The Christians Hour

Aaron Brockett: Welcome to The Christians Hour. Thank you for joining us today. It is a pleasure to have you with us.

Gene Appel: The Christians Hour is a ministry of Gospel Broadcasting Mission, where we share the good news of Jesus Christ through radio and media all around the world.

Aaron Brockett: Well, have you ever noticed the growing trend of people wearing weighted vests while they walk or exercise? The idea is that adding weight can help build strength and improve endurance. It is an interesting paradox: adding weight to help you become stronger.

Gene Appel: But what about the weight we carry on the inside? The weight of guilt, shame, regret, and past mistakes? Those burdens can become much heavier than anything we can wear on our shoulders. And unlike a weighted vest, they are not something we were ever meant to carry. The good news is that Jesus offers a better way.

Bob Russell: Today, we conclude our four-part series through the book of Leviticus. Throughout this series, we have discovered that this often-overlooked book is filled with incredible truths that ultimately point us to Jesus. In this message, we look at the Day of Atonement, and more specifically, the scapegoat.

This was far more than an ancient ritual. It was a powerful picture of what God would one day accomplish through Jesus: the one who would bear our sins, remove our guilt, and make a way for us to be reconciled to Him. Join us now as Ben Cachiaras, lead pastor of Mountain Christian Church in Joppa, Maryland, opens up the scriptures and helps us see how this remarkable picture from Leviticus finds its fulfillment in Christ. Here is Ben to share more.

Ben Cachiaras: I want to tell you what happened 23 years ago when our family was in the Philadelphia airport on Christmas Day, when we were getting ready to head home. So remember now, it is Christmas, so we have got extra suitcases because we have to have presents for like 158 relatives back home. We have got these extra things and unbreakable things that you cannot put in your regular suitcase. You have got to put it in your carry-on. So now we have carry-ons. Every kid has two carry-ons.

We are going to Minnesota where it is 50 below and snow everywhere, so we have got a whole other suitcase with polar fleece lined coats, hats, mittens, boots, snowmobile gear, and dog sleds. We are loaded with stuff. Now, if you are a new parent and you do not understand this yet, let me just tell you: the general rule is the smaller the kid, the more junk you have got to haul along for them. Just figure on about three times their body weight for each kid. That is kind of how it works.

Every kid in our family has a full-sized backpack bulging with toys, games, snacks, and stuffed animals. We have enough food in case we crash and live on a desert island or something for a year. When we pulled up to the curb, the Skycap looked at everything we dumped out and said, "Oh, so it is moving day for you guys." That is what it looked like.

Besides all the big suitcases, we have these roller boards. This is back in the day now. We have backpacks, carry-ons, a camera bag, and a computer bag that weighs about 12 pounds. We have more books, more food, coats, hats, mittens, and that big 40-pound odd piece of plastic with no handle: the car seat. We have three small children who we dragged out of bed at 3:00 a.m. And I know this is hard to believe, but we were running late. We hit construction on the way to Philly, which made it even worse. We are running very close and I would say running out of holiday cheer in our van.

That picture, though, describes our need because the truth is so many of us are hauling around so much baggage through life. We have so much extra stuff. We are hauling all kinds of burdens, junk, and garbage. Some of it is regrets from our past. We feel we have to take that with us. We have mistakes, shame, guilt, burdens, memories, and things done to us or against us.

We cannot erase all that stuff, but the sins, the stains, the pains, the burdens, the sorrows, and the grief make it hard to keep up with the relationships we want. It makes it really hard to keep connecting with God. Can I just ask you a question? What are you carrying today? Specifically, be honest with yourself about what you are lugging through your life.

Scripture says that all of us, left to our own devices, will end up having to try to carry a load that is bigger than we are. All that we are carrying ends up separating us from God and other people. Many of us just kind of accept it, like this is the way life is supposed to be. But what if we could be free of our baggage? What if you could live a different kind of life?

Over the past few weeks, we have been digging into a book of the Older Testament called Leviticus. It is named after the Old Testament priests called Levites. It is all about how God is calling out to us to reconnect with us because God always wants to do that. He provides a way for His people to deal with the baggage and to deal with what the Bible would call their sin problem. Anything that separates us from God and weighs us down, the Bible calls sin.

