Lesson 25 - Leviticus 17 & 18

[Music] [Music] well we're going to resume our study of Leviticus 17 and we left off on a discussion of the topic of blood and the context was that while up to the great flood mankind could on occasion kill animals that it was only for the purposes of sacrifice to the Lord that it would happen animals as a food source were prohibited until Noah received specific instructions in Genesis 9 this was after the earth had been purged of all of its wickedness by means of the floodwaters after that man was now free to kill and eat any kind of animal but Genesis 9 verse 4 did play some rules about using meat as food it says that while it's now okay to man to eat the flesh of living creatures one must not eat the blood from that creature because life is in the blood now let's face it even early man knew that if somebody got cut and their blood flowed out of their body in sufficient quantities he died no blood no life so indeed life was in the blood quite literally and in addition while God made blood unsuitable for food he dedicated blood for the sole purpose of atonement the pattern was obvious one was not allowed to eat something so sacred as the source of atonement which is blood the purpose for blood was life an atonement so to use blood for any other purpose was against God's will but what we need to grasp from what I've told you concerning the prohibition against shedding blood or eating blood is that this blood prohibition applies on a number of levels in a nutshell the term Shafak dam meaning shed blood or just blood for short applies to most any case where blood is misused biblically speaking murder is a misuse of blood because it ends life drinking the blood of an animal is a misuse because blood is for atonement take the life taking the life of an animal outside of the sacred Tabernacle grounds and in a manner other than a god-ordained ritual sacrifice is a misuse of blood because atonement is only available inside the holy grounds outside of the sanctuary the taking of blood is just selfishly terminating life and it's a waste outside of the sanctuary the taking of blood is a misuse of blood because a living creature that our holy God created should not be used for things like glorifying a demon don't glorifying a false god or even should it be used to glorify some kind of figment of our imagination and there are several more examples we are not going to go into for the moment so let's apply our new understanding about the nature of the crime of blood or shedding blood to the New Testament for just a second in that watershed Jerusalem council meeting of 49 ad when Saint Paul went to James the just Jesus's brother who at that time was the head of the Church of Jerusalem to ask the Jewish leadership of the messianic movement to relent from first requiring Gentiles to convert to Judaism in order to worship Christ and to establish some rules for Gentiles to follow that would satisfy the Jewish purity provisions and thereby allow Gentiles and Jews to worship together in Jewish synagogues indeed the outcome was such that many restrictions were lifted and some basic requirements were put onto these Gentiles and many of these edicts have been sadly misunderstood miss applied and misrepresented by church leaders among these requirements for Gentile believers as recorded in acts 15 21 says Gentiles are to abstain from blood acts 1520 but that we write to them that they abstain from things contaminated by idols and from fornication and from what is strangled and from blood the phrase from blood is exactly what we've been talking about it means Gentiles are to refrain from any misuse of blood from murder to not drinking blood to not draining meat of all of its blood to sacrificing an animal to another God whatever scriptural laws and Commandments and regulations were in existence concerning the topic of blood they were to be obeyed by the Gentile contingent of the church and I won't get into it at the moment but it also includes whatever Jewish provisions were in effect at that time concerning where an animal was to be killed and in whatever manner the rules about animal slaughter changed a bit from the time of Leviticus after Joshua led Israel into the land of Canaan after it wasn't so convenient anymore to take an animal to the tabernacle and have a priest slaughter it okay back to the text of Leviticus 17 let's read Leviticus 17 to start things off today open your Bibles to Leviticus chapter 17 page 129 if you have a complete Jewish Bible I don't I said to Moshe speak to Aaron and his sons and to all the people of Israel tell them that this is what Adonai has ordered when someone from the community of Israel slaughters an ox a lamb or a goat inside or outside the camp without bringing it to the entrance to the tent of meeting to present it as an offering to Adonai before the tap tabernacle dad and I he's to be charged with blood he has shed blood that person is to be cut off from his people the reason for this is so that the people of Israel will bring their sacrifices that they sacrifice out in the field so that they'll bring them to a denied to the interest to the tenant meeting to the priest and sacrifice them there as peace offerings to Adonai the priest will spat splashed the blood against the altar of Adonai at the interest of the tenant meeting