If you will this evening, open
your Bibles with me first to Luke chapter 24. I want to read these words that are
recorded that the Lord Jesus Christ spoke to the two disciples
on the road to Emmaus the day of his resurrection. They were
sad and downcast. And they were walking away from
Jerusalem, going to the town of Emmaus. And the Lord Jesus
Christ appeared unto them. And in verse 26, he said, ought
not Christ to have suffered these things and to enter into his
glory? And beginning at Moses and all
the prophets, he expounded unto them and all the scriptures the
things concerning himself. And then down to verse 44, appearing
to the 11 disciples, and he said unto them, these are the words
which I spake unto you while I was yet with you, that all
things must be fulfilled which were written in the law of Moses
and in the prophets and in the Psalms concerning me. Now, let's
turn back in our Bibles to the book of Leviticus, chapter two. Beginning at Moses, he expounded unto them all things
which were written in the scriptures concerning him. The Lord Jesus Christ is the
key to the scriptures. He is the key that opens up the
scriptures unto us. Leviticus chapter two, and when
any will offer a meat offering unto the Lord, his offering shall
be a fine flour, and he shall pour oil upon it and put frankincense
thereon, and he shall bring it to Aaron's sons the priest, And
he shall take thereof his handful, or thereout his handful of the
flour thereof, and of the oil thereof with all the frankincense
thereof. And the priest shall burn the
memorial of it upon the altar to be an offering made by fire
of a sweet savor unto the Lord. And the remnant of the meat offering
shall be Aaron's and his son's It is a thing most holy of the
offerings of the Lord made by fire. The book of Leviticus opens
with instructions concerning five offerings. We looked at
the first offering last week, the Holocaust, the whole burnt
offering. And tonight, in the second chapter,
we read of the meat offering, and then there's a trespass offering,
a sin offering, and a burn offering, which follow. I do not plan to
preach from each one of these offerings at this time, but I
did want to come back to this second offering, the meat offering. Of all these five offerings,
animals were sacrificed. Blood was shed except this offering,
this offering, the meat offering. And John Gale commented that
it could, and I quote, with as much if not greater propriety
be called the bread offering, being made of fine flour. Now some of the old writers were
of the opinion that every time a person offered a whole burnt
offering, the holocaust, they would also with it offer this
meat offering or this bread offering. And we cannot be sure that that
is true every time, but we may be sure of this, that every day,
every morning and every evening, there was a lamb which was offered
upon the altar at the tabernacle and later at the temple. And
with that sacrifice, which was a Holocaust sacrifice, there
was a bread offering offered with it. If you look with me
back to Exodus chapter 29, we see this. In Exodus chapter
29, and beginning with verse 38, Now this is that which thou shalt
offer upon the altar, two lambs of the first year day by day
continually. The one lamb thou shalt offer
in the morning, and the other lamb thou shalt offer at evening. And with the one lamb, a tenth
deal of flour mingled with the fourth part of a hen of beaten
oil, and the fourth part of a hen of wine for a drink offering. And the other lamb thou shalt
offer it even, and shalt do thereto according to the meat offering
of the morning, and according to the drink offering thereof,
for a sweet savor, an offering made by fire unto the Lord. So we know that every day, two
times a day, according to the law, When the lamb was offered
in the morning and the evening, this meat offering, this bread
offering also was offered with it. All of these offerings, all
five of these offerings are in some way types or pictures of
the Lord Jesus Christ. He said, Moses wrote of me. And
the way, one way that Moses wrote of Christ is that God communicated
unto him the word concerning the tabernacle and the offerings
and the priesthood and all that went along with approaching unto
God, worshiping God in that old dispensation. As the daily sacrifice
was typical of the Lamb of God, which takes away the sins of
the world, continually, continually takes away the sins of His people. Remember that verse in 1 John
chapter 1. Let me turn there and read it
quickly so I won't misquote it. But the sacrifice, the offering
of the Lord Jesus Christ is continuously cleansing believers day by day. Sins in the morning, sins in
the evening, all sin. He cleanseth us from all sin. 1 John chapter 1 and verse number
7. But if we walk in the light,
as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another or
with another. And the blood of Jesus Christ,
His Son, cleanseth us. Now, you know that verb ending
shows us this is a continuous thing that takes place. The blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth
us. Yes, it cleansed us when we first
came to Christ. When we first looked to Christ,
the blood of Jesus Christ cleansed us, washed us from our sins,
but it didn't just stop there. And I know we can say it cleansed
us from our past sins, our present sins, and even our future sins. But the point is the blood of
Jesus Christ Continuously, like that lamb, continuously offered
day by day, day by day, morning and evening, as a picture of
the cleansing blood of Jesus Christ our Lord. Cleanseth us
from all our sins. So this bread offering was also
typical of Christ, who is that bread which endures unto everlasting
life. The bread offering definitely
is a type of the Lord Jesus, and it may also serve as a type
of you, if you are a child of God. It may serve as a type,
it is a type rather, of the Lord Jesus Christ, but it may also
serve as a type of every child of God. You remember the Lord
said this He said, if a corn of wheat fall into the ground
and die, except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die,
it abideth alone. He's speaking of himself as a
grain of wheat. This offering was a fine flour. And there's a message there.
