The Great Transfer: Christ Our Scapegoat Text: Leviticus 16:20-22
Introduction: The Central Problem of the Universe
The central problem of the universe is not poverty, or climate change, or systemic injustice, as our modern priests would have you believe. The central problem of the universe is the holy justice of God Almighty confronting the filthy reality of your sin and mine. Everything else is a downstream symptom. If you get this foundational issue wrong, you will get everything else wrong. All of our political follies, our cultural insanities, and our personal miseries flow directly from a failure to understand the gravity of sin and the necessity of a true atonement.
Our secular age, and even much of the squishy evangelical world, wants to treat sin like a regrettable mistake, a personal failing, or a therapeutic problem to be managed. But the Bible treats sin as high treason against the cosmic King. It is a legal problem. It is a capital crime. It creates a debt that we cannot pay and a stain that we cannot wash. Therefore, the solution cannot be mere self-improvement or a vague sense of divine benevolence. The solution must be a legal transaction. It must be a substitution. It must be an atonement that actually atones.
Nowhere is the grammar of this divine transaction laid out with more graphic and visceral clarity than in the ceremonies of the Day of Atonement, the Yom Kippur. This was the high point of Israel's liturgical year, the one day the high priest could enter the Holy of Holies. The entire chapter is a rich tapestry of blood, smoke, and ritual, all designed to teach one central lesson: sin is deadly serious, and God has provided a substitute to bear its penalty. The ritual of the two goats, one for sacrifice and one for removal, is a powerful, two-act play demonstrating the dual realities of propitiation and expiation. The first goat pays the penalty of sin through its death. But our text today focuses on the second goat, the live goat, the scapegoat. And in this gritty, dusty ritual, we see the glorious doctrine of imputation made visible.
We are going to look at three things in this text: the formal identification, the full confession, and the final removal. And in each, we will see a vivid portrait of what Christ has accomplished for His people. This is not some dusty, irrelevant ceremony. This is the gospel in picture form.
The Text
"And when he finishes making atonement for the holy place and the tent of meeting and the altar, he shall bring near the live goat. Then Aaron shall lay both of his hands on the head of the live goat, and confess over it all the iniquities of the sons of Israel and all their transgressions in regard to all their sins; and he shall lay them on the head of the goat and send it out into the wilderness by the hand of a man ready to do this. And the goat shall bear on itself all their iniquities to an isolated land; and he shall send out the goat in the wilderness."
(Leviticus 16:20-22 LSB)
The Formal Identification (v. 21a)
The first action in our text is one of solemn, physical identification.
"Then Aaron shall lay both of his hands on the head of the live goat..." (Leviticus 16:21a)
This is not a casual touch. This is not a sentimental pat. The laying on of hands throughout Scripture is a formal act of identification, of transfer, of commissioning. When the Levites were set apart, the people laid their hands on them (Num. 8:10). When a man brought a sin offering, he laid his hand on the head of the animal (Lev. 4:29). This act legally and formally constituted the animal as the man's substitute. It was a public declaration: "This animal now stands in my place. Let it receive what I deserve."
But notice the specifics here. It is Aaron, the high priest, who does this. And he does it with both hands, signifying the weight and totality of what is being transferred. And he does it not for himself alone, but as the federal head, the covenantal representative of the entire nation. In this moment, Aaron acts for all the sons of Israel. This is a corporate act. The sins of the entire nation are being gathered up and focused on this one point, the head of this goat.
This is the doctrine of imputation made tangible. Imputation is a legal, forensic declaration. It is God reckoning something to someone's account. This is how Adam's sin was imputed to all of us (Rom. 5:12). We were not in the garden, but our representative was, and his sin was legally credited to our account. In the same way, our sin is imputed to our substitute. This is not a metaphor. It is not a therapeutic story. It is a legal transfer. God "made him who knew no sin to be sin for us" (2 Cor. 5:21). How did He do that? By imputation. The Father, the great High Priest, laid the hands of eternal justice upon His own Son and legally identified Him with us. On the cross, Jesus of Nazareth was not merely an example of love; He was, in that moment, legally constituted as the chief sinner of the world, bearing the consolidated guilt of all His people.
Any doctrine of the atonement that shrinks from this glorious, scandalous truth, that tries to make the cross a mere moral example or a victory over spiritual forces without this legal substitution at its heart, is no gospel at all. It is a betrayal. The laying on of hands tells us that our sin had to be formally and legally transferred to another for us to be saved.
The Full Confession (v. 21b)
The physical act is then accompanied by a verbal declaration, a comprehensive confession of guilt.
