If he present it for a thanksgiving, then he shall present with the sacrifice of thanksgiving unleavened cakes mingled with oil, and unleavened wafers anointed with oil, and fine flour saturated with oil, cakes mingled with oil.
A peace offering could be brought for more than one reason, and this verse takes the first: an offering given "for a thanksgiving." Bread comes with it — unleavened cakes and wafers mixed with oil — which raises the question of why an animal sacrifice needs bread at all.
The English name has misled many readers into thinking this sacrifice is about making peace with God.
The term "peace offering" conveys a wrong thought about the sacrifice spoken of in the Scriptures we have just read. Many people take it for granted that this offering pictures Christ making our peace with God. But that is not a correct thought. The peace offering is rather an offering of thanksgiving or praise. The peace offering pictures our communion, as saints of God, on the ground of the value of the work and precious blood of Christ before God — our communion with God Himself, our communion with the Lord Jesus, and our communion with one another as priests of God... That is why we have that expression, "If he offer it for a thanksgiving." Praise and worship necessarily flow from communion.
The Hebrew name behind it points the same way.
...the name would be better understood if translated requitals, or recompenses, which is what the Hebrew word Shelamim means. As the reader may see in Leviticus 7:12, 16, people brought it on private occasions, either for a vow or for a sacrifice of thanksgiving. It really has nothing to do with the idea of peace.
Only the thanksgiving form of the peace offering required cakes of fine flour alongside the animal.
In this chapter, the peace offering for a thanksgiving is the only offering that carried a meal offering along with it. The impression is this. We come to God with appreciation and thankfulness for all that is being done for us. In doing so we must keep in mind not only the death of Christ, but also that perfect life leading up to it.
Each kind of bread carries its own picture. Oil runs through them all, and points to the Holy Spirit.
The offering "for a thanksgiving" had to come with a meal offering. The "unleavened cakes mingled with oil" picture the perfect man Christ Jesus, conceived by the Holy Spirit. The "unleavened wafers anointed with oil" remind us of that blessed One who was anointed with the Holy Spirit. The cakes mingled with oil and fine flour fried set Him before us in His sufferings. Notice so far the complete absence of leaven, because it may express the perfect purity of the humanity of Christ.
One writer draws a further thought from how another translation renders that word.
In the New Translation we find another feature introduced; the word "fried" (v. 12) is translated "saturated" with oil. Every movement our Lord made when in this world, and every word He spoke, were all in the power of the Holy Spirit. It is this blessed Person, our Lord Jesus Christ, who has brought us into fellowship with God as the result of His death.
The cakes were laid on the sacrifice, not brought in place of it. That order is deliberate.
No one can know communion with God apart from a real recognition of the death of Christ for us, because the offerer laid his hand on the victim's head before he killed it. But if the Lord has died, He first lived. So the unleavened cakes pictured His life as well as His death. Yet the order is suggestive. His death comes first here, then His life; the cakes were offered with the sacrifice of thanksgiving — literally, on it.
Everything in this verse is unleavened. The next verse then commands leavened bread as well.
Divine wisdom was providing for man and his fellowship. It was man believing and holy. Still it took account of his nature. There was that in him which was not in Christ. In what represented Him there was no leaven, and there could be none. But whatever represented the saints and their fellowship had to show the corruption of nature, or the picture would not ring true... Christ has, and loves to have, His part in our thanksgiving — He without whom we could have none.
- Communion, not peacemaking. The offering does not picture Christ making our peace with God. It pictures fellowship already enjoyed, with praise flowing out of it.
- Thanksgiving needs an occasion. The words "for a thanksgiving" mark an offering prompted by some particular reason to thank God.
- Bread only here. Only this peace offering carries a meal offering with it. The thankful worshipper remembers Christ's perfect life as well as His death.
- Oil throughout. Mingled, anointed, saturated — the cakes speak of a humanity conceived, anointed and wholly moved by the Holy Spirit.
- Unleavened, because it is Christ. Nothing corrupt could picture Him. The leaven that follows stands for us — there is that in us which was never in Christ.
