Teaching Resources International

The Means of Atonement – C. H. Spurgeon

“This shall be an everlasting statute unto you, to make an atonement for the children of Israel for all their sins once a year.”—Leviticus 16:34
The Jews had many striking ceremonies which marvelously set forth the death of Jesus Christ as the great expiation of our guilt and the salvation of our souls.  One of the chief of these was the day of atonement, which I believe was pre-eminently intended to typify that great day of vengeance of our God, which was also the great day of acceptance of our souls, when Jesus Christ “died, the just for the unjust, to bring us to God.”  That day of atonement happened only once a year, to teach us that only once should Jesus Christ die; and that though he would come a second time, yet it would be without a sin offering unto salvation. The lambs were perpetually slaughtered; morning and evening they offered sacrifice to God, to remind the people that they always needed a sacrifice; but the day of atonement being the type of the one great propitiation, it was but once a year that the high priest entered within the veil with blood as the atonement for the sins of the people.  And this was on a certain set and appointed time; it was not left to the choice of Moses, or to the convenience of Aaron, or to any other circumstance which might affect the date; it was appointed to be on a peculiar set day, as you find at the 29th verse: “In the seventh month, on the tenth day of the month;” and at no other time was the day of atonement to be, to show us that God’s great day of atonement was appointed and predestinated by himself. Christ’s expiation occurred but once, and then not by any chance; God had settled it from before the foundation of the world; and at that hour when God had predestinated, on that very day that God had decreed that Christ should die, was he led like a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers he was dumb.  It was but once a year, because the sacrifice should be once; it was at an appointed time in the year, because in the fulness of time Jesus Christ should come into the world to die for us.
Let us consider THE MEANS WHEREBY THIS ATONEMENT WAS MADE.  You read at the 5th verse, “And he shall take of the congregation of the children of Israel two kids of the goats for a sin offering, and one ram for a burnt offering.”  And at the 7th, 8th, 9th, and 10th verses, “And he shall take the two goats, and present them before the Lord at the door of the tabernacle of the congregation.  And Aaron shall cast lots upon the two goats; one lot for the Lord, and the other lot for the scapegoat.  And Aaron shall bring the goat upon which the Lord’s lot fell, and offer him for a sin offering.  But the goat, on which the lot fell to be the scapegoat, shall be presented alive before the Lord, to make an atonement with him, and to let him go for a scapegoat into the wilderness.”  The first goat I considered to be the great type of Jesus Christ the atonement: such I do not consider the scapegoat to be.  The first is a type of the means whereby the atonement was made, and we shall keep to that first.

Notice that this goat, of course, answered all the pre-requisites of every other thing that was sacrificed; it must be a perfect, unblemished goat of the first year.  Even so was our Lord a perfect man, in the prime and vigor of his manhood.  And further, this goat was an eminent type of Christ from the fact that it was taken of the congregation of the children of Israel, as we are told at the 5th verse.  The public treasury furnished the goat.  So, beloved, Jesus Christ was, first of all, purchased by the public treasury of the Jewish people before he died.  Thirty pieces of silver they had valued him at, a goodly price; and as they had been accustomed to bring the goat, so they brought him to be offered: not, indeed, with the intention that he should be their sacrifice, but unwittingly they fulfilled this when they brought him to Pilate, and cried, “Crucify him, crucify him!”  Oh, beloved! Indeed, Jesus Christ came out from the midst of the people, and the people brought him.  Strange that it should be so!  “He came unto his own, and his own received him not;” his own led him forth to slaughter; his own dragged him before the mercy seat.

