Daniel 9:24
“Seventy ‘sevens’ are decreed for your people and your holy city to finish transgression, to put an end to sin, to atone for wickedness, to bring in everlasting righteousness, to seal up vision and prophecy and to anoint the Most Holy Place.” (NIV)
Today’s Reading: Daniel 9:24-27 and Hebrews 3:1-6
Another prophecy found in Daniel 9:24 is that the Messiah will “atone for wickedness”. The Hebrew word translated as “wickedness” is ʽāwōn which also means “iniquity”. It equally carries the sinful deed, the guilt that deed brings and the consequence that comes from the deed. This “wickedness” or “iniquity” is more than just sinning against God. It takes into account any deviation from God’s established principles such as disobedience of His law or mistreatment of people around us.
This iniquity needs to be atoned for. I’d like to do a deep dive into the concept of atonement today. The Hebrew word for “atone” is kāpar which you may recall is the same word that is used to describe the pitch that coated Noah’s ark. It means “to cover over” and with respect to sin it carries the concept of covering them up as if they were not there. Atonement removes the sin itself and also the guilt of sin.
Leviticus 16 describes the Day of Atonement found on the Jewish calendar. This was the only day the high priest could enter the Most Holy Place. It one day every year that all of Israel would be “atoned”. The high priest would sacrifice a bull for his own sin offering and sacrifice a ram for a burnt offering. Then he would bring two goats – one he would sacrifice to make atonement for all the Israelites and the other he would place on it all the sins and send it away into the wilderness as the scapegoat. God said this process every year would cleanse all of Israel:
“On this day atonement will be made for you, to cleanse you. Then, before the Lord, you will be clean from all your sins” (Lev 16:30).
But this was only temporary because the next day Israel would have the stain of sin on them again. The author of Hebrews makes this clear:
“But only the high priest entered the inner room, and that only once a year, and never without blood, which he offered for himself and for the sins the people had committed in ignorance. The Holy Spirit was showing by this that the way into the Most Holy Place had not yet been disclosed as long as the first tabernacle was still functioning. This is an illustration for the present time, indicating that the gifts and sacrifices being offered were not able to clear the conscience of the worshiper. They are only a matter of food and drink and various ceremonial washings—external regulations applying until the time of the new order” (Heb 9:7-10).
The Most Holy Place in the temple was just a replica of the real Most Holy Place. The blood of animals were only an illustration of the real sacrifice that was needed to permanently make atonement for our sins. However, we cannot make atonement for ourselves. This was ingrained in the Israelites day after day. If they sinned, they had to bring an animal to the priest to receive forgiveness. They could not earn atonement on their own. Paul emphasizes this:
“Therefore no one will be declared righteous in God’s sight by the works of the law; rather, through the law we become conscious of our sin” (Rom 3:20).
We cannot become righteous or be atoned by our own works. We need a high priest to make a sacrifice to God for us. And since animals are only an illusion of atonement, we need the real thing.
“God presented Christ as a sacrifice of atonement, through the shedding of his blood” (Rom 3:25).
“For this reason he had to be made like them, fully human in every way, in order that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in service to God, and that he might make atonement for the sins of the people” (Heb 2:17).
“But when Christ came as high priest of the good things that are now already here, he went through the greater and more perfect tabernacle that is not made with human hands, that is to say, is not a part of this creation. He did not enter by means of the blood of goats and calves; but he entered the Most Holy Place once for all by his own blood, thus obtaining eternal redemption” (Heb 9:11-12).
Jesus, the Son of God, became human and came to earth as our high priest. He didn’t offer the blood of goats and bulls. He offered his own blood. And it’s as simple as this, God accepted Jesus’s blood as the permanent atonement for our sins:
“The words ‘it was credited to him’ were written not for him alone, but also for us, to whom God will credit righteousness—for us who believe in him who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead. He was delivered over to death for our sins and was raised to life for our justification” (Rom 4:23-25).
God credits us with righteousness through the blood of Jesus if we simply believe in him:
“This righteousness is given through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference between Jew and Gentile, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. God presented Christ as a sacrifice of atonement, through the shedding of his blood—to be received by faith” (Rom 3:22-25).
God made a way for a permanent atonement. And now God just wants our heart:
“Therefore, holy brothers and sisters, who share in the heavenly calling, fix your thoughts on Jesus, whom we acknowledge as our apostle and high priest… See to it, brothers and sisters, that none of you has a sinful, unbelieving heart that turns away from the living God. But encourage one another daily, as long as it is called ‘Today,’ so that none of you may be hardened by sin’s deceitfulness” (Heb 3:1, 12-13).
Christ in the Old Testament 
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