Closer through Purity

Warren Brosi

August 27, 2023

Dominant Thought: As covenant people we reflect God’s covenant love to the world.

Objectives:

I want my listeners to understand keys to interpreting Old Testament law.

I want my listeners to feel a deeper appreciation for God’s heart through the law.

I want my listeners to reflect the values of God’s covenant to those around them.

“I am the LORD, who brought you up out of Egypt to be your God; therefore be holy, because I am holy” (Leviticus 11.45).

As covenant people we reflect God’s covenant love to the world.

In our time together today, we will survey about nine chapters from Leviticus 11-20. We’ll save Leviticus 16 for next week as the conclusion to our series.

[Show outline of Leviticus]. We began our series through Leviticus with an overview of the book by seeing how Leviticus describes God’s invitation to bring His people closer to Him. Then, Michael taught us through the offerings: The only way to come closer to God is through sacrifice. Then last week in looking at the priests we learned: The only way to come closer to God is through sacrifice. We talked about the different chairs and how you can move closer to Jesus to bring others closer to Him.

This week, we are going to look at this section of rules and instructions for worship and community life.

What I want to do in our time today, it look at three parts of our theme sentence: 1) As a covenant people, 2) we reflect God’s covenant love, 3) to the world around us. I’m also dong to do something different today when we get to the section of God’s covenant love in the middle of the sermon, we’ll celebrate communion as part of the sermon experience, then we’ll flow out of the communion experience with reflecting that covenant love to the world around us.

First, As covenant people. From the first verse to the last verse, we see the covenant name for God, the “LORD”. It is the name of the God who makes covenants with His people. When you see LORD, L-O-R-D, in all capitals in your Bible, you should think, this is the God who loves His people. He is faithful and loyal and He invites us into a loyal and faithful relationship. 36 times in Leviticus, this Loyal and loving God speaks to Moses to share about the expectations of this relationship.

So as we move through this section of Scripture, we need to know that these words are for a specific relationship that God had with a specific group of people at a specific time. We are covenant people.

The closest thing we have to this time of covenant relationship today is a marriage relationship. It is a vow and promise between a man and a woman to love, honor, cherish, in sickness and in health until they are parted by death. I pray for marriages to be founded on the unfailing love of God. I pray for marriages to be founded on the loyal love of God.

So, before we get into this list of rules and instructions, we need to know these expectations are between a loyal loving God and His people whom He wants to come closer to Him. One other key principle, we need to remember is we believe “all Scripture is God breathed and is useful...” (2 Timothy 3.16). Even these strange verses in Leviticus are useful.

Let’s look at some of these verses in Leviticus. We’ll look at some verses about food and others about bodily fluids. Buckle up. Read Leviticus 11.1-8. These are dietary laws that seem very confusing. I feel like I’m reading some livestock judging manual or a biology textbook. What’s the deal with all this food instructions.

Do these expectation still apply to us today? Pigs are unclean so does that mean bacon and pork chops are off limits? Should Christians not play football? Or just wear those cool receiver gloves when they play?

As we look at this section, I want to give you three guidelines for understanding the Old Testament Law. First, God’s law reflects God’s heart. After you learn about the history and the culture connected to these laws, you see the heart of God. He is holy and pure and wants what is best for His people. Second, If the law is repeated in the New Testament, then it is still in force. The command to “Love your neighbor as yourself” is repeated at least seven times in the New Testament. It is still binding. Third, even if the command is not repeated the values behind the law teach us about God’s heart. We’ll see values such as caring for the poor and not participating in pagan worship practices in some of these laws. (These guidelines are adapted from James Sklar).

Jesus was asked a question about eating with unwashed hands. It was a question about ceremonial cleansing. Let’s read the interaction between Jesus and the teachers of the law in Mark 7.5-19.

Jesus declared all foods clean. So, if you only read your Old Testament only, then bacon is off the menu. However, Jesus calls all foods clean (Mark 7.19).

More important is what is the value behind the instruction. Where is God’s heart toward His covenant people?

It could be that the unclean animals were associated with death. Many of the birds listed later were scavengers. Many of the unclean animals were carnivores. It could be a connection with death and God is all about life.

Leviticus 11.44-47 summarizes the heart of God in regard to clean and unclean food. The goal is to be holy as God is holy. As we move from the food to the fluids, it may be helpful to talk about holy, clean, and unclean.

Imagine a ladder with the top representing holy, the middle as clean, and the bottom as unclean. We say God is holy. He’s pure clean, set apart. He’s not just clean, there is something else special about Him that sets Him apart and separates Him from clean and unclean. Holy. Next we have clean. It may not be set apart or sanctified, but it is clean. It’s not dirty. Maybe think about your special dishes for holidays as holy and your every day dishes in the cabinet as clean. And the dishes you have in the sink after the meal as unclean.

Sometimes, through the course of a normal day’s activities a person may move from a clean state to an unclean state. We usually think of this as a sinful choice, but it may not be. Through the course of normal activity that is not sinful a person may become unclean. We’ll get some examples in the Leviticus 12-14. The examples in this section is more about ritual uncleanness. Ritual purity or uncleanness may not have been the result of a sinful choice. Moral uncleanness is the result of a sinful choice and we will read about some of those later in Leviticus 18.

