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The holiest day on the Jewish calendar, Yom Kippur (Day of Atonement), ended in Israel at sundown a few hours ago. The Western Wall was flooded with thousands upon thousands of ethnic and religious Jews praying prayers of confession of sin, and seeking God’s atonement. Of course, without a temple and any ability to actually offer atoning sacrifices on the altar as prescribed in the Torah, a question is begged:

Upon what basis, then, are these thousands of Jewish sinners seeking atonement? 

Atonement means “covering.” Sins must be “covered” or “hidden” from God’s sight if sinners are to have any hope of forgiveness and everlasting life with God. After all, God’s eyes are too pure to look upon evil (Hab 1:13). God’s perfect justice means “the Lord will by no means clear the guilty” (Nah 1:3). In other words, sinners are in big trouble with God unless God Himself provides a way of atonement. A way for their sins to be covered. A way of forgiveness. A way to be righteous before God. Accepted. Pardoned. Loved as a child of heaven. Sins, all of them, must be dealt with by Holy God. Else no salvation. No hope of heaven. Death. Not life.

Leviticus 16 prescribed the process of substitutionary, sacrificial atonement for Yom Kippur. It included animal blood sacrifices, as well as banishing the scape goat outside the camp to symbolically bear away the sins of the people. All alone. Left to die. Without hope. 

That God prescribed a way of atonement at all is pure mercy! Sheer grace! 

That’s always been the sinner’s only hope of being “at-one-ment” with Holy God. As the beloved hymn proclaims, “Grace, Grace, God’s Grace; Grace that will pardon and cleanse within! Grace, Grace, God’s Grace; Grace that is greater than all our sin!” 

Jews in the Old Covenant appealed not to the animal itself. But to God’s mercy in accepting the animal. Or, at least the Jews who were actually saved from their sins did. In faith, they obediently followed God’s prescription, offered the sacrifices, and trusted in God’s merciful, faithfulness to keep His promise. The promise of atonement. 

Perhaps no better Old Covenant example of this reality – that only by grace are sinners saved and their sins atoned for – exists than King David. After committing adultery and murder, two sins which under the Law had no sacrificial provision at all for atonement (those sins were capital crimes, per Num 35:31 and Lev 20:10), David was left with only one appeal:

Have mercy upon me, O God, according to Your steadfast love; according to Your abundant mercy blot out my transgressions (Ps 51:1). 

Even more telling, is what David prays regarding acceptable sacrifices and offerings:

For You will not delight in sacrifice, or I would give it; You will not be pleased with a burnt offering. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, You will not despise (Ps 51:16-17).

Wow! We need to pray for thousands upon thousands of Jews to make this their plea to God. May God open their eyes. Like Kind David. To see their only hope is in God’s forgiving love and abundant mercy. May their spirits and hearts be broken over their sin. May they grasp their hopeless condition. May they confess no sacrifice, no religious ritual, no act of kindness, no amount of weeping and wailing, could ever actually atone for their sins. They need the Suffering Servant of Isaiah 53 to be stricken for their transgressions and crushed for their sins! Then and only then will Yahweh “see and be satisfied” (Isa 53:11).  

O God, open the eyes of Israel. Bring many to a desperation as they seek atonement. Bless the work of the missionaries and Christians in Jerusalem and Israel. Open the ears and hearts of thousands upon thousands of Jews to hear the good news of Jesus the Messiah. The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world! Circumcise their hearts by Your Spirit, in and through the power of Your Word. May they be given ears to hear. Eyes to see. Hearts to repent and believe. In Jesus. The One and Only Atonement for the sins of mankind.

But when Christ appeared as a high priest . . . He entered once for all into the holy place, not by means of the blood of goats and calves but by means of His own blood, thus securing an eternal redemption (Heb 9:11-12).

by Keith McWhorter