Leviticus 23-24

Leviticus 23 is the Lord telling Moses about the Festivals that they are to observe, which I thought was a fun thing to learn about as we prepare to celebrate 4th of July. Passover, seems to me, is similar to 4th of July in that they both are celebrating independence from another country. However, Passover was a much bigger deal to the Israelites. The Lord mightily delivering them from the Egyptians by using many miracles. He established this time to remind the Israelites of his power and his care for them.

Leviticus 24 tells the story of a man who gets into a fight and during this fight he blasphemed the Name of the Lord with a curse. The punishment for this was for all of the people who heard him to lay hands on his head and then the whole community stoned him to death. vs. 16 "Anyone who blasphemes the Name of the Lord must be stoned to death by the whole community of Israel." Whoa, he takes this very seriously! One thing that I think I'm learning from Leviticus is how holy God is. We love him, we serve him because that is the best life and not because we are afraid of him. Having said that, we should fear him. Not in the way we fear monster, aliens, and wild animals but in the way that we fear the President. We respect the position that he is in and because of that we have fear when we bring shame to that office. There are obvious flaws to that parallel, I know. I think sometimes we focus so much on the God that loves us (and he does) that we forget that he is all-powerful and he really hates sin. He doesn't laugh it off. He wants us to take it seriously also which is why he has Israel take part in the punishment of the blasphemer.

God, please expose any sin in my life and help me to take it as seriously as you do.