We burned a goat

As I walked to the gate, the guys from the Hub were hanging out with one of their moms, smoking a cigarette. "Do we have to listen to the talk?" Luke says. "I ain't gonna listen to that f***ing bull-s**t any more."
"If you listen to me for about 30 seconds, you'll get to destroy the goat" I reply.
Luke again: "We get to destroy the goat? F**k yeah, I aint missin' that."
I read from Leviticus 4, verses 27-31, the instructions for making the sacrifice if a person breaks on of God's commands.
"Yeah, but how does that solve the problem? So you sin against God and then kill a goat? What good does that do? The goat doesn't do anything for God. It seems like all you've done is killed a goat - you haven't really done anything about your sin" - Luke, one more time.

I was shocked, and a bit excited. These are exactly the questions I should be asking, but don't because I've been hearing these stories my whole life. Luke and the others were (for once) entering the story of God's dealings with humanity. Beautiful.

We take the goat outside, and after each person lays their hand on its head and confesses something they're ashamed of, we let the boys tear the goat apart. Then, we BURN IT!! Spurred on by the entire can of gray spray paint I used on it this morning, the goat becomes quite a large fire. Then, as quickly as it flared up, it was gone.
No more goat.
No more sin.
Until next time.
Is this all?

Well of course I don't think that's all there is, but I don't feel the need to give these guys the "Well, the goat points to Jesus, who takes away all our sin" answer just yet. Wait until next week, and the week after that. The beauty of it is, these guys aren't going anywhere...they keep coming back, week after week. Maybe I'll never have to give that answer...maybe the Spirit will make these guys work it out on their own.