Chapter 13 God's Hidden Day of Atonement
'If they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded, though one rose from the dead' (Luke 16:31)
God has a very positive reason for allowing the exact timing of the events to do with our Lord's First Advent to come to light at the present time. That reason is that 'leaven' must now be purged out from the houses of His redeemed people. And what is Leaven? Jesus had to explain the meaning of this to His disciples.
The Son of God had perfect foresight of conditions that would prevail at the close of our age, and in His parable of Matthew 13:33, He saw that 'the whole' of the pure teaching of New Testament days would be 'leavened' by thoughts and doctrines of men. It would commence as 'three measures of meal' (unleavened) but it would end as a wholly-leavened mass. He made it absolutely clear that the 'leaven' He had in mind was the liberty of teachers to think and say exactly what they would about the truth of God (Matthew 16:6-12). Actually it was the 'leaven' in the minds of the Pharisees of His day which caused Him to be put to death (see John 19:7).
Now, however, the hour has come for the Church of God when 'leaven' is to be purged out from all our dwellings, and this is pictured in Exodus 12:19. Everyone knows that before Israel could leave Egypt, at the time of God's great 'midnight' intervention in that land, His people must eat 'unleavened bread' .
In the counterpart illustration in Genesis 19:3, before Lot and his daughters could be rescued from Sodom - the very night before they left the doomed city - he, too, 'did bake unleavened bread.' And to complete the picture, on the last night before King Saul died, at the end of his 'forty years' (Acts 13: 21) (which are typical of our Christian dispensation of forty Jubilee years) he had to eat 'unleavened bread' (1 Samuel 28: 24).
So we see that it is not sufficient for God to require that the impure teaching of men be put away, but that there is need for this to be replaced by 'the truth, as it is in Jesus' (Ephesians 4: 21). All down the age men have tried to make God's truth palatable to the world, and to explain it away, if they could not explain it - but, it stands to reason that now, as we face the end of the journey, 'the true light' must once again shine out - 'for God is not willing that any should perish' , and desires 'all men to be saved, and to come unto the knowledge of the truth' (2 Peter 3:9 & 1 Timothy 2:4).
The Week of the New Creation
We come now to look again at the 'week' of the 'new creation', which we considered briefly in our Chapters 8 and 12. When Mary anointed Jesus at Bethany, in the evening of the true 10th of the 1st month, as we saw, she chose out the Lamb of God four days before the Lord's Passover, and, as the Lord said, wherever the gospel should be preached throughout the earth, this action of hers must be told for a memorial of her. It was a vital part of the plan of redemption.
But Mary also anointed Jesus as King (John 12:3 cp Song of Solomon 1: 12). We learn from John 12:12 that the next morning Jesus rode into the Holy City in triumph, and was acclaimed as 'King' by the multitude of His disciples. Matthew's Gospel tells us that 'the multitudes that went before, and that followed, cried, saying, "Hosanna to the Son of David: Blessed is He that cometh in the Name of the Lord; Hosanna in the highest" ' (Matthew 21:9). The word, 'Hosanna' (Heb. Hoshiah Nah) has the meaning, 'Save now, we pray Thee!'
The requisition of the 'young ass' (John 12:14), upon which Jesus rode, and its being covered with the disciples' garments before they set Him on it - all had specific reference to the hidden meaning of this day, as we are about to see. The account in John 12:23-33 should be carefully studied. We read that Jesus emphasised a certain 'hour': 'The hour is come, that the Son of man should be glorified ... Now is My soul troubled (or afflicted); and what shall I say? "Father, save me from this hour":but for this cause came I unto this hour. "Father, glorify Thy Name." Then came there a voice from heaven, saying, "I have both glorified it, and will glorify it again" ' (verses 23, 27-28).
Then once again Jesus emphasised the significance of that hour with the words, 'now is the judgment of this world: now shall the prince of this world be cast out.' And, looking on four days, He continued: 'And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto Me,' this signifying what death He should die (verses 31-32).
What then was the secret of this day, which Jesus viewed as the day of His burying? What was this hour, which Jesus looked on as the hour of His death, when 'through death' the prince of this world would be 'cast out,' and his power annulled (Hebrews 2:14)?
Let us put all incredulity away - for we are certainly about to discover something very wonderful, so deeply has it been concealed by the mighty hand of God; and scarcely in 3,600 years have the people of Israel understood the meaning of this day which, however, they have most sedulously observed at quite a different season, from year to year.
