Leviticus - Part 3: Glory & Fire
Leviticus - Part 3: Glory & Fire
Pastor Scott Skones
January 26, 2025
As human beings, we often mark and memorialize significant days in our history.
Couples celebrate anniversaries, families throw birthday parties, and communities commemorate centennials.
We also memorialize difficult days. Some of you remember where you were on November 22, 1963 – the day that President Kennedy was murdered. My generation will always remember September 11, 2001.
Personally, some days will always stick in my mind – like August 12, 2000 – a day that I was in a serious car accident. Or, on a more positive note, November 2, 2016 – the day my beloved Chicago Cubs finally broke the curse and won the World Series. Or maybe October 7, 2018 – my first Sunday here as Pastor of Living Word.
Think for a minute about those dates that stick out to you. The dates that, every time that particular day rolls around on the calendar, you stop for a few moments and reflect.
For some of you, it might be the day a child was born, the day you graduated from high school, or the day you got sober. For others it might be the day everything stopped – the day that the grief began – the day your loved one died, the day your marriage ended, or the day you got a diagnosis.
We remember those days because they are days that serve as a threshold – a dividing line – leading us from one era of life into the next. Sometimes for the better, and sometimes not. But always significant. Always monumental.
They are Holy Days. Days that, whether the remembrance is positive or negative, we hold near to our hearts because they signify the beginning of a new life or new era of life.
Our text today serves as one of those days – one of those significant and monumental moments in the history of the Hebrew people – and really in the entire Old Testament.
If you remember the course and trajectory of history leading up to this moment in the story, God has been faithful to his people – leading them and guiding them and delivering them from trouble and slavery. But after the exodus, as God’s people wander the wilderness, God has come near to them. God gave instructions for building a tabernacle – a portable temple – a tent of meeting – where God will meet with his people.
Leviticus is the collection of rules and regulations that form the foundation upon which that relationship and those meetings are to operate.
The first 7 chapters detailed 5 different types of offerings that would be used in worship at the Tabernacle. Chapter 8, which was our text last Sunday, focused our attention on the priests who would serve as the mediators, and specifically on the process that was used as they were ordained into their service.
Following the conclusion of the week-long ordination process for Aaron and his sons, Israel enters into a new era. Previously, Moses had served as the officiant and mediator. Now, Israel will be served by priests who will officiate and mediate on behalf of God’s people. This era – of Aaron’s descendants mediating and offering sacrifices for the sin of the people, would last over a millennium.
Chapter 9 of Leviticus also ushers God’s people into a new era because we find in this chapter an official God-prescribed worship service. The first detailed worship service happens here in our text for today.
You could look back into Genesis and see some impromptu services – like in Genesis 35 Jacob builds an altar to the Lord at Bethel. Or Genesis 46 he offers sacrifices to God.
You could also look at Exodus when God gives instructions for the Passover meal and remembrance.
But what we find in Leviticus 9 is something different. This is the formal, gathered worship of God’s people. God’s people gathering at the meeting place, upon God’s invitation, and worshiping him.
This is emphasized in our text by the fact that you’ll see right at the beginning the connection with the previous chapter when it says “On the eighth day…”. A full week of sacrifices offered as part of the ordination of the priests, and then something new begins on the 8th day.
I’m going to read chapter 9 of Leviticus for us – so I’d invite you to stand as you’re comfortable.
Leviticus 9
On the eighth day Moses summoned Aaron and his sons and the elders of Israel. 2 He said to Aaron, “Take a bull calf for your sin offering and a ram for your burnt offering, both without defect, and present them before the Lord. 3 Then say to the Israelites: ‘Take a male goat for a sin offering, a calf and a lamb—both a year old and without defect—for a burnt offering, 4 and an ox and a ram for a fellowship offering to sacrifice before the Lord, together with a grain offering mixed with olive oil. For today the Lord will appear to you.’”
5 They took the things Moses commanded to the front of the tent of meeting, and the entire assembly came near and stood before the Lord. 6 Then Moses said, “This is what the Lord has commanded you to do, so that the glory of the Lord may appear to you.”
7 Moses said to Aaron, “Come to the altar and sacrifice your sin offering and your burnt offering and make atonement for yourself and the people; sacrifice the offering that is for the people and make atonement for them, as the Lord has commanded.”
8 So Aaron came to the altar and slaughtered the calf as a sin offering for himself. 9 His sons brought the blood to him, and he dipped his finger into the blood and put it on the horns of the altar; the rest of the blood he poured out at the base of the altar. 10 On the altar he burned the fat, the kidneys and the long lobe of the liver from the sin offering, as the Lord commanded Moses; 11 the flesh and the hide he burned up outside the camp.
