Leviticus 11-13

The passages in today's chronological reading plan of the Bible is on Mosaic Law specifics regarding clean and unclean food, purification after childbirth and regulations for skin diseases and molds. The regulations about defiling skin diseases has an interesting dermatology tone to the law especially as it relates to the color of the lesion or the color/presence of a hair growing in a lesion. The bit that stood out to me most this morning was what the LORD said to Moses after outlining the clean and unclean food in chapter 11.

Leviticus 11:44-45 (NIV) "I am the LORD your God; consecrate yourselves and be holy, because I am holy... I am the LORD, who brought you up out of Egypt to be your God; therefore be holy, because I am holy."

The God we love as Christians is holy, as He is holy we must be holy by consecrating ourselves to Him through obedience and faith. Consecration means to be set apart, often contextually this means to be set apart from the world or the culture which values the profane and idolatry. Consecration is to come out from or to separate ties with all that is unholy, holiness throughout scripture is a descriptor of God, while man is made in the image of God we are far from holy because of our sin nature but by the grace of God through Jesus we have been made the righteousness of God. The other aspect to understanding our response of obedience is found in the link between belief and obedience. Dietrich Bonhoeffer in his book The Cost of Discipleship goes to great lengths to explain theologically that only the obedient believe, "unless he obeys, a man cannot believe." 

In order to live a consecrated life holy unto the LORD, our starting place is humility. Surrender of the will follows humility, which follows obedience which is the precursor to belief. My aim is not to split hairs with a 'which comes first, faith or obedience?' debate rather to reinforce the truth that faith and belief are synonymous and as indicated in James 2:17, "faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead." which is further corroborated by Paul in Romans 6 when he writes about being slaves to righteousness.

Romans 6:22 (NIV) "But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God, the benefit you reap leads to holiness, and the result is eternal life."

O LORD may my faith not waver today as I seek to do your will and obey your word as I navigate the world and culture around me. Strengthen me by your Spirit in my heart desire to please, honor and glorify you with everything that I have and all that I am - you alone are worthy of all glory, honor and praise, I choose to worship you and you alone this day my holy, good and perfectly righteous LORD. I choose obedience this day, LORD let your kingdom come and your will be done on earth, in my country, in my state, in my town, in my home and in my heart as it is in heaven. I give you this day and ask that you use me in a mighty way to advance your kingdom of life and light. Amen.

"The first step of obedience proves to be an act of faith in the word of Christ." ~Dietrich Bonhoeffer, The Cost of Discipleship (chapter 2)


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