Yom Kippur: Reflection on importance to all believers.

Well, yesterday was the holiest of days in the Biblical festivals. Yom Kippur is the day of the atonement. It is the day the priest went into the Holy of Holies and completed the sacrifice to atone for all the sins of Israel.  This day follows the seven days of awe where people reflect on their lives and repent.

    The feast day is the one where there are two goats brought, one for sacrifice, and one to be cast out into the wilderness.  The two goats point toward the separation from sin.  One goat cleanses, the other goat takes sin back to where it came.  An interesting take on the two goats is found in this article, which delineates the reason that Jesus is both the sacrificial goat and the scapegoat.  Jesus has cleansed us from sin and he has taken all sin away.  Praise God. 

     The day of Yom Kippur is a day of fasting.  It is a day to focus solely on God and his redeeming us from our sins.  It is a day to reflect on what has gone before and what to turn from next.  Those of us in the church who have lost attending to the Biblical feasts miss a lot by failing to attend and practice these Holy Days.  Why is it that we choose to miss out on the things that benefit us and would draw us into closer understanding of the Messiah in the name of freedom and grace?  Are we so wrapped up in are own kingdoms and own world that we simply neglect what God has for us?  Do we simply figure that since Jesus came and paid for our sins that none of what God set before us matters?   We each need to pray and bow before God in surrender and ask Him that on this day and any day, how are we to walk. What does a person walking in surrender to the King of Kings and not walking in the Kingdom of self do?  Praise God he does forgive us and cleanse us from our selfishness. Praise God our sins are taken a way and sent out.  May the year to come bring each of us into greater awareness of our own sins and may we brought to repentance in those areas God brings before us.