A few things hit me
today as I read through this passage about the defiled people still wanting to
celebrate the Passover. Forgive me if
this post seems a little random, but I have a few agenda items of which I want
to blog.
Admitting We Don’t Have the Answers
First, I really like
what Moses does here. He says “I don’t
know the answer, but I will find out.”
Of course, then He actually does go find out the answer. Some people think they know everything and
refuse to acknowledge something they don’t know. Some people think their spiritual leaders
should have all the answers.
I’ve even seen people
make stuff up on important questions rather than admit they don’t know
something! Other people legitimately say
what they know and confess what they don’t, honestly reporting their findings
when they discover them. And then there
is a third group. These people use the
“I don’t know” as an excuse. They
honestly don’t know something, they confess it, but they never research it or
report back with any kind of findings. I
think it is important to note that Moses is in the middle category – the good
category of leadership.
Reaching Into the New Testament
Second, here’s an
interesting New Testament connection.
Depending on the timeline that you use for Holy Week, note that when
Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus – members of the Sanhedrin – took down Jesus’
body from the cross they defiled themselves and could not participate in
Passover. I had honestly never thought
about that before, but it is true. Their
touching a dead body would have interfered with their ability to remember
Passover. No doubt both of them
remembered the Passover a month later.
The legal means put forth in this chapter reach into the lives of those
people who care for the dead body of God’s Messiah!
Grace Amidst the Law
Third, note that this
ability to observe Passover in the second month is a sign of grace in the midst
of the law. God would rather us delay
our remembrances so that we can make ourselves ritually right before Him than
plunge ahead without concern for our ritual purity. This one is far deeper than it appears.
It is a call for us
to take seriously our ritual purity. If
you know that you are going to be spending time with God in worship, try not to
defile yourself beforehand! But if you
do, confess your defilement to the religious leader who can then go to God and
figure out how to deal with the disparity between human defilement and God’s
holiness. We should not hide our
defilement in our hearts and assume that nobody knows. At the very least, God knows – and God is the
one that matters!
Cut Off
Fourth, and perhaps
most troubling of the group of ideas, is this idea of being “cut off” from the
people. We hear that expression all over
the Old Testament. The specific phrase
“cut off from his people” appears 11 times in the ESV translation of the Old
Testament. The words “cut off” and “people”
appear together in 22 different verses in the ESV’s translation of the Old
Testament. Did God expect this to be
taken seriously? What would it mean if
we actually practiced this today? What
would it mean if families and churches took this idea seriously? Would we even have the guts to do so?
I think of times in
our culture where we use the words “cut off.”
Bartenders cut off patrons who have had enough to drink. Rehab centers cut off patients who are
addicted to drugs and other addictive substances. Sexual partners cut off sexual experiences
between them when there is serious trouble in the relationship. Each of these places tell me that our
communities understand that when someone is doing something so harmful to who
they are as a person then there is just cause for cutting someone off from the
offending behavior. Our society understands
that being cut off has situational necessity.
So that leads me to a simple conclusion.
Since we never “cut anyone off” religiously, we must not consider falling
away from honoring God all that serious of a problem.
Think about it and it
makes sense – although it is a harsh critique of our families and our
churches. It shows that we value peace
among our family/church more than we value true relationship with God. Much like a family hides a secret about the
family drunk, we as faith groups hide our secrets about the faithless. Rather than confront the issue and either
cure it or drive its harmfulness away, we hide it and ignore it as best we can.
Now, I am not saying
we should cut off everyone who does the small sin. Everyone sins – and God Himself knows this. Furthermore, those who truly repent regardless
of the sin have no need to fear being cut off at any time! People in the Old Testament who sinned were
not shunned or cut off, they were expected to repent and ask forgives from
their God. So should our response be
when people in our communities/families sin against us.
Just for fun, let’s
look at what some things are that the Old Testament lifts up as worthy of being
cut off from the people:
· Genesis 17:14 –
someone who is not circumcised
· Exodus 30:33 – someone
who misuses the holy oil for anointing
· Exodus 30:38 –
someone who mimics the incense of worship as perfume
· Leviticus 7:20-21 –
someone who eats of the Lord’s sacrifice while being unclean
· Leviticus 7:25 –
someone who eats the fat of an animal capable of being sacrificed to God
· Leviticus 7:27 –
someone who eats the blood of an animal
· Leviticus 17:9 –
someone who offers a burnt offering anywhere but at the tabernacle
· Leviticus 19:8 –
someone who eats of a peace offering to the Lord on the third (or later) day
· Leviticus 23:29 –
someone who does not participate in the Day of Atonement
· Numbers 9:13 –
someone who does not keep the Passover
If we look at these,
what we see is that common sins – fornication, adultery, lying, cheating, drunkenness,
stealing, even murder! – are not things that deserve “shunning” or being cut
off. Someone who deserves to be cut off
is someone who actively denies our covenant with God. A person who denies their faith is cut
off. A person who rejects God is cut
off. A person who defiles God’s worship
is cut off. A person who has no
intention of honoring that which is holy, or separate, is cut off.
As you can see, all
people sin. So long as there is
repentance there is forgiveness and no need to cut someone off for sin. But when a person directly confronts the
holiness of God, that person is to be cut off.
Of course, God is a
loving and forgiving God. I genuinely
believe that if a person trespasses against God’s holiness and comes to
repentance before his death, then God would forgive even the person who is cut
off. This is, however, just my hopeful opinion.
Realizing One’s Transgression of the Holiness of God
But it raises the
question, how does a person who has transgressed the holiness of God know the
severity of the deed? The simple answer
is that they are confronted by being cut off.
People must be made to understand the gravity of transgressing against the
holiness of God. We should not be
actively condemning anyone – although certainly we should be leading them to
repentance! But we should be very wary
of those who actively transgress upon the holiness of God.
What exactly that
looks like in practice, I don’t know.
I’m going to have to do some thinking about that one. I just wanted us to refine our thinking about
being cut off, who should be cut off, and whether or not we take this practice
seriously in our families, churches, and communities today.
Moving the Camp
Okay, my blog is
already long and I haven’t even touched the movement of the people in the
second half of this chapter. So, I’ll
save that for three years from now. But
I will say this. The people move when
God wants them to move. They wait when
God wants them to wait. The very
movement of the camp demonstrates God’s authority over the people.
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