At the heart of it was a special day called the Day of Atonement, or Yom Kippur. We have all this baggage that separates us from God and one another and weighs us down. That word "atonement" is a fancy sounding word all over the Bible, but mostly here in Leviticus. Atonement refers to a way that God provided to deal with the baggage, to cover over their sin, their crud, and their problem so they could be "at one" with God again. When you think of the word "atonement," you can think of that phrase "at one." It is the way to have peace with God again.

When you are at odds with God, when you are trying to live your life on your own without respect to God, when you are going against God, ignoring God, or pretending God does not matter or isn't there, we think that we are living free. But inevitably, every human that has ever done that ends up with more baggage that we end up carrying around. So God in the Old Testament here calls out and gives some precise instructions for us to be "at one," to atone for it all and finally find peace with God.

Leviticus chapter 16 tells all about it. It all starts with the priest. The priest represented all of the people to God. If you read through the text, there was a very specific sort of outfit: vestments where each part of it was richly symbolic. The priest would go through a very careful process of putting on every single bit of it. There were special sacred undergarments, a linen tunic, a special sash around his waist, and a special turban that made him designated holy to God.

There was a thing called an ephod, and then the breastplate with 12 precious gems. What do you suppose the 12 stones represented? They represented the 12 tribes of Israel as a way of reminding them that the priest was taking all of our concerns before God. He was taking all of our junk before God. To do that, he has got to make sure he is clean because he is going to represent us.

There was a bunch of instructions there you can read in the Bible about how he had to go through these ceremonial washings, wash his hands, and sacrifice some stuff to cover his own family so he is clear and pure before he represents us. Then it comes to the climax of the Day of Atonement. It says that the priest had to get two goats. The first of them he was to offer as a sacrifice to the Lord to cover over the sins of the people. Then there was a second goat, and that goat they called the scapegoat.

He would put the sins of the people in a symbolic way onto that goat, and then the goat would be taken away with the sins of the people on its back. It was God's way of saying, "I want you back in relationship with me, but you have got all this baggage. This sin, the shame, and the stain that separates us." So bring two goats: one you will sacrifice and allow to be a thing that covers sin, and then you send the other one away. That will take care of the rest of all this stuff that separates you from my presence.

Leviticus 16, verse 10 describes the second goat, the scapegoat. It was chosen by lot to be sent away. They kept that one alive, and when it is sent away, they took it way off into the wilderness. Then the people would be purified and made right with the Lord. That is the idea of the scapegoat. That word "scapegoat" in the Hebrew is the word *Azazel*. It literally just means "take him away." That is what *Azazel* means. Remember: first goat, sacrifice him, covers our sins. Second goat, *Azazel*, take him away.

We still use that word "scapegoat" today. It basically means when we try to transfer the blame or the guilt to someone else. They did not do it, but we are going to blame them anyway. They become a scapegoat. If you have got kids, you have got scapegoats in your house all the time. It is pointing fingers: "I didn't do it. She looked at me. He touched me. He made a face at me. The dog ate my homework." Anything to get the blame off of me onto someone else.

It is not just kids. Politicians are great at this. It is always the other guy, the other party. Anything to find a scapegoat. At work, we do it all the time to cover our backside. "I am innocent. I was the good guy. That other person messed up." We are finding scapegoats all the time. We do it in marriages even. "It is not my fault. I married this person with all this baggage. She is the problem." We blame our parents, we blame stuff around us, we blame the weather. We blame everything. God is like, "Stop. Just stop. I know who you are and I see all your baggage and I still love you. I want to be close and connected, but I cannot ignore all that impure baggage. So can we be at one? I will make a way. Take two goats: sacrifice one and send the other away."

I would love to show that to you if I had a goat. We would talk about how they would have a very serious moment of introspection. I am going to invite you to do that right now. Really think about your life. "Wow, I need to look inside and really think about whatever I have that is baggage that I should not be carrying. Any stain, pain, problem, sin, shame, guilt, or grief that is weighing me down and separating me from a perfect, pure God." The priest would then lay hands on this goat. Symbolically, they would think they were transferring and confessing their sins and transferring it to this goat. Then pretty soon, they are going to say, "*Azazel*, take him away."

They would take that goat away in the wilderness. They always got a Gentile guy because no Jew wanted to be near this loaded goat. You do not want to wake up tomorrow morning and see this goat in your backyard. That is not a good sign. They reflected on their garbage, they transferred it to the goat, and then they said, "Take him away."

What are you carrying? What unnecessary burden are you hauling around? If you can be brutally honest to think about that and acknowledge that it is not allowing you to live free in a new way with God and other people. God says, "I did not create you to live like that." The point is not to make you feel guilty. The point is to set you free.

