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Scripture Reading: Deut. 12:6-7; Lev. 4:13-14, 27-28; John 1:29; Rom. 8:3; 2 Cor. 5:21; 1 Cor. 15:3; 1 Pet. 2:24; 3:18; Heb. 9:26b, 28
In this chapter we need to consider how to have Christ increased so that we may offer Him in the meeting as so many different offerings. According to Leviticus 1, 2, and 6, the first offering among the five basic offerings is the burnt offering. Then comes the meal offering and the peace offering. The last two are the sin offering and the trespass offering. So the sequence in these chapters is first the burnt offering, and the last two are the sin offering and the trespass offering. This is the sequence of the record of all the offerings. But in our experience the burnt offering does not come first. In our experience the first offering is the trespass offering. Following the trespass offering is the sin offering. Then in our experience we have the peace offering. After this we enjoy Christ as our food, as the meal offering. Then we experience the burnt offering. In this chapter we have to follow the sequence not in the holy record but in our experience. In our experience we first enjoy Christ as the trespass offering.
Deuteronomy 12:6 gives us what we call the groceries with which we prepare the offerings for God. It says that you have to bring your burnt offerings and sacrifices, your tithes, and the firstborn of your herd and of your flock. The tithe here indicates the ten percent of all the produce of the things from the field, including the wheat, the oil, and the wine. Verse 6 does not give us the details; it just gives us the title, the “tithes.” More details are in Deuteronomy 14:22-23. In those verses we are told that the children of Israel had to tithe all the produce of their seed. That means all the produce of the wheat and the oil and the wine. So those verses give us the details of the tithes of the vegetables.
In Deuteronomy 12:6 there is a clear word concerning the groceries from the animal kingdom — the herds and the flocks. We have to realize that the tithes of the vegetables are not good for burnt offerings or for sin offerings or for trespass offerings. They are only good for the meal offering, for the drink offering, and for a small part of the peace offering. The main part of the peace offering is still of the animal kingdom. In all the offerings the main groceries come from the animal kingdom. The main dishes of the divine feast are cooked with the groceries from the animal kingdom. Then from the vegetable kingdom, the groceries are good for the meal offering, for the last part of the peace offering, and for the drink offering.
For us today Christ is first the life of the animal kingdom. This is why John 1:29 speaks of the Lamb of God. This is the life of the animal kingdom. He is the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world. The groceries from the animal kingdom are more basic than the groceries from the vegetable kingdom. This is why in sequence we cover first the animal kingdom and then the vegetable kingdom. We want to cover how to have Christ increased in the kingdom of the animal life. According to our experience, this is good first for the trespass offering and then for the sin offering. It is also good for the first part, the leading part, of the peace offering. After we finish this, we will go on from the animal kingdom to the vegetable kingdom, to see how Christ is also the vegetable life, good for the last part of the peace offering. He is also good for the entire part of the meal offering and the entire part of the wine offering for God’s satisfaction and our satisfaction too. This is to feed God and to feed ourselves.
According to our experience, Christ is first our trespass offering and then our sin offering. Even for the real practice of the offerings, such as the sanctification of the priests, they first had to offer the sin offering. Then they offered the burnt offering. With some of the sin offerings there was nothing to eat for the priest or for the people who offered the offerings. It was altogether burnt with two kinds of burnings. The first burning was the burning on the altar of the fat and the inward parts of the offering for God’s satisfaction to meet God’s requirements. Then the body of the offering was burned, not on the altar but outside the camp. The burning outside the camp was not a burning to send a sweet odor up to God but a burning of judgment, a burning of abandonment. So mainly what we can enjoy in the trespass offering and the sin offering is just to see the blood. The blood of Christ is shed for us. When we see the blood, we have peace. When we see the blood, we are released from the condemnation. That is mainly what we can enjoy. That is not for our eating. That is just for a kind of settlement of our problem.
This is somewhat like the way we begin our day. When we rise up in the morning, we begin our day by washing. It is so good to begin every day with a shower to get yourself fully washed from head to toe. We also need such a thing in our spiritual life. We have to begin our spiritual life with a shower. How do you take a spiritual shower? It is by applying the sin offering. Every morning you offer Christ to God as your sin offering. That is like taking a spiritual shower. Do not think that you are not dirty, that you are quite clean. As long as you are living, you need a sin offering to wash your being.
The trespass offering may be likened to washing your hands during the day. You take a shower once in the morning, but you may wash your hands many times during the day as they become dirty. During the day whenever you realize that your hands are dirty, you need to wash them again. This is like applying Christ as the trespass offering.
We have to spend some time to see the difference between the trespass offering and the sin offering. In Leviticus 4 there is the sin offering, and then in Leviticus 6 and 7 there is the trespass offering. It is hard to differentiate between what is sin and what are sins, or what is sin and what is a trespass.
