All these rules can seem cumbersome, but they are pointing to one critical thought that the nation must get right…
You might ask “why this particular rule” or “why mention these things, but leave out others?” And to be fair, there are more things that could be mentioned here. So what’s the purpose of this list? To put it very simply, it is to begin teaching the people about how they should relate to God. To Israel (and to the whole world) God is unknown. He used to be well known, back in the Garden of Eden when He would walk through the garden at night, conversing with Adam and Eve. Those were days when God was close and personal, and his creation knew what He expected, and appreciated who He was. But times changed because of mankind’s sin and we became more and more distant in our relationship. The further we get away from God the more depraved we become, and we became very depraved indeed. So depraved that God couldn’t stand it anymore. He literally couldn’t bear the stench that our rebellion created in heaven…so he flooded the whole earth and cleansed it. But our depravity was fused right into our DNA, and within a generation you could see the old habits returning. And so the cycle began again, and society once again began to spiral downward.
How is the Lord going to get through to the world when there isn’t a group of people who know enough about Him to permit Him to dwell among them? Literally, God starts from scratch.
He finds one man who knows and loves Him, and begins to build the nation around that man’s descendants. That man was Abraham, and he is the Father of the nation of Israel. It would be several generations before Jacob is born, and many more before the people would leave Egypt as a fledgling nation, bearing the new name that God gave Jacob…Israel.
But their behavior was still atrocious. They had grown up in many different cultures that were completely pagan. Their actions didn’t identify them as God’s people at all. So the Lord begins to lay out laws for the people to follow. Some of them are laws that make sense from a perspective of personal hygiene, others seems to be directed toward keeping the gene pool diverse. But some of the laws don’t seem to have a basis in the natural realm. I mean, what’s the point in not mating two different animals? or what’s the harm in planting both corn and pumpkins in the same field. Have you heard of mules? Where do you think they come from?
That fact tells us that these rules had a far greater purpose than protecting the public health. They were God’s way of helping the people see that there is a difference between right and wrong, good and bad, clean and unclean. There is an authority that determines what is right and rewards it, and punishes what is wrong. These rules are simply a “training event” to help the whole nation develop a pattern of obedience. God is saying “Learn to do what you are told, and if you do I will bless you. If you don’t, you will be punished”. But it isn’t about the plants or types of animals we eat. It’s about confessing our sins and asking for forgiveness. It’s about restoring a right relationship with our heavenly Father while we are alive on the earth, before we have to answer for all the things we have done wrong.
God is teaching the people how to recognize disobedience, and how to correct it. He is showing us what will happen if we don’t obey him, and what will happen when we do. Before it’s too late, we need to learn these lessons. Obedience will be rewarded. Obedience is called holiness. Those who practice holiness will be blessed.
You may note that we don’t care too much about tattoos anymore…but we still have strong opinions about sexual preferences. I can’t explain completely why it is now okay to have a tattoo or own mules, but it isn’t okay to be homosexual or offer your children up as a human sacrifice…but I think when we group them together like that, you begin to understand the difference between the two groups.
Holiness means to be “set apart” and the Christian is commanded to be different. We do not conform to the depravity of this world by disobeying our parents, meeting every selfish desire or treating others with contempt. We are called to be holy, and God himself is involved in the process of making us holy, just as He is holy.
Dare to be holy. Don’t chafe at the idea you can’t do what the world does, race to become more like Jesus…which the world can never do.
Faithfully,
PR