent represent
the Lord Jesus Christ? It's just like a female of the
flock can be compared. Turn with me to 2 Corinthians
5. And we read verse 21. For he hath made him to be sin
for us, who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness
of God. You see, that female is us. And our Lord Jesus Christ, when
he died, he was dying for us. It was our sin. He was made sin. He was made her. The female of the flock represents
her and she is sin. She was made his righteousness. You see that serpent that was
lifted up. That was Christ being made sin. Just like in this passage, I
believe, that this female of the flock is a representation
of the church, the Lord, and his people. Paul said in Galatians
20, or chapter two, verse 20, I am crucified with Christ. Nevertheless, I live, yet not
I, but Christ which liveth in me. And the life which I now
live in the flesh, I live by the face of the Son of God, who
loved me and gave himself for me. I, Paul said, am crucified
with Christ. This female sacrifice of the
flock is a picture of our Lord dying for his church. This is
substitution. Isaiah 53 verse 12 tells us this,
that he was numbered with the transgressors. He was counted
with. He was counted among the transgressors. So when you look at Christ and
you look at his people, they're one. And it says in Ephesians
chapter one, he hath chosen us in him before the foundation
of the world. You see, when he died, we were
in him. And we were with him. Now, there
is yet another picture for us to look at. And let's look at
verse seven of Leviticus chapter five. And it says, and if he not be
able to bring a lamb, then he shall bring for his trespass,
which he hath committed two turtle doves, or two young pigeons unto
the Lord, one for a sin offering, and the other for a burnt offering. Notice in this verse, it speaks
of two turtle doves, or two young pigeons. Now, if we were to go
back and look at Leviticus chapter one, again, there's several sacrifices
there. One being of the herd, ebolic,
that we mentioned. Another was of the flock, a male
of the flock. And the third was of the fowl.
But of the fowl, only one pigeon or one turtle dove was offered
in the burnt offering. But in this verse for the sinner,
it speaks of two, two turtle doves or two young pigeons. Let me tell you a little bit
about turtle doves and pigeons. There in my house, I've got a
back porch and back, I've got a hedge in my backyard. Some
of you, many of you have been there. And there's two maple
trees there, one on each side of the yard. And then there's
a power line that runs between. And oftentimes in the evening,
I will sit out there on my porch. That's what I do for relaxation. And oftentimes there will be
two doves that come and they will sit together. There's two
of them. And I got to looking into this,
these turtledoves and these pigeons. And do you know something about
pigeons and turtledoves, both of these birds? They are mates
for life. Turtledoves and pigeons mate
for life. They are monogamous in their
relationships. And this sacrifice here of two
turtledoves and of two pigeons Is it not of the Lord Jesus Christ
and his church? Turn with me to Genesis chapter
two. And let's look, read, begin reading
in verse 21. And the Lord God caused a deep
sleep to fall upon Adam, and he slept. And he took one of
his ribs and closed up the flesh instead thereof. And the rib
which the Lord God had made man, made he woman. and brought her
unto the man. And Adam said, This is now bone
of my bone and flesh of my flesh. She shall be called woman because
she was taken out a man. Therefore shall a man leave his
father and his mother and shall cleave unto his wife, and they
shall be one flesh." You see, these turtle doves represent
one flesh. It is crossed in his church. When Christ our Lord was crucified,
We really were crucified with him. We were crucified with him. When he died, he really, really
died for somebody. And I will end with this verse.
In Ephesians chapter five, verse 32, this is a great mystery by
speak concerning Christ and his church. Now there's a message
this morning.