The ordinances of the offerings are a recipe of the divine cooking. Christ is the groceries, we are the cooks, and God and we are the co-eaters enjoying Christ as the satisfaction. This is the highlight of the book of Leviticus. Spiritually speaking, nothing can be higher than our enjoyment of the Triune God in Christ.
Have you ever realized that the church meeting is a cooking meeting, an eating meeting? We have spoken about coming to the meetings to eat, and in the meetings we have sung the short song “Come and Dine” (Hymns, #1148). However, we may never have had the thought that we need the cooking. The groceries are here, and the eaters are also here, but who are the cooks? I have the assurance to say that God and the Spirit are not the cooks but that we are the cooks. Therefore, we all must learn to cook.
From the types in Leviticus, we can see that God surely desires to enjoy Christ. He wants to enjoy Christ through our appreciation of Christ and through our presentation of Christ. However, even up to now, we are still too, old, traditional, superficial, and religious. May we all see that our God desires to enjoy Christ. Christ should not only be our food but also God’s food through appreciation and presentation, that is, through our cooking. We all need to cook Christ that we may feed God with Christ.
Now we come to the categories of the offerings. According to Leviticus, there are five main kinds of offerings, five main kinds of gifts: the burnt offering, the meal offering, the peace offering, the sin offering, and the trespass offering. We need the pictures of the offerings in Leviticus to revolutionize our concept concerning service, worship, and the experience of Christ.
The burnt offering is Christ for God’s satisfaction (1:1-17; 6:8-13). The burnt offering is for God’s food that God may enjoy it and be satisfied. This offering was to be offered daily, in the morning and in the evening.
The meal offering is Christ for the satisfaction of God’s people enjoyed together with God (2:1-16; 6:14-23). The burnt offering is for God’s eating, and the meal offering is for our eating. Our eating of the meal offering, however, is together with God. Christ should first be absolutely for God’s enjoyment, and then He should be for our enjoyment that we may enjoy Him together with God. As Leviticus 2 shows us, part of the meal offering is for God, but the main part of this offering is for us. This indicates that Christ is for our enjoyment that we may enjoy Him together with God.
The peace offering is Christ as the peace between God and God’s people for their co-enjoyment in fellowship (3:1-17; 7:11-38). The burnt offering is Christ for God’s enjoyment, the meal offering is Christ for our enjoyment together with God, and the peace offering is Christ as the peace between God and God’s people. As such an offering, Christ becomes the co-enjoyment of God and God’s people. In this enjoyment there is fellowship.
The sin offering is Christ for the sin of God’s people (4:1-35; 6:24-30). God’s intention is that there be co-enjoyment, enjoyment for Him and for us. His intention is that we may have peace with Him to enjoy Christ with Him in fellowship. However, we need to remember that we still have sin in our nature and trespasses in our conduct. Both our sin and our trespasses are condemned by God. Therefore, we need the sin offering, which is Christ for the sin in our nature. Concerning this, Christ has made propitiation.
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