THE BREAD OFFERING

 

 

Lev. 2:1-16

 

Prayer

 

Different versions of the Bible call this offering different names.

It’s called the bread offering, cereal offering, food offering, grain offering,    

meal offering and meat offering.

 

 

I’m calling it the bread offering because it points to Jesus.

Jesus is the Bread of Life.

 

 

One of the first things we notice is that the Jews could offer the ingredients   

that go into bread: fine flour, oil, frankincense and salt.

OR, they could make bread out of those ingredients and offer the bread.

 

 

If they chose to make bread, they could choose how to cook it.

They could bake it, fry it, or grill it.

 

 

But even though they could choose to offer the ingredients OR the bread,

And even though they could choose HOW to cook the bread,

 

 

They COULDN’T choose WHAT to put in it.

God required fine flour, oil, frankincense and salt.

 

 

And He refused to allow leaven and honey.

The 1^st required ingredient was fine flour.

 

 

 

 

When I think of fine flour, I think of the very best pure white flour.

My parents use to buy flour in cloth flower sacks that contained twenty-five,

fifty, or one hundred pound of flour.

 

 

Some people bought it in barrels.

But most people bought it in sacks.

 

 

Mom made bread out of the flour.

And clothes out of the sacks.

 

 

Mom and my two sisters wore flour sack blouses, dresses and skirts.

But there was something mom always had to do to the flour.

 

 

She always had to sift it.

Do you remember those old crank sifters?

 

 

We would crank and shake.

If we didn’t sift the flour, we had lumps (and perhaps bugs) in the bread.

 

 

So the Jews had to use fine flour in the bread offering.

Fine flour gave the bread a good even texture.

 

 

This tells us that Jesus would be the very best Bread of Life that God could  

offer.

He would be even tempered;

 

 

Not kind and loving one minute,

And fly off the handle the next.

 

 

 

That’s just the way Jesus was.

It didn’t matter who people were,

 

 

How much, or how little they had,

How important, or how unimportant they were,

 

 

Jesus treated everyone with compassion and dignity.

The 2^nd required ingredient was oil.

 

 

Oil signifies the Holy Spirit in the Bible.

God said mix the oil in the flour.

 

 

OR, pour the oil on top of the bread (like butter, I guess).

Oil IN THE BREAD signified that Jesus would be indwelt or filled with the   

Holy Spirit.

 

 

Oil poured ON TOP OF the bread signified the pouring out of the Holy Spirit         

on Jesus.

This happened when Jesus was baptized.

 

 

God said, “This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased” (Matt. 3:17).

And the Holy Spirit descended as a dove and lit on Jesus.

 

 

The 3^rd required ingredient was frankincense.

Frankincense is a precious resin that comes from trees.

 

 

It gives off a good fragrance when it’s crushed or heated.

This signified the precious qualities of Jesus’ life that showed through when  

he was mistreated and under pressure.

 

 

In His own hometown, some people tried to push Jesus over a cliff.

He could’ve destroyed them.

 

 

But He just walked away.

He was arrested, beaten, falsely accused, improperly tried, mocked,

          spit on,

 

 

Crowned with thorns,

And nailed to a cross.

 

 

But He prayed Father forgive them for they know not what they do.

His precious character showed through when He was mistreated and under   

pressure.

 

 

The 4^th required ingredient was salt.

God told the Jews to season every sacrifice with salt (Verse 13).

 

 

He said, “neither shalt thou suffer the SALT OF THE COVENANT of thy    

God to be lacking” (Verse 13).

People in the Middle East sometimes made a covenant of salt.

 

 

Two men would give their WORD to each other.

Each man would have a bag of salt.

 

 

One man would take salt from his bag.

And put it in the other man’s bag.

 

 

The other man would take salt from his bag.

And put it in the first man’s bag.

 

 

After they did that, there was no way to separate the salt back into the

original bags.

That signified that they couldn’t go back on their word.

 

 

God made a covenant of salt with Aaron and his descendants.

Concerning His promises, God said, “It is a covenant of salt for ever before

the Lord unto thee and to thy seed with thee” (Numbers 18:19).

 

 

He was saying, “I will never go back on my Word.”

“My promises are sure.”

 

 

The Southern Kingdom of Judah was being threatened by the Northern         

Kingdom of Israel.

 The King of Judah told the King of Israel, “Ought ye not to know that the    

LORD God of Israel gave the kingdom over Israel to David for ever,  

even to him and to his sons by a covenant of salt” (II Chron. 13:5)?

