And he shall bring it to Aaron's sons, the priests; and he shall take thereout his handful of the flour thereof, and of the oil thereof, with all the frankincense thereof; and the priest shall burn the memorial thereof on the altar, an offering by fire to Jehovah of a sweet odour.
Leviticus 2 moves from an animal burnt offering to a gift of flour, oil and frankincense. The priest burns only a handful of it, yet all the frankincense goes to God — why, and what does this bloodless gift picture?
The Hebrew word behind this offering is not a technical sacrificial term at all. It is the ordinary word for a present brought to someone.
In Hebrew the word minchah just means a present. It is always used of what our translators call a meat offering, but it is not limited to that. So Moses gives this name to the offerings of Cain and Abel, using a term that could describe them both. As a rule minchah covers offerings without blood... Israel could bring such gifts to the Lord. Yet until God acknowledged them as His people, we hear of no such offering being acceptable to Jehovah. Cain tried to approach the Lord with such a gift, and God rejected him. Israel could draw near with such gifts, as offerings made by fire, a sweet aroma to the Lord... In symbolic language, the burnt offering must be on the altar before the meat offering itself can be presented to God.
The older translation "meat offering" meant food. The ESV calls it a food offering.
Each element of the offering carries its own meaning, and the fire tests all three together.
The fine flour was a fitting symbol of His humanity, sinless and in harmony with God. Oil is the well-known figure of the power of the Spirit. It does not stand for His cleansing work, which man's impurity demands. It stands for His energy, set against the self-will of sinful and selfish man. And frankincense stands for the fragrance that God the Father alone valued, and valued perfectly, in His Son as a Man on earth. His Son was the object of a delight beyond words... The fire tests as nothing else can. Out of this offering it brought one thing only, and brought it out fully: an aroma of rest to Jehovah.
The priest burned only a handful of the flour, but all of the frankincense. That marks off the part of Christ's life that was for God alone.
The "oil" typifies the power of Christ's ministry; the "frankincense" typifies the object of it. The first teaches us that He did everything by the Spirit of God; the second that He did everything to the glory of God. The frankincense presents what in the life of Christ was exclusively for God... Every thought, every word, every look, every act of His gave off a fragrance that went up at once to God. In the picture, the fire of the altar drew out the sweet aroma of the frankincense. The same holds for the One it pictures. The more He was tested, in every scene and circumstance of His blessed life, the more clearly this showed: in His manhood there was nothing that could not rise to God.
Verse 2 calls the handful a memorial. That word is rare, and its other uses fill out its meaning.
Of this offering, the priest burnt a handful of the flour, with all the frankincense, on the altar as a "memorial." That word is used elsewhere only of the very similar showbread (Lev. 24) and of the jealousy offering (Num. 5). A beautiful word in relation to this one perfect life on earth: will God ever forget it? Tested by the fire of God's holiness, it was nothing but sweet aroma. The rest became the portion of the priest — the worshipper.
The order of verse 2 and verse 3 matters. The priests eat nothing until God has had His share.
The offering had to be presented to God first. The memorial, with all the frankincense, had to go up to God. Only then could anything be left as food for the priest who offered it... First I am led to appreciate what Christ is to the delight of God's heart. Only then do I realize in some measure what that same blessed Man can be to me. He is food to sustain me in wilderness conditions.
The frankincense went up to God, but the people nearby still smelled it. One writer draws a practical lesson from that.
It is a miserable thing for a Christian to be acting for a testimony. God may make what I do turn into a testimony. While all the frankincense (Lev. 2:2) was burned on the altar to the Lord, those around smelled the sweet aroma. But a testimony is not my object. Those who set up for a testimony will soon make a show of themselves.
- Gift — the offering is a present with no blood in it, brought by a people God has acknowledged as His own.
- Person — flour, oil and frankincense picture a sinless human life, lived in the Spirit's power and fragrant to God.
- Fire — testing did not spoil the offering; it drew the fragrance out.