If you just follow how wheat is sown and harvested and ground
and and put into the oven and burned to make bread. There's a message there, a picture
there of the Savior and of His redeeming work for His people.
But He also said this, that in the end of the age that the angels
would come and gather the wheat, referring to believers, into
His barn. So this offering, it serves as
a picture, yes, as a type of Jesus Christ, but it may also
serve as a type of all believers that we too may be referred to
as wheat, as bread. Now, we're not going to look
tonight at this as a type of believers, but only as a type
of the Lord Jesus Christ. First, there's several things
I want to bring out to us. I pray God would make this a
blessing to all of us, that we might see Christ. We might learn
of Him as we look at this offering. You know, to study history, if
we don't see Christ, if we don't see Christ when we study the
Old Testament, we've missed the point. We've missed the point. It may be very interesting. It
may increase our knowledge, you know, of historical facts and
things like that. And I love history, and I know
many of you do as well. We may study about Sennacherib
and Tiglath-Pileser and all of those foreign kings that invaded
Nebuchadnezzar. I tell you, there's a real message
about Nebuchadnezzar. And you see how God sent him
on a purpose. God raised him up, just like
he did Cyrus. God raised up Nebuchadnezzar
for a purpose, to serve, to chastise the nation of Israel. He was
on his way, as I understand it. He was on his way. And, I mean,
he's a general. I mean, he's got a big army.
He's been successful. And he's got two options, to
go to Jerusalem and conquer them, defeat them at this time, or
to turn and go to Pharaoh in Egypt? Two powers, enemy powers
as far as he was concerned. What's he going to do? Did you
know how they would discern the future? They would cut an animal
open and somehow with the entrails of that animal they would discern
The future. And God, through that, told him,
just leave Egypt alone. You go on to Jerusalem. You know, God is in everything,
isn't he? He works in everything, no matter how small, no matter
how great. He raises up one king and puts
down another. He raises up a country, really,
raises up a country. You look in the Old Testament,
Assyria and Babylon and those various nations besides Israel. God raises up, they serve His
purpose, and He puts them down. Isn't it wonderful to think about
the fact that this God is our God? That this God is our Father? that he's in control of all things. But my point is, if we only see
these historical facts, no matter how interesting they are, if
we miss Christ, we've missed the message. You can know all
of that history you want to and die and go to hell. But if you
know Christ, you have eternal life. You have a relationship,
you're reconciled unto God the Father. The first thing, the main part,
let's look first of all, the main part of this offering was
fine flour here in Leviticus chapter two. Fine flour. Verse one says, and when any
offer a meat offering, a bread offering unto the Lord, his offering
shall be a fine flour. I've already mentioned that our
Lord quoted that verse, or spoke that word, except a corn of wheat
fall into the ground and die, it abides alone, but if it die,
it brings forth much fruit. And with those words, the Lord
Jesus Christ showed the absolute necessity of his death in order
to save the many which the Father had given him in that everlasting
covenant of grace. Fine flour. The main part of
this offering is fine flour, and it shows the excellency of
Christ, that is, the God-man mediator, the excellency of Christ
to all others, to all other creatures. Do you remember, look with me
in Hebrews chapter 1. You remember how the writer of
Hebrews shows the excellency of Christ above the angels. In Hebrews chapter one, verses four and five. First of
all, he reminds us that this one in whom God has spoken unto
us has a more excellent name. than the angels. Verses 4 and
5, being made so much better than the angels, as he hath by
inheritance obtained a name, a more excellent name than they.