Note, again, that though this goat, like the scapegoat, was brought by the people, God’s decision was in it still.  Mark, it is said, “Aaron shall cast lots upon the two goats: one lot for the Lord, and the other lot for the scapegoat.”  I conceive this mention of lots is to teach that although the Jews brought Jesus Christ of their own will to die, yet, Christ had been appointed to die; and even the very man who sold him was appointed to it—so saith the Scripture.  Christ’s death was fore-ordained, and there was not only man’s hand in it, but God’s.  “The lot is cast into the lap, but the whole disposing thereof is of the Lord.”  So it is true that man put Christ to death, but it was of the Lord’s disposal that Jesus Christ was slaughtered, “the just for the unjust, to bring us to God.”

Next, behold the goat that destiny has marked out to make the atonement.  Come and see it die.  The priest stabs it.  Mark it in its agonies; behold it struggling for a moment; observe the blood as it gushes forth. Christians, ye have here your Savior.  See his Father’s vengeful sword sheathed in his heart; behold his death agonies; see the clammy sweat upon his brow; mark his tongue cleaving to the roof of his mouth; hear his sighs and groans upon the cross; hark to his shriek, “Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani,” and you have more now to think of than you could have if you only stood to see the death of a goat for your atonement.  Mark the blood as from his wounded hands it flows, and from his feet it finds a channel to the earth; from his open side in one great river see it gush.  As the blood of the goat made the atonement typically, so, Christian, thy Savior dying for thee, made the great atonement for thy sins, and thou mayest go free.

But mark, this goat’s blood was not only shed for many for the remission of sins as a type of Christ, but that blood was taken within the veil, and there it was sprinkled.  So with Jesus’ blood, “Sprinkled now with blood the throne.”  The blood of other beasts (save only of the bullock) was offered before the Lord, and was not brought into the most holy place; but this goat’s blood was sprinkled on the mercy seat, and before the mercy seat, to make an atonement.  So, O child of God, thy Savior’s blood has made atonement within the veil; he has taken it there himself; his own merits and his own agonies are now within the veil of glory, sprinkled now before the throne.  O glorious sacrifice, as well as High Priest, we would adore thee, for by thy one offering hot hast made atonement forever, even as this one slaughtered goat made atonement once in a year for the sins of all the people.

I have now an interesting fact to tell you, and I am sure you will think it worth mentioning.  Turn to Leviticus 25:9, and you will read: “Then shalt thou cause the trumpet of the jubilee to sound on the tenth day of the seventh month, in the day of atonement shall yet make the trumpet sound throughout all your land.”  So that one of the effects of the atonement was set forth to us in the fact that when the year of jubilee came, it was not on the first day of the year that it was proclaimed, but “on the tenth day of the seventh month.”  Ay, methinks, that was the best part of it.  The scapegoat is gone, and the sins are gone, and no sooner are they gone than the silver trumpet sounds,
“The year of jubilee is to come,
Return, ye ransomed sinners, home.”

On that day sinners go free; on that day our poor mortgaged lands are liberated, and our poor estates which have been forfeited by our spiritual bankruptcy are all returned to us.  So when Jesus dies, slaves win their liberty, and lost ones receive spiritual life again; when he dies, heaven, the long lost inheritance is ours.  Blessed day!  Atonement and jubilee ought to go together.  Have you ever had a jubilee, my friends, in your hearts?  If you have not, I can tell you it is because you have not had a day of atonement.

One more thought concerning the effects of this great day of atonement, and you will observe that it runs throughout the whole of the chapter—entrance within the veil.  Only on one day in the year might the high priest enter within the veil, and then it must be for the great purposes of the atonement.  Now, beloved, the atonement is finished, and you may enter within the veil: “Having boldness, therefore, to enter into the holiest, let us come with boldness into the throne of the heavenly grace.”  The veil of the temple is rent by the atonement of Christ, and access to the throne is now ours.  O child of God, I know not of any privilege which thou hast, save fellowship with Christ, which is more valuable than access to the throne.  Access to the mercy seat is one of the greatest blessings mortals can enjoy.

Precious throne of grace!  I never should have had any right to come there if it had not been for the day of atonement; I never should have been able to come there if the throne had not been sprinkled with the blood.