12 Then he slaughtered the burnt offering. His sons handed him the blood, and he splashed it against the sides of the altar. 13 They handed him the burnt offering piece by piece, including the head, and he burned them on the altar. 14 He washed the internal organs and the legs and burned them on top of the burnt offering on the altar.
15 Aaron then brought the offering that was for the people. He took the goat for the people’s sin offering and slaughtered it and offered it for a sin offering as he did with the first one.
16 He brought the burnt offering and offered it in the prescribed way. 17 He also brought the grain offering, took a handful of it and burned it on the altar in addition to the morning’s burnt offering.
18 He slaughtered the ox and the ram as the fellowship offering for the people. His sons handed him the blood, and he splashed it against the sides of the altar. 19 But the fat portions of the ox and the ram—the fat tail, the layer of fat, the kidneys and the long lobe of the liver— 20 these they laid on the breasts, and then Aaron burned the fat on the altar. 21 Aaron waved the breasts and the right thigh before the Lord as a wave offering, as Moses commanded.
22 Then Aaron lifted his hands toward the people and blessed them. And having sacrificed the sin offering, the burnt offering and the fellowship offering, he stepped down.
23 Moses and Aaron then went into the tent of meeting. When they came out, they blessed the people; and the glory of the Lord appeared to all the people. 24 Fire came out from the presence of the Lord and consumed the burnt offering and the fat portions on the altar. And when all the people saw it, they shouted for joy and fell facedown.
Lord, as we reflect on your holy, inspired, and inerrant word, may you give us faith to believe all that you have said. We pray in Jesus’ name. Amen.
I want to give you a bit of a summary of this text as we begin, and then we will identify and discuss some specifics of what we see and learn about worship in this passage. We can summarize Leviticus 9 this way: God invites his people to worship him, gladly accepts the sacrifices offered in faith, and restores them to fellowship with him.
I want to say that one more time: God invites his people to worship him, gladly accepts the sacrifices offered in faith, and restores them to fellowship with him.
As we observe, from a distance, this very first official divine service, we learn and recognize a handful of really important attributes and aspects of true worship.
1 - Biblical Worship is at the Lord’s invitation.
In verses 1-6, Moses is giving instructions that he received from the Lord, as they prepare for this first worship service – and in verse 5 we read: They took the things Moses commanded to the front of the tent of meeting, and the entire assembly came near and stood before the Lord. 6 Then Moses said, “This is what the Lord has commanded you to do, so that the glory of the Lord may appear to you.”
I spent time two weeks ago developing this idea in greater detail – that God is the one who comes to us in worship. All worship is initiated by God’s call to worship, not by us. We can only come before the Lord at his invitation. And so I’m not going to spend much time on this today – but we see it in the text and so we need to have it in our mind as we proceed. God is the one who initiates worship. God is the one who promises to appear, to come near.
This is really a matter of posture. Sometimes people approach worship as if it’s conjuring – that if we perform these certain things we will be visited by the supernatural. When, in fact, true worship is always at God’s invitation. God wants to live in relationship with his people. God wants to give his good gifts to his people – and so he invites us to worship him.
The second aspect of worship that we will highlight today is this:
2 - Biblical Worship recognizes the gravity of our sin and the inadequacy of our offerings.
V8 - So Aaron came to the altar and slaughtered the calf as a sin offering for himself.
Now this might not strike you as particularly odd because we are in chapter 9 of Leviticus and all that we’ve heard so far has been 8 whole chapters of offerings and sacrifices.
But it’s important that you notice something here. What happened at the end of chapter 8? We had seven consecutive days of sacrifices offered to cleanse Aaron and his sons of their sins. An entire week of sacrifices as part of the ordination process.
And here we are on the 8th day – coming on the heels of 7 full days of cleansing sacrifice for Aaron’s sin – and what’s the first thing that happens at the beginning of this worship service? Aaron has to offer ANOTHER sacrifice because of his sin. A calf is offered up as a sin offering.
And we learn a couple of important details about ourselves here.
First, we see the gravity, the weight, the enormity of our own sin. Think about this. It’s highly unlikely that, following the final sacrifice on day 7, that Aaron and the boys went out carousing. It’s not like they finished their ordination and celebrated with a night of debauchery and depravity.
Aaron was likely exhausted from a week-long ordination process, had a good night’s sleep, and then woke up on day 8 ready to serve in the tabernacle at this very first worship service for Israel.
And yet, the very first thing that has to be done is for him to offer ANOTHER sacrifice to the Lord. Something else had to die in his place, in order that he might carry out his duties. Why? Because our sin is that thorough. Our sin is that pervasive. Our brokenness is that complete.
