L6-3: What highly successful people have in common with the Levitical burnt offerings

Adonai said to Moshe, “Give this order to Aharon and his sons: ‘This is the law for the burnt offering: it is what goes up on its firewood upon the altar all night long, until morning; in this way the fire of the altar will be kept burning.'”-Leviticus 6:1-3

Do you want to know one interesting trait common to ALL top performers regardless of their field?

It doesn’t matter whether the high achiever in question is a successful entrepreneur, a top athlete, or a best-selling author, study after study has shown that pretty much without exception, they all share the following in common:

ALL HIGHLY SUCCESSFUL PEOPLE have a morning ritual they perform when they wake up in the morning and and an evening ritual they perform before retiring for the night. 

How does this practice contribute to a successful life?

Well, when you take the time to perform a morning ritual upon awakening consisting of drinking water, some basic stretches, and quiet prayer time, you are setting the tone for the day and preparing both your mind and body to meet the challenges and stresses that life is going to inevitably throw at you.

A morning ritual is kind of like the stretching you need to do before a strenuous race in track and field for example.

Now performing an evening ritual has similar effects.

A good evening ritual allows you to shake off all of the stresses that have accumulated during the day and sets the stage for a good night’s sleep.

Compare this to spending hours on end watching youtube videos, ogling online pornography, or going half-blind checking out your Facebook feed. 

I once heard a pastor explain his pre-bedtime Bible study ritual by saying that during the course of our day we are constantly exposed to things that “damage and dirty” our soul.

It could be the dirty jokes we overhear our coworkers sharing with each other.

Or it could be the worldly billboard ads we see when commuting to work that entice us to lead ungodly lifestyles by urging us to drink their beers or smoke their cigarettes.

Whatever the situation may be, just like we take a shower to clean our bodies before going to bed, our minds and souls also need to be cleansed of all the grime and dirt they’re exposed to before drifting off into sleep.

We need a ritual to set the tone BEFORE we start our day and we need a ritual to prepare us for a good night’s sleep AFTER the day has ended.

Well, we see this exact same principle in the OLAH sacrifice or the Burnt Offering.

The OLAH was performed EVERY DAY by the priests without failure, once in the morning and once in the evening.

Two one-year old rams (male sheep) were the sacrificial animals used for this purpose.

These lambs were NOT provided by common worshippers.

They were taken from the priesthood’s own special flocks and raised solely for the purpose of being offered up for burnt offerings.

One of the rams was offered up in the morning, and the other in the evening on behalf of the whole nation of Israel.

Here’s the thing.

The morning OLAH was the sacrifice that set the tone and began each day’s routine of sacrificing animals (followed by grains) on the altar.

Here was the sequence of the priestly morning ritual for the OLAH:

First, the ram was killed and then burned up on the Brazen Altar.

Second, the MINCHAH or Grain Offering was thrown on the altar to be burned up.

Third, a libation offering of either wine or water was performed.

Once this morning ritual was completed, the day began.

On the other end of the spectrum, the evening OLAH of the male ram was the CLOSING SACRIFICE of the day.

Once this final OLAH sacrifice was made, no more sacrificing was permitted.

Now notice the detail that the burnt up male ram was to be on the fire-grill of the bronze altar all through the night.

In other words, the fire had to be kept burning ALL night!

It was never allowed to go out.

Are you catching the awesome spiritual significance of this?

The Lord’s fire in our lives must NOT go out.

Nor must we do anything to quench the Lord’s fire.

We must keep it continually stoked.

And one way to keep the Lord’s fire in our lives continuously stoked is to as I just mentioned have a proper Godly morning and evening ritual to both start and finish you’re day.