Introduction

In the previous article we considered our Lord’s one offering that has perfected forever them that are sanctified. What God decreed in his eternal counsel concerning the consummation of his covenant of grace was brought to completion by the high priest, Jesus Christ. He accomplished all that was needed to bring a guilty and damnworthy people unto the living God for intimate fellowship in his holy sanctuary, such that already now we sit together in heavenly places in Christ. That offering was his lifelong suffering for the sins of many and his diligent obedience to the will of God in the place of his elect, which culminated in Christ’s high priestly service on the cross as the bloody sacrifice.

At the end of the previous study, we noted that the incalculable number of sacrifices offered daily in the temple for over a millennium could never perfect what the righteous servant of Jehovah perfected. Those sacrifices could not take away sin once and for all. They could not ransom a single life from hell. They could not satisfy the divine justice of the Holy One of Israel, whose majesty was profaned and truth slandered by the treacherous rebellion of man. Those sacrifices brought nothing to completion, for they were not what God had determined in his wisdom to reconcile a people unto himself. Or better, those sacrifices brought nothing to completion, for they were not the one through whom God would show the exceeding riches of his grace in his kindness toward us.

Those sacrifices of the old dispensation were merely the shadow of a body, a body of the mediator, who stands in his appointed place in history and is revealed only in the fullness of time according to the good pleasure of Jehovah. Those sacrifices were not the glory of God to be revealed, but they were dim reflections of his marvelous light. Those sacrifices were not the very image of him who lives and was dead and is alive forevermore, but they were figures ready to be disposed of at the power and coming of the Lord Jesus Christ in our flesh. They pointed ahead to the cross, where mercy and truth met together, and righteousness and peace kissed each other.

But now the Lord God of Israel has visited and redeemed his people. The dayspring from on high has visited us. Simeon took up the Christ in his arms and declared, “Mine eyes have seen thy salvation, O Lord!” And this one, being the first to announce the glad tidings of his gospel, declared, “It is finished!” even as he willingly laid down his life and fulfilled every type and shadow of prophecy. Now he is seated in heaven at the right hand of majesty as the lamb that was slain, executing all things in heaven and on earth unto the great and notable day of the Lord. And then the holy city, the new Jerusalem, shall come down from heaven as a bride adorned for her husband, and the tabernacle of God shall be with the redeemed. God shall dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and he shall be their God. The fruit of God’s labor in his Son, our high priest!

Such an office and power that belong to Christ may not be ascribed to any other man, much less to a goat or a bullock. However, those sacrifices of the old dispensation, fulfilled and abrogated two thousand years ago, do teach yet today. We confess in Lord’s Day 6 of the Heidelberg Catechism that God represented the holy gospel by those sacrifices. Furthermore, Belgic Confession article 25 teaches that “we still use the testimonies taken out of the law and the prophets, to confirm us in the doctrine of the gospel” (Confessions and Church Order, 89, 55). Sacrifices confirm us in the holy gospel! They continue to speak, ministering to our faith in the risen and exalted Lord. And so, we take up a more extensive study of the sacrifices, as they confirm us in the doctrine of the labor of our eternal high priest, who, on the basis of his one offering and sacrifice for sin, continually intercedes on our behalf and brings us into fellowship with the Father.

The particular focus of this article is to give ourselves both a general reacquaintance with the sacrifices prescribed by God through Moses as well as to examine their overarching doctrine.

Five Sacrifices

The book of Leviticus opens with a treatment of five different kinds of sacrifices: the burnt, meat, peace, sin, and trespass offerings. “The Lord called unto Moses, and spake unto him out of the tabernacle of the congregation, saying, Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, If any man of you bring an offering unto the Lord…” (Lev. 1:1–2). What follows are seven chapters of instruction regarding those various sacrifices.

Chapters 1–3 deal with the burnt offering, the peace offering, and the meat offering, respectively. The Israelite would have been familiar with those three sacrifices, for those sacrifices had already been brought to light in sacred history. Burnt offerings were what Noah offered unto Jehovah when Noah departed from the ark and sacrificed clean beasts and birds, what Abraham offered when he sacrificed his only and beloved son Isaac in the land of Moriah, and what Job offered for his children and for his foolish friends. Meat offerings were known prior to that point, for God in Exodus 30 forbad their usage upon the altar of incense. Regarding the peace offering, it is possible that the meal shared between Jacob and his brethren was of this sort. Furthermore, after Moses sacrificed peace offerings at the base of Mount Sinai, he ascended the mount with the elders of Israel for a meal in the presence of their covenant God (Ex. 24). That Israel was already familiar with those kinds of offerings is indicated by the fact that they needed no introduction when God prescribed them through Moses (Lev. 1:3; 2:1; 3:1).

