(tm) One goat was slain and one lived

Christ died but He rose again. We are baptized not only into His death but also into His resurrection.

Because Christ lives we shall be saved to the uttermost, meaning we shall be reconciled fully to the Father. There is part of our personality that must die on the cross of Christ. There is a new creation born in us that is alive forever. The Divine redemption includes not only forgiveness, as marvelous as that is, but also re-creation and absorption into the Divine Nature.

Every guilt, tendency, and effect of sin is being removed from us by the authority and power of the Divine Atonement that has been made by Christ. Shall we allow the Holy Spirit to work a perfect work of atonement in us?

The removal of the scapegoat signifies not only the complete reconciliation of the members of the Body of Christ to God but also the removal of the presence of sin from the earth. One of the principal missions of Christ—Head and Body—is the judgment and destruction of all sources and forms of sin in the earth. The planet on which we now are living will be purged of all sin.

Think of it! God will not destroy the present heavens and earth until He first demonstrates for one thousand years that He is able to rule in righteousness on this earth or in any other area that He chooses. God cannot be defeated.

After the Lord has demonstrated His power, wisdom, righteousness, and compassion with clarity, He will cast aside in disdain the material creation—the present heavens and the earth—and create a new heaven and a new earth.

God has made new creatures. He will not permit any element that has been sullied by sin and rebellion to continue in existence in the new heaven and the new earth.

The Lake of Fire will burn throughout eternity. Whoever wishes to do so at that time may go out and observe Satan, Antichrist, the False Prophet, and the souls of people who have rebelled against God.

And he shall take a censer full of burning coals of fire from off the altar before the Lord, and his hands full of sweet incense beaten small, and bring it within the vail: And he shall put the incense upon the fire before the Lord, that the cloud of the incense may cover the mercy seat that is upon the testimony, that he die not: (Leviticus 16:12,13)

The cloud of perfume that arose when the holy incense was poured on the hot coals of the censer was an important part of the observance of the Day of Atonement. The fragrance of the perfume was to "cover the mercy seat." This type was fulfilled when the holy prayers and praises of Jesus of Nazareth ascended to the Father, especially in Gethsemane and also during the time of His crucifixion.

The kingdom-wide fulfillment of the enveloping of the Mercy Seat by the holy perfume is described in Revelation, Chapter Eight. The incense, which is the fragrance of Christ, is mixed with the prayers of the saints. The whole is poured on the coals of the golden censer. The holy perfume ascends "up before God from the angel’s hand" (Revelation 8:4).

Then the trumpets of the Lord prepare to sound. There must be an increase in the prayer and praise that ascends from the members of the Body of Christ in our day before God will consent to give the signal for the trumpets to sound that announce the return to earth of the Lord Jesus.

Christ’s appearing: the day of reconciliation. Christ will appear as the complete fulfillment of the Day of Atonement, the day of reconciliation. The trumpets will announce the Millennial Jubilee, the time of the restoration of all things to their rightful owners.

Satan has stolen what belongs to Christ and His saints, but it all will be returned in the Jubilee. Can you believe the kingdom of darkness will be defeated and those who harm the earth will be destroyed? There is nothing anyone can do to prevent it. The Day of Atonement is coming—the day of reconciliation, the day of the completion of redemption.

Then shalt thou cause the trumpet of the jubile to sound on the tenth day of the seventh month, in the day of atonement shall ye make the trumpet sound throughout all your land. And ye shall hallow the fiftieth year, and proclaim liberty throughout all the land unto all the inhabitants thereof: it shall be a jubile unto you; and ye shall return every man unto his possession, and ye shall return every man unto his family. (Leviticus 25:9,10)

The Day of Christ’s appearing is the fulfillment of the Day of Atonement—Yom Kippur of the Jews. He will appear "without sin unto salvation." The fullness of redemption is yet ahead of us, as the New Testament indicates. We Christians possess the Holy Spirit as the firstfruits and pledge of the Day of Redemption that is yet to come.

The Day of Christ will be the period of reconciliation, deriving its authority from the blood of the cross. The Church will be united with Christ, as expressed in the words: "The marriage of the Lamb is come, and his wife hath made herself ready."

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