I imagine some of us have been cheated, abused, or mistreated. Even though it was wrong and it was done to you, you are still carrying it around because it was an unforgivable thing, or you feel that way. Now that is baggage that you are carrying. Maybe today is the day that you put it on the goat, so to speak, and let God take it away. There are things we regret from our past: things you have said, things you have done, things you did not say or do. Things we would not want anyone to know: private stains, pains, addictions, secret thoughts. We all have it. If you would be so bold, could you name all of that and say, "I want to be pure and right with God"?

The high priest, after he laid his hands on the goat, would take a red cord. They would coil it up and put it on the head of the goat, around the head of the goat to symbolize the blood that would be sacrificed for the other goat and to symbolize all the weight that was there. Jewish tradition says they would then, before they sent the goat away, take that red cord and put it on the gate into the temple so everyone could see it. Tradition says that over the course of the next year, that red cord would miraculously turn white.

Red turning white. I wonder if any of them thought of Isaiah chapter 1, verse 18, which says, "Though your sins are as scarlet, I will make them white as snow. Though they are red like crimson, I will make them white as wool." Doesn't that sound good? God can take what stains and pains us and take it away. You are free to live a new life.

That is what they would do. They would observe this every year. The problem was as soon as they sent this goat away, then they would mess up again and now they have got more baggage. They would carry that baggage for another year until the Day of Atonement came. They did it every year like that for hundreds of years until one year everything changed. That was the year Jesus showed up.

God still called for us to be at one with Him, but this time He says we are not going to use a goat anymore. So Jesus, who lived a perfect life and had no baggage of His own, still became a sort of fall guy. He came before a guy named Pilate. Pilate had Him flogged, and then it says the soldiers twisted together a crown of thorns and put it on His head. It would have pierced the skin and it would have created a red ring around His head.

Pilate says, "I know He is innocent, but here is your king. What do you want to do with Him?" Watch what they said. John chapter 19, verse 15. They shouted, "Take Him away! *Azazel*! Take Him away and then crucify Him." Remember, there were two goats. Crucify one, take the other away. Jesus is both goats.

Today I want you to know He is not just your sacrifice to cover your sins. He is your *Azazel*, your scapegoat, because God has called out to us and says you can place anything free of charge on Him and it will be taken away. Your sins will be remembered no more. Seven hundred years before Jesus ever came on the planet, they told all about this *Azazel* goat in Isaiah 53. It says, "It was our weakness that He carried, our sorrows that weighed Him down. All of us like sheep have strayed and we have left God's path. But then the Lord laid on Him the sins of us all."

God has provided an updated way for us to deal with our baggage and to have a new life. You do not have to sacrifice a goat. You do not have to transfer your stuff to a goat because God loves you. He gave His own life and became your *Azazel*. That is incredible love. I just want to plead with someone today who is carrying something you do not need to be carrying. I want to plead with you to leave it with Jesus: your sin, your burden, your pain, your sorrow, your grief, your regrets, your past, your shame.

Whatever baggage you are lugging around, know this: Jesus, when He takes it away, takes it to a cross where it dies with Him. He takes it into a tomb where it stays. When He rises again, it stays there and you can rise to walk in new life. What if we just did that right now? Could you think of one thing that you are carrying that God, you know, does not want you to carry? Would you symbolically put it on the Jesus *Azazel* goat right now and let God take away your baggage?

Jesus, we want to just say, will You take away something that someone is carrying today? Let us give it to You and let You have it. When your sin leaves, if someone brings it up from the past, you may still have consequences you are working through. But if someone says, "Yeah, remember that?" you can just say, "Excuse me, I do not see a goat here. The goat has left the building." Your identity has changed when you give your baggage, whatever it is, to Jesus who takes it away.

In scripture, we are told now as believers on the other side of Easter that we do not have to observe the Day of Atonement every year anymore because Jesus took away our sins once and for all. Not by sacrificing a goat. Now He does not ask you to do that. He does ask for you to offer to Him not a goat, but your life. To offer your heart, your trust, and your faith. To believe in Him and to live for Him.

The beautiful picture that the Bible gives us for picturing that is baptism. It is something physical, real, and tangible as a way of reminding us what happened at the cross. My burden was transferred to Jesus. In the tomb, it was buried with Jesus. When He rose to new life, I can begin a new life. Baptism pictures all of that. My old self is buried in a watery grave when I am baptized. Jesus takes it away and turns my stains as white as snow and I am raised up to walk in a new life.

