The Scapegoat

"Aaron will lay both his hands on the head of the live goat and confess over it all the Israelites’ iniquities and rebellious acts—all their sins. He is to put them on the goat’s head and send it away into the wilderness by the man appointed for the task. The goat will carry all their iniquities into a desolate land, and the man will release it there." - Leviticus 16:21-22

The scapegoat was a key element of the Jewish Day of Atonement. Their sins were symbolically placed on the goat and the goat was left in the wilderness to die for their sins. What the goat did as a symbol, Jesus did in reality when God placed the sins of mankind on Jesus on the cross. As Paul writes in 2 Corinthians 5:21, "He made the one who did not know sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God."

Prayer Suggestion - Take a moment to thank Jesus for taking your sins upon himself on the cross.