Daily Devotionals

Even if your sins are like scarlet, they will be white as snow (Isaiah 1:18).

Since the days of Moses, Yom Kippur (the Day of Atonement) has been the most holy day on the Jewish calendar. The focus of this day is the most important issue facing humanity. We are told that this is the day when we are to find atonement and forgiveness for our sins.

In Temple times, Yom Kippur centered around the sacrifice of the two goats described in Leviticus 16. The chatat (sin goat) was to be killed after the priest had confessed the sins of the nation over it. The second goat, the azazel (scapegoat), was also to have the sins of the people confessed over it. But instead of being slain as a sacrifice, this goat was to be set free in the wilderness. By so doing, the people of Israel were to realize that their sins were taken away from them as they trusted in God's way of atonement.

The Talmud (Yoma 39b) tells us about an unusal part of the goat ceremony. A crimson thread was attached to the scapegoat and, every year, the thread would miraculously turn white. For the rabbis, this illustrated the truth of Isaiah 1:18, that God had cleansed the people of their sin. Strangely, the thread stopped turning white about forty years before the destruction of the Second Temple, around the year 30 C. E. Something had changed! Believers in Yeshua know what happened. The Messiah came at that time and fulfilled what those two goats had foreshadowed. The thread, no longer turning white, was a sign to the world that God sent his Son to be the propitiation and atonement for our sins (Romans 3:23-25). Have you given heed to the sign of Yom Kippur?

...let the love of Messiah show through me, knowing my sins are as white as snow.

BK