He obtained a more excellent name than all the holy angels,
for to which of the holy angels, for unto which of the angels
said he at any time, Thou art my son. Now angels are referred
to as sons, in the scriptures, but he never said to any one
of them, thou art my son, this day have I begotten thee, this
eternal day. The Lord God, Jehovah, the son
of God has no beginning and he has no end. He's the Alpha and
he's the Omega. He never, God never said this
to any angel. Thou art my son, this day have
I begotten thee. And again, I will be to him a
father, and he shall be to me a son. And then next, he shows
how that he's more excellent than the angels because God commanded
all the angels to worship him. Verse 6. And again, when he bringeth
in the first begotten into the world, he saith, And let all
the angels of God worship him. On that first Christmas, as we
like to refer to his incarnation, the world does, God sent a host
of holy angels, right? Praising God in the highest,
worshiping this babe. that was just brought into this
world, the angels. And then he goes on in the next
verses, verse seven, tells us that not only did he command
the angels to worship him, but the angels are his servants. But thou, but under the sun,
he saith, thy throne, O God, is forever and ever a scepter
of righteousness, is the scepter of thy kingdom. holy angels. He has a more excellent name
than they. They are commanded to worship
Him, and they are His servants. And in verse 8, He has a more
excellent place, that is, He is upon the throne of God. This fine flower shows the excellency
of his person, not only to the holy angels, but to all the sons
of man. He is God's elect in a special
way. Now, all of God's children are
chosen of God. They were all chosen from before
the foundation of the world, but they were all chosen in him. He is God's first elect. And
all of His chosen were chosen in Him. He is God's elect in
a special way. We like to believe and know from
the Word of God that we too, because we believe in Him, we
know that we were chosen in Him. You know, sometimes when men
hear the gospel, they get concerned and they question, well, maybe
I am not one of God's elect. That's not the question. That's
not the question. The question is, do you believe,
do you believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God? And if you can answer in the
affirmative and say, yes, just like Peter, I believe and am
sure that thou art the Christ, the son of the living God. You're
one of his chosen. You know that. You know your
election by your calling and not your calling by your election. Make your calling and election
sure. Always in that order. Always.
He is a chosen of God and precious, and all of his members were chosen
in him. And the psalmist said, thou art
fairer than the children of men. Grace is poured into thy lips. Therefore, God hath blessed thee
forever. There's none like him in the
excellency of his mediatorial office. We know that he's the
one mediator, the God-man. He's the one mediator between
God and men. Men have been lied to and men
have been deceived by the teaching that the saints may act as mediators,
that you can pray to those who supposedly are saints, or you
can pray through the Virgin Mary that she too is a mediatrix between
God and men. That's a lie. That's Satan's
lie. It never came from the Word of God. The Word of God's very
specific, isn't it? There's one God and one mediator
between God and men. the man, Christ Jesus. And we
see his excellency in his offices as prophet, priest, and king. As king, he's the king of kings. Oh yeah, there are other kings.
There have been other potentates. But there's never been any like
him. He's the king of kings. He's
the Lord of lords. And all other kings reign at
his pleasure. at His pleasure. He's a prophet. You know, they said when He was
here in the flesh, they said, no man ever spoke like Him. Well,
of course not. He had authority. The words which
He spoke, He received from His Father. They were the words that
were given unto Him to speak. And He said this, the words,
now listen to this, the words that I speak unto you are What are they? What are the words? They're spirit and they're life. He didn't say they're spiritual.
No, no. He said the words that I speak
unto you, they are spirit and they are life. And think about
this. After 2100 years more or less
since he spoke those words, his word is still Spirit and Life. His Word, the words which He
spoke. He is that Prophet above all
other Prophets. All other Prophets witnessed
of Him, beginning at Moses and all the Prophets. I like that
word all, don't you? All the Prophets. You just begin
in the Old Testament and search through it and there's many Prophets.
They didn't write prophecies. But they are pointed out to us
as prophets, and they all spoke of Him. They all witnessed to
Him. His Word is spirit and His life. His Word is sharper than a two-edged
sword. When God the Holy Spirit blesses
His Word, Sinners, lost sinners like you and I, like we were,
and maybe you're here tonight and still are. His word cuts,
I mean, it's a two-edged sword. It convicts you that something's
wrong, and if God's in it, you're never going to find peace anywhere
else, my friends. I think it was Augustine who
said that God had created man with such a capacity to know
God that until he comes to rest in God, he'll never find rest
anywhere in this world, anywhere else. But oh, what a blessing
it is when by the grace of God, we're brought to rest in him. Not only is he the king above
all kings and the prophet above every prophet, he's a priest.
