Moving Closer
So for our Scripture reading, you just heard a couple verses from Chapter 11, but we’re actually going to step back and understand the purpose of this entire section of Chapters 11–15. And that might seem like a lot, but it’s really not, because these five chapters are doing one thing: they are establishing how Israel must live with God in their midst within a fallen world of death.
This is all about how Israel’s relationship with God and how their lives are to be oriented toward him, not away from him. That’s the main idea I want to unpack for the rest of this sermon through three statements of explanation. These are the three points I want to get across:
Leviticus 11–15 is part of a story about moving closer to God.
The movement of being closer to God requires purity and sanctification.
God will sanctify his people and thus make them fit for his closeness.
We’re gonna look at those three things. Let’s pray:
Father in heaven, glorify your name today! We are here, by your grace, with your Word open before us, and we ask, show us your greatness and goodness in Christ! Make your will be done in our lives. Father, we surrender to you now, by the power of your Holy Spirit, in Jesus’s name, amen.
Let’s start with that first statement:
1) Leviticus 11–15 is part of a story about moving closer to God.
Last week in Chapters 8–10 we heard the story of Aaron’s sons, the priests, Nadab and Abihu. Chapter 10, verse 1 says they offered unauthorized fire before Yahweh, in a way he had not commanded, and so Yahweh consumed them with fire and they died, in the holy place.
And that story, that scene, within the overall narrative of Leviticus is very important.
One reason we know it’s important is because in Chapter 16, the Day of Atonement, the chapter begins by referring back to this scene in Chapter 10. We’ll see this next week when we focus just on Chapter 16, but Chapter 16, verse 1 says:
“Yahweh spoke to Moses after the death of the two sons of Aaron, when they drew near before Yahweh and died.”
So, Yahweh speaking to Moses in Chapter 16 happened on the same day that Aaron’s two sons died. Chapter 16 is just continuing that story from Chapter 10. Which means, Chapters 11–15 are inserted in this story as a parenthetical. These chapters come in and say “Hey, by the way…” They are put here strategically and thematically because of this story.
So I want to show you how it fits. Think with me here:
How Do We Get Back to Eden?
All along we’ve seen that the storyline of the Pentateuch (not just Leviticus, but the whole storyline of the first five books of the Bible) has been answering the question of how a holy, living God can dwell in the mist of a sinful people within a fallen world of death.
That question, ultimately, is: How can God have the relationship with humanity that he intended in the beginning with Adam and Eve before sin entered the world?
That’s the question: How do we get back to life in the Garden of Eden?
Remember that at least for a little while, at the beginning in the Garden, there was God with his image-bearing creatures, Adam and Eve, surrounded by the beauty of his created world, and all was whole and right and very good. We read in Genesis that God walked in the Garden with Adam and Eve (Gen. 3:8). God was there with them, and they were with him in his fellowship and closeness.
But when Adam and Eve sinned, they were exiled from the Garden. That’s really important. They were sent out from Eden, which means they went downward and eastward. The spatial realities here matter. So think actual space:
Eden was described as an a-scent — it was a garden-mountain up here.
And so exile meant a de-scent from the garden, going that way, eastward.
And this movement is important because for all of the rest of the Pentateuch, and the Bible, we see a longing to return to Eden — which is a longing to move upward and westward.
Eden is here, exile is to here — and the longing to be back with God, in the Edenic presence of God, the closeness of God, goes like this. Moving toward Eden we could call an Edenic movement. Moving from Eden, toward exile, is an exilic movement. Edenic movement is moving toward life. Exilic movement is moving toward death.
The basic framework of those two movements is behind virtually every part of the Bible going forward. We don’t have time to look at examples, but it’s everywhere.
The question is: How do we get back to life in Eden where God was close to humanity?
Mount Sinai echoed that question, and then the tabernacle highlighted that question. The tabernacle was basically a replica of the Garden of Eden.
Moving Upward in the Tabernacle
And I know Pastor Joe already did this a couple weeks ago, but I think it’s helpful, so pretend again that this room is the tabernacle with the fenced courtyard area.
And actually it’s not hard to do, because get this: the fenced area of the courtyard, from the front entrance of the courtyard to the Most Holy Place, that distance was around 150 feet. And if you were to measure from the steps outside to this altar back here, guess what? It’s about 150 feet. So that helps our imagination.