But the second thing that we see as a result of this is the inadequacy of our offerings. 7 full days of offerings weren’t enough. That number 7, of course, indicates fullness. Completeness. 7 full days of offerings and sacrifices and it wasn’t enough. It wasn’t adequate to fully atone for Aaron’s sin.
Anything that we bring will be insufficient. Nothing that humans produce or offer to God can truly atone for our sins. Nothing that I could offer is sufficient.
One of the most pervasive anti-Christian lies is that if you do more good than bad, you’ll be all alright in the end. As long as the sum of your good works is greater than the sum of your sin, God will be pleased with you.
Our passage today proves that assumption false. There is no offering that you can offer, no amount of good works that you can perform, no measure of a well-lived life that you can achieve that will offset the gravity, weight, and consequence of your sin.
If you have been living your life under that false assumption – that as long as your good works outweigh your sin – or as long as you're not the WORST sinner you’ll be alright in the end – I plead with you to consider verse 8 – that even Aaron – the high priest – after a week's worth of sacrifices – still needed that offering, without blemish, to die in his place for his sin.
And that’s the Gospel. That Jesus Christ, the sinless son of God, without blemish, offered up himself for you.
Biblical worship recognizes the gravity of our sin and the inadequacy of our offerings. And clings to the one true offering who gave himself for us.
3 - Biblical Worship is submission to God’s word.
In verse 10 we see a phrase that has been repeated many many times in chapters 8&9 - the phrase is “as the Lord commanded Moses…” It shows up many times over these chapters and it’s important for us to consider this.
Again, God re-orients our understanding of what worship is. Worship is not just emotion. It’s not a performance we do for God. It’s not just gifts we give to God. It’s not a style of music. Worship, true worship, is placing God’s word in the proper place as it relates to us. It’s living in submission to God’s word. Living under the authority of God’s word.
Worship is not merely attending and hearing a message. It’s not merely singing songs. It’s not merely putting money in the offering. Those acts are PART of worship, but at the core of worship is assuming the right posture. Allowing God to remind us that we are the ones in need and he is the one who possesses what we need. Allowing God to remind us that he is the one true God and his word is the final authority.
Biblical worship is submission to God’s word.
4 - Biblical worship focuses on the glory of the Lord.
V. 6 - “This is what the Lord has commanded you to do, so that the glory of the Lord may appear to you.”
And then jump down to verse 23 - “Moses and Aaron then went into the tent of meeting. When they came out, they blessed the people; and the glory of the Lord appeared to all the people.”
God gives these instructions and the people carry out these offerings and sacrifices for a specific purpose, which is revealed in verse 6. All of this is focused on one thing, identified in the text by the words “SO THAT.”
“SO THAT THE GLORY OF THE LORD MAY APPEAR TO YOU.”
So, the focus of worship is the glory of God.
The word glory is a bit of a challenging word for us to define. Most of us have a sense of the meaning when we hear it, but we might struggle to put our finger on a good definition of it.
The Hebrew word for Glory is derived from the word for “weight” or ‘heaviness.” It’s a word picture that is intended to make us consider the significance and substance and resoluteness of the Lord.
It’s a word that illustrates the considerable value and importance of God. We use the same type of imagery in English. We might say that a conversation is a “heavy” or “weighty” topic. What do we mean by that? We mean It’s important. It’s not flippant. It’s complex and of great significance. It’s not to be taken lightly.
And so that’s helpful as we think about this focus on the Glory of God. The Glory of God is him revealing to us the fullness of who he is. It’s him making known to us his presence and his power and his ultimate authority in all things.
I would argue that many of the ills that plague the modern church stem from a low view of God and his glory. Many churches have exchanged the glory of God for human emotion and experience. They’ve inverted worship to be about us. To be about our experience, our encounter with God, our glory – pretending like God exists to make your week better, to help you live your best life, to make you a better version of yourself.
When, in fact, Biblical worship does exactly the opposite. It brings us to the end of ourselves. It overwhelms us with our sin.
Remember in Isaiah 6 when Isaiah sees the glory of the Lord. What is his response? “Woe to me. I am ruined. I am unclean.”
That’s what the glory of the Lord does – it leaves us ruined and undone before a holy God.
The focus of BIblical worship is the Glory of God.
And, of course, this focus is ultimately a person. The Glory of God is found in a person. John tells us this in John chapter 1. Listen to this: The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.
Or in 2 Corinthians 4:6 – Paul declares that God’s glory is displayed in the face of Christ.
Or Hebrews 1:3 - “The Son is the radiance of God’s glory…”
You can’t understand the Glory of God without seeing Jesus.
Biblical worship focuses us on the Glory of God – which we find ultimately in Jesus.