- Memorial — the burnt handful is God's lasting remembrance of a life lived wholly for Him.
- Food — the priests eat only after God has His portion. See Christ as God's delight first, and He becomes your food.
And the remainder of the oblation shall be Aaron's and his sons' [it is] most holy of Jehovah's offerings by fire.
Leviticus 2 describes an offering of flour, oil and frankincense. This verse settles what happens to the rest of it. Why does God take only a handful, and why is food handed to men still called "most holy"?
The order in the chapter matters. One writer follows it past the ritual into history.
The offering had first to be brought to God. The memorial with all the frankincense had to go up to God before anything was left as food for the priest who offered it. So it has been in history. The work that was for God had to be finished. That pathway of holy worth had to reach its end in complete subjection to the will of God. Only then could we find food for our souls in the life of the Lord Jesus Christ… The very food that satisfies the heart of God is now given to sustain the priests in their priestly service of God.
Chapter 1 sets a different rule for the burnt offering.
The rest of the offering belonged to Aaron and his sons (v. 3). Here is a clear difference from the burnt offering. There the rule was that all of it went up to God as an accepted offering, and it made the one who brought it accepted too. Here only a handful was burnt, but all the frankincense went up. The rest was for the great High Priest and the priestly family, the Christian body… It was "most holy," but that did not keep it from us — it was given to Christ and His own to enjoy.
Older translations call this the "meat offering," using an old word for food. Commentators read it as a picture of the life the Lord lived before the cross.
Next to the burnt offering comes the meat or food offering, especially called most holy. "It is," we read, "a most holy part of the LORD's food offerings." In this it shares a feature with the sin offering and the trespass offering… The burnt offering, as we have seen, spoke of His death. The meat offering spoke of His life, though it also pointed clearly to His death… The wave sheaf pictures Him as alive in resurrection. The meat offering views Him as alive before death — His life before the cross — and all of it was a sweet savour to the LORD.
The phrase is not loose praise. It is a title used of only a few offerings, and one writer sees God guarding His Son in it.
God's Son would in grace become a man. To guard His person from being trampled on, God sent Moses to impress on Israel that the meat offering was most holy (2:3). He gave it the same title that belongs only to the sin offering and the trespass offering (6:25, 7:6). How carefully God guards the character and person of His Son! Yet though it was most holy, the priests were to eat it in the holy place in the tent of meeting. That was a privilege indeed.
The food goes to Aaron's sons, not to Israel at large. Where they eat it matters too.
The meat offering pictures Jesus on earth so beautifully, and the sons of the high priest were to take it as their own (Lev. 2:3, 10). To value Him in this way you need strength in the power of the Spirit of sonship.
The priests alone ate the holy things, and they ate them in a holy place. We can only take in what is precious in the work of Christ when we have a sense of God's presence, and when we are under the power of that oil which is never poured on flesh.
Eating this offering is not like feeding on the offerings that deal with sin.
When we feed on the meat offering we are not thinking of what the other offerings show, atonement and acceptance. We are taken up above all with the perfections and matchless beauty of Christ as Man, which so delighted the Father. As we are occupied with Jesus in this way, we come into sweet communion and enjoy the Father's own thoughts about His Son. Then the Spirit leads the heart to well up and overflow in praise and worship.
- God first. The handful and all the frankincense go up to God before anyone eats. The priest has a portion only because God received His first.
- Then shared. The burnt offering went up whole. This one leaves a rest, kept back for the priestly family to eat.
- The food is His life. Commentators read this offering as Christ alive before the cross, the Man whose whole life was a sweet savour to God.
- Holy, yet given. "Most holy" is the same title the sin and trespass offerings carry. It guards the person of the Son. Yet He is not kept back — He is given to His own to enjoy.
- Eaten in the holy place. Only priests eat, and only in God's presence. The result is not fresh assurance about sin. It is communion in the Father's delight in His Son, overflowing into worship.