Laws About Unintentional Sins
22 “‘Now if you as a community unintentionally fail to keep any of these commands the Lord gave Moses— 23 any of the Lord’s commands to you through him, from the day the Lord gave them and continuing through the generations to come— 24 and if this is done unintentionally without the community being aware of it, then the whole community is to offer a young bull for a burnt offering as an aroma pleasing to the Lord, along with its prescribed grain offering and drink offering, and a male goat for a sin offering.[a] 25 The priest is to make atonement for the whole Israelite community, and they will be forgiven, for it was not intentional and they have presented to the Lord for their wrong a food offering and a sin offering. 26 The whole Israelite community and the foreigners residing among them will be forgiven, because all the people were involved in the unintentional wrong.
27 “‘But if just one person sins unintentionally, that person must bring a year-old female goat for a sin offering. 28 The priest is to make atonement before the Lord for the one who erred by sinning unintentionally, and when atonement has been made, that person will be forgiven. 29 One and the same law applies to everyone who sins unintentionally, whether a native-born Israelite or a foreigner residing among you.
30 “‘But anyone who sins defiantly, whether native-born or foreigner, blasphemes the Lord and must be cut off from the people of Israel.31 Because they have despised the Lord’s word and broken his commands, they must surely be cut off; their guilt remains on them.’”
Numbers 15:22-31
Obviously, if there is unintentional sin, there is also intentional sin. This passage addresses both. Here God tells Moses to tell the people that if the leaders sin unintentionally, there is a specific sacrifice process to go through. When the process is finished, God will forgive the sin. God lays out unintentional sin, sacrifices, and forgiveness for both the community and the individual.
God wanted to forgive them of their sin but a sacrifice was still needed because the debt must still be paid. In addition, having them go through the sacrifice process shows God that they are serious about making things right. That they have made a decision to commit themselves to God. And, if it happens again, they are willing to go through the process again in order to receive God’s forgiveness.
In the same way, we also must accept God’s forgiveness. Without it, we cannot meet God. This part of the Gospel is a big hang-up for the secular world. Why can’t God just save us all? If we are all bad and he made the sacrifice then what is the point of having some special club of saved and non-saved? The point is this: God has come more than half way for us. He made the ultimate sacrifice with his son. Can’t we take the extra step to confess with our mouth that Jesus Christ is Lord? It seems like such a small sacrifice on our part. I honestly don’t think God is require that much from us.
However for intentional sin (only the individual is mentioned), this person is to be cut off from the rest of the people. Why can’t they be reconciled? Why can’t they offer a sacrifice and be forgiven like the others? One intentional mistake and they are thrown out? Isn’t this rather harsh? I think not. The reason and the difference is that this person willfully sins and does so defiantly. God looks at the heart and at the same time with these laws, is asking the people to do the same. I don’t think those that were cut-off were done lightly. They knew each other and who the offenders and trouble makers were. These were those who had a heart set against what is righteous and I don’t think this would have been a first time accidental sin, if there is such thing as a willful accidental sin.
David said in the Psalms that he wanted to be kept from willful sin and in Hebrews 10:26 it says “If we sin willfully after we have received the knowledge of truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sin.” Now, there are times in my life where I deliberately and knowingly sinned and other times where I found myself knee deep in sin. But it was I who journeyed the rest of the way into the waters of rebellion. However, once the light bulb comes on and I came to my senses, I quickly swam back to the shore to make myself right with God. If I were deliberate, willful, and intentional within my heart as God talks about in this passage (or at least the way I interpret it), I would continue in the waters of rebellion and never look back. In this case, there wouldn’t be any sacrifice left. I miss my chance until I come to my senses. The reality is that hope is never lost even for the intentional sinner.
It is not about a walk of perfection, but a recognition of sin. Many within the world wait for us as Christians to fall and then lash out in blame while claiming we judge them when we do the same. However the difference that is never addressed by the world is that we as Christian, even though at times fail, recognize our actions as sin. The world does not see anything they do as sin, only good. They recognize no fault yet blame the Christian for holding to their belief. The truth is perhaps for a moment we deny what is right but, as Christians, we all know when we sin. This is the difference of verse 27-29 and verse 30. On one side such a thing is unintentionally and the other defiant. As Christians, we always come back to the realization that we are not on the right path. I think the defiant person here never comes to this conclusion nor ever plans to. They want this sin in their life which is why they are cut off from the people.
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