The Ordination of Priests
Study Scripture: Exodus 29: 1-9, 35 – 37
Background Scripture: Hebrews 4 14: 14- 16 9:24, Numbers 20:24-28 1 Peter 2:4-5
Lesson #3 March 15, 2025
Key Verse
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Exodus 29:
INTRODUCTION
So you want to be in Paradise, do you?
You want to be freed from bondage and to enter in God’s presence, do you?
You believe that you can follow the Ten Commandments, the well- known set of Laws given by God and which forms the basis for thousands of years of legal systems, which is about the relationship of God to His people and the relationship worship that is at its centre, do you?
You want to go with God, do you?
If you do you have to adjust to a new home.
The nation of Israel committed themselves to that kind of covenant agreement where the Lord would reign as King from the Tabernacle, with His throne above the Ark between the cherubim.
This King had delivered the people from slavery in Egypt and from the condemnation of sin so that He may dwell with them in an incredible state of intimacy.
One writer therefore reminds us:
“The book of Exodus spends seven chapters giving instructions for the construction of the tabernacle and six chapters describing its construction. We may look at all this as boring details, but it shows the importance of worship in the life of Israel, and it shows the importance of worship in our lives as well.
The Lord delivered the people out of Egypt so that they might worship him (Exodus 3:18; 5:1, 3; 7:16; 8:1, 20; 9:1, 13; 10:3) ……
God’s redemption of Israel, and of us, is for the purposes of entering into relationship with him, a relationship that embraces both worship and love in response to his holiness and love for us.
From the beginning, the Lord desired to dwell with man.
The Garden in Eden was God’s land (Genesis 2:8). He dwelt there. Yet because of sin, man was driven from the presence of God (Genesis 3:24).
The amazing thing is that God didn’t give up on man at this point. He still desires to dwell with man, to be God to man.
In the tabernacle there is a kind of re-creation going on by which God will dwell with man again…
Then there are also similarities between the garden in Eden and the tabernacle. Most significantly, both include cherubim (Genesis 3:24, Exodus 25:18). In Genesis the cherubim guarded the way to make sure that man would not enter God’s presence.
But here, the cherubim are to be mounted on each side of the Ark of the Covenant, and the Lord is to be enthroned between them. Here, the cherubim bring God back to man”.
Note that to enter Paradise the system in the entire Old Testament is a costly one. It required
- Having a specific man anointed and approved, clothed in specific approved garments (Exodus 29:1-25)
- Eating approved foods (Exodus 29:26-34)
- Meeting God in an Approved Place (Exodus 29:35-44)
- Meeting God at approved times (Exodus 23)
- Following faithfully approved Laws given by God (Exodus 20 and subsequent chapters) teaching the people how to live in God’s ways.
- Continually shedding much blood in approved Sacrifices led by approved and specially consecrated persons (Leviticus 8).
In our Study we are examining the instructions God gave Moses about the High Priest, for he would be central to the nation’s relationship to God for he would be the lead person to forgiveness and worship.
Let us not treat this key role lightly for in Christianity the same role of a leader in forgiveness and worship is true for us today.
The things we are looking at in Exodus are a shadow of the reality that came into full and personal view in the Person of the Lord Jesus Christ. He redeemed and saved us and became for us our Eternal High Priest.
The role of this priesthood is glorious, wonderful and amazing.
Understanding it is indispensable for your journey as a Christian today. one scholar stresses.
Never forget what the purposes of God have always been. Christianity is not a new religion for this passage from over 1400 B.C. points to the ultimate fulfillment in Jesus Christ promised in Genesis 3:15 when Judaism and any other pagan religions had not yet existed.
We are now therefore being pointed to the reality and instructed by the Holy Spirit not to stay in the shadows but to focus on the reality in the Lord Jesus Christ.
The importance of this is found in the importance of how to consecrate Aaron and his sons as priests to God.
Do not therefore forget you true believers are “priests” to God and the full force of the symbols apply to you. You are under the Great High Priest, the Lord Jesus Christ and you should be careful to your position in Christ. One writer therefore reminds us:
“This chapter describes an elaborate, holy, seven-day ceremony with glorious and beautiful clothing for Aaron, the high priest, Clothing with gold and colourful fabrics, and beautiful jewels, clothing unparalleled in its splendour. And this ceremony included animal sacrifices and lots of blood”.