"...and confess over it all the iniquities of the sons of Israel and all their transgressions in regard to all their sins; and he shall lay them on the head of the goat..." (Leviticus 16:21b)
Look at the exhaustive, comprehensive nature of this confession. The text piles up the words: "all the iniquities," "all their transgressions," and "all their sins." This is not a vague, "Sorry for whatever we did wrong." This is a thorough, detailed accounting. The Hebrew words here cover the full spectrum of human rebellion. Iniquity refers to the twisted, perverse nature of our hearts. Transgression refers to our willful rebellion, our crossing of God's boundaries. Sin refers to our missing the mark, our failure to meet God's perfect standard. God is making it clear that every aspect of our fallenness, from the crooked desires of our hearts to our open acts of defiance to our pathetic failures, must be dealt with.
And Aaron, as the representative, confesses it all. He is speaking on behalf of the people. This is what a true priest does. He intercedes for the people by identifying with their sin. This is what Daniel did, confessing the sins of his people as though they were his own (Dan. 9). This is what the church is called to do as a royal priesthood, to confess the sins of our nation and our generation, not from a position of self-righteous superiority, but as those who are implicated. We are to stand in the gap.
But ultimately, this points us to our Great High Priest, Jesus Christ. He is the one who truly identifies with us. And in the Garden of Gethsemane, as He contemplated the cup of God's wrath, He was confessing our sins. The weight of all our iniquities, transgressions, and sins was being laid upon Him. The psalms He quoted on the cross are full of such confessions. "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" is the cry of a man bearing the full weight of covenantal abandonment. He was not just feeling sorry for us; He was becoming us, liturgically and legally. The confession over the goat was a shadow; the agony of the garden and the cross was the substance.
The Final Removal (v. 22)
Once the sins have been identified with the goat and confessed over its head, the final act is one of decisive removal.
"And the goat shall bear on itself all their iniquities to an isolated land; and he shall send out the goat in the wilderness." (Genesis 16:22)
This is the glorious result of imputation. The goat, now legally identified with the sin of the people, literally bears it away. The sin is removed. It is carried to an "isolated land," a place cut off, a place of desolation. The wilderness in Scripture is a place of testing, judgment, and death. It is where Israel wandered in disobedience. It is where Jesus was driven to be tempted by Satan. It is the antithesis of the Garden, the antithesis of the promised land. It is a picture of the curse.
The goat takes the sins of the people and carries them into the land of the curse, effectively removing them from the camp, from the presence of God. This is what the Bible means by forgiveness. It is not just overlooking sin; it is removing it. "As far as the east is from the west, so far has He removed our transgressions from us" (Psalm 103:12). John the Baptist saw Jesus and declared, "Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!" (John 1:29). He doesn't just cover it; He takes it away.
This is why the author of Hebrews tells us that Jesus suffered "outside the camp" (Heb. 13:12). Like the scapegoat, He was cast out. He was led outside the city of Jerusalem, the holy city, to Golgotha. He was taken to the place of the curse, the place of desolation, and there He bore our iniquities away. He was sent into the ultimate wilderness of divine abandonment so that we could be brought into the promised land of God's presence.
The man appointed for the task leads the goat away, and the people watch it go. They watch their sins, all of them, being carried away until the goat is a speck on the horizon, and then gone. This is the assurance of pardon made visible. Your sin is gone. It has been taken away. It will not be coming back. It has been banished to an isolated land. To question your forgiveness in Christ is to suggest that the scapegoat somehow found its way back into the camp.
Conclusion: Two Goats, One Savior
The Day of Atonement required two goats. One was slain, its blood sprinkled on the mercy seat, satisfying the wrath of God against sin. This is propitiation. The other goat, our scapegoat, had the sins of the people laid upon it and was driven away, removing the sin from the people. This is expiation. Both were necessary, and both are fulfilled perfectly in the one person and work of Jesus Christ.
On the cross, Jesus was both goats at once. He was the goat of sacrifice, shedding His blood to satisfy God's perfect justice. His death paid the penalty in full. But He was also the scapegoat. He bore our sins upon Himself and carried them away forever. He endured the wilderness of God's curse, being cut off from the land of the living, so that we might be brought into the camp of God's people, into the very Holy of Holies, by His blood.
This is the great transfer. This is the heart of the gospel. Your sin, all of it, was legally transferred to Christ. His perfect righteousness is legally transferred to you. This is not a feeling; it is a fact. It is not a process; it is a finished work. When God looks at you, if you are in Christ, He does not see your sin. He sees the righteousness of His Son. Your sin has been sent into the wilderness, and it is never coming back. Therefore, lay aside the weight of that sin which Christ has already carried away. Stop trying to pay for what has been purchased. Live as a forgiven people, because your scapegoat has done His work, and it is finished.