The Bible illustrates these two in a way that helps us to understand. The Bible illustrates sin as something of ignorance and as something not seen, something hidden (Lev. 4:2, 13, 22, 27; 5:15). Leviticus illustrates a trespass as something quite different. It speaks of deceiving your neighbor or wronging your neighbor or damaging someone (6:1-4). That is a trespass. That is not of ignorance, and that is not something hidden from the eyes. That is very apparent and very visible. This is the way that the Bible illustrates the difference between sin and trespasses.
Sin is a hidden, invisible problem not seen by people, which you may often do in ignorance. This illustrates sin in our nature. It is hidden from the eyes. Suppose I am a gentleman all day long, doing nothing wrong to anyone. Even my wife could not find any fault in me. This may mean that I have no trespasses, but this does not mean that I am not sinful. I may be perfect in behavior, in my outward doing, but it does not mean that I am not sinful in my inward nature.
We need to see the light. We are not only sinful in our nature, but also our entire nature is sin. Just as a table may be made of wood, our nature is made of sin. Although I may not commit any trespass all day long, for the whole day I have been sin. All day long I may have been living just naturally. I did not exercise my spirit; I did not contact the Lord; I did not live Christ; I did not walk and have my being in the spirit. I just lived myself. I sat down without Christ. I took a walk without Christ. I ate without Christ. I did not offend any others, but it was without Christ. This is something hidden from the eyes. The sinful nature is there, but it is hidden from the eyes.
If I am in spiritual darkness, I might be ignorant of this sinful nature. Because I was humble, honest, faithful, gentle, so much in order, and caring for others, I might consider that I am a wonderful and excellent person. But this would be in ignorance. Once the light came, I would realize that this is not Christ. This is myself. This is the produce of Adam, a sinner. I was living Adam; I was living a sinner. Then the invisible sin would become visible in enlightened eyes, and I would offer Christ as my sin offering. The sin offering is for this. I am concerned that even up to now some may still remain in that ignorance, thinking that they are okay, that they are so excellent, so perfect, so nice, so humble, so gentle. This is ignorance.
But I believe that at least a number have been enlightened through these years so that you are not ignorant of what you are. Every day you have some realization that you yourself by nature are nothing but the totality of sin. Outwardly you may be okay. Outwardly you may be excellent. But inwardly you are not excellent. Inwardly you are sin. Inwardly you are not only sinful, but you are sin itself. So every day when you begin a new day, the first thing that you must do is offer Christ as a sin offering. Every day we should offer Christ as our sin offering. This kind of offering always cleanses us and reminds us that we are sinners. As you begin a new day, you have to remember that you are a sinner. The first person whom you may see in the new day is your wife. If you realize clearly that you are a sinner, how could you exchange words with her? That sin offering, which you offered early in the morning, would remind you that you are a sinner. Because you offered Christ as your sin offering early in the morning, you would be reminded that you are a sinner. You are not still under ignorance, because you fully realize that you are sin and that every day you need Christ to redeem you.
According to the fact, we know that Christ redeemed us nineteen hundred years ago. Some teachers have stressed this very much. But we need to stress the experiential redemption as well as the factual redemption. We need the redemption in our daily experience. Every morning when we begin our day, the first thing that we need to do is to offer Christ as our sin offering. Do not think that this is too repetitious. You have to realize that life is altogether the totality of repetition. I have been eating breakfast three hundred sixty-five days a year for seventy-seven years. But I should not say that I am disgusted and bored with breakfast, so I will not eat it anymore. Life is the totality of repetition.
Every day you have to repeat the offering of Christ for your sin. If you do not have a good breakfast in the morning, you cannot have a good day. In like manner, in the morning you must have a proper offering of Christ as your sin offering. You need to offer Christ as a big bull for your sin offering. The way to have good health is to have a good breakfast. The way to be healthy spiritually is to begin by offering Christ as your sin offering. Do not say that you have no heart to offer Christ as a sin offering and that your spirit is dormant. This is your laziness. Some who do not eat a proper breakfast say that they have no appetite. They have no appetite because they do not eat. The more you eat, the more you have an appetite. Eating gives you an appetite and even enlarges the capacity of your appetite. Do not excuse yourself. It is your duty to eat a good breakfast, and it is your duty to keep yourself healthy spiritually by offering Christ as a sin offering early in the morning to begin your day. Do not say that you do not have a heart and that you do not have the spirit. This is your obligation. Try to do this, and you will see that you will be healthy.
