5.8

A life poured out (Isaiah 53:12; Philippians 2:7)

Jesus is God’s Passover Lamb, God’s sacrifice for our freedom from sin and death. The holy nature of God’s sacrifice is uniquely seen in the holiest day of the Jewish calendar, on Yom Kippur. On this day the High Priest carefully prepared himself to enter the Holy of Holies with the blood of sacrificed animals, all according to the pattern God showed Moses on Sinai. The blood atoned for Israel’s sins by covering them so she could commune with God. While the High Priest mediated between God and Israel, Israel was called to approach God with souls afflicted and humbled, with anah. God wanted nothing from Israel: not her offerings, not her good deeds, not even her repentance. The only thing He wanted was her being all open and laid bare before Him (see Hebrews 4:13). No defenses between them, no excuses or bribes; only the most fragile presence of His people because that is the profound nature of their life. That is what this God of truth wants, to be true God to His people as they are in truth

In this holy communion, God reveals His intended relationship with Israel. He brings her into the truth of who she is to Him and who He knows her to be: a people who are broken and weak. God more than anyone knows this because He formed her from dust and gave her life. He delivered her from slavery. God never intended for Israel to be strong in herself. He always wanted her to be strong in Him. On Yom Kippur God commands her to come as she is so she can see who God is to her. He does not despise her weakness (Psalm 51:17). Instead, He sanctifies her in her weakness to become His own so they can live as one. This way alone makes their union possible. To attempt to approach God by any way other than anah will destroy her. No one can survive the least resisting of God’s holiness, as the sons of Aaron discovered. Our only hope is to receive God in humility. Then we can worship Him in spirit and truth (John 4:24)

Some may sense the beauty of so open an invitation, to come with empty hands so that God can fill them with Himself. Others may be entirely offended that God would reject their efforts and intentions as less than worthless, that anything they contribute would be an obstacle to Him and that their only worth is to accept they have no worth apart from Him. How can our ego and sense of self survive such an invitation? Regardless of how we hear Him, all of us who have tried to approach God in His holy way of anah soon discover it’s impossibility. Such humility, to live in so poor a spirit that begins and ends in dust before God has never been lived on earth, except by Jesus

Jesus best explained the meaning of a poor spirit with His life. He claimed nothing from or for Himself but entrusted His life’s source and purpose to God His Father. “Amen, amen, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of Himself unless it is something He sees the Father doing. Whatever the Father does, these things the Son also does in like manner” (John 5:19). “The words that I say to you I do not speak on My own initiative, but the Father abiding in Me does His works” (14:10). Jesus explained Himself as if He were only an emptiness for God to fill up, nothing apart from His Father. Yet, in all His emptiness, there was no presence on earth that so greatly impacted so many people with so much good for all time. For Jesus to be so receptive and responsive to His Father required Him to give up His trust in everything except in God, to will only what God wills. His life was fully anah, afflicted and open for God to live in and through

The role of High Priest was central to observing Yom Kippur. The High Priest made blood atonement, first for himself and then for Israel. He identified with Israel in her sin and mediated for both himself and her. But how could he stand apart from himself to mediate for himself? How could he mediate for God and represent a holy God to Israel, in his sin? It was impossible for him to fully assume either position. He could, however, indicate what kind of mediator was needed to fill such a pivotal role in God’s relationship with His people. This mediator would present God so the people can receive Him, and present the people for God to accept. This One would be the Messiah, Israel’s hope

The story in Genesis about Melchizedek (14:18), priest of God Most High, foreshadows the Messiah. Melchizedek appeared to Abraham about five hundred years before Moses and the Levitical Priesthood began. Only one other time is he mentioned in the Hebrew Bible, in Psalm 110:4 when King David speaks of the Messiah: “The Lord has sworn and will not change His mind, ‘You are a priest forever, according to the order of Melchizedek.’” This priest of the Most High God differs from the Levitical priests in at least two important ways. First, he is chosen as priest with an oath by God and not because He is a Levite. Second, he would be forever. He will forever mediate for His people to receive and be sanctified by God

Yom Kippur reveals that God’s holy relationship with His people must be in the spirit of anah. His priest would also have to be in the spirit of anah to represent God and people to each other. This humble spirit is Jesus. In His emptiness before God, Jesus receives God fully to present Him to us. In His humility, we can come to Him without fear so that He can present us to God. In this way He mediates between God and us. In Jesus, God did what Israel could not do and was never expected to do. Just as we saw earlier that God’s commandments pointed to promises He would fulfill, so also the appointed holy days were ultimately meant to celebrate the ways God is and does for those who trust Him

God always intended the law and the appointed times to indicate and reflect the substance that is His, alone. God the Creator commanded Israel to rest in the Sabbath that He ultimately establishes for her. God the Redeemer commanded Israel to sacrifice life in anticipation of His sacrificed life. God the Sanctifier commanded Israel to humble herself to recognize the Messiah who comes in humility. Jesus “poured out Himself to death” (Isaiah 53:12) to keep God’s promise to us