Num 18:1, So the Lord said to Aaron, "You and your sons and your father's household with you shall bear the guilt in connection with the sanctuary; and you and your sons with you shall bear the guilt in connection with your priesthood. 
	This morning, we continue with our consideration of this passage. We are using a rather extensive quote from Dr. Ronald B. Allen in his writing on the Book of Numbers contained in The Expositor’s Bible Commentary. We are evaluating the significance to us, today, of the reason that God included both Chapters 18 + 19 in His Word. To many readers, these chapters seem out of place within the overall structure of the entire Book of Numbers which deals with the desert experience of the Children of Israel. Dr. Allen makes it very clear that these chapters are vitally part of the entire book of Numbers as directed by the Holy Spirit for the expressed benefit of us as the New Testament Church. 
The Omnipotent and Omniscient Lord God Almighty is constantly faithful to both the Old and the New Testament readers as He provides the means whereby our understanding of His grace and His mercy can be better appreciated by those who seek to know and to understand what He put into place. The office of the priestly order was an absolute necessity to be enables to come unto Him and to find the means of forgiveness and redemption. Accordingly, it shows just how much God loved His people then and loves His people now through the avenue of the service of those so chosen to make propitiation for the sins of His people.  
As a reminder, these chapters immediately follow the affirmation of God's selection of Aaron as the chosen priest of God to the people through the use of the rods from all the tribes. This is where we will once more read the statement from Dr. Allen. 
Quote, The house of Aaron has been convincingly validated by the miracle of the budding, blossoming, and fruiting staff (Num 17). Now, as Aaron was growing older and his sons Eleazar and Ithamar were assisting him more and more in his sacred duties, tasks that would be theirs alone on his demise, it is necessary to explain more fully the manner of the priesthood. The inclusion of chapters 18-19 in the story line of the desert experience is not intrusive but compelling. 
	Nevertheless, the modern reader comes to chapters 18-19 with a sense of foreboding; what, we may wonder, is in these chapters for me? The answer to that question is fivefold:
1.	The reader of Scripture needs to have general knowledge about the major institutions of the biblical period just for Scripture to make sense.
2.	Our understanding of the true worship of God begins with the sense that He controls and directs true worship; who the priests are and how they function are first His concerns. This means that worship is not a game where we may make up the rules as we play.
3.	A general knowledge of the work of the priests in the Hebrew Bible gives many insights to the modern reader as to the interests of God in our own worship. Often we think of worship in terms of what we like and appreciate. This misses the mark; worship is principally for God’s pleasure.
4.	A general knowledge of the work of priests in the time of Hebrew worship gives the Christian reader significant insights into the priestly work of the Lord Jesus Christ. The Book of Hebrews has an intense priestly orientation in its presentation of the Lord Jesus Christ, priest of God in the manner of Melchizedek.
5.	In contrast with the highly regulated, highly structured patterns demanded of the priests of the Hebrew economy, the believer in the Lord Jesus Christ today has a direct access to God through the Savior that is nearly unbelievable. We are all priests; we can come near the presence of the Lord without an intermediary. Yet our privilege as believer-priests can only really be appreciated against the background of priests in the biblical period. End quote.
Last week, we considered the aspects of worship and God’s control and pleasure in the true worship of His people. This morning, we will concentrate on the realities expressed in the 4th and 5th detailed explanations as to the value of these chapters, and indeed the whole Book of Numbers. This will be as it relates to us today in the priesthood of Jesus Christ. 
The priestly work of the Aaronic lineage was the earthly representation of the perfect priesthood of Our Lord and Savior. Therefore it is indicative of the only manner in which mankind can find full access to the Most Holy God.
As we read in Ex 28:38, The Lord established the priesthood with the function to take away the iniquity of the people in order for them to find acceptance before God. The priests, through an exhaustive and complicated and precisely detailed manner of preparation, brought the sacrifices for the sins of the people unto God, but it was in seemingly endless repetition. 
Ex 28:38, And it shall be on Aaron's forehead, and Aaron shall take away the iniquity of the holy things which the sons of Israel consecrate, with regard to all their holy gifts; and it shall always be on his forehead, that they may be accepted before the Lord. 	The responsibility of the priest’s service was so great that they were personally accountable to God for their course of action and interaction and behavior. As our morning’s passage states very precisely - So the Lord said to Aaron, "You and your sons and your father's household with you shall bear the guilt in connection with the sanctuary; and you and your sons with you shall bear the guilt in connection with your priesthood. 
The priests bore the guilt upon themselves in their service before God and the nation. It was on their heads as to whether or not the sacrifices were presented in the manner that would be accepted by God. They were personally accountable and individually faced the most dire of consequences as they entered the holies of holies if all had not been perfectly accomplished to ensure their covering of holiness and sanctification before God. 
The Prophet Isaiah was shown the scope of this and detailed it in Isa 53:4-11, as he foretold the affliction and torment and agony that the Christ, the Suffering Servant, would bear in His priestly service on the behalf of those whom He would sustain and save. Please turn to it so we can read it together in gratitude for all that Jesus took upon Himself personally for you and for me. 
Isa 53:4-11, Surely our griefs He Himself bore, And our sorrows He carried; Yet we ourselves esteemed Him stricken, Smitten of God, and afflicted. 
