THE SHADOW OF THINGS TO COME

“Now this is what you shall offer on the altar: two lambs a year old day by day regularly. One lamb you shall offer in the morning, and the other lamb you shall offer at twilight.” (Exodus 29:38-39)

The Levitical priests in the Old Covenant were required to offer two lambs each day. One in the morning and one at twilight. The Levites, the specific tribe of Israel that was tasked with handling the temple duties, were required to do this daily. As I was reading this text one morning I was arrested by this verse.  

It was as if God himself said, “Stop, pay closer to attention to what you just read.” I began to imagine in detail what these two verses looked like each and every day.  

The sun is just beginning to rise over the camp of Israel and the sound of bleating lambs and goats fill the morning air. A robed levite rises from his tent and makes his way to the tabernacle. As he enters the outer court he sees the prominent brazen altar. A place of slaughter and forgiveness.  

In humble obedience to the temple duties, this levite grabs the yearling lamb. The young male lamb bleats nervously as it is picked up and carried to the place of offering. The priest secures the lamb and he feels the soft wool and tender skin tense up under his grip. As he cuts its throat the lamb lets out a loud bleat, followed by silence. He then finishes the offering by pouring the blood around the altar and burning the animal on the brass grate.  

This Spirit-filled vision played over and over in my mind as I imagined the priests performing this duty morning after morning and night after night. As I was pondering how much physical work this required for the priest and the reality of witnessing daily death, it was as if I was awoken from a spiritual slumber. The reality is that the priests would have felt the warmth of the blood of the lamb on their hands and been connected to the weight of the sacrifice each and every day. Whether their hearts connected with it or not, the physical act of taking the life of an animal connected them to the sacrifice in a very intimate way.  

I then heard the voice of the Father speak to me:

“If the priests of the Old Covenant were so diligent in stewarding the blood of lambs, how much more should my New Covenant priests steward the blood of My Son?”

In a moment I realized how numb I was to that reality. How lazy I had been with the blood of Jesus! A deep conviction hit me!

How much of the Christian activity in my life was simply going through the motions instead of a joyous response to the Gospel? How could I be so numb to the greatest act of love the world had ever known?  

I started asking myself these questions. What would it look like for me to stay connected to the sobering reality of Jesus’ brutal death on the cross? How could I keep the blood of Jesus "warm" upon my heart? How could I prevent myself from being numb and forgetting the depth of love and the intensity of God’s passion for me demonstrated through this moment in time? How do I take something that my mind knows intellectually and move it into a heart reality? How could I, a priest unto God in the New Covenant, keep my heart connected to his sacrifice and from that place offer something of value to God? These questions sparked a deep hunger in me to know how to keep my heart innocent and alive to this truth I had been “taught” my whole life.

This hunger became more than just a neat revelation, it felt as if God was inviting me to partake of an ancient lifestyle that would bring a consciousness of God into my life that I had never known previously. An invitation to enter into my ministry as a priest before God. An invitation to diligently and humbly steward the blood of Jesus Christ. An invitation to be loved deeply and to live a life of love.