Today 9 4 18
Shalom Brother
So INTERESTING to hear from you! The timing and how our Lords ~ Father, Son, and Spirit weave Their each individual and unique Offices into our fabric of time and space over hundreds and thousands of years, and by a simple reaching out of an email cause many things to coalesce into a diamond-like focus of truth, light, and life. My case in point (bear with me please, as this has several layers):
The Spirit put it on my heart to systematically read through the Scriptures again in a year, starting date this time being my birth date in late July; this puts me in Leviticus now. He has also brought a renewed focus of my attention on what troubles me about a number of interactions I have had in these past years in the Hebrew Roots circles (these may be individual cases of immaturity, lack of knowledge/poor teaching, or a spirit in need of grace) and the dynamic of our best relationship of the tenents of the Law, the clear understanding of the Prophets (who Yeshua sanctioned) as to the nature and role of mercy, grace, and faith, the doctrines of the denominations that present so many facets of truth and life and were witnessed by the works of the Spirit in their time, and our present moment. So, the scripture (last nights reading), the morning devotional (presented by Charles Spurgeon, circa late 1800’s and part of my regular practice), your email, and our Lord.
The scripture:
Leviticus 5:1-6 (ESV)
1 “If anyone sins in that he hears a public adjuration to testify, and though he is a witness, whether he has seen or come to know the matter, yet does not speak, he shall bear his iniquity;
2 or if anyone touches an unclean thing, whether a carcass of an unclean wild animal or a carcass of unclean livestock or a carcass of unclean swarming things, and it is hidden from him and he has become unclean, and he realizes his guilt;
3 or if he touches human uncleanness, of whatever sort the uncleanness may be with which one becomes unclean, and it is hidden from him, when he comes to know it, and realizes his guilt;
4 or if anyone utters with his lips a rash oath to do evil or to do good, any sort of rash oath that people swear, and it is hidden from him, when he comes to know it, and he realizes his guilt in any of these;
5 when he realizes his guilt in any of these and confesses the sin he has committed,
6 he shall bring to the LORD as his compensation for the sin that he has committed, a female from the flock, a lamb or a goat, for a sin offering. And the priest shall make atonement for him for his sin.
The italics are the subject in context – the picture that went through my mind as I read this was the woman with the unclean issue of blood who – against all Law and social convention – touched His robe and was healed. You know the story – but play it out in all the nuances and dynamics of Who/who is involved in the context of the Leviticus scripture. Then I receive your email (blessed to hear from you). As it was late, I intended to respond with this today. Then my am devotional, as follows:
September 4
Morning Verse
“I will; be thou clean.” Mark 1:41
Primeval darkness heard the Almighty fiat, “light be,” and straightway light was, and the word of the Lord Jesus is equal in majesty to that ancient word of power. Redemption like Creation has its word of might. Jesus speaks and it is done. Leprosy yielded to no human remedies, but it fled at once at the Lord’s “I will.” The disease exhibited no hopeful signs or tokens of recovery, nature contributed nothing to its own healing, but the unaided word effected the entire work on the spot and for ever. The sinner is in a plight more miserable than the leper; let him imitate his example and go to Jesus, “beseeching Him and kneeling down to Him.” Let him exercise what little faith he has, even though it should go no further than “Lord, if thou wilt, thou canst make me clean”; and there need be no doubt as to the result of the application. Jesus heals all who come, and casts out none. In reading the narrative in which our morning’s text occurs, it is worthy of devout notice that Jesus touched the leper. This unclean person had broken through the regulations of the ceremonial law and pressed into the house, but Jesus so far from chiding him broke through the law Himself in order to meet him. He made an interchange with the leper, for while He cleansed him, He contracted by that touch a Levitical defilement. (italics – mine) Even so Jesus Christ was made sin for us, although in Himself He knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him. O that poor sinners would go to Jesus, believing in the power of His blessed substitutionary work, and they would soon learn the power of His gracious touch. That hand which multiplied the loaves, which saved sinking Peter, which upholds afflicted saints, which crowns believers, that same hand will touch every seeking sinner, and in a moment make him clean. The love of Jesus is the source of salvation. He loves, He looks, He touches us, WE LIVE.
Morning and Evening.
To me, here again the dynamic theme of the life of the Law being substantiated by the Life of the One Who fulfills it, and it is in Him that our justification rests.
note: a response to a friend and brother in Christ who I have not heard from in several years.
