Leviticus 11-13 = Today's thoughts

Today’s Thoughts Come from Leviticus 11-13

 

Today is one of those days where I more fully appreciate not being under the old covenant,  No pork (surely that can’t mean Barbeque) , no shrimp, no crawfish;  no wonder the Pharisees were so hard to get along with. (Ha-haa)  You look at the regulations and for the most part they are completely understandable, they actually make good community health policy.  Isolate the infected, don’t eat scavengers from the land or from the sea, avoid birds of prey and those that consume the dead.  All of these things have the potential to cause great community harm and illness, God obviously knowing this, is likely one of the reasons these restrictions were in place.  Once again however access to the relationship is dictated by right action rather than right heart. And there has to be more to it than just community health protection.  Because if that was the major reason for the restrictions, why remove this ever, even when Christ came back and fulfilled the law there was no great advancement in medical care, disease prevention and long term food storage. So why make the unclean clean and why let these detestable items become fine for consumption.   While I don’t claim to know the full answer I think the partial answer is this.  Sure it was good for community health to do these things, but that wasn’t what the underling goal of the rule. The goal of the rule was to create a pathway for relationship and Community health was just a tag along benefit.  When Christ fulfilled the law it didn’t change the fact that leaving these foods alone or not isolating the diseased was still a good idea, it just no longer had a bearing on whether or not you could be in a right relationship with the creator.  Before Christ, keeping the law was required for relationship, after Christ, it is simply a set of rules, some beneficial for secondary reasons but rules and not divinely instituted requirement for a relationship with the creator of the Universe.  Thank goodness,  because while I agree that carrying around dead animal carcasses will make me unclean, and most likely prevent me from being allowed in my own home, not being able to eat Barbeque with friends and family well that would just be ridiculous.  Regardless of secondary results, we must always be aware that God is working towards a relationship with us, that is His objective that we would all know Him, Love Him and want to spend our eternity with Him.  Everything else is secondary and most likely only a priority to us.  Don’t be consumed with law and miss the reason for it. 

Have a great day

Rob