In contrast to those first three sacrifices, the sin offering given in Leviticus 4:1 through 5:13 and the trespass offering given in 5:14 through 6:17 were unknown to Israel prior to the Exodus. That those offerings were new to the Israelite is evident not only by the fact that those offerings have no earlier mention in scripture but also that they have a unique introduction in Leviticus. The discourse on burnt, meat, and peace offerings continues uninterrupted in chapters 1–3. But when 4:1 introduces the sin offering and 5:14 introduces the trespass offering,¹ both begin with the words, “The Lord spake unto Moses, saying…”

What follows in the remainder of chapter 6 and in chapter 7 are further regulations regarding those five sacrifices.

Until the law came by Moses, bloody sacrifices were marked with great simplicity. Later, elaborateness marked the sacrificial system, and the number was increased to five. Though these five sacrifices had many common elements, each possessed unique features that set them apart both in practice and in the mind of Israel. And so the question arises, why five?

In early volumes of the Standard Bearer, Rev. G. M. Ophoff gave a thorough examination of those different sacrifices, and his conclusion regarding the divine wisdom in prescribing those different sacrifices was as follows:

All these kinds of sacrifice were needed to bring out the whole truth in connection with the work of Christ; they were needful to the believer as the instruments for the adequate expression of the faith that was in him, of his contrition, gratitude and praise, thus of the response of his heart to the grace of God that he experienced. The manifold riches of grace called for such an elaborate ritual sacrifice, if anything like a complete representation was to be given and supplied, namely a shadow service in the face of which every feature of redemption and salvation of the elect of God stood out in plain relief, and thus a service that as performed in faith and love betokened all the hallowed and variant states and feelings of the true people of God.²

In harmony with this conclusion, Ophoff examined the sacrificial system not only from the viewpoint of how the body of Christ was typified in the various sacrifices but also with special emphasis on the inner condition of the elect sinner who brought those offerings by faith.

However, my scope in treating the sacrifices is narrower, for I intend to give particular emphasis on how those different sacrifices show forth the richness of Christ’s one offering that has perfected forever them that are sanctified. Thus the present study is more confined to the doctrines of Christology. And what will stand in stark relief as I treat those different sacrifices will be that the cross was vicarious satisfaction.

Atonement or Satisfaction?

Vicarious satisfaction—this is the precise term that exhaustively expresses all that Christ has done on our behalf as our mediator. It is the overarching doctrine of the cross as typified in the Levitical sacrifices. This is the genus under which subsumes the finer points of doctrine described and depicted by the various sacrifices. But this needs an explanation.

This needs an explanation because we are, perhaps, more familiar with another term that is frequently used when describing the nature of Christ’s offering of himself as a sacrifice unto God—substitutionary atonement.

Atonement is a theological term that has common usage among us. When we were taught the distinctives of the Reformed faith over against Arminianism under the acronym TULIP, we learned that L stands for limited atonement. As young people we were taught substitutionary atonement from the Essentials catechism book in the lessons on Christ’s state of humiliation and the Lord’s supper.³ If you were to look in the back of The Confessions and the Church Order of the Protestant Reformed Churches, under the “Doctrinal Index to the Creeds” and the “Doctrinal Index to the Liturgical Forms,” you will find in the Christology section that the work of Christ is subsumed under the heading “Atonement.” And this is the heading that Hoeksema gave in his Reformed Dogmatics to his treatment of the nature of Christ’s sacrifice.⁴

Atonement is the term in the King James translations of the Hebrew word כפר, and it is the important word used in connection with the Levitical offerings. For example: “He [the offerer] shall put his hand upon the head of the burnt offering; and it shall be accepted for him to make atonement [כפר] for him” (Lev. 1:4; see 4:20, 26, 31, etc.). The great focal point of the entire sacrificial system was the day of atonement (כפר), when the blood of the first goat was brought all the way into the most holy place and sprinkled on the mercy seat (more literally, the place of atonement since the Hebrew word for mercy seat is a derivative noun from כפר) and when the second goat was sent away into the wilderness to be seen no more. “On that day,” said Jehovah, “shall the priest make an atonement [כפר] for you, to cleanse you, that ye may be clean from all your sins before the Lord” (16:30). Over one hundred times this term appears in the Old Testament.