I have learned over the years that there are some questions that we all seem to have about baptism. One of the big questions is, "When should I get baptized?" According to scripture, the answer is the moment you believe in Jesus. The moment you are ready to have your baggage taken away, the moment you want to be cleansed, the moment you want your future secured, and the moment you want to begin a new life. That is when.

When people heard about Jesus in the Bible, in the very first sermon that was ever preached by Peter, they said, "What should we do?" and he said, "Turn your life toward God and get baptized, every single one of you." And they did so, 3,000 of them immediately right there on the spot. In Acts chapter 8, there is another guy riding along in a chariot. He gets convicted about Jesus and he stops the chariot right there and he says, "Look, here is water. Why don't I get baptized right here, right now?" And he did.

In Acts 16, there is a prison guard who called on Jesus for forgiveness and new life. It was a beautiful moment. Even though it was the middle of the night, immediately he and his household were baptized. So if you want to walk into a new life with Jesus, your first step is into the water.

Often I talk to people and they are like, "Yeah, I am thinking about it, but I do not feel ready. I have got to learn some more or clean up my act or I am not quite ready yet with God." I appreciate that, but I want to remind everyone that baptism is really not a sign of maturity. Baptism is a birth. It is a sign that says, "I am ready to begin a new life." Someone might say, "Why is it a big deal? Why should I be baptized at all?"

First of all, Jesus was baptized to give us an example and we say we follow Him. Every single one of the early Christians in scripture was baptized. Then Jesus actually commands you and me to be baptized. Then He commands us to help as many others be baptized as possible as well. Jesus' final words were, "Go into all the world and make disciples and baptize them in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit." I am not sure, honestly, that we would need any other reason.

If your perspective is "What's the least I can do and still get in?" it just sounds like the wrong question. I know Jesus had to die on the cross and bleed and all that, but do I really have to get wet? It just sounds like the wrong question, doesn't it? If you are trying to find a way to get around it, you are going to have to do that without the Bible's help. Jesus gave His life to take away our sins and He gives us a way to respond. He did not ask us to pray a prayer, sign a card, raise our hand, or stand on our head. But He did ask us to get baptized.

Repent and be baptized, every one of you. Jesus said, "Go make disciples and baptize all people." So in the Bible, baptism is for all of us. In fact, from the time of Jesus' resurrection forward in the Bible, every single person in the Bible who said yes to Jesus was baptized. Scripture says whoever believes, if you are ready to say, "I believe," and you have not been baptized by your choice by immersion and you want the old life gone, you should say yes.

Acappella: You are there. You are there. You are there. You are there.

Where can I go from your spirit? Any place that I choose to go, you're already there.

And if I go to the heavens, if I rise on the wings of dawn, if I settle by the sea, I know your hand is always there to guide me.

You are there. You are there. You are there. You are there.

Where can I go from your presence? When trouble is in my way, you're already there.

You will not go from my presence. Before a word of mine is said, if in the depths I lay my head, in the shadow of your wings, you're there to hide me. Oh, hide me.

You are there. You are there. Oh, you are there. Let me show you are there. You are there. Holy Spirit, you're there. You are there. You are there. You are there.

Aaron Brockett: Well, how about you? Are you still carrying the weight of your past? Is guilt, shame, or regret keeping you from experiencing the freedom Christ offers?

Gene Appel: Listen to the invitation of Jesus in the book of Matthew chapter 11, verse 28 through 30. He says, "Come to me all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light."

Aaron Brockett: If you have never trusted in Christ, let today be the day you bring those burdens to Him. He has already carried the weight of your sin to the cross so that you can walk in freedom. Give it to Him today.

Gene Appel: And maybe your next step is baptism. Jesus calls us as His followers to be baptized as an act of faith and obedience: a beautiful picture of dying to our old self and being raised to new life with Him. If you have never taken that step, I encourage you to find a Bible-believing church in your area and take those steps into the waters of baptism.

Aaron Brockett: And if you need help finding a church, we would be honored to help. You can email us at thechristianshour@gmail.com.

Bob Russell: Our thanks to Ben Cachiaras for sharing that powerful message with us today. And our thanks to Acappella Ministries for providing the music of worship. If you would like to hear this program again or listen to previous broadcasts, visit our website at thechristianshour.org. There you will find all of this year's messages available to stream or download for free. You can also listen wherever you get your podcasts: simply search for The Christians Hour.

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