Leviticus 4:12

The witness is just as plain that it was a sin offering. Verses 11 and 12 show something quite different from the eating of the peace offering. It differs from the burnt offering too, which was burnt inside the court on the bronze altar. The sin offering had to be burnt outside the camp. It was holy, most holy, yet fully identified with the sin confessed on it. How all of this was more than fulfilled — raised to the highest degree on every side — in Him who suffered for our sins!

Taking it outside the camp was a sign: the victim, now identified with the offerer's evil, had to go far away from God. The camp was the place where the people of God were, as the sanctuary was where He Himself dwelt. To show this holy hatred of evil, the priest could not burn the sin offering near the sanctuary in the court, or even in the camp. He had to take it outside the camp and burn it solemnly there in a clean place.

"Outside the camp" is a place where there is no recognised relationship with God or man. It is seen either as the place of judgment from God, or as the place of reproach from man... The body of the sin offering burnt "outside the camp" is a fitting picture of God's holy judgment on sin. Into this place Jesus went. He suffered outside the camp, or, as the Word says, "outside the gate" — for when Christ died the city had taken the place of the camp. So that we might have the place of blessing inside the veil, He had to take our place of judgment outside the camp.

It was not burned on the altar, and not with the fire of acceptance. On the contrary, it was burned outside the camp. It counted as sin, and was in no sense a sweet aroma. Yet when what had been made sin was no more, its ashes were mingled with those of the burnt offering. In effect, the sacrifices were one.

How precise these directions, and how complete. Every part of the animal was to be burnt; nothing of it was to be preserved. Either to be burnt, or to be eaten; that was the command about it. Why was this? God was teaching here that the guilt was not charged to the sinner for the sin he had just brought the sacrifice for. The offerer laid his hand on the animal's head and confessed his sin over it. The victim was then charged with that sin, and once it was eaten or burnt the sin could no longer be found, for the victim carrying it was nowhere to be found.

Now compare what was done with the "blood" with what was done with the "flesh" or "body" of the sacrifice. Two great branches of truth come into view: worship and discipleship. The blood brought into the sanctuary is the foundation of the first. The body burnt outside the camp is the foundation of the second.

We are not called to go outside under the judgment of God. We are called to go outside under the reproach of men, and that to the fullest... We cannot share His sufferings at the hand of God, but it is our privilege to share the insults He received from the hands of men. He went outside the camp to bear our judgment: we go outside the camp to bear His reproach.