We have seen that there were specified offerings for a variety of situations, such as burnt offerings for sin (Leviticus 1:3-9), fellowship offerings (Leviticus 3:1-5), and restitution offerings (Leviticus 6:1-7). In addition to all of these, a morning and evening offering were required each day, of a yearling lamb without blemish, along with choice grain and wine (Exodus 29:38-46).

We can read the sweep of the narrative from Exodus through Numbers in just a couple of hours, and that may cause us to suppose that the events recorded here were all more or less contemporaneous. But actually, perhaps twenty or thirty years had gone by since the time of the crossing of the Red Sea; and so the requirements for that daily offering are repeated here for the new generation (Numbers 28:1-8). The new version is worded differently enough that we can see it hasn’t simply been copied from the previous edition, but the requirements remain the same.

And then suddenly we get something new: or at least, something that the story had not told us up to this point. Now we learn that on the Sabbath the regular daily offering is to be doubled: not just a lamb in the morning and one in the evening, for a total of two, but two additional lambs, for a total of four, along with their grain and drink offerings. “On the Sabbath day: two male lambs a year old without blemish, and two-tenths of an ephah of choice flour for a grain offering – this is the burnt offering for every Sabbath, in addition to the regular burnt offering and its drink offering” (28:9-10). Because this requirement is not listed in Exodus, it raises an interesting question: had they been sacrificing these extra lambs every Sabbath for twenty years or more, and only now got around to writing down the rule about it? Or was this a new rule, only established a couple decades after the giving of the Covenant at Mount Sinai?

And there is another provocative issue here. The importance of the Sabbath has been emphasized over and over again. In the Ten Commandments we learned that on the Sabbath no one is to do any work at all (Exodus 20:10). Later this gets emphasized in stark terms: “whoever does any work on the Sabbath day shall be put to death” (Exodus 34:15; see also Exodus 35:2, Leviticus 23:3). Just a few days ago we read the story of the man who gathered up a bundle of firewood on the Sabbath, who therefore had to be stoned to death (Numbers 15:35). Yet on the Sabbath the priests in the sanctuary have to do the daily sacrifices just like they do every other day, morning and evening: except now it turns out that on the Sabbath they have to do twice as much work as usual. Thus this text (Numbers 28:9-10) is probably the passage Jesus had in mind when he said “Have you not read in the law that on the Sabbath the priests in the temple break the Sabbath and yet are guiltless?” (Matthew 12:5).

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Our hearts should be devoted to you every day, Lord, and especially on the Sabbath; but we are not good at that. We see the exceptions that Jesus made about the Sabbath and take them to mean there are no limits for our Sabbath behavior: we assume we should be able to do whatever we feel like doing. Protect us from that self-centeredness, we pray: and give us your grace, to devote ourselves to you “every day and twice on Sunday.”