and make the fat go up in smoke as a pleasing aroma for Adonai no longer will they offer sacrifices to the goat demons before whom they prostitute themselves this is a permanent regulation for them throughout all their generations also tell them when someone from the community of Israel or one of the foreigners living with you offers a burnt offering or sacrifice without bringing it to the entrance to the tent of meeting to sacrifice it to sacrifice it to add and I that persons to be cut off from his people when someone from the community of Israel or one of the foreigners living with you eats any kind of blood I will set myself against that person who eats blood and cut him off from his people for the life of creatures is in the blood and I have given it to you on the altar to make atonement for yourselves for is the blood that makes atonement because of the life this is why I told the people of Israel none of you is to eat blood nor is any foreigner living with you to eat blood when someone from the community of Israel or one of the foreigners living with you hunts and catches game whether animal or bird that may be eaten he is to pour out its blood and cover over with earth for the life of every creature it's blood is its life therefore I said to the people of Israel you are not to eat the blood of any creature because the life of every creature is in its blood whoever eats it will be cut off anyone eating an animal that dies naturally or is torn to death by wild animals whether he's a citizen or a foreigner is to wash his clothes and bathe himself in water he'll be unclean until evening then he'll be clean but if he doesn't wash them or bathe his body then he'll bear the consequences of his wrongdoing in the first four verses were told that all domestic animals used for food had to be first part of a sacrifice and this had to be formed in accordance with all the carefully crafted god-ordained sacrificial rituals which means it of course had to happen at the tabernacle and if somebody broke that law they had committed blood or blood guilt and were therefore subject to being correct cut off by God now verse five makes it clear that this ordinance concerning blood was not a preemptive strike the Israelites were currently killing animals from their flocks and their herds out in the open fields and for some reason thinking that just didn't count the thought among the people was is that if they were outside of the camp of Israel at the time then God's rules on blood don't apply and further the Israelites very likely we're building these small crude altars and offering some of these animals to the gods that they had learned to worship down in Egypt or even sacrificing to Yoho way thinking they still had the right to do so I remember until the establishment of the priesthood that had only weeks earlier from where we are now been ordained by God the senior firstborn of each Hebrew family acted as the one who performed the rituals the various rituals for that family now let us also remember that these laws about blood were for foreigners as well the mixed multitude that came up from Egypt with with the Israelites so you had Hebrews you had non Hebrews that this was for then while will Israel was in the wilderness why would God require all animals used for food to be first offered on us as a sanctuary sacrifice and then after they entered the land of Canaan he was going to allow some slack in that as with everything else we've witnessed this was a teaching process jehovah was in the midst of ringing 400 years of Egypt out of Israel and showing these non Israelites who lived among his people that there was more to him than just bringing judgments upon nations who came up against him it was going to take 40 years in the wilderness for Israel to adopt some new ways while forgetting most of their old ways once they got into Canaan once they spread out over the land he was nearly impossible that meat could be brought on a several days journey to the place of the tabernacle and then of course later on the Temple in Jerusalem to slaughter it when it involved food but the lesson had been taught and Yehovah is requirement for sacrifices to be made only at the place he designated all that remained intact with no deviations from it allowed now for those of you who've been paying close attention throughout our Leviticus Studies we get a very interesting nuance in verses 5 through 8 we have thus far study five basic classifications or categories of sacrifices the olá the mija the Haddad the Assam and the Ziva shelamim each one of these special categories is for a precise reason each has a particular ritual each has a certain occasion upon which they're to be performed some of these classes of sacrifice were mandatory not voluntary they had to be performed when the losses they must or there was an unpleasant consequence others of these sacrificial categories are voluntary and in general the worshiper decides for himself when an if he's going to offer it in verse 5 the reference is to a type of sacrifice that is to be brought before the Lord and it's called the save ah Shamim and the significance of this that it is the type of offering that can be brought to the Lord at the discretion of the worshiper so an Israelite who decided it was time for his family to eat some meat could bring a save our