Today we'll be looking at what a leader in the community must do when he has sinned. Yesterday we studied the sin offering the people were to bring when they realized they had sinned as a group. The day before yesterday we talked about what a priest was to bring when he realized he had committed sin.
We need to keep in mind that this chapter is talking about unintentional sin. This doesn't necessarily mean the person has no awareness at all that he's doing wrong but by using the term "unintentional sin" we know the Bible is not talking about the sin of those who have rejected the Lord and who are living in defiant opposition of Him. It's talking about the average God-fearing citizen of the nation who wants to do right but who (like all of us) messes up from time to time. This person loves the Lord and belongs to Him but is incapable of avoiding all errors because he is living in a mortal human body in a fallen world.
Based on what I've studied in regard to this chapter, unintentional sin can be a sin committed in ignorance because a person doesn't know all the Lord's laws or because the person misunderstands the Lord's laws. Or it can be a type of sin a person commits because he has been deceived, either by someone else or by the temptation of the devil or by his own reasoning. It can be a case where the person reacted in a way that seemed right to him but, if he'd had time to compare his reaction to the word of God, it would not have stood the test. It can mean he's harbored a wrong attitude about someone or something and he didn't realize it for a time or else it didn't bother him for a while until the Holy Spirit pointed out his error. We all commit these types of sins. We love the Lord and belong to Him but we dwell in weak human bodies in a world where we're bombarded by stress and temptation. In Old Testament times we'd need to bring a sin offering when we became aware we were in the wrong, but now that Christ has offered Himself for us, we need only go to the Lord in a repentant spirit and admit our wrong and ask for the forgiveness the Lord faithfully bestows upon us. "If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness." (1 John 1:9)
"When a leader sins unintentionally and does what is forbidden in any of the commands of the Lord his God, when he realizes his guilt and the sin he has committed becomes known, he must bring as his offering a male goat without defect." (Leviticus 4:22-23) The sin offering for a priest or for the community as a whole was a bull. A bull was a bigger and more expensive offering than a male goat. I think this is because the sin of a priest was very serious due to the influence he had on the entire community; his sacrifice had to be a big one. Also when the community as a whole sinned, it was a very serious matter and it required what was considered the biggest type of sacrifice. Although a leader in the community (an elder or a judge, for example) has a great deal of influence, his personal sin is not likely to affect the entire community but only those with whom he has the most contact or those who are under his direct supervision. So his offering is to be a male goat.
"He is to lay his hand on the goat's head and slaughter it at the place where the burnt offering is slaughtered before the Lord. It is a sin offering. Then the priest shall take some of the blood of the sin offering with his finger and put it on the horns of the altar of burnt offering and pour out the rest of the blood at the base of the altar. He shall burn all the fat on the altar as he burned the fat of the fellowship offering. In this way the priest will make atonement for the leader's sin, and he will be forgiven." (Leviticus 4:24-26) The Bible makes no mention of the remainder of the goat having to be burned outside the camp the way the remainder of the bull had to be burned outside the camp. It is believed this means the priest could retain what was left over, just as he does with certain other types of offerings.
We have to remember that the priests made their living from their work at the tabernacle, as they should and as was ordained by God. They had to support not only themselves but also their wives and children, for the priests were married men with families. This is why with many types of offerings the bringer only had to devote a portion of them to the Lord and the remainder could be shared by the bringer and the priests or the remainder belonged to the priests alone.
I want to stop here and point out that the Bible does not teach that a priest must be unmarried. The only instances in the Bible that I can think of where a priest or prophet or teacher of the gospel was not to get married was due to the particular circumstances of the time period he was in. For example, the Lord told the prophet Jeremiah not to marry in Jeremiah 16:1-4. This was not because a prophet isn't to marry but because of the terrible distress that was soon to come upon the people when the Babylonian army besieged and conquered Jerusalem. The Lord makes it clear that He's trying to spare Jeremiah the worry and distress that a man with a family was going to experience in those times.
For another example, the Apostle Paul chose to remain unmarried, though this was not because the Lord forbade him to marry. He felt that due to the perils of his work in preaching the gospel, he would be endangering a wife and children. He also thought he couldn't do as good of a job for the Lord if he had to worry about how his ministry would affect his family. He told his fellow Christians that if they had the ability to remain celibate that due to the intense persecution the church was going through it would be a good idea not to marry at that time. (See the 7th chapter of 1 Corinthians for Paul's words on marriage.) One reason Paul was so fearless in preaching the gospel is because he knew he was endangering no one but himself. He had no wife and children to be seized and arrested along with him. He didn't have to fear that his wife and children would be beaten or imprisoned or even executed due to him being a minister of the gospel.
For a third example, we can look at the Lord Jesus Christ who was an unmarried man. From a human standpoint it wouldn't make sense for Him to take on a wife and children, knowing He was going to be executed on a cross. He knew He'd be leaving a widowed wife and orphaned children behind. It wouldn't have been fair to put them through what they'd have to go through during the years of His ministry and during the years after His departure from this earth. One could even say it would be cruel to obtain a wife and have children knowing what was to come. From the standpoint of Him being God the Son, He never intended or needed or wanted to marry because His bride is the church as a whole. Christ belongs to every human being on the face of the earth who puts their trust in Him. He loves us all the same. He belongs to us all the same. He is just as much your Lord as He is mine. To all who are His, He is the "Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, and Prince of Peace." (Isaiah 9:6b)
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