Close to God

When I read the instructions God gave Moses for sin offerings, I am astounded at the detail. And I think about Moses receiving these instructions from the Lord. I am jealous that Moses heard so clearly from God – his call, his leadership, how to get water, what God is going to do next… talking with God on the mountain, in the Tent of Meeting, etc. And then it occurs to me… Moses had to lead over a million people for 40 years in a desert on a camping trip that wouldn’t end. How else could he have done it without those close interactions with God? Maybe I shouldn’t be so jealous… If God is meeting me in the same way he met with Moses, I might need to be leading a million people on an excursion that is anything but easy. No thank you on that one! Okay – maybe I’m not so jealous!

However, I still seek to be close to God and hear his voice. As I read the first nine chapters of Leviticus, I see with the building of the tabernacle, a new practice of sacrifices. This practice had actually begun before the Israelites left Egypt. Each family sacrificed a lamb, putting the blood on their doorposts so that the angel of death would pass over them and not take their firstborn child. But on the mountain, God gave Moses some very particular instructions on how to build the tabernacle and how to sacrifice and when.

When the altar was built, it was to have four horns – one on each corner. And when sacrifices were made, blood was to be put on each of the horns before pouring the rest at the ground by the altar. In some ways, I think these horns represent the doorposts which spared the lives of their firstborn. By making sacrifices for their sins, the Israelites were trying to keep a clean record between them and God so that God would continue to lead them. During their ordination, in a carefully prescribed way, Aaron and his sons placed their hands on the head of the animal being sacrificed (Leviticus 8:22). I think it was to keep them close to fact that the animal was dying in their place – sin leads to death.

I wonder if sacrificing animals over and over lost its effect on them. Maybe it is kind of like trying to train a dog where they focus on the reward or what follows rather than on what you are trying to train them to do. For instance, if every time the dog messes on the floor you yell at him and take him outside, he may mess on the floor and then go stand at the door to go outside. Maybe sacrifices became that way for the people. They kept sinning because they could take the sacrifice to the altar and make atonement for the wrong done rather than quit sinning.

God is holy – we cannot come close to him in our sin. Jesus was our sacrifice – our sin lead to his death. I wonder if each time we sinned we had to come close enough to touch him while he was being put to death if that would make us less likely to sin again – at least in the same way. I wonder how common ‘repenting’ has become. Do we just take what Jesus did for granted and keep on sinning because grace abounds? (Romans 6:1) Or do we come close enough to touch him and truly understand what he did for us. “No one who lives in him keeps on sinning. No one who continues to sin has either seen him or known him.” I John 3:6

I think that to be close to God means that I am very aware of what Jesus did for me and I am looking into his eyes when I repent of sin and I truly turn around and quit doing what I know offends God. I want to please him, not offend him. I do not want to take advantage of his grace. I want to be close to God.