Sunday Thoughts: Atonement

I don’t imagine that many of us spend much time thinking about how bad our sins are. One hopes that we’re confessing them and repenting from them, but unless we stumble hard, I don’t imagine that we’re running around wailing about our sins.

Podcaster and former actor Barry Cooper relates how Lady Macbeth dramatically frets over her sin:

There’s a famous scene where, after the murder of the king, Lady Macbeth sleepwalks. And as she sleepwalks, she rubs her hands together, compulsively, over and over, as if she’s trying to wash them. She sees blood on her hands, and no matter what she does, she cannot get them clean.

Because of course this isn’t literal blood on her hands, it’s a symbol of her guilt: her deep, moral uncleanness before God. Blood you can deal with; you can get that off with soap and water. But not guilt. And she realizes to her horror that nothing she can ever do will ever get rid of it. It’s unreachable by human hand. And she realizes that one day, when she stands before her Creator, there will be a reckoning for what she has done. Even the thought of that Day is so horrific to her that she already feels herself to be in hell.

The question Shakespeare wants us to ask ourselves is this: how do we get ourselves clean of our sin?

Of course, we know that the answer lies in God’s atonement for our sins. Under the old covenant, God instituted an elaborate sacrificial system, but the forgiveness of sins came on the yearly Day of Atonement (Yom Kippur), during which the high priest entered the Holy of Holies to atone for the sins of the Israelites.

“Although many additional rites were added over the centuries, the basic description of the original Day of Atonement is Leviticus 16,” explains the Baker Encyclopedia of the Bible. “Complex and detailed ceremonies all focused on the central objective of complete atonement by sacrifice.”

“The Day of Atonement served as a reminder that the daily, weekly, and monthly sacrifices made at the altar of burnt offering were not sufficient to atone for sin,” echoes the New Bible Dictionary.

Related: Sunday Thoughts: The Weight of Our Sin

The sacrificial system and the priestly duties could only atone for sins temporarily. The Hebrews had to repeat these sacrifices day after day, and the priests performed their acts year after year. These sacrifices never forgave sin once and for all.

But one sacrifice did: Jesus’ death on the cross. “Indeed, under the law almost everything is purified with blood, and without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sins,” writes the author of Hebrews in Hebrews 9:22.

He continues:

For since the law has but a shadow of the good things to come instead of the true form of these realities, it can never, by the same sacrifices that are continually offered every year, make perfect those who draw near. Otherwise, would they not have ceased to be offered, since the worshipers, having once been cleansed, would no longer have any consciousness of sins? But in these sacrifices there is a reminder of sins every year. For it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins. 

Consequently, when Christ came into the world, he said, “Sacrifices and offerings you have not desired, but a body have you prepared for me; in burnt offerings and sin offerings you have taken no pleasure. Then I said, ‘Behold, I have come to do your will, O God, as it is written of me in the scroll of the book.’” 

When he said above, “You have neither desired nor taken pleasure in sacrifices and offerings and burnt offerings and sin offerings” (these are offered according to the law), then he added, “Behold, I have come to do your will.” He does away with the first in order to establish the second. And by that will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all. 

And every priest stands daily at his service, offering repeatedly the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins. But when Christ had offered for all time a single sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God, waiting from that time until his enemies should be made a footstool for his feet. For by a single offering he has perfected for all time those who are being sanctified. 

And the Holy Spirit also bears witness to us; for after saying, “This is the covenant that I will make with them after those days, declares the Lord: I will put my laws on their hearts, and write them on their minds,” then he adds, “I will remember their sins and their lawless deeds no more.” Where there is forgiveness of these, there is no longer any offering for sin.

Hebrews 10:1-18 (ESV)

Only Jesus’ death on the cross could cure the disease of sin for all those who make Him Lord and Savior. Let that fill your heart with gratitude to Him today.

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