Unpacking Truths
Dive deep into God's word and unpack divine truths for today's life journey. In a world where everyone is seeking, join us as we guide you to find hope and power in God's timeless wisdom. If our discussions spark questions or ideas, reach out to us at UnpackingTruths@LOCChurch.com. Don't forget to Like, Share, and Subscribe, allowing us to continue helping people unpack God's truth for their lives! Hosted by Pastor Kendall Koenig and Pastor Maureen O'Connor of Light of Christ Church in Algonquin, IL.
Unpacking Truths
The Relevance of Sacrifice in Modern Faith: Historical and Theological Perspectives
Can the ancient practice of animal sacrifice still hold relevance in a world without the Temple? Discover the profound and complex history of the Jewish sacrificial system, tracing its roots from early biblical narratives such as Cain and Abel, through the detailed codifications in Leviticus and Deuteronomy, to its centralization at the Tabernacle and the Temple in Jerusalem. Join us as we explore how these rituals served as a deep, symbolic means for humans to connect with the divine, reflecting humanity's primal instincts. Learn about the theological shifts and prophetic critiques that ultimately redefined the concept of sacrifice, especially after the destruction of the temple in AD 70.
We delve into the transformative period when early Christians began to envision Jesus as the ultimate and final sacrifice, a theme powerfully articulated in the book of Hebrews. By reinterpreting Old Testament prophecies, particularly Isaiah 53, through the lens of Jesus' suffering and resurrection, we see how Christian rituals like communion emerged as a reflection of this new understanding. Lastly, we touch on the practical aspects of faith within the church community, emphasizing the importance of flexibility and willingness to step into various roles, even those that might seem mundane. Tune in for an enriching discussion that not only examines historical practices but also connects them to contemporary faith experiences.
#AncientSacrifice #JewishTraditions #TempleRituals #BiblicalHistory #DivineConnection #ChristianTheology #SacrificeAndFaith #PropheticInsights #OldToNewCovenant #FaithInPractice
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So today, on Unpacking Truths, we have a question that has come in from one of our listeners and it is One of you, yeah, one of you. See, we actually do answer your questions. We're going to unpack this truth. And the question was why did the Jewish people stop with sacrifices? Why, and what happened that the sacrificial system of sacrificing animals just kind of ended?
Speaker 2:I'm Pastor Kendall.
Speaker 1:And I'm Pastor Mo.
Speaker 2:Welcome to Unpacking Truths, where we dive deep into God's timeless truths for our lives today.
Speaker 1:Grab your coffee, open your hearts and your minds. Come take this journey with us, as we unpack God's truths. And so why don't you kick us off?
Speaker 2:You bet. So, Mo, as we've talked about this, I'm going way back, so we're doing background to get to the answer of this question. Because it got us just thinking about sacrificial system and why did people sacrifice? And the truth is it starts from the earliest of time. I mean, you look back in the Bible and you see it Cain and Abel offering a sacrifice, Noah, after coming off the ark, offers a sacrifice, and so way before you get to Leviticus where God lays out all these detailed things of how to do that, there was this impetus to sacrifice, to offer the best of what you had to God. And we also noticed that this is not unique to the Jewish faith, that in sort of religious systems around the globe from the earliest times, animal sacrifices have been a part of that in different religions.
Speaker 1:All kinds of sacrifices, not just animal. Children's sacrifices too. So behave kids.
Speaker 2:Absolutely Tragic things like that. And so there has always been this sense that human beings have sensed this longing for what is beyond, for the divine that is beyond them. And how do I connect with that divine and how do I control the divine? How do I connect with that divine and how do I control the divine? How do I do that? And some ways were to either say thank you with an offering or to try and get the gods to do something. They would sometimes do an offering.
Speaker 1:To appease them, so they weren't angry.
Speaker 2:There were sort of these variety of ways that sacrifices have happened around the globe in human societies in lots of different times happened around the globe, in human societies in lots of different times. So it has been a part of human society for a long, long time.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. And I think it's pretty interesting that you kind of bring up the reality that although we don't have a command from God to sacrifice animals and here's how it's all set up until Deuteronomy but then how you bring up, before that right, that you know Cain and Abel and their story of offering to God, even though it was designated to a certain place in Deuteronomy at the temple, and you know all that, but how it's always been interwoven in history, this idea of wanting to connect to something bigger than ourselves.
Speaker 2:And I think some of the idea of animal sacrifices and incense and those things that, if you sensed God was beyond you, you often talked about God in the heavens. Well, how do you connect with something that's up there? Well, smoke goes up. I mean there's some sense where that was, I think, part of that whole idea of sacrifices.
