Outside the camp 3 – Holiness is not where you think it is.

Life as a follower of Jesus replaces the efforts of the Old Testament ways of sacrifice and we must turn our back on religion. There is nothing in religion that can do anything for us. This is what the author is trying to convince the Jewish Christians of. He is likening the ways of the old which only pointed to the new and to something better. He has been saying if these heroes of the faith were using the old but looking for the new then why now when we have the new would we return to the old?

“The high priest carries the blood of animals into the Most Holy Place as a sin offering, but the bodies are burned outside the camp. ¹² And so Jesus also suffered outside the city gate to make the people holy through his own blood.” (Hebrews 13 v 11-12)

It is clear the author is thinking of the Day of Atonement when the High Priest offered the blood of the animals as a sin offering. On this occasion the carcases were not used for food but they were carried outside the camp to be burnt. The offering of the animal was totally given to God. The similarities are there with the sacrifice of Christ. But the differences are stark also. The blood of the offering was shed and given inside the camp and the carcase of the animal was burnt outside the camp. Whereas Jesus’ blood was shed and his body destroyed outside the camp. If anyone is to benefit then they have to also go outside the camp. That is the message. Law is inside and Grace is outside.

Jesus died outside the security of the camp. Out of sight out of mind. Outside the beautiful Holy City and the centre of religion. Holiness is not restricted to a place and all that is familiar. Holiness was not the Temple. The Temple inside the camp had become the den of robbers. The true Temple was Christ.

The leaders thought they were cleansing their city of blasphemy by having Jesus crucified outside. However Jesus was taking on their sin on Himself outside their city.

In Exodus 32-33 we have the account of the golden calf and the great sin of the camp. Moses was angry and he interceded for the Israelites. In Exodus 33 v 7, “Now Moses used to take a tent and pitch it outside the camp some distance away, calling it the “tent of meeting.” Anyone inquiring of the Lord would go to the tent of meeting outside the camp.”

Sin creates distance from God, it always has. But Moses, the type of Christ, met with God outside the camp and interceded for the people. Years later Christ in the offering of His life interceded for us by dying on the cross outside the camp.

All our best efforts will not lead to holiness. There is nothing inside that can do anything about that. The miracle is outside the camp. There is an altar outside the camp. It is here where holy exists.