The Scapegoat

Reformation Baptist Church

After the High Priest goes into the Holy of Holies, consecrates the mercy seat and the altar of burnt offering, he then brings the live goat that he will make the scapegoat. He lays hand on the goat and confesses the sins of the children of Israel, so that the goat can bear the sins out into the wilderness. It bears the sins away to an uninhabited land, the picture of sin being removed and not just transferred. After that, the High Priest comes back and takes off the linen garments that he had on before that were just the standard robes of a priest and replaces them with the garments of the High Priest. He then comes and offers the burnt offering for himself and for all of the people, burning the fat on the altar of burnt offering and taking its flesh and burning it outside the camp. Unlike most sin offerings, this is burned outside the camp like a burnt offering and all of it is burnt. No parts are kept by the priests.They would appoint this scapegoat to take away the sins, but as it says in Hebrews, it never worked. It required the perfect lamb of God to bear the sins of the world away.