12.8 The Ceremonial Law
March 2008
References and Notes:
1. Abraham built altars to worship God. Genesis 12:7,8; 13:4,18
2. Empty sacrifices are not pleasing to God. Hebrews 10:5, Jeremiah 6:20, Isaiah 1:11
“And Samuel said, Hath the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams” (1 Samuel 15:22).
“For thou desirest not sacrifice; else would I give it: thou delightest not in burnt offering.
“The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit: a broken and a contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise” (Psalm 51:16-17).
“To what purpose is the multitude of your sacrifices unto me? saith the Lord: I am full of the burnt offerings of rams, and the fat of fed beasts; and I delight not in the blood of bullocks, or of lambs, or of he goats.
“Wash you, make you clean; put away the evil of your doings from before mine eyes; cease to do evil” (Isaiah 1:11,16);
“Wherefore when he cometh into the world, he saith, Sacrifice and offering thou wouldest not, but a body hast thou prepared me:
“In burnt offerings and sacrifices for sin thou hast had no pleasure” (Hebrews 10:5-6).
After Saul had been king of Israel for about sixteen years, he was commissioned to totally exterminate the Amalekites, including women, children and all their animals. Saul was victorious but saved the king alive and the best of the sheep and cattle “to sacrifice unto the Lord thy God.” Saul showed here a legalistic attitude that God would be pleased simply by the sacrifice of animals. Saul even went so far as to say to Samuel, “I have performed the commandment of the Lord” (1 Sam. 15:13).
Samuel met Saul on his return from battle. “And Samuel said, ‘Hath the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams” (1 Samuel 15:22).
3. The Testimony, the ten commandments, also called the covenant were kept IN the ark.
“And Moses said unto Aaron, Take a pot, and put an omer full of manna therein, and lay it up before the LORD, to be kept for your generations.
“As the LORD commanded Moses, so Aaron laid it up before the Testimony, to be kept” (Exodus 16:33-34).
“And the LORD said unto Moses, Bring Aaron's rod again before the testimony, to be kept for a token against the rebels; and thou shalt quite take away their murmurings from me, that they die not” (Numbers 17:10).
“And I will write on the tables the words that were in the first tables which thou brakest, and thou shalt put them in the ark” (Deuteronomy 10:2).
“Which had the golden censer, and the ark of the covenant overlaid round about with gold, wherein was the golden pot that had manna, and Aaron's rod that budded, and the tables of the covenant” (Hebrews 9:4),
The book of the (ceremonial and other) law were put in the side of the ark.
“And it came to pass, when Moses had made an end of writing the words of this law in a book, until they were finished,
“That Moses commanded the Levites, which bare the ark of the covenant of the LORD, saying,
“Take this book of the law, and put it in the side of the ark of the covenant of the LORD your God, that it may be there for a witness against thee” (Deut 31:24-26).
4. The “book of the law” was put in the side of the ark (Deut. 31:26).
The ten commandments were written on stone to show that they were permanent and unchanging. These tables were put inside the ark beneath the mercy seat (Ex. 25:21; Deut. 10:2,
5. “All that the Lord hath spoken, we will do” (Exodus 19:8; 24:3, 7).