I hope to hear many prayers such as this: “Lord, thank You that You have helped me to begin my day by offering You as a sin offering. Lord, thank You that You are such an offering to me for this day.” But mostly when you pray, you pray in the ordinary, regular, and religious way. You do not have any prayer offered to the Lord according to the riches of the typology in His holy Word. The prayers that you have offered are too common, too religious, and too natural. There is no revelation. There are no riches inherited from the rich word of God’s Scriptures. I hope that after reading these messages, your prayer would be changed and transformed. Do not offer those old-fashioned prayers. Rather, offer something according to the rich typology of the Word, offering Christ as all the offerings to God.
Now let us talk about the trespass offering. Suppose you began your day by offering Christ as your sin offering. But when you came to the breakfast table, it was just a mess, and breakfast was not ready. Right away the flame rose up within you. You were offended with your wife. Eventually, you said something to let her know that you were not so happy. But once you got into the car and were driving on the highway, you were condemned. You asked the Lord to forgive you because you were in your flesh: “Lord, forgive me. Thank You, Lord, You are not only my sin offering but also my trespass offering.” This means that you offered the Lord Jesus as a trespass offering. We need Him to be our trespass offering many times a day.
At work you have many opportunities to be offended by your colleagues. This is another chance for you to trespass. But by confessing to the Lord, you enjoy Him as your trespass offering. While you are driving home, another driver may offend you, and you may blow the horn at him. Then right away you would realize that you have trespassed again. You would offer Christ once more as your trespass offering: “Thank You, Lord, You are my unlimited trespass offering.”
This is the way to have Christ increased in you for the sin offering and for the trespass offering. If you live a life every day in such a practice, you will be so rich with Christ as your sin offering and your trespass offering. Then you will come to the meeting with such a Christ. In your prayer this will be expressed. In your testimony this will be expressed. In your sharing something will come out. Especially at the Lord’s table you will appreciate and see the Lord as your sin offering and as your trespass offering. At the table meeting you will enjoy the Lord as a big bullock, so adequate for your sin and for your trespass offering. You will thank the Lord that He has taken care of your sinful nature, of your sinful self. He has also taken care of your transgressions, your trespasses, your wrongdoings. You will realize that you have no merit and no goodness to justify you and to cause you to be accepted by God, but Christ is your sin offering and your trespass offering. If this is your case, your prayer at the Lord’s table will not be according to the traditional way. Because we are void of the experience of Christ, we have the kind of heart to come to the meeting again and again with empty hands. Either you do not open up your mouth, or you open up your mouth and just speak a word that is so ordinary and so much under the influence of tradition.
I hope you will see that this is the way to have Christ increased in you. Rather, I would say this is the way for you to raise Christ, just like a rancher raises cattle. If you do not have this kind of practice experientially, when you come to the meeting, you do not have Christ. This is not according to the side of doctrine but according to the side of experience. In Deuteronomy and Exodus in the types there are not only doctrinal things but also experiential things. Even many of the seeking Christians have no interest to get into these things. The riches in the typology have been buried in these books for years. We have to see that these are the real contents of the Lord’s recovery, and this is the reality of the contents of the Lord’s recovery.
How marvelous it would be if we could come together and sit around the Lord’s table, offering prayers and praises in this way without any of the traditional Christianity heritage. This would cause our meetings to be absolutely different from the Christian meetings of today. We have to practice what is revealed in the types in the holy Word. This will impress people. At the beginning they may be offended, but eventually they will be convinced. This will satisfy the real seekers, the real hungry ones. Let us go on to learn something, to enter into a new field, and to practice what the Lord has been showing us in these days.
I hope that this word could help us to see how we can raise Christ to be the groceries for us to cook a course for God as either the sin offering or the trespass offering. I hope also that we could have a clear view of the difference between sin and sins, that is, between the sin offering and the trespass offering in a practical and experiential way. You have to put all these matters into your daily practice.
Some of the verses in the Scripture references show that Christ deals with sin as the sin offering. John 1:29 says that the Lamb of God takes away the sin of the world. Romans 8:3 says that God sent His Son in the likeness of the flesh of sin and concerning sin. Sin here, according to Darby’s note, has the thought of the sin offering. Then 2 Corinthians 5:21 says that Christ was made sin, not sins, for us that we may become the righteousness of God in Him. These verses show that Christ is our sin offering.
Other verses listed show that Christ is our trespass offering. First Corinthians 15:3 says that Christ died for our sins, not sin. Then Peter says that Christ bore our sins on the tree (1 Pet. 2:24). He also says that Christ died for our sins (3:18). These verses show how Christ deals with sins, trespasses, and transgressions as our trespass offering.
Hebrews 9:26 says that Christ was manifested to put away sin. This means that He was manifested as the sin offering. Verse 28 says that Christ offered Himself to bear the sins of many. This is the trespass offering. So four of the verses refer to Christ as the sin offering, and four of the verses refer to Christ as the trespass offering. When you read the singular word sin, you must realize that Christ is our sin offering. When you read the plural word sins, you must realize that Christ is our trespass offering.
