Unintentional Sin

Leviticus 4 focuses the reader on a variety of unintentional sins.  Instructions for the whole Israelite community occur here:

"If the whole Israelite community sins unintentionally and does what is forbidden in any of the Lord's commands, even though the community is unaware of the matter, when they realize their guilt and the sin they committed becomes known, the assembly must bring a young bull as a sin offering and present it before the tent of meeting.  The elders of the community are to lay their hands on the bull's head before the Lord, and the bull shall be slaughtered before the Lord." (4:13-15)

Instructions about the blood follow, as well as instructions about fat.  And the passage concludes:

"In this way the priest will make atonement for the community, and they will be forgiven.  Then he shall take the bull outside the camp and burn it as he burned the first bull.  This is the sin offering for the community." (4:20-21)

Two points moved me as I read this.

1) Atonement is made for the whole community.  The tent of meeting refers to the tabernacle, the house that God has given instructions for building throughout the latter portions of Exodus. This tabernacle is the Lord's house.  It is based on the pattern of Mt. Sinai, where the Lord resides in a cloud, and the instructions that come to the variety of people who are able to approach - the priests - and those who approach symbolically - the people, approaching symbolically through sacrificed animals.  The instructions are all terms of the covenant between the Lord and his people Israel - terms which hold out hope that God and his people will truly be united again beyond the veil, deep within the holy of holies, where God's glory cloud dwells.  Atonement shows us God's covenant-keeping heart, the solidity of his word, his intention to make provision for his people in their sin, but not only passing over sin, but through its provisional payment through the death of representative animals, allowing Israel to see themselves passing over into the Lord's presence through the smoke of offerings.  Passing over into new unity and fellowship with the Lord.  We need to see this today - that God has never not had this heart.  God has never not provided an economy for the restoration of all things.  This atonement, perfected in Jesus, the representative sacrifice who enters, breaks the veil, and celebrates a new covenant sacrifice of Lord's Supper with his people, is just as clear to be seen in our Old Testament.

2) This is made for unintentional sin.  What does this mean?  The scripture suggests an unawareness on the community's part.  We can deduce a potential sequence: sin has occurred.  The community is unaware.  They come to realize what has happened.  They make atonement according to what God has provided.  They didn't intend to sin.  They intended to do what is right.  But things didn't go according to their intentions.  Why does this move me?  I'm still not quite sure.  Perhaps it's this: I tend to think that sin only "counts" if I meant to do it.  If I accidentally break a dish and I apologize, I expect to hear, "That's ok.  You didn't intend to do it."  But within the economy of a covenantal relationship, my apology functions as atonement and that's the end of it, barring any future accidental breaking of dishes which may change things.  Atonement for both intentional and unintentional sin communicates the importance of keeping covenant, that this is the primary shaper of Israel's very identity as a people saved through the Red Sea from captivity.

But this is still not quite what moves me about it.  Let's shift from focusing on 'intentional' to focus instead on 'realize.'  I've noticed for a few years that every time I think I have a full understanding of the magnitude of the nefariousness and pervasiveness of sin, I realize somehow that it's worse than I thought.  Worse on multiple levels: for instance the vile things humans are capable of out there, and the vile things I'm complicit in from within my soul.  Julie Clawson's book Everyday Justice: The Global Impact of Our Daily Choices illustrates global impacts of the way I treat, for instance, chocolate, coffee, cars, clothes, and more.  Now I didn't say I'd read it.  Dare I read this book?  Dare I uncover sin that, however unintentional, is still real?  Let's go further.  Jessica Trounstine's book Segregation by Design: Local Politics and Inequality in American Cities details how cities have segregated along racial lines according to certain zip codes with considerable economic ramifications.  Again, dare I?  Now I didn't intend any of this, but if I find that the world I live in is much different than the world I would desire, and then a few years and a few books later, I find that the world is even more different than the world I desire, than I sort of have a choice.  I can either deaden my desires and forget the greater world and city I desire.  Or, I can enter more vigorously into a yearning to see the Lord bridge the distance between the new creation to come and the world we see now.  And that entering must be something like what Leviticus 4 means by 'realize'.  And, frankly, that's the entering I'd rather do.

The atonement Jesus has already made is a once and for all holy of holies for us all to be endlessly renewed in God's presence.  It is the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow.  The unintentional sin that I realized 10 years ago may be different from the unintentional sin I discover tonight, or 10 years from now.  But Christ's death, resurrection, and enthronement over all is quite sufficient for all sin, past or yet to come, intentional, unintentional, discovered, repented, or willfully ignored and covered up.  I think ultimately what moves me about this is that I don't need to obfuscate, bowdlerize, or deny my complicitness in the brokenness of this world.  I really have nothing to lose precisely because of the generosity of 'once and for all' salvation from Jesus.  This is a much happier way to live because the Lord's covenant love drives out my fear of adverse punishment from any rumor of my attachment to nefarious goings-on.  In driving out this fear, he also drives out my sleepy complacency and contentment to just be 'getting on' with life.  I'm reinvigorated to call out to God to drive out any wicked way in me.

Intentional or otherwise.

So don't worry.  Sin - whether intentional or unintentional in your life - is probably much greater than you realize.  Let it drive you deeper into the arms of the Lord who has only ever met us, redeemed us, and loved us as mere, dirty, rotten sinners.