Besides the cakes, he shall present his offering of leavened bread with the sacrifice of his peace-offering of thanksgiving.
The law of the peace offering has just called for unleavened cakes and wafers. Now this verse adds what Israel's worship almost never allows: loaves made with leaven. Leaven pictures corruption, so why does God command it here, and what does that say about the worshipper who brings the thank offering?
This command stands out. In Israel's other offerings, leaven is shut out by name.
This is all the more striking. Every Israelite began the holy year with the Passover, where God banned leaven in every form. The ban covered the meal offering too, in pointed terms, as the chapter given to it makes plain. Yet in the peace offering for thanksgiving, as in the two loaves of the Feast of Weeks, leaven was not only allowed but prescribed. And the reason in each case was the same. Divine wisdom was providing for man and his fellowship. This was man as a believer, and holy. Still it took account of his nature. There was that in him which was not in Christ.
The cakes of the previous verse and the loaves of this one stand for different people. The change of ingredient marks the change of subject.
Notice that up to this point there is no leaven at all. That was to express the perfect purity of the humanity of Christ. Then, besides these things, "he shall bring his offering with loaves of leavened bread." And why do we now have leaven? Surely not to express what Christ was, but what we are. Even in our thanksgivings to God our Father, we still have that in us — the flesh — in which nothing good dwells.
The command does not hand the worshipper a licence. The worshipper brings bread that is already baked, and the rules around it are tight.
God permitted leaven here — and in Scripture leaven is always a symbol of evil — but it had to stay under careful control. There is no leaven in verse 12, which speaks of Christ Himself. No suggestion of evil can ever attach to Him. But leaven does appear in verse 13, which brings us, the offerers, into the picture. Even there, it had to stay under control. Nothing suggests the leaven is active. It has been in the oven and baked — fire has judged it in the presence of God.
The leavened bread is part of the offering, yet it never reaches the fire of the altar. Note the order of the parts, and who receives what.
In addition, the offerer was to bring leavened bread. The whole formed one offering, though its foundation was the animal sacrifice. On that lay, as it were, the unleavened cakes and wafers, and on them the leavened bread. Of all this, only the appointed part of the animal burned on the altar, and the serving priest received a heave offering of the cakes and bread.
The share taken out for the priest points to Christ.
One portion out of the whole, or out of each offering, was to go to Jehovah as a heave offering, and it fell to the priest who sprinkled the blood, as his portion. Christ has, and loves to have, His part in our thanksgiving — He without Whom we could have none.
Read as a picture of praise today, the leaven is an honest confession tied to the act of giving thanks.
But if it is a question of OUR offering a thanksgiving sacrifice, the leaven simply admits this: in OUR offering there may be ignorance, self-satisfaction, pride, a lack of proper reverence, even rivalry. It is painful to hear faulty or mistaken things said in thanksgiving. It is painful to see a brother stand for a worship hymn with his hand in his pocket, or sit in a careless, lounging way.
God sees the flaw and still takes the offering. The nature that the leaven pictures has already been judged.
The rules for the peace offering pictured the communion of God with His people. Under them the offerer could bring both unleavened cakes and leavened bread to Jehovah. The first set out Christ in His perfect, spotless purity. The second set out the worshipper. He had an evil nature, and in the sacrifice and death of Christ that nature had passed under the fire of God's judgment. God accepted both.
- Prescribed, not tolerated. God bans leaven at Passover and in the meal offering. Here He commands it, because this offering must tell the truth about the man who brings it.
- Two breads. The unleavened cakes picture Christ's spotless humanity. The leavened loaves picture the worshipper, who still carries something that was never in Christ.
- Baked, not rising. Fire judges the leaven before anyone brings it. The evil is owned, not left free to work.
- Off the altar, into the priest's hand. The sacrifice is the foundation of the whole offering. Only the animal's appointed part burns on the altar, and a heave offering from the bread goes to the priest, Christ's own share in our thanks.
- Both accepted. That nature passed under God's judgment in Christ's death. So God receives the honest thanks of a flawed worshipper.