Numbers 29:24, commentary and pictures

The verse directs that the grain offerings and drink offerings for the bullocks, rams, and lambs be given according to their number and in the prescribed manner, as part of the directions for the Feast of Tabernacles beginning on the fifteenth day of the seventh month and lasting seven days. That feast was Israel's great thanksgiving season of rejoicing for the fruits of the earth, commemorating the wilderness wandering, and it foreshadowed the great harvest home when God's pilgrims wander no more. The offerings belong to the additional offerings appointed for the Sabbaths, annual sabbaths, new moons, and feasts, as part of the regular daily ministration and continual service carried on in the holy place throughout the year by the Levitical priesthood with the morning and evening burnt offering and the incense, distinct from the yearly cleansing of the sanctuary. That earthly ministration with all its appointments served as the example and shadow of a like work in the true tabernacle which the Lord pitched, under the Melchisedec priesthood of Christ, so that the continual comprehends the entire service of the heavenly sanctuary made after its pattern.

Feast Setting and Wording

The grain or meat offering and the drink offerings for the bullocks, for the rams, and for the lambs were to be provided in proportion to the number of animals and according to the prescribed manner. The instruction belongs to the directions for the Feast of Tabernacles, which began on the fifteenth day of the seventh month and lasted seven days. Its opening holy convocation on the fifteenth day and its closing holy convocation on the twenty-second day were annual sabbaths on which servile work was forbidden, and various kinds of offerings were brought on those annual sabbath days as well as on the intervening days of the feast.

The Feast of Tabernacles was the great thanksgiving feast of Israel and the first national thanksgiving day, a season of rejoicing and thanksgiving for the fruits of the earth shared by son and daughter, manservant and maidservant, Levite, stranger, fatherless, and widow. It commemorated the wanderings in the wilderness, and on every seventh year the law was read at this feast, which was the feast of the church because the nation was the church. The feast foreshadowed the great harvest home of God, when the weary pilgrims to Zion will wander no more and the ingathering of God has taken place.

The same rule is also applied to the offerings for the tenth day of the seventh month, the Day of Atonement, where the accompanying grain and drink offerings were likewise to match the number of bullocks, rams, and lambs and follow the prescribed manner. It does not state whether these grain and drink offerings were made before or after the high priest's work in the most holy place, since either timing is possible, and their presence does not prove they were preliminary to that work or alter the timing of its central work. The verse shows the great number of burnt offerings in the sanctuary service, each with its meat and drink offering according to its number. The drink-offering wine was strong wine, over a quart for each lamb, and it was always poured out upon the burnt offering, not drunk freely by priests and worshipers, and the large number of sacrifices explains why wine is mentioned so often in connection with the sanctuary service, since there were drink offerings for every burnt offering.

Sanctuary Service and Shadow

The verse belongs to the additional or special offerings appointed for the Sabbaths of the Lord, the annual sabbaths, new moons, and feasts, as part of the regular daily ministration and continual sanctuary service performed throughout the year. It prescribes that the grain or meat offering and the drink offerings for the bulls, rams, and lambs were to be provided according to their number and after the prescribed manner. These were regular sacrifices in addition to the individual offerings for sin and in addition to the daily morning and evening services, yet reckoned with that continual service through the year.

That daily ministration was carried on in the holy place of the earthly sanctuary by the Levitical priesthood, together with the regular morning and evening burnt offering and the burning of sweet incense on the golden altar, alongside the offerings presented for individuals through the year. It was distinct from the individual sin offerings and from the yearly cleansing of the sanctuary in the most holy place. As part of that earthly ministration the verse serves unto the example and shadow of a like work in the heavenly sanctuary, the true tabernacle which the Lord pitched and not man, revealing the work carried on there under the Melchisedec priesthood of Christ.

These meat and drink offerings were typical of Christ, required in numbers matching the number of bullocks, rams, and lambs. Their presence on feast days did not make every day on which sacrifices were offered a shadow, for otherwise daily sacrifices would make every day a type.

The verse is one of about sixteen places in Numbers 28 and 29 where the morning and evening sacrifice, offered for the entire congregation every day of the year and never omitted for any other offering, is called the continual burnt offering. Before the first advent every question of sin and its cleansing met its solution in and through the sanctuary in the wilderness, and to accomplish this its services were continual. The continual comprehended the entire service of the earthly sanctuary as ordained of God, including showbread, lamps, incense, and the high priest's work. Because the earthly sanctuary with all its appointments and services was only a type or figure of the heavenly sanctuary made after its pattern, the term continual applies with equal force to the sanctuary above, so the entire force of the prophecy of taking away the continual applies there, since the earthly sanctuary with its priesthood had ended its operations before that power began its operations.