So again, let’s imagine like we did in Pastor Joe’s sermon. Imagine that back there at that marble altar/buffet is the Most Holy Place. That’s where the Ark of the Covenant stayed, and there was a veil that separated the Most Holy Place from the Holy Place, and the veil had two cherubim woven on it, just like the two cherubim who stood guard at the entrance of the Garden of Eden. So the Most Holy Place was the Garden of Eden.
And then out here in this area, on this side of the veil, is the Holy Place, with the altar of incense, and the lampstand, and the showbread, and then there’s another veil right here, and that’s the tabernacle.
Outside here is the courtyard. And in the courtyard is the Bronze Basin where you washed, and the Bronze Altar where you sacrificed. And pretend the entrance into the courtyard is those doors.
Now the idea is that all movement to that entrance and through that entrance, facing the Most Holy Place, is upward and westward. It’s an Edenic movement.
And outside the tabernacle and courtyard is the camp of Israel, and then outside the camp is the wilderness. That’s exile and chaos.
Now here’s the thing: the whole construction of the tabernacle, which was patterned after the Garden of Eden, was meant to emphasize movement toward God. It was meant to shape the people of Israel with Edenic movement, upward and westward. Their lives were meant to be oriented this way, and acclimated this way.
And the whole design of the tabernacle, and that movement closer, was for how to think about all of life in this world.
Because after the fall into sin, there are just two paths for humanity. These two movements, Edenic and exilic, are two paths, and every singe one of us is on one of those paths.
We are either moving away from God, away from Eden, toward death.
Or we are moving closer to God, closer to Eden, toward life.
That’s the simplicity of this whole thing. Everyone in this room is either moving away from God or closer to God. Where do you think you are?
Priests and Problem
Well, see, for Israel, in the old covenant, their movement was mediated by priests. The priests were set apart as holy to administer the sacrifices for the people and guide them in how to live with God in their midst. And that’s the high point of Leviticus 8–9, which we saw last week. The priests are set apart, and everything is going well — and this is exciting! The blessings are flowing! But then in Chapter 10 two priests die … in the holy place.
And that’s when we’re supposed to hear screeching tires. Wait a minute!
This means that although God has made a way for Israel to be with him through the priesthood, even the priests have to tread extremely carefully. There’s another layer of boundaries and limits that we have to learn about because apparently Aaron’s sons defied those boundaries.
And we know that their defiance, at the very least, was that they did what God had not commanded (Lev. 10:1), but in more detail, many Bible scholars argue their real offense was that they attempted to enter the Most Holy Place. That’s deduced from the story and the response.
We know Aaron’s sons were in the holy place when they died, and in Chapter 16, verse 1, when it refers back to Chapter 10 and their deaths, God tells Moses to tell Aaron, basically, don’t make the same mistake your sons did. He says: Let Aaron know that he just can’t go into the Most Holy Place at any time.
So we infer that’s what his sons had attempted to do, unauthorized. They crossed the line. They didn’t revere the glory of God. So apparently now even the priests weren’t holy enough — and that raises the big question for Israel again.
They would think: I understand God’s here in our midst, but can we really be close to him? Can we really be close to God like it was in Eden?
The death of Aaron’s sons seem to say no, and now their dead bodies have polluted the holy place, and so the story leaves us scratching our heads. Can this movement really happen?
Well, the parenthetical of Chapters 11–15 is meant to answer that. This is the second statement:
2) The movement of being close to God requires purity and sanctification.
Okay, so remember back when we started: Chapters 11–15 are establishing how Israel, a sinful people, must live with God in their midst within a fallen world of death. The answer is they must live “cleanly” But what does that mean?
There are two big dichotomies we have to understand in Leviticus. We see them both mentioned in Chapter 10, verse 10. God told Aaron,
“You [Aaron and the priesthood] are to distinguish between the holy and the common, and between the unclean and the clean.”
Those are the two dichotomies:
there is holy and common
And then as a subcategory of common there is another dichotomy of either clean or unclean.
Holy/common. Clean/unclean.
And within the Old Covenant, those dichotomies are meant to determine and guide this movement.
Guiding the Movement
So now we’re going to think about the space again, and now layer on these dichotomies.
Imagine this as the tabernacle and the courtyard again. Outside this courtyard — Summit Ave, Saratoga, Grand, Snelling — that’s the surrounding camp of Israel. That’s where the people of Israel lived. But then outside of that camp is the wilderness; that’s the place of exile; it’s out among the nations, a world of death. Now track with me: all that is out there is unclean.