Speaker 1:Yeah In my you know what I found really interesting. So I kind of wondered, like why animals, like, why choose animals? And so in some of my research I like Rabbi Tovia Bolton a lot and he speaks about how animals, right, are very primitive. If they're hungry they kill. If you're in their territory they kill. So they're this very reactive you know they don't think through things first and how animals are supposed to represent humanity's kind of animalistic, primitive part of ourselves.
Speaker 1:I hadn't heard that before, where we too right what is our desire and where we impulsively and selfishly just do what we want, when we want for survival purposes, without thinking of the other, to that part and releasing the life source, which was the blood right as a sacrifice to God to atone for their sins. And so I thought that was really interesting and it kind of, you know, it made a lot of sense. And then I thought, well, yeah, I just thought that was super interesting. It was the same kind of like as Christians, we're supposed to die to ourselves in different ways, right, like what does that look like? Die to certain parts of ourselves, put on our new armor and be in Christ, right, clothe ourselves with Christ. And so it was interesting to think about how it's a dying to that part of themselves to live for something bigger in the process of connecting with God through the sacrifice. So I thought that was interesting.
Speaker 2:Yeah, a whole other area, and this is something we could probably talk about in lots of different angles and aspects, I think. As we both know and as we're trying to lay out. So the process of sacrifice happened from the very beginning of Scripture, from wider human history, and then, as it began to develop within Judaism, it was very much shaped by Leviticus, by Deuteronomy, and sort of coming out of Egypt and as those books are presented for Moses, that they're sort of God is laying out to them, here's how I want you to do it, and there were also some very clear guidance on how to do it and also you to do it, and so, and there were also some very, very clear guidance on how to do it and also where to do it, and so the sacrifices were to be done in front of the tabernacle, in front of this moving tent that they took with them, that they constructed in the wilderness.
Speaker 1:Because the tabernacle was where the presence of God resided.
Speaker 2:Yes, so you were offering it there as a sign of God's presence and offering to God, because that was the God was in there.
Speaker 2:God was in there. And so then, once they got settled in the Holy Land, in the Promised Land, sacrifices sometimes happen in different places. But then once the building of the temple by Solomon, then it was very much controlled only sacrifices should happen at the temple and in the temple. And so it was this gathering point, this focal point, and very much they had to happen there and that so the temple became. Originally sacrifices happened in different places, but then, based on Scripture, god's line, it had to happen in one place.
Speaker 1:And that's why the sacrificial system of animals stopped after the destruction of the temple in 70, right, Well, and that's where we're getting to.
Speaker 2:So yeah, I mean, this temple that gets built in 970 BC eventually gets destroyed by the Babylonians in 587 BC, gets rebuilt and continues up until past Jesus' day, till 70 AD, and then, when the Romans destroy, when the Jews rebel against Roman rule, 70 AD and Rome comes in, destroys the temple, the ability and their understanding and the practice of animal sacrifices ended in 70 AD.
Speaker 1:Because of the command in Deuteronomy 12, right Like this is the place you have to sacrifice, and so it was interesting to me, also with this Rabbi Bolton right. So if for the Jewish people because I should not be speaking into like Jewish theology, so I did a lot of different research with rabbis just what does this mean then for you? If that was your system of being forgiven, right for missing the mark and sinning and doing things you shouldn't have been doing, then how are you forgiven? Then how are you forgiven? And so now modern you know modern Judaism and not all you know people think differently, different sects of Judaism, right, but majority.
Speaker 1:The idea is that through prayer, through repentance and an offering of self, right that becomes the sacrifice, and so what it is is. It's when I's when I talked about the actual animal representing that human, very selfish, reactive part of self. That's where the offering of self is themselves right. And so they often go to Hosea 6.6, which says I desire mercy, not sacrifice, and acknowledgement of God rather than burnt offerings. And so they use that to really understand that it is my heart, my mind and the devotion of myself that I sacrifice this animalistic, selfish, primitive, undivine, godly part of myself that's not made in your image. I sacrifice and I give it to you.
Speaker 1:And some have said you know the rabbis were going back and forth with well, I thought blood had to be spilt for atonement and so many view it like the energy that I have and the heat within my body. It becomes the blood, right, like that's some of their views, rabbis, different understandings of this system and trying to explain things right for the reality that we do have these things in scripture that say like it has to be done this way. This is you know, and we so often want to go black and white. But then also we have scriptures like Hosea where it's like, hey, rather than sacrifice, this is what I really want you to acknowledge me right and to be merciful.
