Detest what is forbidden. Not only does God tell them that certain foods are unclean and they are not to eat or even touch them; He tells them that they are to detest them. If we can learn to detest things that are temptations for us, it will be much easier to avoid them.
God went to such lengths to protect the Israelites and to distinguish them from everyone else that they would eventually encounter. I am beginning to see why they needed to spend so much time in the desert; so that this new lifestyle would become more solidified before they would end up interacting with the rest of the world. If they would have just received these laws and then moved right into Canaan, they would not have learned dependence and obedience to God.
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It easy at times to ignore parts of the OT like these chapters and think they are not relevant to us today, but God still has a message for us today. God's desire was for His people to be different than the rest of the nations and easily identifiable as being different. Their lifestyle was different, what they ate was different, they were to have honor and integrity and "be holy as God is holy." Some OT laws are strange to us today but our lives are still to be different as followers of Christ. People should look at us and know that we are different because of our light and love. Are we trying to fit into the world or transform the world?
ReplyDeleteJenn
I am a follower of the blog, but not one who is reading along with you. The next time I get to these passages during my devotions I am going to have to consider how different God was making his people in light of the customs of the time. Were they looked at as weird? Did other's scoff at them because of their dress, their food, their home life, etc. Sermons, home group topics, classes at church, discussion with church friends frequently revolve around being relevant in today's world. We don't want to be too conservative and turn people away because we are so unlike them. Maybe Jesus' teachings in the NT changed the way we should live our life in light of relevance to the rest of the world. I would be surprised if God was worrying about relevance when he gave the Israelites his laws.
ReplyDeleteTeresa