However, the term atonement all but disappears in the New Testament. In the King James Version, atonement is used once in Romans 5:11: “Not only so, but we also joy in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom we have now received the atonement.” But the Greek word in this verse (καταλλαγή) would be better rendered as “reconciliation” instead of “atonement,” for this is how the word is translated in 2 Corinthians 5:18‒19: “All things are of God, who hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ, and hath given to us the ministry of reconciliation; to wit, that God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them.” In fact, there is no one Greek word in the New Testament that is equivalent to the Hebrew⁵ כפר.

Rather, there are many different Greek words that convey the rich thought of the Hebrew כפר. In the New Testament the Holy Spirit speaks of ἱλασμός, or “propitiation.”⁶ Propitiation was needful to appease the wrath of God, which justly belongs upon all men for their sin and rebellion against him. By the offering of himself, Jesus Christ turned the wrath of God from us, where it rightfully belonged, and turned it to himself. We must add that, in the light of God’s counsel, God was never angry with his people but ever beholds them as beloved and redeemed in his Son. Neither is Christ a third party who interposes himself between a vengeful God and a sinful people, but Christ was sent by God to turn away his wrath that rightfully belonged to us. “Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation [ἱλασμός] for our sins” (1 John 4:10).

In the New Testament the Holy Spirit speaks of ἀγοράζω and λυτρόω, or “redemption.”⁷ Christ by his one offering redeemed us from our slavery to sin and Satan, which our sin rightfully deserves. When man fell God executed upon man a sentence of death to sin and Satan, according to the justice of God’s perfect law. And since the law demands payment of the penal debt incurred by the sinner, what was needed was a ransom, a purchase price, to be paid to God. This purchase price came from God. God paid God what God was due for our sins. He redeemed us from hell and the grave through Jesus Christ, who is the ransom of our souls and the price paid for our redemption. The work of Christ as it bears upon the elect sinner is deliverance from the curse of the law by the payment of an equivalent ransom price. “Christ hath redeemed [ἀγοράζω] us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us: for it is written, Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree” (Gal. 3:13). Our savior, Jesus Christ, “gave himself for us, that he might redeem [λυτρόω] us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works” (Titus 2:14). “Pass the time of your sojourning here in fear: forasmuch as ye know that ye were not redeemed [λυτρόω] with corruptible things, as silver and gold, from your vain conversation received by tradition from your fathers; but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot” (1 Pet. 1:17‒19).

In the New Testament the Holy Spirit speaks of ἄφεσις, or “remission of sin” and “forgiveness.⁸ Closely connected is καθαρίζω, or “cleansing” and “purging.” Christ by his offering expiates all sin, so that all guilt is utterly removed and so that the moral obligation to be punished for that sin is annulled. “This is the covenant that I will make with them after those days, saith the Lord…Their sins and iniquities will I remember no more. Now where remission [ἄφεσις] of these is, there is no more offering for sin” (Heb. 10:16–18). “How much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without spot to God, purge [καθαρίζω] your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?” (9:14). That man is blest whose transgression is forgiven and whose sin is covered. That man is blest unto whom Jehovah does not impute iniquity. We emphasize this aspect in light of our condemnation of the Protestant Reformed doctrine that the cross was not forgiveness.⁹

In the New Testament the Holy Spirit also speaks of καταλλαγή, or “reconciliation.”¹⁰ In the state of guilt, speaking from the viewpoint of the sinner, the sinner is the proper object of the wrath of God. In the sinner’s own mind and conscience, he is an enemy of God. In the state of righteousness, the sinner is the object of God’s love and favor. In the sinner’s own mind and conscience, he is the friend of God. Here we must studiously avoid the idea that God must be reconciled to man. Rather, God is the one who reconciles. God is God. God remains the sole subject when dealing with the ungodly but elect sinner. Man remains the sole object. “All things are of God, who hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ, and hath given to us the ministry of reconciliation; to wit, that God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them” (2 Cor. 5:18–19). Thus atonement is never the cause of God’s love, for he is absolutely unchangeable in his being and thoughts in eternity. Rather, atonement is the effect of his eternal love, for God so loved the world that he gave his only-begotten Son. And the people of God were reconciled unto him at the cross when he did not impute their transgressions to them but to Christ.

These are the words that the New Testament uses. Though the term atonement disappears in the New Testament, it is certainly present behind the other words that are used to describe the nature of Christ’s offering.

Neither does the term atonement appear in the Reformed creeds. And that is not surprising considering the etymology of the word. Atonement is a rather late word, arising in the sixteenth century with the original meaning of “being at one with others,” or at-one-ment. It was soon adopted as a theological term meaning “reconciliation of man with God” and “satisfaction or reparation for wrong or injury, propitiation of an offended party.”¹¹ But the creeds are not lacking for words either when describing the nature of Christ’s high priestly service. Consider the language of Belgic Confession article 21, entitled “The Satisfaction of Christ, Our Only High Priest, For Us.”

