Leviticus 1:1-4, “The LORD called Moses
and spoke to him from the tent of meeting, saying, (2)
"Speak to the people of Israel and say to them, When any one of you
brings an offering to the LORD, you shall bring your offering of livestock from
the herd or from the flock. (3) "If his offering is a burnt offering
from the herd, he shall offer a male without blemish. He shall bring it to the
entrance of the tent of meeting, that he may be accepted before the LORD. (4) He
shall lay his hand on the head of the burnt offering, and it shall be accepted
for him to make atonement for him.”
The master theme of Leviticus is the holiness of God and the holiness
that God requires of all those who would worship and serve Him. As we shall
learn, God’s holiness is absolute, there is no higher standard of holiness, to
quote from the angels in Isaiah 6, God is holy, holy, holy.
The challenge that this presents to us is immediate, a challenge which
Leviticus makes clear to us from the outset of the book. This challenge is the
fact that while God is holy, holy, holy, we are sinful, sinful, sinful. The
first seven chapters of Leviticus are devoted to the offering up of sacrifices
and offerings, predominantly because of our sinfulness. Later on in Leviticus
there are exhaustive instructions as to what is clean and unclean, how we are
to cleanse ourselves, the sacrifices, washings and ceremonies of purification
that all need to take place before God can be approached in worship. All these
present to us evidence of the fact that in our sinful state there is a great
distance between ourselves and God, to the point that we cannot approach God in
worship until that sin is dealt with.
As Leviticus shall make abundantly clear to us, this sinfulness cannot
ever truly be dealt with by means of these animal sacrifices and washings. The
sin within us remains, as we constantly fall back into sin, and thus have to
offer up yet more sacrifices and offerings. Therefore something greater than an
animal sacrifice and a ceremonial washing with water is needed. This is where
Leviticus points us clearly to our great need of Jesus Christ, who through the
offering up of His life as a sacrifice for sin, can effectively and permanently
deal with our sin and make us holy by covering us with His righteousness.
In our study of Leviticus over the next few weeks, we will find that
it will challenge us great in regards to our personal holiness and therefore
constantly point us to Jesus Christ as the only one that can make us holy. We
should not become despondent or discouraged by the many failings that Leviticus
will expose in our lives, rather we should be encouraged to take those failings
to God in prayer, asking once more for His grace and forgiveness. Leviticus
should not cause us to become overwhelmingly distressed by our sinfulness,
rather it should cause us to love Christ all the more and marvel at the
immensity of the grace that we have received, a grace that now causes God to
count us as holy, righteous, pleasing and acceptable in His sight. Finally
Leviticus should spur us on to walk in greater holiness, especially in light of
the fact that we have been filled with God’s Holy Spirit who enables, helps and
guides us to walk in holiness.
Holy Father, we thank and praise You that
through Christ, Your Son, You have made us holy. We cannot fully understand how
abundant Your grace is to sinners such as us, a grace that led Christ to die in
our stead and give to us His righteousness. To think that we who believe are
now counted and seen as holy in Your sight, is a thought to marvellous for
comprehension. We pray that by Your Spirit, we will be able to give evidence of
this holiness to the world around us. Amen.
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