But inside the camp of Israel, that’s clean. Both are common, but outside the camp is unclean, inside is clean. So in order to be in the camp, facing and moving toward the tabernacle, you have to go from unclean to clean.
Common and clean can move toward the tabernacle, into the courtyard, to the priests. But then here, in the Holy Place, the common cannot enter. Only the holy can enter. That’s the other dichotomy. So we go from common and clean, to now you must be holy. This is only for the priests.
If we’re talking back there, behind the veil, in the Most Holy Place, in the Garden of Eden, there you have to not just be holy, but it’s the most stipulated holiness. We’re going to see this next week. It’s only the High Priest who can go there, and he can only go there once a year.
So remember the movements. And think:
unclean means moving out; going this way, facing this way, toward death
clean is moving in that direction; facing and headed to Eden, toward life
And that helps us understand that word “clean.”
Edenic Life or Exilic Death
The Hebrew word for “clean” is tāhôr. And “clean” is the right translation, but some synonyms are helpful, so when you hear “clean” think:
normal from abnormal
pure from impure
natural from unnatural
healthy from unhealthy
whole from unwhole
Lifeward from deathward
See, it’s about a distinction. And the best way to think about the distinction is that it draws a line between Edenic life and exilic death.
Much of these common things considered unclean are not morally offensive to God (they’re not sinful), but they’re unclean because they symbolize movement from life in Eden toward exile and death. They are pointed the other way. But clean is pointed that way.
And being pointed that way is necessary for life with God in your midst within a fallen world of death. It’s how you move closer.
So let’s look briefly at the clean/unclean laws in Chapters 11–15. They’re related to four things, and you can probably see these in the subject headings (if you’re reading an English translation).
First, Chapter 11 is laws about animals, including eating them and having contact with their carcasses.
Second, Chapter 12 is about the postpartum state of mothers.
Third, Chapters 13–14 are laws about discerning leprosy and how to react to it, and how to cleanse lepers and cleanse houses.
Fourth, Chapter 15 is about what to do about the loss of bodily fluids.
Without getting into the details, each of these have to do symbolically with life, order, and wholeness. For example, with childbirth, leprosy, and the loss of bodily fluids, the point there is a lack of wholeness. Again, these are not sinful, but each involves either a loss of fluid (as a kind of loss of fullness) or a corruption of your person. It’s either loss or injury. That’s not Eden and lifeward. That’s un-whole, pointed that way.
But here’s the thing. And this is amazing. The unclean can become clean. Anybody know the word used for that? It’s purification.
That’s important. If something is unclean, it needs to be purified in order to become clean. That’s why these laws are often called Purity Laws. It’s all about going from unclean to clean.
And that helps explain the animals.
Clean and Unclean Animals
When it comes to these animals, there are different views on what these prohibited animals have in common — (again, we don’t have time, but overall, I think it has to do with the order of creation). But mainly, the main purpose of the animals laws, of animals being either clean or unclean, is that it’s meant to remind Israel that distinction matters — and that they were distinct from all the other nations of the earth.
And nothing would remind Israel of that better than something to do with their food. Because food is necessary to life, and normally, people eat food everyday.
For several years now I’ve loved the topic of habit, and I’ve read a lot of books about habits, and really nerded out about it, and one practical takeaway I’ve learned is that if you want to start a new habit, the best way to do it is not to try something new from scratch or in isolation, but you attach the new habit to something you’re already doing. The idea is to bundle your habits. You think about your everyday life, and then you hook your new habits onto your already established routines.
That’s basically what these dietary laws are doing. Every time the people of Israel would eat, they’d remember they were not eating the unclean foods that the unclean nations ate — because God had called them out from the unclean nations. In other words, God had made Israel clean.
Think of our tabernacle again, and out there, outside the camp, are all the nations of the earth, and it’s all unclean. And Israel was there once. They were unclean too. But now they’re not. Why? Because God called them out from the nations — literally out of Egypt — through blood the sacrifice of the Passover, and through the “washing” of a parted Red Sea. God had purified Israel. God had made them clean. All by grace. Don’t forget that! It was by his unconditional election and calling.
God had purified Israel to be his people, to move this way. But it’s even more than that.
He Intends to Sanctify
If something goes from unclean to clean, it’s called purification. Well, what is it called if something goes from common to holy? It’s sanctification.