We believe that Jesus Christ is ordained with an oath to be an everlasting High Priest, after the order of Melchisedec; and that He hath presented Himself in our behalf before the Father to appease His wrath by His full satisfaction, by offering Himself on the tree of the cross and pouring out His precious blood to purge away our sins, as the prophets had foretold. For it is written: He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon Him, and with His stripes we are healed. He was brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and numbered with the transgressors, and condemned by Pontius Pilate as a malefactor, though he had first declared Him innocent. Therefore, He restored that which He took not away, and suffered, the just for the unjust, as well in His body as in His soul, feeling the terrible punishment which our sins had merited; insomuch that His sweat became like unto drops of blood falling on the ground. He called out, My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me? and hath suffered all this for the remission of our sins.

Wherefore we justly say with the apostle Paul, that we know nothing but Jesus Christ, and Him crucified; we count all things but loss and dung for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus our Lord, in whose wounds we find all manner of consolation. Neither is it necessary to seek or invent any other means of being reconciled to God than this only sacrifice, once offered, by which believers are made perfect forever. This is also the reason why He was called by the angel of God, Jesus, that is to say, Savior, because He would save his people from their sins. (Confessions and Church Order, 47–49; emphasis in bold added)

In conclusion, the word atonement itself is a suitable theological term, so long as we understand all that is implicated by its usage. We do not go so far as Hodge did to dismiss the term atonement as “ambiguous” and “too limited in its signification for the purpose assigned to it.”¹² Hodge’s contention was this:

It does not express all that Scripture declares that Christ did in order to satisfy all the demands of God’s law. It properly signifies the expiation of sin, and nothing more. It represents only that satisfaction which Christ rendered to the justice of God in vicariously bearing the penalty due to our sins, but it does not include that satisfaction which Christ rendered in his vicarious obedience to the law as a covenant of everlasting well-being.¹³

Over against what Hodge contended, when we use the term atonement in connection with the one offering of the body of Jesus Christ, we use it in a technical and theological sense that means much more than the idea that Christ expiated the sins of his people. He certainly bore away all of our sins and blotted out the handwriting of ordinances that was against us by his blood, nailing it to the cross. But Christ did not simply take us up from our infinite debt to zero. Through the whole of Christ’s life, there ran an element of infinite humiliation, especially in his death. Therefore, every act was, in one aspect, an item of vicarious suffering, and in another aspect, an item of vicarious obedience to the will of his Father. When we use the word atonement, we include this passive and active work of Christ. He fulfilled all righteousness. It is as Hoeksema said,

Mere passive suffering is no sacrifice. Even the damned in hell suffer the wrath of God without ever atoning for their sin. To satisfy the justice of God one must perform an act that is the perfect antithesis of the act of willful disobedience of man in the first paradise. His act must be the perfect “yes” over against the sinner’s “no.” This is exactly what Christ accomplished on the cross. Voluntarily he entered into death and suffered the deepest agonies of hell, not for his own sins, but for the sins of those whom the Father had given him.¹⁴

Yet we can sympathize with Hodge’s sentiment. He wished to do justice to the perfect offering of the Lord Jesus Christ. And if there remains any ambiguity, then there is another word that simply captures all that has been said above. Satisfaction.

Preferred: Satisfaction

I prefer the word satisfaction to atonement. This is the overarching doctrine in the light of which I will examine the various Mosaic sacrifices.

For, first, satisfaction is the word of the creeds. It is the word that Belgic Confession article 21 uses to summarize Christ’s high priestly sacrifice. And it is the word of article 20:

We believe that God, who is perfectly merciful and just, sent His Son to assume that nature in which the disobedience was committed, to make satisfaction in the same, and to bear the punishment of sin by His most bitter passion and death. (Confessions and Church Order, 46–47; emphasis added)

Satisfaction is the word of the Heidelberg Catechism in Lord’s Days 5–6, 21, and 23:

Q. 12. Since then, by the righteous judgment of God, we deserve temporal and eternal punishment, is there no way by which we may escape that punishment and be again received into favor?

A. God will have His justice satisfied; and therefore we must make this full satisfaction, either by ourselves or by another.

Q. 16. Why must He be very man, and also perfectly righteous?

A. Because the justice of God requires that the same human nature which hath sinned should likewise make satisfaction for sin; and one who is himself a sinner cannot satisfy for others.