So, now the bodily fluids, can make a person unclean. Childbirth in the first covenant rendered a woman unclean for a certain period of time (Leviticus 12.4-5). Childbirth is natural and life giving. Yet, there’s a lot of blood involved and that life is in the blood, so maybe the picture is to remind us that death cannot enter the holy presence of God. The woman did not sin, but for a set time at that time in God’s relationship with His people you must wait to come closer. Leviticus 12.6-8 highlights the how the woman re-enters the community after childbirth. Notice, the offerings from earlier in the book of Leviticus: burnt offering and purification offering. If the woman is unable to offer a lamb, then she may bring doves for pigeons for the offering.

Earlier this year, we stepped into a Catholic Church near the coast in France and I noticed the stained glass window depicting Mary and Joseph with baby Jesus and they were offering two doves. That window shows the Holy couple observing the law of Moses from these verses in Leviticus and narrated in Luke 2.22-24. The value from this example is the unclean must be kept separate from the holy. In Leviticus 15.31, we see this summary principle in action. God didn’t want His covenant people unclean so they would not die in their uncleanness for defiled God’s dwelling place.

Only through atonement are the unclean able to become clean. Atonement purifies and pays the price to make someone clean.

The cool thing about Jesus is when someone unclean came and touched him like the bleeding woman in Matthew 9.20-22, Jesus doesn’t become unclean. The Holy One heals the unclean. When no one else would come near a leper because he was unclean. Jesus reached out and touch the leper and said, “I’m willing. Be clean!”

Second, As covenant people, we reflect God’s covenant love… With the offerings, atonement is given. It is through the sacrifices of these animals that the unclean become clean. In some instances it was through the normal activities of life. At other times, it was through sinful choices.

As we look at God’s covenant love, we see it fulfilled in the life of Jesus when on the night He was betrayed said to His disciples at the last supper, “this cup is the new covenant in my blood” (Luke 22.20).

The first covenant shows us the values of God’s heart. It prepared the way for Jesus to come. The writer of Hebrews describes how Jesus mediates a better covenant to the first one. Listen to Hebrews 8.6-13. In other words, the new covenant is founded on better promises and signed in the blood of the perfect sacrifice once and for all.

So, as we prepare to take the Lord’s Supper, let’s remember we are God’s covenant people who reflect God’s covenant love to the world of around us. Tell Jesus thank you as we remember His love for us the Holy one who can make the unclean clean and bring us back to God. After we take communion, we’ll look at Leviticus 18-19 to see how we can reflect God’s covenant love to the world.

Let’s pray. Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, thank you for coming to us to make us clean. We love you. Amen.

[Communion is served.]

As covenant people we reflect God’s covenant love the world around us.

In Leviticus 18-19, we’ll observe several ways we reflect God’s covenant love to the world around us. I’ll highlight two of them: God cares for life and He cares for the others and His people should reflect those values.

Let’s read Leviticus 18.1-5. The reason God gives these instruction is so His covenant people will live differently than those around them who do not love God. Oswald Chambers said, “Don’t let the world press you into its mold.” In Leviticus 18.5, we hear, “Keep these decrees and laws, for the person who obeys them will live by them. I am the LORD.”

In Leviticus 18, we read about several examples of God’s care for life in His expectation for healthy sexual behavior. After listing several illicit sexual relationships, Leviticus closes with a few more examples and then a reminder of God’s heart for His people. Read Leviticus 18.21-30.

God values life so do not sacrifice your children to the pagan gods. Don’t participate in their rituals.

In Leviticus 18.22 homosexual behavior is forbidden and described as detestable. Please hear the heart of God on this issue. Homosexual attraction is no the sin. Once one engages in homosexual behavior then it is sin. Remember, one of the guidelines for understanding if the rule is still in force today is if it is repeated in the New Testament. Several times in both the New and Old Testament, homosexual behavior is condemned (Genesis 19, Leviticus 20.13; Judges 19.22ff; Romans 1.27; 1 Corinthians 6.9).

My friends on this issue, there are churches still trying to figure out how to read these verses in Leviticus. My encouragement is to read all of Scripture and when you read all of Scripture you will find that God’s design for marriage is one man and one woman. That’s his heart.

Followers of Jesus, we have a responsibility to show love, mercy, and compassion to all people regardless of their sexual behavior. Jesus summarized the Law and the prophets by saying, “Love God and love people.” “All the Law and the Prophets hand on these two commandments” (Matthew 22.40).

In Leviticus 19, our covenant God shows what holy living with others looks like.

Let’s read Leviticus 19.1-4. We again see the desire for God’s people to reflect His holiness. The commands of respecting parents and not turning to idols are repeated in the New Testament. We reflect God’s heart when we honor our parents and put God first.

Leviticus 19.9-10 gives us an example of a cultural practice. In those days, people leave the edges of the fields with grain so the poor could come after them for food. These verses illustrate God’s heart to care for the poor and the immigrant. In Leviticus 19, God’s heart wants His covenant people to transform families with respect and honor, poverty with food, workplaces with honesty, marketplaces with honesty and respect, the legal system with justice for the poor, relationships with kindness and truth, and race relations with love. As God’s covenant people, we reflect God’s covenant love the world around us. And it’s spelled in one word: Holy.