Monday, May 14, 2012

When a ruler hath sinned


Leviticus 4: 22-26, “When a ruler hath sinned, and done somewhat through ignorance against any of the commandments of the LORD his God concerning things which should not be done, and is guilty; Or if his sin, wherein he hath sinned, come to his knowledge; he shall bring his offering, a kid of the goats, a male without blemish: And he shall lay his hand upon the head of the goat, and kill it in the place where they kill the burnt offering before the LORD: it is a sin offering. And the priest shall take of the blood of the sin offering with his finger, and put it upon the horns of the altar of burnt offering, and shall pour out his blood at the bottom of the altar of burnt offering. And he shall burn all his fat upon the altar, as the fat of the sacrifice of peace offerings: and the priest shall make an atonement for him as concerning his sin, and it shall be forgiven him.”
We know that an entire organisation will be influenced by the morals of the leader. Any ruler cannot rule without, at least, some compliance from the people. If the people refuse to tolerate a bad leader then the leader will soon be forced out of office (compare Eccl 10: 5, “There is an evil which I have seen under the sun, as an error which proceedeth from the ruler:”) However, a nation with an evil rules needs to have some way of dealing with the issue before the whole nation is destroyed (see Prov 14: 34, “Righteousness exalteth a nation: but sin is a reproach to any people.”) The Lord, in His grace, established a method whereby a ruler could deal with his own sin, if he really didn’t know what he was doing, and so save the nation from destruction. When it was discovered that the ruler had sinned, the rules was to bring an offering for his sin and offering was to be sacrificed in the approved way so that atonement could be made for the sin and forgiveness effected.
(The view expressed in this blog are my own and should not be taken as inspired in any way.)

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