Leviticus 8

It is shocking that God would use men in His great plan to restore us and His creation from the ravages that came upon the world as a result of Adam's sin. Aaron was a sinful man. His sons were sinful men. Yet the Lord commanded Moses that these men would be ordained as priests who would represent other sinful men before God. Not only were these men sinful, they were weak as all men are weak. As all men have so much that they do not know, there was far more that Aaron and his sons did not know about God's purposes than that which they did know. How is it that God could use sinful and weak men like us? We long for the perfect priest, who is without sin, and who knows what He is doing.

While all Israel awaited the coming of such a Man, Aaron and His sons needed to take their spots in the Lord's great work of testimony and salvation. This required that they be set apart for the work that God had called them to do. By the Lord's command this setting apart from the rest of Israel was achieved by ordination.

The ordination of Old Testament priests required the men chosen by God for the job, the special garments for the priesthood described at the end of Exodus, anointing oil as a symbol of a necessary gift from on high, and offerings that reminded us that these men had need for atonement, just as all Israel had need for atonement.

The process of ordination also required a congregation of worshipers who would serve as witnesses that these men had been set apart according to the Lord's command. The congregation of Israel gathered at the entrance to the tent of meeting. Moses, God's chosen mediator of the Old Covenant brought Aaron and Aaron's sons and washed them with water. They were ceremonially cleansed, but who could wash away their sins? Moses clothed them with the special priestly garments, but who could give them garments that would allow them to appear in the presence of God with the righteousness that He required? Aaron had the golden plate, the holy crown, placed on his head as the Lord commanded Moses, but who could make him truly holy?

Moses did all that the Lord required. He anointed the tabernacle and all that was in it. He anointed the altar, and the utensils, and the basin. Then he poured anointing oil on the head of Aaron. This ceremony also required the shedding of blood according to God's command. Aaron and his sons laid their hands on the bull of their sin offering. This was how they began their work as consecrated Old Covenant priests. They acknowledged their condition as sinners before God. They admitted that a substitute was necessary to stand in their place, since they could not stand the holy wrath of God. The blood of the sacrifice purified the altar. The blood was poured at the base of the altar. The Lord's portion of the sin offering, all the fat, was consumed on his altar, and the rest was burned outside the camp.

Then the ram of the burnt offering was killed, after the priests laid their hands on the head of the ram. The blood was thrown against the sides of the altar, and the cut up and washed pieces of the offering were burned on the altar. A second ram, called here the “ram of ordination,” was treated like the first ram, but Moses took some of the blood from this animal and “put it on the lobe of Aaron's right ear and on the thumb of his right hand and on the big toe of his right foot.” He did the same to Aaron's sons. The blood required for their ordination was on them, but would they hear with crucified ears, and would they walk with crucified feet as priests of the Lord?

Moses received the breast that would have normally been given to the priest. Those pieces of the animal that Aaron and his sons waved were burned before the Lord, but the breast that Moses waved for a wave offering was Moses' portion of the ram of ordination.

In these ceremonies we see a surprising connection between God, His covenant mediator Moses, His Old Covenant priests, and the blood and holy oil associated with their consecration to this office. They and their garments were set apart, and they ate of the sacrifice and the grain offering according to the Lord's command. For seven days they could not leave the tent of meeting. After seven days, the days of their ordination were completed. All of this was necessary to make atonement for these sinful and weak priests, who did not really know what the Lord was doing, and could not understand how their lives fit into God's larger plan to fill the earth with His glory.

How is it that we, who still sin, and who find that there is so much in our own lives that we do not know; how is it that we know more than they did about a better priesthood than Aaron's?

A new Priest has come. He was set apart from the Father for the purpose of turning away the wrath of the Lord. He is God. He is the Mediator of a better covenant. He is an eternal Priest, anointed with the fullness of the Holy Spirit beyond measure. He had no sin that required the shedding of blood at His ordination. He became the one offering that will change all of creation. He knew that the way of the cross was the right way, and He followed that way for our salvation. He understood the will of His heavenly Father, and He accomplished it.