THE SACRIFICIAL SYSTEM OF THE OLD TESTAMENT

1. A Broken Relationship
When man was first created, he had a close relationship with God. They were able to walk and 
talk together in the garden of Eden as friends. Sin however changed all that. The close 
relationship was broken and Man and God were no longer able to communicate as friends.

2. God's Plan
To put the situation right God planned a campaign of "reconciliation", a program designed to 
bring the two sides back together. (Another word for reconciliation is atonement" - to make 
"at one") This involved convincing man that he had sinned, repentance on man's part, and some 
means of paying the penalty for man's sin. The penalty for sin was death and if man was not 
going to die then someone else would have to. That someone it was decided would be Jesus, 
God's Son.

3. Sacrifices
This plan was worked out well before the world was even created, but God still had to explain 
the plan to man. This was done gradually over many years, the first step being the instruction 
to make sacrifices.

The first sacrifices mentioned in the Bible are those of Cain and Abel in Genesis Ch. 4. Note 
that only the animal sacrifice was considered acceptable to God. This is because the animal 
had to die; God doesn't like death but man had to realise that sin is a very serious thing, 
and the only result of sin is death.

Sacrifices then, were offered regularly by God's people to help to explain the plan of 
salvation to them. However, as the years went by, God brought some other things in to make His 
plan even clearer. Certain people were made "Prophets" who would speak to the people every now 
and then from God. Others were made "Priests" who would go before God on behalf of the people. 
So the relationship between God and man was brought a little closer.

In the time of Moses God gave a lot more instructions as to how, when, and where sacrifices 
should be made. These were carefully designed so that man would be able to understand more 
fully just what God's plan of salvation meant.

4. The Tabernacle
The centre of the sacrificial system was the "Tabernacle" a special tent where people would 
bring their animals to be sacrificed by the priest. The man who brought the animal would put 
his hands on the head of the animal (usually a lamb) and then confess his sins, showing that 
he was sorry for what he had done. The priest would then kill the animal showing that the 
penalty for sin is death. Some of the animal's blood would then be taken and sprinkled inside 
the "Holy Place" in the tabernacle showing that only God can take away sins.

5. The Day of Atonement
The sin then, was symbolically transferred from the man to the animal to the priest and 
finally to the sanctuary where it stayed until one particular day which was called the day of 
"atonement". On this day no one did any work and no ordinary sacrifices were made. Instead the 
High Priest would take two young goats into the tabernacle. One was chosen at random to be 
sacrificed - the "Lord's Goat". The High Priest would put his hands on the goat's head and 
confess that all the Israelites were sinners. The goat would then be killed and its blood 
sprinkled inside the Holy Place and the Most Holy Place. By this act, all the sins which had 
accumulated inside the tabernacle over the past year, were cancelled out, the sanctuary was 
cleansed. The priest then put his hands on the second goat symbolically putting the guilt for 
sin on it, and the goat was then led out into the desert. Notice that because this goat wasn't 
killed it had nothing to do with paying the penalty for sin.

6. Symbolism
Everything in the tabernacle or sanctuary was symbolic, that is it represented something else. 
Note that the death of an animal never took anyone's sins away, it was Jesus' death that took 
everyone's sins away, the animals in the Old Testament sacrifices just represented Jesus. The 
sanctuary in the OT represented something else in heaven, a "heavenly sanctuary" if you like, 
and the things which went on in the earthly sanctuary represented what went on (or would go 
on) in the heavenly sanctuary. So the day of atonement when the sanctuary was cleansed, when 
all the accumulated sins of the year were removed, also represented something which would go 
on at some stage in heaven. From the prophecy of Daniel 8:14 it seems that whatever this was 
started at the end of the 2300 days (years) which we date as A.D. 1844.