So ask yourself why Israel needed a High Priest and why do you need one too.
Is this God’s mechanism which makes the High Priest central and essential to salvation?
Let us look at God and then look at ourselves honestly.
God is holy, glorious, pure, brilliant and majestic but all mankind is not holy but instead we are unholy, steeped in sinfulness, darkness, impurity, with a heart he does not understand and cannot control.
We must ensure in the heart what Moses sang:
“Lord, who is like you among the gods? Who is like you, glorious in holiness, revered with praises, performing wonders?”
Do not underestimate or downplay our problem for if we do we like the unbelieving and rebellious Satan and are lost. One writer laments:
”We simply don’t comprehend our smallness before God and the vastness of this chasm between us.
In our deception, we say, “Sure, I acknowledge God is bigger than me, but he’s not that much bigger, really, is he?”
But the truth is, its like we are standing at the foot of a glorious mountain cliff towering over us, and we should be overwhelmed with the height and majesty of the mountain compared to our small-ness.
The book of Exodus shouts to us of his glory……
Even a deeply spiritual man like Moses, perhaps more godly than any other human at that time, was terrified to face God in all his holiness, glory, and splendour.
So again, our fundamental problem is always centered around a too-small view of God and a too-large view of ourselves.
We are greatly deceived. And the result is that we don’t see our great need.
So now there is no access to God because of his glory and our sinfulness, we are faced with only two options. Only two:
- Judgment OR
- Mercy .
Our only hope is mercy. Our only hope is that somehow God will have compassion on us in our plight.
So what does the Lord do to extend mercy? He does more than simply wishing our sins away. He has a process. A mechanism. The mechanism for extending mercy to unholy man can be summarized in one word: substitution.
God is just and will punish crimes against him. But because he is merciful, and only because he is merciful, he allows an exchange. In the Old Testament he allowed an animal to be killed in a holy ceremony, and the blood was offered up in the place of Israel’s blood. A life is exchanged for a life.
The word for this is Substitutionary Atonement. This is explained clearly here. Leviticus 17:11”.
You might fool yourself into thinking you can close the gap between you and God by
-your sundry religious activities,
-doing good works,
-doing the best you can, or
-seeking after God in your own way and by your own efforts after creating your own rules for access.
Access to the holy and glorious God is therefore denied us We cannot enter the presence of God
Since no person is holy, not even Aaron the High Priest God will have to make him presentable to stand in the presence of God as mediator for the nation, and God not only has to clean him up, and dress him up so he can enter the tabernacle, but God had to provide for him go through “this elaborate, glorious, holy ceremony to make Aaron clean and pure”.
So hopefully now Exodus 29 will make you understand the mechanism in God’s plan of salvation. This Old Testament event will now make sense to us when the Gospel calls Jesus the Lamb of God and the Great High Priest who had to become a man and personally shed His blood so we can understand Hebrews 4:14-16 which states:
“Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens—Jesus the Son of /God—let us hold fast to our confession. For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who has been tempted in every way as we are, yet without sin.
Therefore let us approach the throne of grace with boldness, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in time of need”.
THE TEXT
The Ten Commandments, the law of the altar, and sundry laws relating to servants, violence, how to deal with issues arising from the presence of animals, the responsibilities involved in possessing property, sundry moral and ceremonial principles to be observed, the rules of justice which applies to everyone, and how they should be interpreted, the Law of the Sabbaths, the three annual Feasts, the promises of God’s protection, the rules for the Sanctuary and the offering for its construction and the contents for the Sanctuary, the garments for the priesthood, and the sundry sacrifices and the sin offerings, have been described.
Verses 1-3. After describing and communicating all the instructions of God to the nation, clear instructions on the setting apart of and consecration of the priests are given.
The ceremony procedures are described later in Leviticus 8.
The instruction is to set the priests apart for the purposes God intended. They are to be hallowed, set apart or sanctified.
The word Consecration means to be made Holy, Sacred, Set Apart, Sanctified. This had to be done in the ceremonial sense.
The word “priests” is defined as someone who serves God on behalf of the people.. Different levels with their different duties for priests were established. All jobs were special and holy and had to be done with great care. But only the high priests were permitted to enter the innermost part of the tabernacle, the Holy of Holiest to make Atonement for sins at the Mercy Seat.