 

 

He was saying, “Don’t you know that you can’t defeat us because God gave         

His WORD that a descendant of David will sit on the throne?”

That’s still future.

 

 

But this is the point.

God made a covenant of salt to symbolize that He won’t go back on His      

Word.

 

 

Don’t overlook that covenant of salt.

Jesus will sit on the throne of David in Jerusalem because God made a          

covenant of salt to put Him there.

 

 

Salt is a preservative.

Jesus spoke words that preserve.

 

Salt prevents corruption.

Jesus spoke words that prevent the corruption of society.

 

 

Salt is a flavoring.

Jesus spoke words that flavor life and make it better.

 

 

Some people need salt to live.

Jesus spoke words that lead to eternal life.

 

 

Jesus had salt in Him.

And you have salt in you.

 

 

Jesus said, “Ye are the salt of the earth” (Matt. 5:13).

Paul said, “Let your speech be always with grace, seasoned with salt”

(Col. 4:6).

 

 

How can your speech be always with grace?

It can be always with grace, if you let every word express the grace of Jesus.

 

 

How can your speech be seasoned with salt?

It can be seasoned with salt, if you let your speech contain the Word of God.

 

 

Prayer is an offering to God.

God said, “Let every offering be seasoned with salt” (Verse 13).

 

 

We would do well to pray the Scriptures back to God.

Anyway, salt in the Bread Offering symbolized the Word of God in the Bread         

of Life.

 

 

 

Let’s now look at the two ingredients that couldn’t be used in the bread        

offering.

The 1^st forbidden ingredient was leaven.

 

 

Leaven is yeast.

It makes bread rise or puff up.

 

 

It symbolizes sin in the Scriptures.

The Bread of Life would be without leaven or without sin.

 

 

When the Jews took Jesus before Pilate,

Pilate said, “I find no fault in this man” (Luke 23:4).

 

 

He examined and cross-examined Jesus three times.

And three times he said, “I find no fault in this man.”

 

 

Jesus was the Bread of Perfection.

He never tried to glorify Himself;

 

 

Never tried to justify anything He did;

Never got proud or puffed up.

 

 

Notice, this.

Forbidding the use of leaven in the bread offering also meant that the things of        

God are not to be mixed with sin.

 

 

We’re to have no part in sin.

We’re not of this world.

 

 

 

We’re to come out of this world.

Jesus said, “Be ye perfect even as your Father in heaven is perfect.”

 

 

Paul said, “Sin shall not have dominion over you . . .” (Rom. 6:14).

I want to take this a step further.

 

 

Remember that salt symbolizes the Word of God.

Salt was a required ingredient.

 

 

And leaven was a forbidden ingredient.

Salt and leaven couldn’t be mixed together.

 

 

Jesus said beware of the leaven of the Pharisees (Matt. 16:6).

The leaven of the Pharisees was false doctrines.

 

 

Beware of people who mix salt with leaven;

People who take a sprinkling of the Word of God.

 

 

And mix it with a little wad of false doctrine.

It’s dangerous to mix the Word of God with false doctrines.

 

 

Leaven grows.

False doctrines spread.

 

 

The end result is apostasy.

The 2^nd forbidden ingredient was honey.

 

 

The reason honey was banned isn’t clear.

One man suggested that honey was forbidden because it will sour.

 

Jesus didn’t sour.

He was tempted by Satan.

 

 

But He didn’t fall away.

Another man suggested that honey was forbidden because it’s made by bees.

 

 

Bees come under the list of unclean things God gave to Moses.

Jesus didn’t have anything to do with things that would cause Him to break

the Law of Moses.

 

 

He always kept the Law.

Another man suggested that honey was forbidden because it’s a natural        

sweetener.

 

 

But the sweetness of Jesus wasn’t natural.

He was God in the flesh.

 

 

I want to close with three quick comments about the bread offering and our  

Communion service.

1^st---The bread offering was shared between God and the priests.

 

 

Part of the bread was burned on the altar as a sacrifice to God.

And part of it was consumed by the priests.

 

 

We share Communion with God as a nation of priests.

2^nd---The bread offering was broken into pieces (Verse 6).

 

 

At the Last Supper, Jesus took the bread, blessed it, broke it and said,

“This is my body which is broken for you.”

The broken bread offering signified the broken body of the Bread of Life.

 

3^rd---The bread offering was holy.

Communion is a sacrament of the Church.

 

We sometimes call it Holy Communion.