Offering

Leviticus 9:5-8 – And they brought what Moses commanded in front of the tent of meeting, and all the congregation drew near and stood before the Lord. And Moses said, “This is the thing that the Lord commanded you to do, that the glory of the Lord may appear to you.” Then Moses said to Aaron, “Draw near to the altar and offer your sin offering and your burnt offering and make atonement for yourself and for the people, and bring the offering of the people and make atonement for them, as the Lord has commanded.” So Aaron drew near to the altar and killed the calf of the sin offering, which was for himself.

Leviticus 4:2-3,5-6,11-12 – “Speak to the people of Israel, saying, If anyone sins unintentionally in any of the Lord's commandments about things not to be done, and does any one of them, if it is the anointed priest who sins, thus bringing guilt on the people, then he shall offer for the sin that he has committed a bull from the herd without blemish to the Lord for a sin offering…And the anointed priest shall take some of the blood of the bull and bring it into the tent of meeting, and the priest shall dip his finger in the blood and sprinkle part of the blood seven times before the Lord in front of the veil of the sanctuary…But the skin of the bull and all its flesh, with its head, its legs, its entrails, and its dung—all the rest of the bull—he shall carry outside the camp to a clean place, to the ash heap, and shall burn it up on a fire of wood. On the ash heap it shall be burned up.

Application:

• ·         Although the burnt, grain and fellowship offerings were voluntary, the sin offering was compulsory. As soon as an anointed priest became aware of unintentional sin, he was to bring his sin offering to the Lord.
• ·         Our parallel to the sin offering was Jesus, who suffered outside the city gate. The first type of sin offering was offered by and for a priest or by the elders for the whole community. The second type of sin offering was for a leader of the nation or a private individual. The offering included confession and the symbolic transfer of guilt by laying hands on the sacrifice. Then the priest who offered the sacrifice made atonement for the sin, and the Lord promised forgiveness. By bringing such a sin offering, a faithful Israelite under conviction of sin sought restoration of fellowship with God.
• ·         Since the sins of the offerer were symbolically transferred to the sacrificial bull, the bull had to be entirely destroyed and not thrown on the burnt offering ash heap.

All Scripture verses taken from ESV