But He was pierced through for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities; The chastening for our well-being fell upon Him, And by His scourging we are healed. All of us like sheep have gone astray, Each of us has turned to his own way; But the Lord has caused the iniquity of us all To fall on Him. 
He was oppressed and He was afflicted, Yet He did not open His mouth; Like a lamb that is led to slaughter, And like a sheep that is silent before its shearers, So He did not open His mouth. By oppression and judgment He was taken away; And as for His generation, who considered That He was cut off out of the land of the living, For the transgression of my people to whom the stroke was due? His grave was assigned with wicked men, Yet He was with a rich man in His death, Because He had done no violence, Nor was there any deceit in His mouth. But the Lord was pleased To crush Him, putting Him to grief; If He would render Himself as a guilt offering, He will see His offspring, He will prolong His days, And the good pleasure of the Lord will prosper in His hand. As a result of the anguish of His soul, He will see it and be satisfied; By His knowledge the Righteous One, My Servant, will justify the many, As He will bear their iniquities. 
	Jesus is the Christ Who bore all our sins to the cross and was nailed to it as the only means for our redemption. In His willingness to take upon Himself all our guilt and shame and trespasses, He perfectly fulfilled the every obligation of the priestly order. He made Himself the sin offering which eternally satisfied the righteous and just wrath of God. 
	The Apostle Peter, in 1 Peter 2:21-25, which refers back to the prophecy of Isaiah, describes for us the manner in which Christ’s substitutionary work should have its perfect effect in our lives. 1 Peter 2:21-25, For you have been called for this purpose, since Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example for you to follow in His steps, who committed no sin, nor was any deceit found in His mouth; and while being reviled, He did not revile in return; while suffering, He uttered no threats, but kept entrusting Himself to Him who judges righteously; and He Himself bore our sins in His body on the cross, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness; for by His wounds you were healed. For you were continually straying like sheep, but now you have returned to the Shepherd and Guardian of your souls. 
	The Writer to the Hebrews gives manifest details to the measure of the work of Christ as Our Perfect and Glorious High Priest. We begin with Heb 4:15+16. 
Heb 4:15+16, For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but One who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and may find grace to help in time of need.
Our Lord is compassionate and merciful in the fact that He knows exactly what we are going through in each and every situation. He does not stand over us in a place of superiority, looking down His nose at such poor miserable creatures who should know better. He understands our frustrations and our temptations and He works to make known within us the power of His grace and His longsuffering and His mercy and His patience and His endurance and His holiness.
	Then, as we can read together in Heb 5:1-10, Jesus’ High Priestly office is an eternal office on our behalf. He has gloriously satisfied the very heart of God, His and now, through Jesus, Our Heavenly Father, in absolute perfection. 
	Heb 5:1-10, For every high priest taken from among men is appointed on behalf of men in things pertaining to God, in order to offer both gifts and sacrifices for sins; he can deal gently with the ignorant and misguided, since he himself also is beset with weakness; and because of it he is obligated to offer sacrifices for sins, as for the people, so also for himself. And no one takes the honor to himself, but receives it when he is called by God, even as Aaron was. So also Christ did not glorify Himself so as to become a high priest, but He who said to Him, "Thou art My Son, Today I have begotten Thee"; just as He says also in another passage, "Thou art a priest forever According to the order of Melchizedek." In the days of His flesh, He offered up both prayers and supplications with loud crying and tears to the One able to save Him from death, and He was heard because of His piety. Although He was a Son, He learned obedience from the things which He suffered. And having been made perfect, He became to all those who obey Him the source of eternal salvation, being designated by God as a high priest according to the order of Melchizedek. 
	Then, in Heb 9:24-28, is described how utterly singular and immeasurably valuable is the work that Jesus has accomplished. Heb 9:24-28, For Christ did not enter a holy place made with hands, a mere copy of the true one, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us; nor was it that He should offer Himself often, as the high priest enters the holy place year by year with blood not his own. Otherwise, He would have needed to suffer often since the foundation of the world; but now once at the consummation of the ages He has been manifested to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself. And inasmuch as it is appointed for men to die once and after this comes judgment, so Christ also, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, shall appear a second time for salvation without reference to sin, to those who eagerly await Him. 
These are all truths that come into full focus as we learn to appreciate what was put into place by God all those centuries ago through the establishment of the priestly order. As we continue to read through the Book of Numbers, and in deed all of scripture, it would serve us well to constantly stop and to ask the Lord to open in our hearts the greater measure of what He has done. This is in order to appreciate ever more fully His wonderful and tremendous love and mercy. He has blessed the sons of men for all these ages of ages in the type, and then the actual giving of His Only Begotten Son, Jesus Christ, Our Eternal High Priest, and Lord and Savior. He willingly took upon Himself all our guilt and shame. He bore it all to the cross and then left it there in the grave in order to raise us up victoriously with Himself in all His glory unto eternal life. So be it.  
So the Lord said to Aaron, "You and your sons and your father's household with you shall bear the guilt in connection with the sanctuary; and you and your sons with you shall bear the guilt in connection with your priesthood. Amen.
					
This morning’s benediction is Ps 8:1. O Lord, our Lord, How majestic is Thy name in all the earth, Who hast displayed Thy splendor above the heavens!  Amen.