This evening at sundown, September 20, 2026, we have come to the first Holy Time Sabbath of this seventh month. Two days later on September 22, 2026, after sundown, we will observe the Day of Atonement - Yom Kippur - one of the most solemn and, in some respects, most important days of the entire sacred year. Then, only five days later, we will enter Sukkot, the Feast of Tabernacles.

These days are not isolated appointments on a calendar. They belong together within the prophetic pattern YHWH established from ancient times. Each reveals something concerning Messiah and the great work of redemption He came to accomplish.

This year, as we approach the Day of Atonement, we look especially at Leviticus 16 and at the remarkable ceremony of the two goats. These two animals portray two different but complementary aspects of the one sacrifice of Messiah. When we understand them, something else comes into focus: the coming of Yeshua to Yochanan to be immersed, followed immediately by His being driven by the Spirit into the wilderness. Here Yeshua fulfilled the prophetic meaning of the Day of Atonement.

Our observance of Atonement Day - On Atonement Day we set aside the day before YHWH as a sacred time of humility, examination, repentance, thanksgiving, and remembrance of the atoning work accomplished for us by Messiah. Whatever outward form our observance takes, the purpose is not merely to reproduce an ancient ritual. The Temple service pointed beyond itself. We are looking at the reality to which the ritual pointed - the work of Messiah.

What happened on the Day of Atonement - Leviticus 16 gives us the most complete description. Once each year the high priest entered the Most Holy Place. This was not an ordinary priestly service. He could not simply walk behind the veil whenever he wished. Before doing anything for Israel, the high priest first had to deal with his own sin and the sin of his household. He washed, put on the holy linen garments, and offered a bull as a sin offering for himself. Incense was taken behind the veil so that the cloud of incense covered the mercy seat. Blood was then brought into the Most Holy Place.

But the central ceremony for the nation involved two male goats. This is an important detail. Leviticus 16:5 says that two goats were taken from the children of Israel for a sin offering. Not two unrelated offerings. Two goats - one sin offering.

Lots were cast over them. One goat was designated for YHWH. The other was designated for Azazel (yes, the devil) - the goat that came to be known as the scapegoat.

The goat for YHWH was killed. Its blood was carried behind the veil and applied before the mercy seat. Through this blood the sanctuary, the Tabernacle, and the altar were cleansed from the uncleanness and transgressions of Israel.

Then something dramatically different happened with the second goat. It remained alive. The high priest placed both hands upon its head and confessed over it the iniquities, transgressions, and sins of the children of Israel. Those sins were symbolically placed upon the living goat.

The goat was then led away by an appointed man and released into the wilderness. Leviticus says that the goat bore upon itself all their iniquities into a solitary land. One goat died. The other carried the sins away. Yet together they formed one great picture of atonement.

Propitiation - These two goats help us understand two aspects of what Messiah accomplished for us. The first involves propitiation. The goat for YHWH was slain. Blood was required. Sin brought guilt before the righteous Judge, and that guilt could not simply be ignored. In Messiah, the sins of His people were placed upon the innocent One according to the will and purpose of the Father.

Yeshua did not die because of sins He had committed. He had none. He died because our sins were placed upon Him. The righteous judgment those sins demanded fell upon the sacrifice instead of upon those for whom the sacrifice was accepted. The sin was judged. The guilt was dealt with. The sacrifice was killed. This is one aspect of Messiah's work. But it is not the entire picture.

Expiation - There is also what we may call expiation - the removal and carrying away of sin. This is pictured especially by the living goat. The first goat shows sin brought under judgment through sacrificial death. The second goat shows sin being borne away. Both are necessary to the picture.

Messiah did not merely pay a legal penalty while remaining distant from the human condition. He entered our world. He became flesh. He lived among sinners. He experienced temptation, opposition, suffering, rejection, weakness, sorrow, and ultimately death itself - yet without committing sin. The corruption of this present world surrounded Him throughout His life, but it never became His own personal sin.

Because He was perfectly righteous, He could stand in our place. He could receive upon Himself that which belonged to fallen humanity without Himself becoming a transgressor. He could bear what belonged to us because there was nothing sinful in Him that required atonement for Himself.

That perfect life is essential to the effectiveness of His death. Had Yeshua sinned even once, He could not have been our sacrifice. Instead, He lived out perfect righteousness in the midst of a sinful world and then voluntarily offered that righteous life for us.

The two goats therefore give us two views of the same saving work. The slain goat shows sin judged. The living goat shows sin carried away. Propitiation and expiation. Judgment and removal. Death - and the bearing away of sin.

The Picture Fulfilled - Now consider what happened when Yeshua came to Yochanan. Yochanan later declared: Behold, the Lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world.

Notice those words: takes away the sin.

The sacrifice does not merely acknowledge sin. It removes it and takes it away. The language immediately brings us into the world of sacrifice and atonement.

Of course, Yochanan calls Yeshua the Lamb of God, while Leviticus 16 uses goats. The point is not that every sacrificial animal represents exactly the same detail. Rather, the entire sacrificial system converges upon one Person.

The Passover lamb. The sin offering. The burnt offering. The goat for YHWH. The scapegoat. All of them illuminate different aspects of the one perfect work of Messiah. And this brings us to the timing. Luke tells us:

Yeshua himself, when he began to teach, was about thirty years old.

That chronological notice is important. Yeshua was living out the appointed days of YHWH on their day. Yeshua was born at Sukkot. He came to Yochanan on the Day of Atonement, fulfilling the meaning of the two goats. Then His thirtieth birthday was only five days away. He was, quite literally, about thirty years old.