Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

God the Supreme King

Aaron Offers Sacrifices

9 The day after the ordination rites were completed, Moses called Aaron and his sons and the leaders of Israel. ² He said to Aaron, “Take a young bull and a ram without any defects and offer them to the Lord, the bull for a sin offering and the ram for a burnt offering. ³ Then tell the people of Israel to take a male goat for a sin offering, a one-year-old calf, and a one-year-old lamb without any defects for a burnt offering, ⁴ and a bull and a ram for a fellowship offering. They are to sacrifice them to the Lord with the grain offering mixed with oil. They must do this because the Lord will appear to them today.”

⁵ They brought to the front of the Tent everything that Moses had commanded, and the whole community assembled there to worship the Lord. ⁶ Moses said, “The Lord has commanded you to do all this, so that the dazzling light of his presence can appear to you.” ^7 (A)Then he said to Aaron, “Go to the altar and offer the sin offering and the burnt offering to take away your sins and the sins of the people. Present this offering to take away the sins of the people, just as the Lord commanded.”

⁸ Aaron went to the altar and killed the young bull which was for his own sin offering. ⁹ His sons brought him the blood, and he dipped his finger in it, put some of it on the projections at the corners of the altar, and poured out the rest of it at the base of the altar. ¹⁰ Then he burned on the altar the fat, the kidneys, and the best part of the liver, just as the Lord had commanded Moses. ¹¹ But he burned the meat and the skin outside the camp.

^22 (A)When Aaron had finished all the sacrifices, he raised his hands over the people and blessed them, and then stepped down. ²³ Moses and Aaron went into the Tent of the Lord's presence, and when they came out, they blessed the people, and the dazzling light of the Lord's presence appeared to all the people. ²⁴ Suddenly the Lord sent a fire, and it consumed the burnt offering and the fat parts on the altar. When the people saw it, they all shouted and bowed down with their faces to the ground.

Changed Lives

4 Since Christ suffered physically, you too must strengthen yourselves with the same way of thinking that he had; because whoever suffers physically is no longer involved with sin. ² From now on, then, you must live the rest of your earthly lives controlled by God's will and not by human desires. ³ You have spent enough time in the past doing what the heathen like to do. Your lives were spent in indecency, lust, drunkenness, orgies, drinking parties, and the disgusting worship of idols. ⁴ And now the heathen are surprised when you do not join them in the same wild and reckless living, and so they insult you. ⁵ But they will have to give an account of themselves to God, who is ready to judge the living and the dead. ⁶ That is why the Good News was preached also to the dead, to those who had been judged in their physical existence as everyone is judged; it was preached to them so that in their spiritual existence they may live as God lives.