Speaker 2:Well, and Mo, that's a great. I'm glad you lifted up that scripture because we sort of jumped from 970 BC to 70 AD, about a thousand years. There was already critiques of the sacrificial system that was starting hundreds of years after the sacrifices were happening at the temple, that the prophets were starting to push the people because the sacrificial system like, oh, this good thing happened in my life, okay, I have to sacrifice two turtle doves, or I did this, and while I do, this and a partridge in a pear tree, yeah whatever they were, but that it was a sense.
Speaker 2:of it became perfunctory. It became like, oh, I'm just doing this, god says I have to do this, so I do this.
Speaker 1:Wait, I hate to say this out loud, but it kind of sounds like my family, like big Irish Catholic family. It kind of sounds like confession, like oh man, like no-transcript.
Speaker 2:What need have I for all your sacrifices, says the Lord. Or in Jeremiah 620, your burned offerings are not desirable to me, nor are your sacrifices pleasing to me. You're beginning to see this movement within Judaism. Saying that the animal sacrificial system has become was supposed to be this response of either gratitude or brokenness to God, and it just became going through the motions, and so the prophets started attacking that, and Jesus did as well with some of his words too.
Speaker 1:Yeah well, they're missing the mark, right, they're missing the purpose of sacrifice. Like sacrifice in Hebrew is korban, which means offering. It's drawing near, actually it's a drawing near. So it's all about relationship with God. So I sacrifice because the whole purpose is to draw near to you, and so it's a dying off of the parts of ourselves. And some of the theology I read as well talked about how it was thought that when a priest right would pray over the animal or whatever, the sins of the community would go into the animal and then they would sacrifice it. So all the primitive parts of self, all the sins that everyone had done in the community, dies right there with the animal, and so, and then we get to start new right. That's the forgiveness and clean slate.
Speaker 2:And that can be done in two ways. That can be done in an authentic, heartbroken kind of way, or it can be done in a cavalier kind of way, like well, I got to go through this, so then I can keep doing. You know the joke that I always say with my Bible study the? You know the cheesy Christianity. You know I like to sin, god likes to forgive, so it's a great arrangement you know, and that's what the sacrificial system had become, and we're.
Speaker 1:Hey God, I just want to make sure you get to do your part. I don't want to take that away from you at all.
Speaker 2:Exactly, and so that became so. There was already an internal tension within Judaism around the sacrificial system because it was being used not for the original intent, the original purpose, and Jesus was even challenging some of that. Not for the original intent, the original purpose, and Jesus was even challenging some of that. But then you had these two things that happened, as you said, in AD 70, the temple was destroyed so no longer could you do the sacrificial system because the temple was gone.
Speaker 2:But you also had this other dynamic within the. With the birth of Christianity out of Judaism and that the Christian church began to move. While the early Christians would gather in the temple for worship and probably still did practice some of the sacrificial system, you see in the very early church starting to move away from that. In Acts you see Paul wanting to purify himself and he says and I'm going to go to temple to make sacrifices. So they were still doing that. But by the end of the New Testament you begin to see them talking about Jesus was the final sacrifice and so we don't need that anymore.
Speaker 1:Well, and it's like a both and because if sacrifice means for them, you know this idea of drawing near to God. I could definitely see if you are Jewish, and this is your tradition you want to draw near to God as much as possible. So I'm going to draw near to God through the sacrificial system where we have Paul going to the temple to make sacrifices with the other disciples, and then you also have this understanding that you know I go through. You know I draw near to God through Christ, right by drawing near to Christ and by clothing myself in Christ and following the way of Christ in the world. And so it's like a both and, as that began to, if you're a believer in Jesus as the Messiah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:So let me just read a couple of these verses from Hebrews. So Christ, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time, not to deal with sin, but to save those who eagerly await him. And it is by God's will that we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once and for all. Especially in Hebrews, like every other chapter, the writer of Hebrews comes to this point of Jesus being our high priest, but also the high priest who sacrificed himself to end the need for animal sacrifice, because he accomplished it all upon the cross.
Speaker 1:Right? Well, because a priest was always needed, right, to do this part. And so there's a priest needed, and usually it was when sacrificing for the whole community. It was two animals, and one of them they were thought to put the sins of the community in, and one of them they brought they called it the scapegoat right, they brought it to the edge of the community and cast it out. And the other, they sacrificed.
Speaker 1:So Jesus becomes the scapegoat for us sacrificed. So Jesus becomes the scapegoat for us, right, the one that takes upon himself what really is our punishment, our consequence, and so he becomes the priest, the scapegoat and the sacrificial lamb all in one. And that's the beauty of it. And we relive that every single Sunday in communion right, remembering that as we goive, that every single Sunday in communion right, remembering that as we go to the altar and as we, you know, the bread is his body and the blood is his wine, we remember that, we're supposed to remember that sacrifice. That's why we have those. You may notice those white cloths, linens, over the bread and over the wine. It's because it's a corporal, it's a covering. It's because it's a corporal, it's a covering, it's like a burial covering. We are covering the body with burial, covering and remembering this great sacrifice of Jesus, who took upon himself what really was ours.