shelamim type of offering at his own whim and go home from the sanctuary with the remainder of the animal across his shoulders further some of the offerings had to be completely destroyed by fire and others that weren't burned up it was to go to the priests the Vivas Lam Meem however provided the bulk of the sacrificial animal to the worshiper so as I mentioned many months ago for this and other reasons that viva la même sacrifices were undoubtedly the most numerous performed at least they were while they're out in the wilderness now verse 8 makes it clear that all of these are regulations apply to who to foreigners living among Israel as well as natural Israelites and although it gets lost in translation into English in verse 8 in essence it makes clear that the entire range of sacrifices every category no exceptions had to be performed at the Tabernacle so where it says say to them further if anyone of the house of Israel or of the strangers who reside among them offers a burnt offering or a sacrifice well the burnt offering in the original Hebrew is Ola and the word sacrifice in Hebrew is Ziva short for Ziva a la meme the Ola is the chief of all sacrifices and therefore it all goes up to the Lord not even the priest can have any meat from an Ola category of sacrifice the Ziva is it the opposite end of the spectrum from the Ola the Ziva is almost purely voluntary it can be offered as often or seldom as the worshiper decides and it is the one sacrifice in which the worshiper keeps almost all the meat for himself so the idea here of saying is someone offers and Ola or as Ava it's like our Americans saying from A to Z from soup to nuts it indicates all inclusiveness every kind now we just can't pass up those words of verse 7 which says that the people will no longer offer their sacrifices to the goat demons in the wilderness now obviously the Israelites were doing this at this point in history God doesn't deal with hypotheticals even more obvious since we just finished studying on vidiq assist een and yom kippur with its scapegoat ritual there is a link between the Oz's l to whom the scapegoat was sent and the goat demon reference here just one chapter later leviticus 17 remember that Oz's l and goat demons are thought to be evil powers that rule in the wilderness areas and I think in some sense or another these are quite real not that they're necessarily demons that look like goats but indeed there's some sort of spiritual power or principality whose domain was that the the desert regions the wilderness and the people Israelite foreigner like we're sacrificing to these demons and God says stop it no more now further in the scapegoat ritual when the scapegoat was sent out to us as ell it was by no means a sacrificial offering that was being sent out to these goat demons it was actually the opposite rather the scapegoat was loaded up with all of israel's sin and uncleanness and it was sent back to the evil one returned to sender out in the wilderness it was all flung right back in his face as a reproach by God and proof of Yahweh's invincibility and his power over Satan and all of his demons then verses 10 through 12 were again told what we've previously discussed no one among the entire throng of people of the Exodus are to partake of blood or they'll be cut off now verse 13 starts a new instruction and it involves the killing of non domestic animals wild animals so the first twelve verses of chapter 17 deals with domesticated animals approved food sources which is entirely different from wild animals that can be used for food sometimes but never can they be used for sacrifices the idea is that when man hunts animals deer antelope Birds he doesn't have to drive his pray towards the sanctuary and kill it there but neither can a man drink the wild animals blood only because it's wild the blood provisions applies to all meat the blood of a wild animal is not suitable for sacrifice so it has to be drained from the animal and buried in the ground the life which is in the blood has to be returned to the dust where it's returned to God not used for food blood is either to be used for God's purposes or it's to be disposed of it's never for us to decide and the penalty for disobeying God's commandments concerning a wild animal blood it's just as serious as for the misuse of domestic animal blood the violators to be cut off now verses 15 and 16 deal with what must have been a pretty everyday matter for these refugees from Egypt something they would encounter in the wilderness and after they had settled in the promised land what do you do with a valuable domestic animal or a wild animal that has died naturally or it's been killed by another animal after all meat was expensive they weren't gonna waste it they didn't have to interestingly it's not that the person is instructed against eating the flesh that was killed under those circumstances it's just that the person who does that becomes what unclean and that uncleanness only lasts until the end of the current day sunset and until that person takes a ritual bath and washes his garments and if a person takes those steps to become clean again than all as well if he or she doesn't then were told they were will bear their guilt now let's take a moment understand this he shall bear his guilt comment because we're gonna see it many times