The High Priest thus had access to God once a year to perform the task of Mediator for the people.
The consecration ceremony needed an unblemished, blameless young bull and two rams so that sacrificial blood could be shed.
Bread, unleavened bread as was used at the Passover in Egypt, was to be there at the ceremony for this stood for fellowship with God.
This was made of fine wheat flour with three types of loaves, unleavened bread, unleavened bread mixed with oil, unleavened cakes/wafers mixed with oil
They had to be in one basket the word basket meaning to “build” in a weaving process from a willow branch.
All are to be presented to God at the sanctuary. Aaron and his sons were imperfect and first had to sacrifice to cover their sins so that they could be prepared to minister to the Lord.
When people came to the Sanctuary to sacrifice they would be reminded of their sins for they had to put their hands on the animal to be sacrificed and confess their transgressions. The priests would cut the animal’s throat and the blood poured out until the life blood was emptied.
Whether they thought of themselves as guilty before God or not they would see what sin had brought to them and they hopefully would never forget that.
Verse 4. Aaron and his sons are to be brought to the Tent of Meeting, The Sanctuary, and their entire bodies evidently with the people witnessing them, washed clean.
Verses 5-6.The garments described in Chapter 28 are to be put on Aaron with the robe, the ephod, and the breastplate with the Urim and the Thummin.
Then the turban was put on Aaron’s head and the “holy crown”, the plate of “pure gold” referred to in 28:36 was put on the turban.
This “crown” separated Aaron from the other priests and everyone else in the nation.
Verse 7.Exodus 25:6 had mentioned the ‘anointing oil’ but this first put on Aaron’s head. Psalm 133:1-3 called this precious oil which was poured on Aaron’s head
“running down on the beard,
The beard of Aaron,
Running down the edge of his garments.
It is like the dew of Hermon,
Descending upon the mountains of Zion;
For there the Lord commanded the blessing-
Life forevermore”.
Verse 8. Then the special clothing was put on the sons of Aaron so that all knew they were separated to the duties of the priesthood, serving in the Holy Place section of the tabernacle.
They were girded with sashes and the special hats were put on their head to mark them out.
It was then emphasized that their position as priests would last only as long as the system of Mosaic Law lasted. Messiah would on His Coming fulfill the law and the priesthood as then defined ended.
So Moses was empowered to consecrate and ordain Aaron and his sons, setting them apart to accept offerings from the people and offer these to the Lord.
Verses 35-36. In this ordination and consecration ceremony on each of the seven days a bull had to be sacrificed as a “sin offering for atonement”.
Note this was atonement but it was incomplete for only Messiah, the Suffering Servant of Jehovah could offer complete atonement.
Aaron and his sons had to first offer sacrifices for atonement for their sins.
Note sin had affected everything. Its corruption was extensive and so even the altar, a material object, had to be cleansed.
The unholy defiles. When something is defiled sin is present. See Haggai 2:10-14 for a discussion on this principle.
The altar had to be consecrated for sinful men had built it. To be acceptable for use, it had to be sanctified, set apart for sacred use.
Atonement for the altar had to be made for the seven days.
The altar would then be most holy
Verse 37. Nothing that was unholy should touch the altar Anything offered on the altar should be items being offered to a Holy God and so devoted to sacred use.
But it is very unlikely that the abomination of desolation could be transformed into a holy thing.
There is however disagreement on how this verse should be interpreted.
It is clear however that sacrifices had to be made continually to deal with this issue of sin.
CONCLUSION
Never forget that Jesus is the only way to salvation. He is the only and perfect way into the presence of God the Father.
The Apostle Peter tells you that you are a priest who has been called and separated to use by God.
Do not treat your position in Christ lightly, and do not keep on breaking His comandments and testimonies.
He came to dwell with you.
This should have a massive effect on your day- to -day life.
Always keep Him in your thoughts.
Remember Him and keep trusting Jesus throughout your life.
He came to tabernacle with us and so it is a great comfort that Jesus understands us and will be a perfect and powerful Mediator.
Because He has shed His sinless and perfect blood His sacrifice was sufficient once and for all. Any suggestion that His work on the Cross is not sufficient and that He needs to do more to effect your salvation is a fraudulent idea. So go boldly to God the Father in your times of need as well as in times of joy.