Hi . . .

I’d like share with you a doctrine which seems to be very prevalent today. I believe the following quote from an email recently received by me is the FALSE gospel and would appreciate it if you would take the time to consider it.

It was sent to me by an SDA, but I believe it is pure apostate Protestantism!

Maybe I’m making too much of the lamb/goat situation but we were raised up as a church (SDA) to show the relevance of the sanctuary to today’s truth, so it seems important to me. Anyhow, I hope you can find time to read it.

THE FORMULA  & ORDER OF THE GOSPEL

1. God so loved the World that He gave His only Son as an Atonement for sin which reversed the condemnation ( verdict ) in Adam.  Good news, no one needs to die the 2nd death!

2. The sinner hears/sees  the Good news,  he then responds, by believing

3. He then experiences Justification { forgiveness } by Faith

4. His Faith makes him obedient to all Gods commands.  " Faith works by Love…."

5. As long as he lives this process of Sanctification {setting apart} continues

6. Christ’s ministry{ministering circumstances to build ,test and strengthen the faith of  believers  in the Most holy place results in the "Final Atonement"  He is the " Author and Finisher of our faith"  and will "purify the soul"  He will do it!! He promised our job is to believe it!

7. Thus the promise" According to your Faith So be it unto you" can produce a people ready for Translation, who keep all the "Commandments of God and have the Faith of Jesus"

A message that prepares a people not just to die, but to be translated!!

This doctrine is found in the sanctuary service (a picture of the plan of salvation given to Israel). 

In the morning and evening sacrifices there was no prerequisite for repentance on the part of Israel. 

This was a picture of John 1:29, the sacrificial "lamb that taketh away the sin of the world"  Something must have been accomplished by this "Lamb" otherwise why not just let the sinner repent when he brings his lamb?   Could this be the true picture? 

Where we see (John 3.16),  the sacrifice is provided without any human effort or action, and  then   we see the sinner responding by faith because he  "beheld" the lamb paying the price the sinner deserves.  He then brings his lamb as a personal response to what has already been accomplished. 

His response does not accomplish or even establish the gift which is already given, but evidences the individuals faith, repentance and new birth because of the death of the lamb.

Here is the secret of success in the Christians experience. He beheld the lamb slain!

I believe the above is not Scriptural and here is why:- 

My answer:

 John 1:29

First, we need to agree that Christ has offered to be our Saviour, and if we accept the gift He exchanges a portion of His life for our past life (Romans 6:6), which He calls being "born again". John 3:3. That covers all the living that went on before.

Then day-by-day He forgives and cleanses us of any new transgressions which we repent of, and confess. It is written, "If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness". 1 John 1:9. But this can only be done for those who are His children – not for those who stay with Satan in his rebellion.

So there are two things that need to be dealt with:

One is made up of a sinful nature, and the other is comprised of actions. Both are borne by the Son of God at different times and are treated differently in the plan of salvation. One is pictured by a lamb, and the other by a goat. We need to distinguish between them if we would be wise regarding God’s plan.

The LAMB is pictured by the Passover ritual, for it is written; ". . . Christ our passover is sacrificed for us". 1 Corinthians 5:7. By that ritual God shows how the Son of God comes into our lives and how the old life goes to Him to bear. We ingest one AFTER the other is removed. (See all of Exodus 12.)

But what about the future sins of those who have been thus changed? Those who have the life of the Son of God in them? For, "There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit". Romans 8:1. "Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new". 2 Corinthians 5:17.

When we become aware of our sins and confess them to Him, He takes the result of them (which is death, Romans 6:23) into Himself and thus becomes the Bearer of our deaths. That is the first part of our query text.

Then God says of His people:

Isaiah 40:2

What does "double" mean?

Not only forgiveness, but also cleansing.

Just as there are two robes for the prodigal, one on the road on the way home and another when he gets there, so there are two coverings for our actions of sin. One for us on the day when we confess them, and another when the "warfare" or controversy is over.

When is that?

Jeremiah 50:20

So how and when is this brought about?

There is a special ritual in the sanctuary service which provides the answer. It was performed on one day of the year, called "The Day of Atonement". It was observed near the end of the round of services which were repeated every year as a complete demonstration of the plan of salvation. For the first part of the twenty-four hours of that day the normal ceremonies were continued, but because of the sense of the urgency of the time many more people came to confess their sins. But eventually the queues came to an end and late on the day the cleansing ceremonial began.

So first, let’s look at those daily confessions:

Leviticus 4:27-31

There is mention of a lamb in the next verse if he cannot get a goat, but it is still to be a female, therefore it does not represent the Son of God. "And if he bring a lamb for a sin offering, he shall bring it a female without blemish". Leviticus 4:32. Whether goat or sheep, "female" represents the offerer as the "wife" of Christ. It is a male goat that represents Christ. By offering a female the penitent is recognising that he deserves to die but the Son of God has saved him from that fate.

Another point we should note is that each confession (the laying of the hand on the head of the sacrifice) has to be of a specific action. It is NOT sufficient to say "LORD, I’m a sinner" for that describes a "state of being". What is required here is a heartfelt abhorrence of what we have been doing.

In the texts above the priest disposed of the blood and the fat, the death and dangerous bits, but what did he do with the body?

