FBC Daily Devotional – April 14, 2021

Well, here we are, the middle of the week, Wednesday already, and I trust your week is going well, and the Lord is blessing you and taking care of you, meeting your needs, keeping you healthy or getting you stronger.

Maybe you've been sick lately, and I know some people in our congregation have been affected by COVID and so forth, some of their family, extended family and so forth. I hope the Lord is blessing with some health in these particular days.

Clean and Unclean Foods in Leviticus 11

Well, speaking of health, have you been perplexed at times by the list of requirements that you read in Leviticus chapter 11? If you haven't read that passage, you might want to review it again. This is that chapter where the Lord gives the restrictions to Israel about the different foods that they can eat, what's clean in different animals, what's clean, what's unclean, what they can eat, what they can't eat.

And as you go through that list, you're probably going to realize, hmm, I've had some of this in the last however long, when was the last time you had some shrimp? Maybe a shrimp salad or a shrimp, when was the last time you had shrimp?

How about a hot dog made with pork or pork chop or bacon or something like that? How long has it been? Well, if you've eaten any of those things, well, those are animals that are prohibited in the Leviticus 11 list.

And that has created some perplexity. People have wondered, well, why did God create such a distinction between these animals? Some were clean and some weren't. And the answer to that is, good question, good question.

But there is no, really, there's no consensus. And the fact is, God didn't give a reason, he didn't give a reason. And so if he didn't give a reason, we're always in dangerous territory to insist on a reason.

I mean, I know some folks today even insist that you should not eat pork because God prohibited the eating of pigs in the Old Testament law. Interestingly, some of those who refuse to eat pig or pork meat will be okay eating shrimp or some other things that are in that list of prohibited things.

But anyhow, if you have an ESV study Bible and you look at Leviticus 11, there's an extended discussion there about why the prohibition of these different things. And I'll tell you the same thing, that there's no consensus.

There are some who think that the distinction was for health benefits. There are others who think that God gave the distinction because of what they call the death motif. In other words, that the unclean animals, some of them were more associated with death than the clean animals were and so forth.

But when all is said and done, through the centuries, there has not been a consensus among God's people. And consequently, you can't be very dogmatic and shouldn't be very dogmatic on the purpose for the distinction.

Now, what God has revealed is that he wants that distinction to send a message, and that message is that the people of Israel were God's people, and they were set apart to be set apart for God as his people.

Holiness and Covenant Identity in Deuteronomy 14

And that's brought out in Deuteronomy. So Deuteronomy, if you remember, literally means second law. It's a repetition, it's a repeating or a rehearsal of the law that was given in Leviticus. And in Deuteronomy chapter 14, Moses reminds God's people of the distinction between a clean and unclean animals, but it's bookended, that list is bookended by some very interesting statements.

Let me show you. Deuteronomy 14, verse 1 says, You are the sons of the Lord your God. You shall not cut yourselves or make any baldness on your forehead for the dead. For you are a people holy to the Lord your God, and the Lord has chosen you to be a people for his treasured possession out of all the peoples who are on the face of the earth.

All right, so here's this prohibition against cutting your hair in a certain way on the forehead when someone, a loved one dies. And that apparently was a practice among some of the pagan cultures, and he says, you don't do that because you are a distinct people, you're a people, the sons of the Lord your God, you're a people holy to the Lord.

But then in verse 3, right after that, he says, You shall not eat any abomination. And then he goes on to describe the distinction between the unclean and unclean animals. So you can eat the ox, the sheep, the goat, etc., but you can't eat those that don't chew the cud and so on and so forth.

And he talks about what you can eat out of the water, what you can't eat out of the water, and certain kinds of birds. You can eat clean birds and you can't eat dirty birds, if you will. And he says, you can't eat anything that dies naturally.

You can give it, you can give it to, now here's the thing, listen, he says, you can't eat anything that dies naturally. You may give it to the sojourner who is within your towns, that he may eat it, or you may sell it to a foreigner.

Now that seems to indicate that the issue here isn't a health concern. The issue is something else. And here's the something else. He says, you don't eat anything that's died naturally, for you are a people holy to the Lord your God, holy, H-O-L-Y, holy to the Lord your God.

So it seems that the general purpose, at least, for the giving of this distinction between the clean and unclean animals, what they could and couldn't eat, is simply to communicate to everybody else, we are a distinct people.

We are a distinct people. And that's not any different for us as New Testament Christians. Now, for New Testament believers, we don't have that eating law, eating distinction between animals and so forth.

Holiness for New Testament Believers

God took care of that, the Lord took care of that in Acts chapter 10, when he told Peter to eat the unclean animals that were on this sheet coming down out of heaven. Peter says, no way, no way, I can't do that, and God says, hey, what I've cleansed, don't call holy, yeah, so don't call unclean.

So, we can eat any of those animals, that's not the issue here. But it doesn't change the fact that we are still a people holy to the Lord. Listen to what Peter writes in 1 Peter 1, verses 15 and 16, he says, but as he who has called you is holy, so you be holy in all of your conduct, since it is written, you shall be holy, for I am holy.

So yes, we are to still pursue holiness, it's just not going to be defined by whether or not you had a hot dog for dinner last night, or you have ham for dinner this Sunday. So be a people of God, be a holy people of God, but fortunately, it's not determined by our diet, our dietary restrictions.

So, anyway, I hope that's helpful, gives you a little bit of insight into that passage in Leviticus chapter 11. Well, let's have a word of prayer, ask God to bless the remainder of the day, and this is a midweek service night, Wednesday, so if you can join us tonight at 7 o 'clock for Bible study and prayer time, you're invited to do that, and hope it will be a blessing.

To you.

So, our Father and our God, we do thank you for calling us to yourself, to be a people of your own, and may we live that out in our day-to-day living. May we be a people holy unto you, and this we pray, in Jesus' name and for his sake,.

Amen.

All right, well have a good rest of your Wednesday, God bless you.