Prepare our hearts, O God,
to hear your Word
and obey your will.
Through Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen.
Through Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen.
Chapter 4 goes against the grain of our modern sense of guilt. We tend to emphasize intention when it comes to sin. If someone sins unintentionally, we tend to loosen up the accountability. Leviticus 4 is filled with the consequences for sinning unintentionally. “When anyone sins unintentionally and does what is forbidden in any of the Lord’s commands…” and then come the lists of sacrifices. God’s holiness is such that all sin shows up as sin in its light. My dad always used to say, “Close only counts in horseshoes and hand grenades.” It certainly doesn’t count in holiness. As I read these chapters, I wonder how hard it was to find a pigeon or dove among this huge community!
Gordon Wenham is a theologian who has written a great commentary on Leviticus (yes, such a thing exists). He says the opposite of holy is not unholy. He says the Jews had three categories: holy (or consecrated), clean, and unclean. Clean was the designation for the ordinary state of things. Something clean could become unclean through the process of pollution. Something holy could become clean by being profaned. Polluting and profaning are the process of sin. Going from unclean to clean is to cleanse. To go from clean to holy is to sanctify (or consecrate). Cleansing and sanctifying happen through sacrifice. God took all of the days that were clean and made one holy - the Sabbath. God takes people who are clean and asks that they be holy. “Take my life and let it be consecrated Lord to thee.”
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