Purification: unclean to clean.
Sanctification: common-clean to holy.
Well, when God saved Israel he didn’t intend just to have a clean people, he wanted a holy people. Listen to Leviticus 11:44,
For I am Yahweh your God. Consecrate yourselves therefore, and be holy, for I am holy. You shall not defile yourselves with any swarming thing that crawls on the ground. For I am Yahweh who brought you up out of the land of Egypt to be your God. You shall therefore be holy, for I am holy. (Lev. 11:44–45)
So God doesn’t just save and purify his people, he sanctifies his people. Which means that God doesn’t intend for his people to be merely around him and directed toward him, but he will have his people close to him.
And he means that for us.
3. God will sanctify his people and thus make them fit for his closeness.
All of this in Leviticus, of course, is the grammar of the gospel. Pretty much every concept we have for understanding what God has done for us in Christ comes from Leviticus.
But the big difference in the New Covenant is that the clean/unclean dichotomy has passed away. The identity of God’s people has now extended to all nations, to whoever believes.
If you’ve put your faith in Jesus — whoever from wherever — if you’ve put your faith in Jesus, God has purified you. He’s called you out of darkness, out of the chaos, out of exile and slavery and deathwardness. By the blood of Jesus, God has made you clean and he has pointed you this way. You are his.
He’s Not Finished
But get this: He’s not finished with you. He’s not finished with us!
God doesn’t just save us, but he sanctifies us. He will make us holy.
The apostle Peter, speaking to the church, to us, he quotes verbatim Leviticus 11:44. He says we are to be holy as God is holy ( 1 Peter 1:16). Setting our hope on the future, on the coming of Jesus here, we are not to be conformed to this world of exile, but we are to be transformed as holy, fit for the new world that is to come.
Because the whole plan is that God wants us close. He wants us with him in the Most Holy Place. He wants to take us back to the Garden of Eden, but better, because now the new Garden of Eden is coming here as a garden-mountain city, a holy city, called the new Jerusalem.
Do you realize the Christian life — our progressive sanctification, the degrees of Spirit-empowered glorification that we experience now and one day will experience completely — that’s all meant to make us fit for that world?
Your growth as a Christian is about transforming you to dwell in the Most Holy Place, which will be its own new world overcoming this one. That’s what we’re doing here, church. That’s where we’re headed.
Becoming Like Jesus
But it’s even more than that. Don’t think that our calling to be holy, to be sanctified, is something abstract. It’s not. That’s not how the Bible talks. But to be sanctified in the New Testament is to become like Jesus.
So you see, God sanctifying us, God making us fit for that world coming here, means that he, by his Spirit, changes us to become more like Christ.
And this is how we should think about the Christian life. It’s about becoming more like Jesus, which takes us deeper than just trying not to sin. The most reduced, shallow way to think about the Christian life is to think it only means “Don’t sin.” That’s part of it, but it’s much deeper than that. The Christian life, becoming more like Jesus, means we orient our lives toward Eden. It means we face that way, and we move that way.
This hit me last week. One day I made a scheduling mistake and overloaded my calendar, and I was just playing catchup from the start. You know days like that? I just was scrambling, and about half way through the day, driving on the road, I felt the sense of hurry, and I thought: Is this Edenic movement? Which way am I facing right now?
See, it wasn’t an issue of sin. It was a deeper orientation of the heart. Which way am I moving? Is this the way of living living like Jesus? Am I moving closer to God? Remember that’s the point of everything. And I want that for my life, for my family, for our church. Let’s go there.
Look, I’ll be honest with you: If you just want to be entertained on Sundays, or if you want to be coddled in your sin, I’m glad you’re here, but you’re probably not going to like it very long. Because we want transformation. Hey, it’s okay not to be okay, but we want transformation. We want to be as Christlike as forgiven sinners can be. We’re going there.
And that’s what brings us to the Table.
The Table
When we talk about Christlikeness, we’re not talking about self-improvement. This is not you bettering yourself; this is about surrendering to what Jesus has done and is doing in you. It’s bowing to him. It’s decreasing, that he might increase.
And that’s what we do at this Table. Because we recognize here that the only way we can be close to God is because Jesus has come here for us. He has saved us. He is sanctifying us. He is the one we praise.
So this morning, if you trust in Jesus. If he has indeed called you to himself, receive the bread and cup, and give him thanks.
