READING FOR AUGUST 23, 2024: LEVITICUS 13, LUKE 14, PSALM 86:1-7 LEVITICUS 13 Some of us remember the time when the COVID 19 pandemic totally changed our lives, including church. Yorktown Methodist Church went totally online for quite a while. When public services resumed, we all wore masks. Some churches experienced heated division over whether to wear masks. YMC didn’t engage in such foolish arguments. For Israel as they emerged out of Egypt, the major disease was leprosy.
The Hebrew word “tzaraat,” according to medical authorities, doesn’t refer to modern day leprosy, more accurately known today as Hansen’s Disease. It likely was an umbrella term for various skin diseases. The description of symptoms in Leviticus 13-14 makes unpleasant reading. It was like COVID in one respect, though, because it could lead to complete social isolation. A difference is that the priest diagnosed the patient. As we read this, we may be shocked by God’s standard of purity. We live in a culture where purity isn’t valued. If the standard were lower, though, the love that Jesus demonstrated wouldn’t be nearly as great.
The way our Holy God interacted with Israel at this time required the people to become acceptable according to God’s revealed standards. Animals that were blemished could not be offered to God. Priests who were not consecrated could not minister. Buildings, utensils, and clothing had to be ceremonially clean before use. Remember that even incense had to be made with the proper ingredients or else the priests would die.
Likewise, God also insisted that His people be pure or unblemished. God’s standard of purity expressed before the cross was that those within this community of God who were “blemished” physically by having leprosy “shall remain unclean all the days during which he has the infection; he is unclean. He shall live alone; he shall live outside the camp” (vs 46). Yet even with this stern standard of purity, we see glimpses of God’s grace. After seven days, the unclean person was reexamined by the priest and, if clean, rejoined the community. If still unclean, this person was reexamined again in seven more days by the priest and, if clean, rejoined the community.
This all points to how we are made acceptable now to God by grace through faith in the sinless lamb sacrificed for us: “For the bodies of those animals whose blood is brought into the Holy Place by the high priest as an offering for sin are burned outside the camp. Therefore, Jesus also suffered outside the gate, that He might sanctify the people through His own blood.
LUKE 14 Doesn’t it seem suspicious that the leaders of the Pharisees, no friends of Jesus, invited Him over to eat on the Sabbath. It also says they watched him closely and positioned a man suffering from Edema directly in from of him. Edema is a condition that is highly visible
READING FOR AUGUST 23, 2024 CONTINUED: LUKE 14, PSALM 86:1-7 and results in swelling, but likely is caused by a more serious underlying condition that is not visible. Jesus tried flush out the Pharisees with a question, but they wouldn’t go on record. He then healed the man while disarming the Pharisee by showing how their behavior was both unloving and hypocritical. The Bible still shows us those traits about ourselves. Jesus followed this up with a parable about angling for public honor, in this case the most honored seats. Of course, this is still a problem. So many of us build our lives around the recognition we feel we deserve; we are terrified by the prospect of losing or not getting it. The punchline of Jesus’s parable is one of the great counter-intuitive truths of the Bible: ”Everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and the one who humbles himself will be exalted.” The best-known positive example at Taylor University is Samuel Morris, a son of a tribal chief from West Africa: “In December 1891, Morris arrived on Taylor’s campus (then in Fort Wayne). When asked by [President] Reade which room he wanted, Morris replied, ‘If there is a room nobody wants, give that to me.’ Morris’s faith had such a profound impact on the Fort Wayne community he was frequently invited to speak at local churches. At night, he could be heard in his room praying, which he simply called ’talking to my Father."' Jesus emphasizes that our behavior in social situations reveals our real Kingdom priorities. Do we only greet the same friends in church or sit with the same crowd for fellowship times? How might we be on the lookout for those who appear to be less connected to others in the church or even to Jesus? The parable about making excuses also uses a social situation to determine if we are making God our top priority. Notices secondary priorities such as family and work can crowd out God. If that happens, Jesus implies we won’t experience heaven: ’For I tell you, none of those men who were invited shall taste of my dinner’” (vs. 24). Jesus then restates this idea using building and military illustrations. Verse 33 is extremely provocative and among the least read and taught: ”None of you can be My disciple who does not give up all his own possessions.” PSALM 86:1-7 David first requests God’s attention and response before he mentions individual concerns. He knows nothing good can happen unless these two conditions exist. This request before an Almighty God shows both wisdom and humility. David doesn’t express spiritual pride, but rather vulnerable dependance. He is not looking to his other connections or assets to rescue him--only God. He highlights a characteristic about God that is not often considered: God is ready to forgive. The image of God poised and awaiting our reaching out to Him in confession and repentance is moving. It reminds us of Jesus knocking at the door (Rev. 3:20) or weeping over Jerusalem (Matt. 23:37). He’s ready to respond to us now.
