The Peace Offering Series

Offering: Living & Giving for the Glory of God

Study of Leviticus

The Peace Offering

Leviticus 3:1-17

First Family Church

317 S.E. Magazine Rd.

Ankeny, IA 50021

www.firstfamilyministries.com

Transcript of Message by Todd Stiles

January 23, 2011

Take your Bibles. Find Leviticus chapter three and let’s continue to find great comfort in the bloodiest book of the Bible. And aren’t we thankful? I would encourage you not to ever grow accustomed to the bloodiness of the Bible, of the bloodiness of the beautiful, terrible cross or to try to run from it. For we are not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God to salvation to everyone who believes, amen?

So, boy, you just read Leviticus and sing those songs and you start realizing, wow, our culture may not think it is really in, but praise God for the shed blood of Jesus, amen?

We are looking today at Leviticus three and we have arrived here because we are looking at seeing how the Israelites worshipped and related to God when he came and lived among them. You recall the end of Exodus chapter 40. The glory of the Lord descended and suddenly God was not just in a pillar of fire or a cloud. He was now among them. And so how do we relate to this God that is living right here with us?

Well, that is what Leviticus is about. How do we approach God? How as an Israelite in centuries ago do we worship him?

And so Leviticus is really a book that describes how they worshipped God. And a couple of things we have seen from the first two offerings is that true worship is individual. That was seen in the burnt offering. You brought it. You laid your hand on it and then the whole thing was offered to God. We have also seen that true worship is grateful and we saw that in the grain offering.

Today we are going to see that true worship is also communal. It is something that we share together. So, yes, it is individual, but there is a wonderful place for the body of Christ to worship together. We are going to see how that is taught in the peace offering. So Leviticus three is where you have your Bible open to. And this short chapter describes the mechanics of the peace offering.

Now I got to tell you, though. This chapter is relatively short, but chapter seven about verses, oh, I think 11 through about 36 describe a lot more mechanics about the peace offering. We want to see both of these texts today in what will be somewhat mechanical and rote. Don’t let it lose your attention. Don’t kind of get bogged down. There is some good details here, but I want us to work through the text in an appropriate manner and then I want to bring some meaning to the peace offering by showing you some New Tes-tament Scriptures where this is kind of highlighted.

So the first few minutes might get a little long because we are going to be doing some theology and biology. You will see what I am talking about. But just hang with me. Don’t lose me.

I would draw your attention also to the screen behind me. This is kind of another, just a picture of the tabernacle. It is the entire enclosure. The tent of meeting is that house or that tent inside the white fence. And, of course, inside the tent of meeting is where the holy of holies was. That is were the ark of the covenant was and that is where God dwelt.

And this, outside the tent of meeting, there was the brazen altar. That is where many of these offerings took place. And all the tents, the camps, the families and the clans were facing, of course, that direction. And I am sure they extended for miles as you are talking about a million people plus.

Some of these logistics are hard to understand. I have had a number of great questions from you wonderful Bereans who study your Bible so well about how did that many peo-ple offer that many burnt offerings? What did they do with all that blood and all that flesh and all those carcasses and...?

Those are good questions. I don’t know if I have answers to them, but let you know. God is not a disorganized God. He had a plan and he had it working out just right.

Well, this peace offering was one of the ones they brought to the tabernacle. We are go-ing to read about it in Leviticus three.

Now when I say the word “peace” to you, you often probably think about peace in Amer-ican terms. You think about an end of hostility. You think about a cease fire. You think about something that means, ok, people are getting along.