He's the priest who by one sacrifice, All those priests in the Old
Testament, many of them high priest, year after year after
year after year, if they had followed God's law that he gave
to Moses, they would have taken that blood and sprinkled it on
the mercy seat and before the mercy seat and come back out.
They were representatives of the nation of Israel. But that
blood could not take away one sin. Not one sin. It could picture His sacrifice,
and it was given for that purpose. But He, by one offering, not
two offerings or three, but by one offering, He hath perfected,
perfected, perfected. Get a hold of that, perfected.
You're not half perfect. No. By one offering, He hath
perfected them that are sanctified. them that God has set apart.
Yes, He is the mediator. Fine flour shows not only the
excellency of His person, but the purity of the Lord Jesus. All men, as David said in that
psalm, when he was confessing his sin, his awful fall into
sin, he was confessing that unto the Lord, seeking forgiveness
because of God's loving kindnesses. His loving kindnesses. But in
that confession and that asking for forgiveness, he said, all
men are conceived in sin and shaped in iniquity. Not him. Not this man. That's true of
all other men. It's true of me. It's true of
you. But not him. Oh, no. We know it's impossible. I believe this is found in the
book of Job. It's impossible to bring a clean thing out of
an unclean. But God did. God did. Mary was in that sense unclean. She was a sinner like every other
person. Yet out of that unclean thing,
God brought a clean, a pure one. How was that possible? What did
the angel tell Mary? The Holy Spirit shall come upon
thee. Therefore, that holy thing which
shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God. That holy
one, that holy thing. Fine flour, or bread, is the
principal part of maintaining human life. We talk about bread.
It's the staff of life. In the model prayer, when the
Lord taught His disciples and therefore taught us to pray,
one of the petitions was, give us this day our daily bread. Now bread there stands for the
food that we need day by day, but man needs more than just
bread. We need drink. In fact, you can
live, I believe this is true, longer without food than you
can water. We need water. Give us this day
our daily bread. Yes, we need bread. Yes, we need
water. Yes, we need clothes. Yes, we
need shelter. The Lord Jesus Christ is all
of these things to us. He's that fine flour that maintains
human life. He's the bread of life that came
down from heaven and gives life to the world. And those who by
faith feed upon him shall never die. Shall never die. The second, and I'll be very
brief on these next two points. Other ingredients, we saw the
main ingredient of this offering was fine flour, but other ingredients
that were included and excluded. included oil, oil was poured
upon or mixed with the fine flour. We know that he was conceived
by the Holy Spirit. And we also know that at his
baptism, God, the Holy Spirit came upon him in the form of
a dove and remained upon him. And the first time that we have
him preaching, We use that term loosely. Preaching in the synagogue
in Nazareth recorded, I should say, of him preaching. What did
he say? The spirit of the Lord is upon
me. For he hath anointed me to preach
the gospel to the poor, to heal the brokenhearted, preach deliverance
to the captives, the recovering of sight to the blind, and set
at liberty the bruised, to preach the acceptable year of the Lord. Did you know this is the acceptable
year of the Lord? It's been going on since the
Lord Jesus Christ gave himself a ransom for many. The acceptable
year of the Lord. The year of Jubilee. The year
when captives may be set free. When debts are canceled. How? Through the Lord Jesus Christ,
the acceptable year of the Lord. And then there was frankincense.
Now frankincense is a sweet gum. And as I thought about this,
I thought, well, it gave consistency to the flower and the oil, the
gum gave consistency to this offering. But what it meant was when they
put this bread offering, the priest took his portion and put
it on that altar and it burnt, it was a sweet smell. The frankincense
gave it a sweet smell. And so we read in Ephesians that
he gave himself an offering, a sacrifice as a sweet savor
unto the Lord. And then something else which
was included was salt. Salt. I like salt, don't you? Someone told me one time after
we've reached a certain age, and I've been past that age many
years ago, that we especially like salt. And it's the worst
thing we could eat. You go on a salt-free diet. Oh,
it's bland. It's not savory at all, is it?
But there was salt mixed with this offering to show that Christ
is tasty. Oh, taste and see that the Lord's
good. If you don't believe He's good,
you've never tasted. You've not tasted yet. Oh, taste
and see. Look to Christ. Believe in Christ. Receive Christ. Oh, taste and
see the Lord is good. This offering, there was salt
mixed with it. Savory. But then there was two
things which were excluded. I believe this is in verse 11.
