FBC Daily Devotional – April 20, 2021

Faith Baptist Church

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Well, a good Tuesday to you. I hope your week's gotten off to a good start and you're seeing the

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Lord work in your life already and helping you get things done that you need to do. As we mentioned yesterday,

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I hope you also got some time to rest a while, even if it was just for a few minutes in the evening, wind down from the day, just to rest and reflect on the day's events.

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Well, today we read in Leviticus chapters 15 and 16 and just a few different ideas, unrelated in some way, that I want to share today.

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One of them is you have these rather extensive laws in chapter 15 regarding bodily discharges.

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That's, you know, kind of an uncomfortable passage of Scripture to read, isn't it? All these different things, if somebody has a discharge of this or that or whatever.

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And those discharges, interestingly, rendered a person ritually unclean.

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As I thought about that, I wondered, you know, what's the significance of that? What's the point of it?

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Perhaps it's merely hygienic and, you know, the

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Lord's concerned about disease spreading or things like that. Perhaps, but it would seem to me that that would be the kind of law that would be perpetual.

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I mean, there would be no end to it if that were the case. So I'm not quite sure that's all there is to it.

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Then I got to thinking about a passage that we'll actually read tomorrow's reading, where the

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Lord was criticized for, you know, eating without washing his hands first.

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The Pharisees did that. You remember that? If you don't remember it, stay tuned.

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You'll read about it tomorrow. But anyway, in that confrontation with the Pharisees, the

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Lord said that, listen, it's not what goes into your mouth and into your stomach that defiles you.

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It's what comes out from inside of you. That's what defiles you.

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And so is this, all of these laws regarding ritual uncleanness with discharges, is that just a way of signifying that it's what's within you that comes out that defiles you?

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Because, after all, it's out of the heart where all manner of evil is discharged into your practice, into your speech, and so forth.

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And those things that come out of you, come out of your heart, if they're evil, that's what defiles you.

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Again, stay tuned in tomorrow's reading. The other thing I wanted to point out is, in chapter 16, the

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Lord gives some guidelines, rules, if you will, for approaching him on the

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Day of Atonement. Very strict, very precise procedure on the

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Day of Atonement, and that procedure was limited to one day per year.

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One day out of the year. Well, the book of Hebrews tells us that all of this signified that the way to the

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Lord and being in his presence was not fully open.

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It took the work of Christ on the cross to fully open the way for us to go into the presence of the

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Lord at any time, without a whole bunch of strict procedures to follow to get there, either.

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So, there's a great blessing to be had for the New Testament believer who realizes that Christ has opened a way, and we don't have to jump through a whole bunch of hoops, and we're not limited to one day a year when we can go before the very presence of the

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Lord, and so on and so forth. So, thank Christ for his work opening the way, giving us access to the very presence of God.

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And then the third section that we read had to do with the ritual of the two goats, and this is an interesting picture, isn't it?

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One of the goats was slain, and its blood was applied to atone for the sin of the people.

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The other goat was kept alive, but there was this ritual of putting the hands on the head of that goat, and that signified that all of the iniquity was transferred from the sinner to that goat, and then the goat was led away into the wilderness and was never to be seen again.

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What is that signifying? It's signifying that with the blood sacrifice, with the atoning blood sacrifice, there is forgiveness of sins, and those sins are sent away, never to be remembered again, never to be brought against the sinner again.

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And once again, what a wonderful picture of what our Lord Jesus has done in not only offering the blood sacrifice, atoning for our sins, but seeing to it that those sins are banished, they're banished forever, and it's like cast into the depths of the deep blue sea, never to be brought up again before us.

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Thank the Lord. Thank our Lord Jesus for His gracious work in opening the way for our access to God and for that atoning sacrifice that enables us to have that access, dealing with our sin once and for all.

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So, our Father, we thank you today for our Savior, the work on the cross that He performed in our behalf, dying in our place, atoning for our sins, and thank you that that forgiveness that we enjoy is a total forgiveness and an unending forgiveness, and those sins forgiven are never to be resurrected, never to be brought back into our presence again.

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Thank you for that wonderful sacrifice. And I pray that you would bless this reading in Leviticus to our hearts today, we pray, in Jesus' name.

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Amen. All right. Well, have a good rest of your Tuesday. I trust the Lord will bless you richly in it.