Q. 56. What believest thou concerning “the forgiveness of sins”?

A. That God, for the sake of Christ’s satisfaction, will no more remember my sins, neither my corrupt nature, against which I have to struggle all my life long; but will graciously impute to me the righteousness of Christ, that I may never be condemned before the tribunal of God.

Q. 60. How art thou righteous before God?

A. Only by a true faith in Jesus Christ; so that, though my conscience accuse me that I have grossly transgressed all the commandments of God, and kept none of them, and am still inclined to all evil; notwithstanding, God, without any merit of mine, but only of mere grace, grants and imputes to me the perfect satisfaction, righteousness, and holiness of Christ; even so, as if I never had had nor committed any sin: yea, as if I had fully accomplished all that obedience which Christ has accomplished for me; inasmuch as I embrace such benefit with a believing heart. (Confessions and Church Order, 87, 88, 105, 106– 7; emphasis added)

And satisfaction is the word of the Canons in 2.2–3:

Since, therefore, we are unable to make that satisfaction in our own persons, or to deliver ourselves from the wrath of God, He hath been pleased in His infinite mercy to give His only begotten Son for our surety who was made sin, and became a curse for us and in our stead, that He might make satisfaction to divine justice on our behalf.

The death of the Son of God is the only and most perfect sacrifice and satisfaction for sin, and is of infinite worth and value, abundantly sufficient to expiate the sins of the whole world. (Confessions and Church Order, 163; emphasis added)

Second, satisfaction was also the word of the fathers. It is the word that is used to describe Christ’s high priestly work as sacrifice. Heppe used the word when he made a distinction in Christ’s high priesthood between his satisfactio and his intercessio. He then quoted from the Leiden Synopsis and from Bucan, respectively.

The priesthood of Christ is the function of Christ by which he appears before God (1) to keep the law accepted by himself in our name, to offer himself to Him as the sacrifice of reconciliation for our sins, (2) and by his intercession with Him to obtain us His everlasting help and the gift of the H. Spirit and to apply them effectively, Heb. 10:7-8f. (Lo, I am come to do thy will)

How many parts are there of this office?—Two: satisfaction, by which he had fulfilled the law and paid up the ransom for the sins of the world; in respect to this part he is called redeemer and savior and lamb or victim: and intercession, by which Christ solely desires that his sacrifice should avail for ever with God the Father for the reconciliation of his elect, brings our prayers to the Father and bestows upon us confidence to approach Him.¹⁵

Satisfaction, according to the usage of the word, already captures not only the passive nature of Christ’s work but also his active obedience. Here is Heppe once more:

The satisfaction rests entirely upon the voluntary obedience with which Christ gave himself up for the world, by his subjecting himself on the one hand to the will or mandatum of the Father for the elects’ sake and on the other hand to punishment for the transgression of the law for them also, i.e., by his complete fufillment of the law (his oboedientia activa); and his bearing on the Cross the full punishment for the transgression of the law (his oboedientia passiva).¹⁶

The active and passive righteousness of Christ were never separated from each other, and therefore, except in their logical discrimination, we should regard them as the inseparable parts of one organic whole. The whole earthly life of Christ, including his birth, was one continued self-emptying even unto death. Every moment of his life, in the form of a servant, was of the nature of holy suffering. Every experience of pain during the whole course of his life, and eminently in his death on the cross, was, on his part, a voluntary and meritorious act of obedience. He lived his whole life, from his birth to his death, as our representative, obeying and suffering in our stead and for our sakes. And during this whole course, all his suffering was obedience, and all his obedience was suffering.

And so, satisfaction is the overarching doctrine according to which we will further examine the sacrifices. Satisfaction encapsulates all the various concepts that scripture assigns to Christ’s one offering, and satisfaction emphasizes both Christ’s suffering and his obedience to the will of his Father.

A Vicarious Work

The high priestly work of Christ on the cross was also substitutionary, or vicarious. This means that Christ suffered and died in the place of the elect as their head, so much so that it was as though we died at the cross. The Lord’s supper form states this clearly in the second part of self-examination:

Secondly. That every one examine his own heart, whether he doth believe this faithful promise of God that all his sins are forgiven him only for the sake of the passion and death of Jesus Christ, and that the perfect righteousness of Christ is imputed and freely given him as his own, yea, so perfectly as if he had satisfied in his own person for all his sins and fulfilled all righteousness. (Confessions and Church Order, 268; emphasis added)

This is also the explicit teaching of scripture. But we will have to pick up here next time.