The first thing was leaven. Note, no meat offering which
you shall bring unto the Lord shall be made with leaven. Don't
put any leaven in it. Fine flour, oil, frankincense,
salt, no leaven. Now, Levin, according to the
words of the Lord Jesus Christ, according to his words, he said,
or he used Levin, rather, to picture two things. The first
was, he said, beware of the Levin of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy. The Lord Jesus Christ was real,
he was true. There was no hypocrisy in him. You know that word hypocrisy, I'm counting on my memory here.
But it comes from a word which means mask, M-A-S-K, just like
you have mask on. But in plays, in Greek plays,
There might be one actor and he might play a number of parts
and all he would do is hold up another mask in front of his
face. And that's what hypocrisy is. It's playing a part. Beware
of the leaven of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy. They play
a part. They want to come across as being
religious. They stand on the street corners
and blow a trumpet when we give an offering. Everyone listen
when we pray. Everything we do to be seen of
men. Our Lord said they have their
reward. They want to be seen of men, be thought to be real,
religious, sanctimonious. They get it. Beware of Levin. And then he used Levin a second
time concerning the false doctrine of the Pharisees and the Sadducees. Now we could go a long way there.
False doctrine of the Pharisees. What was the basic false doctrine
of the Pharisees? They believed that they could
establish a righteousness by their own works that God would
accept. That has to be the main false
doctrine of the Pharisees. They did not understand the law. The law is spiritual. And because
they could observe the outward acts of the law, they thought
that they were keeping the law and that they were accepted to
God by their works, by their righteousness. I'm thankful tonight
for the righteousness of Christ, aren't you? And scripture in
Revelation says that they washed their robes in the blood of the
Lamb. They wash their robes. That's
where we must be washed. And we must have a robe that
He puts on us, which is His righteousness. And then there was a second thing
that was excluded, not only leaven, but honey. Now that may sound
strange at first, because we know that honey is used sometimes
to picture good things. For instance, the word of the
Lord is sweeter than honey. God's Word, His written Word
is sweeter than honey. But honey could not be included
in this meat offering, this bread offering. And there are several
reasons that I have read that were given for that purpose,
why it could not be included. But one of the things that I
read is that honey, when it is burned, it gives off a stench. It gives off a bad smell. Oh,
I cannot picture the sacrifice of Christ. His sacrifice is a
sweet-smelling savor, a savor of rest. And another thing that
is mentioned by many of the writers is that Levin itself will act as, or not leaven, honey
will act as leaven. It, it will, I can't think of
the word, but it too will work in, in flour to make flour rise,
you know. It's not pure. It has a, has
a fermenting, that's the word, fermenting. Leaven has a, or
honey has a fermenting part of it. and that could not be used. And then the third thing, this
offering involved two things. Part was burned as a memorial
upon the altar. Man brought his bread offering
and the priest took some of it and put it on the altar and it
burned and the sweet smell went up on before the Lord, just like
the sacrifice of Christ. The other part, was for the priest. The priest who offered for the
man, he was allowed to eat that. That's one way God provided for
the priest. And I would just remind us that
the Lord, if you look with me in Revelation chapter one, the Lord has made us priests. Priests were allowed to eat this
flower offering. They were commanded to eat it.
And in Revelation 1, verses 5 and 6, the scripture says, And from
Jesus Christ, who is the faithful witness and the first begotten
of the dead, and the prince of the kings of the earth, unto
him that loved us and washed us from our sins in his own blood,
and made us kings and priests unto God. There's not a separate
order of Christians. This idea there's priest and
then there's layman. No, we believe in the priesthood
of all believers. He has made us kings and priests
unto God. And just as the priests of old
were commanded to eat that bread offering, so we too are to continue
to feed upon Christ, the true bread offering. Hebrews 12 and
verse 2, looking, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher
of our faith. You say, well, I looked years
ago. Yeah. Keep on looking, looking unto
Jesus. Unto whom? Coming. I came, I
came back so many years. Keep on coming. Every day. Keep on looking. Keep on coming. Keep on feeding upon Christ. He's the author. He's the finisher
of our faith. If we think of faith as objective,
he is our faith. And if we think of faith as being
subjective, as that which is in us, we feed upon Christ. Our faith is strengthened and
confirmed by looking, looking, looking, feeding, feeding, feeding
upon Christ. I pray that the Lord will bless
these thoughts and words to us here this evening. We're going to sing Break Thou
the Bread of Life, number 176, and we'll stand as we sing number
176.