Leviticus 6:25-30

Why? The priest ate the body to show that the "death" caused by sin had now passed into him, for not one part of the penitent’s animal entered into the sanctuary building. In this way we are shown that the Son of God bears the result of our sins. However, in the type, the record of the deaths is put in the earthly building by the priest’s sacrifice when he goes off duty. See Leviticus 4:3-12 where the priest takes some of the blood of a BULLOCK into the building (v4) and sprinkles it seven times on the floor before the second veil (v6), puts some on the horns of the golden altar of incense (v7), and then pours the remainder away down the drain out in the courtyard (v7. The fat is burned on the brass altar (8-10), and the rest of the body is taken out of the camp to be burned (v11-12).

I repeat, on the occasions when the blood of a bull’s sin offering was used inside the building, the body of the animal was taken outside the confines of the camp and unceremoniously burnt on a rubbish heap! A special one of course!

For example:

Leviticus 16:27

Having understood that, let’s look at what happened on that special day:

Leviticus 16:15

In the sanctuary services blood represents a death and a means of transfer. The young bull represents a serving person (a servant) and this informs us that the Son of God laid down His life for a particularly special reason, among many others. The ritual with the bull’s blood was to show a transfer of the record of daily sins into another part of the building – the part where God sat on His throne in the symbolism.

All of this was a picture to us of what we cannot see – the effect of sin on our Saviour and Redeemer. So we are told:

Hebrews 9:11-14

Here it is again:

Therefore, in this ceremony of the bull’s blood we are being told how the results of the confessed sins of the Christians reach the presence of God the Father. Before that some of the records of death were pictured as being stored in the first apartment of the building which was also a type or picture of Christ. So they are now IN Christ in one place, but will be IN Christ in another place! The sprinklings show that the inhabitants of both heaven and earth should know WHERE they are at the point of time represented by the final part of the Day of Atonement.

Now we come to the meaning of the "day", for it is a picture of a future event.

While the High priest is sprinkling he is making "an atonement", or cleansing the place which represents a part of the Son of God, so we should see that the record of sins will move. But which sins? Those of our past lives, or those which we have confessed and been forgiven for? One is the WHOLE life of the "old man", while the other is of deaths caused by individual ACTS of the "new man".

Let’s read on.

Leviticus 16:16

That text gives us the answer. It is the record of our "transgressions" (our actions of sin AFTER conversion) which will be on the move. The sprinkling of the "bull’s blood" will move them into God’s presence; the sprinkling of the "goat’s blood" will move them out and leave the rooms (plural) "clean". This means that after this experience the Son of God will be clear of the results of those sins.

Leviticus 16:17

All this will be done by the Son of God and will not require the presence of any man or woman. He will have "cleansed" Himself, His visible church members, and all those others who followed Him without public recognition.

Now, when He takes up the results (deaths) of the sins in a new way, what can He do with them?

Now will come the turn of the other goat.

Leviticus 16:21-22

The "deaths" associated with the confession and forgiveness of sins are in this way transferred to the one most suitable to receive them – the "scapegoat", mentioned in verse 8.

This transaction did not immediately kill the second goat, which represents the author of sin, Satan, and it was set free in a "wilderness", a place where there is no man, to do its own thing. In like manner, after the event represented by the special ceremony on the Day of Atonement, Satan will still be free to do what he wants to do. The difference is that he will then be in "a land not inhabited". There will be no human alive whom he can tempt! The Christians will have left the planet to be with Christ for a while, and the rebels will have all died. Only after the second resurrection will Satan choose a path which will lead him into death, but that’s another story.

Thus we can see that the "wages of sin" for the actions of reborn men and women will eventually end up on the instigator of all sin, and this seems fair and just. He is after all, the tempter, and should bear the result of his actions too.

By performing these rituals day by day and year by year the nation of Israel were able to be used by God as a picture of what was going on in the kingdom of heaven.

Hebrews 9:23-24

Hebrews 10:1-4

Every generation therefore had many opportunities of learning the truth and practising it. They even had a public holiday on the special day so that they could ponder its meaning!

Leviticus 16:29-31

Leviticus 16:34

But what about the past lives of those whose actions of sin were disposed of?

Concerning those there is nothing in the Bible except the Passover ceremony. This was not performed in any part of the sanctuary originally (later the Jews incorporated it into one of their temple services), but it was meant to be held in the homes and tents of the people to show that conversion (rebirth) can take place anywhere a person desires it. But there is nothing in that service which shows the "natures" being transferred into the sanctuary (or out of it), even though we know that Christ bears them.

So what will happen to them on the real Day of Atonement?

He will still have them!

So not all the effects of sin had disappeared.

That body which He showed to Thomas is the same body He has today, and will have for eternity. Therefore retaining the "old" lives of His followers is not the same as carrying the results of the sins which they have committed in their "new" lives. Remember that there are two problems? He solves one by putting it on the head of Satan; He solves the other by keeping it within Himself. Because He is God He can do this, but it is like a cancer within Him. It can be contained, but not removed. It is "death" and cannot be released to pollute the universe again.

He is indeed our Saviour forever!

For more on this subject, see this site,

http://www.geocities.com/weprotest.geo/Tabernacle/tab_teachings.html

For an in-depth, full on study, try this one,

http://www.geocities.com/weprotest.geo/Sanctuary/title_page.html#.

Conclusion:

The real Day of Atonement will deal with the deaths associated with the sins committed by Christians, but their past lives will be held forever by the Son of God as part of the deal He made with them regarding conversion. So when He appears the second time without sin, it is because He has been cleared of the deaths for actions of sin. This lifts a great load from Him, but He remains as our Saviour for all eternity.

In the love of Christ,

Ron