throughout the tour in the Old Testament the idea is concerns our current case is this if a person chooses to eat the flesh of an animal that's died of natural causes or from accidental death or it was attacked and killed by another animal then that person has not done something against God follow me think back to what we learned about clean and unclean and about sin they aren't necessarily the same things one doesn't necessarily produce the other God permits this however if a person chooses to do this a loud thing there's a mild consequence that goes with it in that he or she becomes ritually impure for a few hours and they have to take a ritual bath and they have to wash their clothes there is no sin involved here there is no transgression against God God isn't saying he'd God really isn't even saying he'd rather you didn't do it yet upon choosing to eat the flesh of an animal that died this way there are conditions that God has placed upon it and by the way here's another of those examples as I said earlier Clendenen uncleanness and sin are not necessarily linked the person in this particular scenario becomes unclean for a very short time but is committed no sin it's just like a woman who's entered her monthly cycle she becomes unclean for a time she did then but there's no sin involved now if you follow these interns that's laid out by God there's no problem there is no problem but if you don't God says now you've transgressed against me not because you ate meat that was killed in that manner but because you failed to follow his ordained purification procedures so to bear the guilt means that you are guilty of trespassing against God for failing to follow his procedures now there will be judgment of some sort now the exact punishment if any of all if any at all the time in the place of it are completely at God's prerogative further since you now bear the guilt we've gone beyond and cleanness now you have to make an atoning sacrifice because you sinned something that would not have been required had you just followed the ritual purity procedures well we're going to move on to chapter 18 and when we read chapter 18 we're going to be reminded of chapter 15 because human sexuality is front and center in these verses now 1 1 when one takes the time to read the holy scriptures more than just a few verses at a time and too often completely out of context and out of order we soon find that human sexuality plays a huge role in the Bible why because sexuality is the basis of propagating physical life a physical life that God created to operate and multiply in that way we simply can't get around it we are male and we are female and we're very different from one another and God has put a nearly irresistible attraction between the sexes God has given us sex not only for procreation but offers also for joy and pleasure provided provided it's within the bounds of marriage and it is the case among humans that we unfortunately abuse these wonderful gifts that God has given us sometimes the abuse is out of misunderstanding at other times it's out of ignorance but more out it's just flat-out disobedience or it's a very misguided belief that as Christians God's commandments just don't apply to us and as much as our church talks of hope for unity what we find in the Torah and really and the New Testament if we'd actually read it and trust it for what it says and not allegorize it it is that God constantly this God pattern of division election and separation is constantly expanding and it's his means to bring us to a godly type of unity in the end that is you have a sets up dynamics and rules of what is good of what promotes godly defined life what's holy what's eternal all else is against its opposite of these divine governing dynamics and rules evil death sin the short-lived physical life that we have for instance so you Hopi divides all things into two basic categories for him and against him then he elects who or what will be included in each category next he makes a deep chasm an impassable barrier between the two sides he separates them it is not God that is constantly seeking unity physical unity in our physical world it's human beings who chase after it the Lord seeks spiritual unity man has always tried to put back together these things that God separates and divides God draws sharp distinction man wants to blur those distinctions or remove them all together we have devised a name today in the West for drawing sharp distinctions intolerance in the current world intolerance is a bad thing better says our secular humanist planet is tolerance whereby all distinctions are done away with Nimrods rebellion at the Tower of Babel revolved around trying to physically unify people instead of allowing them to be divided and separated as God wanted they refused to leave they wanted to stay bound together physically God said no I want you to spread out no this is not a polemic against unity in the body of Messiah God himself is unity he has one he's a HOD but this is entirely different than our human notion of unity which has so severely infected the church that other than for the buildings where we meet there is precious little difference between what we as believers choose as a way of life and what everybody else chooses our notion of unity is more akin to consensus which is but agreements