Speaker 2:And in many ways the Christian church, after experiencing the Christian movement, jesus' followers, after experiencing his death and resurrection, went back to the Old Testament and go like hold it. We didn't expect a suffering Messiah. And they ended up back in Isaiah 53 where it says and we thought his troubles were a punishment from God, a punishment for his own sins. But he was pierced for our rebellion, crushed for our sins. He was beaten so we could our sins. He was beaten so we could be whole. He was whipped so we could be healed. That whole sense of Jesus becoming the vicarious sacrifice for all of us, completing that so we no longer need to do animal sacrifice.
Speaker 1:Can you imagine what worship would be like, though, if we really came to the altar for communion every single time and really just resonated with those words that you know that Jesus was beaten, that he was rejected, that he was brutally tortured, really for our behalf. And here we stand before his body Right, and here is his blood, before his body right, and here is his blood, and we consume it, so that we remember that not only did he give himself for us, but he lives in us and because of him we're free.
Speaker 1:Like, if you know, if we came to the altar every time, like that for communion, how could we not live transformed lives.
Speaker 2:It is we face the same challenge that Jewish folks experienced long ago that you can begin to just start going through the motions.
Speaker 1:Absolutely.
Speaker 2:And it's so easy for each of us to get caught up in everything else and to forget the deepest reality of what has been done for us.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, and I mean, we do it like I've done it too, on accident.
Speaker 2:Of course.
Speaker 1:You know just where you're going through the motions. I even had a friend say you know, you just drink the blood of Christ like you were taking a shot. I was like, oh yeah, because you just go through the motions, sometimes without really being present in the moment to realize what's going on and just how powerful that is, Just how powerful that is.
Speaker 2:And, mel, that's where I love the line. And maybe this is even where we end, where you said the whole purpose of sacrifices initially were this idea to draw near to God. Yes, that that is what worship is to be. That is what prayer is to be. It's not like oh, have I checked off my morning prayers? Did I go to worship? This week it is about drawing near to God. Week it is about drawing near to God and that in worship we do that, and maybe the modern sense of sacrifice In our whole lives, right, our whole lives, our finances, our time.
Speaker 2:Well and that's just where I was going to go is that we no longer sacrifice animals. Jesus has done the full sacrifice for our sins. But there is still this sense of giving something of ourselves up for God. It's when people talk about giving something up for Lent or that, when we offer our time for a neighbor in need, for a ministry, that makes an impact. For, in Jesus' name, when we give up our financial resources, when we invest in those things, we are making a sacrifice because we're saying that's even more important, because we want to draw near to God. We're not trying to control God, we're not trying to own God, we're just saying, god, we see what you have done for us, we see what you have done for us, jesus, and so we make these personal sacrifices to honor you, to draw near to you Absolutely.
Speaker 1:Amen to that, personal sacrifices to honor you, to draw near to you Absolutely Amen to that.
Speaker 2:Well, I don't know. I think it was a simple question that was asked and we'll circle around. It was AD 70 when the Jewish sacrificial system ended, and that's why because the temple was destroyed. But as we've sort of touched in just little ways, there's so much more to that system that was and that still is today in a very different way for all of our lives. Thanks for joining us for Unpacking Truths this week. If you have more questions like that, please submit them below and we'll love to dig into those going forward Next time on Unpacking Truths.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, I think it really does come down to creating healthy boundaries, and we can be unboundaried, we can be too boundaried. We need healthy boundaries because they help us to live well. They help us to steward the gift of our time and our energy and our talents in the right way. And yet there are times where God's going to call us out of our natural way. And yet there are times where God's going to call us out of our natural way. You know, there'll be times where my primary job, at Light of Christ, is not to vacuum the carpet. We have some other people who do that at different times. Does that mean Kendall will never vacuum the carpet. No, there might be a time where I need to step in to do that. So it's not my normal thing, but there may be a time when I need to do that.
Speaker 1:Thanks for joining us on this episode of Unpacking Truths. If anything that we discussed sparked any ideas or you have any questions, we would love for you to go to unpackingtruthscom, or you can also email us at unpackingtruths at locchurchcom.
Speaker 2:And don't forget to like, share or subscribe to the podcast, because you doing that allows other people to connect to this content and grow with God as well.
Speaker 1:Until next time, we hope you know that you are loved.