5 - Biblical Worship involves receiving the blessing of God.
V. 22-23 - Then Aaron lifted his hands toward the people and blessed them. And having sacrificed the sin offering, the burnt offering and the fellowship offering, he stepped down.
23 Moses and Aaron then went into the tent of meeting. When they came out, they blessed the people; and the glory of the Lord appeared to all the people.
This element of “blessing” is an important part of true worship as God has designed it. This is why every worship service that we have together ends with words of blessing.
Just in case you didn't know, I didn’t pull those words out of thin air. Those words of blessing or benediction that you hear every Sunday come to us as Part of God’s design for worship – starting in this very first worship service. The words themselves aren’t recorded for us here in Leviticus 9, but they are recorded in Numbers chapter 6.
Numbers 6:22
The Lord said to Moses, 23 “Tell Aaron and his sons, ‘This is how you are to bless the Israelites. Say to them:
24 “‘“The Lord bless you
and keep you;
25 the Lord make his face shine on you
and be gracious to you;
26 the Lord turn his face toward you
and give you peace.”’
27 “So they will put my name on the Israelites, and I will bless them.”
So these words that you hear nearly every Sunday as you leave are the words that Aaron and the priests pronounced and proclaimed over God’s people from that very first worship service.
And I don’t know if you noticed – but they aren’t just empty words. Did you see what God promised in verse 27? Through those words of blessing, God does something. When you receive those words, God is doing something significant. Verse 27 “So they will put my name on the Israelites, and I will bless them.”
When Aaron and his sons announced God’s blessing over the people, it was more than just closing words. It’s more than just a nice saying. Through the messenger, God is doing two things: He is placing his name on the people and he is blessing them.
And the same is true today – in even greater fullness. Because the true and great blessing of God, his glory, his son, has come to us. And so when our service concludes today, and you hear those words of benediction, they aren’t empty words. In and through those words, God is placing his name on you – declaring that you are his. That he is with you. And he is delivering his blessing to you. He is conveying his grace and mercy and hope and love and peace to you through his word.
Why do we do it? Because God’s people have been given this gift since that very first worship service.
Well, there’s one final aspect of worship that I want to point out to you.
6 - Biblical Worship results in repentance and joy.
Notice the response to the Lord revealing his glory to the people at this first worship service. Verse 24: Fire came out from the presence of the Lord and consumed the burnt offering and the fat portions on the altar. And when all the people saw it, they shouted for joy and fell facedown.
God shows himself as fire. There is a connection here, of course, to the first official Christian worship service that we see after Jesus’ resurrection at Pentecost when the presence of God the Holy Spirit is seen as fire there as well.
But God shows up and what is the response of the people?
Repentance and Joy. They fall face down before the Lord. Of course, that’s an act of submission and humility and repentance. It’s an acknowledgment of sin and a confession of God’s greatness and glory.
They respond in repentance, but also in joy. “They shouted for joy and fell face down.”
This is worship. And this is the response to Biblical worship – a response of Joy and Repentance.
Well as we close today, I want to leave you with this:
The Israelites had to offer sacrifices to atone for their sins in order to approach God, see his glory, and receive his blessing. We approach God with reverent confidence, repentance, and joy because Jesus made the sacrifice once and for all.
As you reflect on this first worship service – as you consider Biblical worship, God-initiated, God-honoring worship – I want to draw your attention to what we DON’T see in the text. What is missing from this first formal worship service?
There’s no singing, right?
We often, in our minds, limit our understanding of worship to singing, to music. If someone visits a new church and you ask them what they thought of it and their response was “I really enjoyed the worship.” There’s about a 90% chance that they are talking about the music.
But in this first worship service, as God’s people gather, there’s no mention of music.
Now I’m not saying that we shouldn’t sing when we gather to worship. Both the Old and New Testaments make it pretty clear that music became an important part of the gathered Worship of God’s people. However, music is a means to worship, not the core of worship. Music is one way that we worship the Lord, it is not the worship itself. Music is the vehicle of worship, not the substance of it.
The focus of worship at this first service must also remain our focus each and every Lord’s day when we gather. What is that focus?
The Lord’s invitation
The sufficiency of Christ’s sacrifice and the insufficiency of anything we bring.
Living in submission to God’s word
The Glory of God coming to us in word and sacrament.
The blessing of God is proclaimed over us.
And, finally, the response of repentance and faith.
This is Biblical worship. By God’s grace, may this always be true of us.
This sermon is offered as a resource by Living Word Lutheran Brethren Fellowship in Dickinson, North Dakota. It has been lightly edited for the website, but the original tone remains unchanged, and no grammatical revisions or style adjustments have been made.