achieved through compromise with a goal of universal agreement and single mindedness we divide ourselves up into smaller and smaller groups until we finally feel sufficiently comfortable then we try to unite everyone in that small group via groupthink then we hope it'll grow think of it as humanity for the body of Christ standing in an enormous circle holding hands singing Kumbaya but that's not the kind of unity that God is and it's not what he's seeking for us rather God wants us to be of one spirit with him with Christ if I am one spirit with Christ and you are one spirit with Christ than you and I are in unity I don't hold your hand I hold Christ's and metaphorically speaking you don't hold my hand you to hold Christ's hand then we're unified you see that rather enormous difference one is a method of group control that's man's way the other is how the Lord comes into a spiritual relationship with us his way so what we're going to witness in Leviticus 18 is yet another chapter and the ongoing biblical saga of God setting up that which is good and holy separating it from that which is evil and unclean and as his holy and set apart nation of Israel is to follow the one and forsake the other just as believers who have been grafted into Israel by faith in Yeshua were to do the same thing we're to grasp the one and shun the other anything well another thing that we're gonna see undergoing further development in this chapter is the family unit here we're going to find God's definition of who is included in a family and who's not who is the head and focus of the family who is not the Bible from beginning to end revolves around a patriarchal family that is men the fathers are the leaders and they're the responsible party by the way of the family unit I'm not going to get into the politically correct apology that women are not the head of the family God didn't apologize about it so I'm not gonna yet as I mentioned earlier all gifts can be perverted and distorted that men would abuse their wives and daughters that men would treat them as less than equal value in God's eyes is unacceptable to Christ and he taught against it he didn't teach against the God ordained male leadership role of the family he taught against the male leadership's abuse of power and authority of dereliction of duty because that leaders role is to selflessly Shepherd his family and I tell you this because we begin to read chapter 18 I want you to understand the context of what we're gonna read that these instructions that are being spoken of are from the male point of view the head of the families point of view that is it is understood that these are instructions to Israelite males not to females at every level of Hebrew society and it also applies to the foreigners who now live within the boundaries of Hebrew society naturally females are affected greatly by these rulings but that's primarily because of what God enjoins men from doing so with that open your Bibles and let's read Leviticus chapter 18 if you have a complete Jewish Bible its page 130 Auto and I said to Moshe speak to the people of Israel and tell them I am Adonai your God you are not to engage in the activities that are found in the land of Egypt where you used to live you are not to engage in the activities found in the land of Canaan where I'm bringing you nor are you to live by their loss you are to obey my rulings and laws and live accordingly I am Adonai your God you are to observe my laws and rulings and if a person does them he will have life through them I am Adonai none of you is to approach anyone who is a close relative in order to have sexual relations I am Adonai you're not to have sexual relations with your father you're not to have sexual relations with your mother she's your mother don't have sexual relations with her you're not to have sexual relations with your father's wife that's your father's prerogative you are not to have sexual relations with your sister the daughter of your father the daughter of your mother where they're born at home or elsewhere do not have sexual relations with them you are not to have sexual relations with your son's daughter or with your daughter's daughter do not have relations with them because their sexual disgrace will be your own you are not to have sexual relations with your father's wife's daughter born to your father because she is your sister do not have sexual relations with her you're not to have sexual relations with your father's sister because she is your father's close relative you're not to have sexual relations with your mother's sister because she is your mother's close relative you are not to disgrace your father's brother by having sexual relations with his wife because she's your aunt you're not to have sexual relations with your daughter-in-law she's your son's wife do not have sexual relations with her you are not to have sexual relations with your brother's wife because this is your brothers prerogative you are not to have sexual relations with bolt with both a woman and her daughter nor are you to have sexual relations with her sons daughters daughters daughter they are close relatives of hers it would be shameful you are not to take a woman to be a rival with her sister and have relations with her while her sisters still alive you are not to approach a woman in order to have