The Hidden 'Day of Atonement'
'On the tenth day of this seventh month there shall be a day of atonement: it shall be a holy convocation unto you; and ye shall afflict your souls, and offer an offering made by fire unto the Lord.' (Leviticus 23:27)
If we acclaim Jesus as the Head of a 'new creation', we shall readily accept the fact that when He came into the world, His Father saw a new calendar come into being. To prove this, we must measure our Lord's years forward from the day of His Nativity, which was October 29th, 1 BC. Taking this as the first day of the new calendar, we find that the age of Jesus on April 27th AD 33 - the Jews' 10th of Nisan - was 33 years (of 354 days each), 6 months and 10 days. In other words, it was the Day of Atonement in His 34th year. (In terms of our solar years, this measurement was 32 years and 181 days, or a total of 11,869 days.)
The seventh month in Israel's calendar, of course, fell annually in the autumn, and the last occasion when any Israelite would ever accept that a 'Day of Atonement' fell in the spring would be that day when the lambs were chosen for the Exodus Passover (see Exodus 12:3 and Levitius 23: 41-43 where it is obvious, as we have previously stated, that God saw the Exodus take place in a 'seventh month').
So now at last we have the reason why Jesus said: 'Now is my soul troubled,' for to Him it was a reality that that day was, indeed, the true 'Day of Atonement' - the one day in the year when every Israelite must 'afflict his soul,' according to the Law. But none in Jerusalem then knew what God was accomplishing in secret. Long since He had ceased to take pleasure in the round of Jewish festivities.
As He says in Isaiah 1:14: 'Your new moons and your appointed feasts My soul hateth' and in the previous verse, 'the new moons and sabbaths, the calling of assemblies, I cannot endure.' Also, in Amos 5: 21 we hear Him say: 'I hate, I despise your feast days.' God knew from the beginning of the Calvary Passover and of Israel's scornful rejection of His beloved Son.
How wonderful for the eye of God to see the true Israelite, Jesus, perfectly fulfilling His Word and magnifying His Law, according to a calendar which the Father Himself had conceived, and would ultimately make known to men.
Here on this secret Day of Atonement, as we learn from His words already quoted from John 12: 27-33, we find He was even then offering Himself 'as an offering made by fire unto the Lord' (Leviticus 23:27). To Christ the interval of four days to the actual hour of His death on Calvary was as though it did not exist - to Him it was 'now'.
The Day of Atonement is the day of covering (for the Hebrew word, 'to make atonement', implies this). So we see Jesus - 'the Lamb of God' - covering the ass's colt with Himself as He sat upon it, His disciples having first covered it with their own clothes. For in Job 11:12 we are told that 'man' is 'born like a wild (or free) ass's colt' , and in Exodus 13:13, that 'every firstling of an ass thou shalt redeem with a lamb ... and all the firstborn of man among thy children shalt thou redeem.'
The disciples had identified themselves with the ass by putting their own clothes on it. The unclean animal typified them, but the Redeemer had covered it, and the rejoicing of the multitude knew no bounds. How wonderful that Jesus should manifest Atonement (covering) personally in this way!
It was now just four days of a thousand years each (4,000 years in the Redemption Chronology) from the Fall of Adam when God Himself had made atonement with His own hand by the shedding of blood, in Eden, for 'unto Adam also and to his wife did the Lord God make coats of skins, and clothed them' (Genesis 3: 21).
And at that very hour when the first blood was spilled in Eden, the Redeemer had looked ahead to Calvary. To Him each 'thousand years' was 'as one day' (2 Peter 3:8) and over that time He would bear with sinful man and blot out' as a thick cloud' his transgressions, and 'as a cloud' his sin (Isaiah 44:22). To the Saviour the work was 'finished' as it were, 'from the foundation of the world' (Hebrews 4:3).
This appears to be the thought of God behind the Day of Atonement on the tenth of the month, while the slaying of the lambs on the fourteenth of the first month (the Passover aspect) showed that the death of the Redeemer would not take place until the 4,000 years were ended.
Much more could be said as to the anointing of Jesus, our Great High Priest, at the opening of this hidden Day of Atonement - a day which Leviticus 23:32 carefully informs us, commences 'in the ninth day of the month at even.' We mention this because of the timing of the Supper in Bethany when Mary anointed the Lord with her precious ointment.
We are told that 'the house was filled with the odour of the ointment' (John 12:3) and there is no doubt that our Lord's command: 'Verily I say unto you, Wheresoever's this gospel shall be preached in the whole world, there shall also this, that this woman hath done, be told for a memorial of her' (Matthew 26:13) will be obeyed throughout the household of God, before the end comes.
Even the chief apostles were ignorant and sided with Judas Iscariot in decrying Mary's act, because they failed to see the reason for this anointing - and nothing is more clear than the fact that Mary enjoyed an intimacy with the heart of God which none of the others shared. As Jesus had said on a previous occasion, she has 'chosen that good part, which shall not be taken away from her' (Luke 10:42).
Chapter 14 The Death and Resurrection of Jesus