sexual relations with her when she is unclean from her time of need ah you're not to go to bed with your neighbor's wife and that's become unclean with her you're not to let any of your children be sacrificed to Molech thereby profaning the name of your god I am Adonai you're not to go to bed with a man as with a woman it's an abomination you are not to have sexual relations with any kind of animal and thus become unclean with it nor is any woman to present herself to an animal to have sexual relations with it it's a perversion do not make yourselves unclean by any of these things because all of the nations which I'm expelling ahead of you are defiled with them this land has become unclean that's why I'm punishing it the land itself will vomit out its inhabitants but you are to keep my laws and rulings and not engage in any of these disgusting practices neither the citizen nor the foreigner living with you for the people of the land have committed all of these abominations and the lands now defiled and if you make the land unclean it'll vomit you out too just as is vomiting out the nation that was there before you for those who engage in any of these disgusting practices whoever they may be they will be cut off from their people so keep my charge not to follow any of these abominable customs that others before you have followed and thus defile yourselves by doing them I am Adonai your God well another appropriate name for this chapter is probably God's principles of human sexual behavior and right out of the box we see yo ho we draw the distinction between the behaviors of the world and versus the behaviors expected of Israel and those who are attached to Israel the people are told that they are neither to continue with the sexual behavioral habits that were acceptable back on the place they left behind Egypt nor are they to take up those habits of the people who currently occupy the land that Israel is going to be taking over the land of the Canaanites now let's be clear there is nothing we've encountered so far that says that the Israelites lived in a state of disgust in Egypt nor were they particularly concerned about the immoral nature of the society that they were going to eventually encounter in Canaan it was Yehovah who was disgusted it was God who was concerned and he was gonna make Israel aware of his disgust and teach them to adopt his ways so much of this was relatively new to the Israelites and we're going to discuss that now I'd like you to take notice that these rules are presented to us kind of like the Ten Commandments part two they're announced to Israel in the same form I am THE LORD thy God you shalt not then a listed showels and shalt nots commences and like the Ten Commandments not a lot of reason is given for these decisions that God has made concerning how Israel will deal with sexual sexual immorality other than for the fundamental principle that I'm holy so year to be holy or that the things God prohibits are far more than some type of a minor irritation to him they're detestable they're an abomination he hates those behaviors and in the positive it says in verse 5 that those who will obey His commandments will enjoy life real life the kind of life that's from God it's not implying that if you break one of these laws that you're necessarily gonna die and verse 6 sets up the primary dynamic upon which the bulk of what follows will adhere and it is that none of you remember it is referring to men to males when it says you you shall according to most Bible text come near your own flesh to uncover nakedness or as the complete Jewish Bible says you are not to approach anyone who is a close relative in order to have sexual relations with them that is a lot closer to what's being discussed here let's take a minute to define a couple of terms and we're gonna find this mini in many places in the Word of God uncover nakedness what's one term on another term his own flesh what uncovering nakedness is referring to is usually the uniquely male or female body parts or it is referring to having sexual relations in general and when the Bible speaks of his own flesh it's referring to to the developing biblical definition of close relatives his own flesh close relatives so the idea is that a man is not to have sexual relations with a female who falls within certain boundaries of those who are part of his family so with that understanding it makes most of the list of who a man can have sexual relations with and who he can't barely comprehensible but depending on your version we can get these odd sounding instructions like in verse 13 do not uncover the nakedness of your mother's sister for she is your mother's flesh now we can easily understand the instruction that a man's not to have sex with his mother's sister his aunt well what is this about the aunt being her mother's flesh well has you've undoubtedly figured out it means that the mother's sister and the mother are close biological relatives and the biblical term for being a close relative is a being of somebody's flesh so then what do we make of an earlier verse verse 7 your father's nakedness that is the nakedness of your mother you shall not uncover she is your mother you shall not uncover her nakedness when it speaks of a man uncovering his father's nakedness is talking about a man or is it talking about a man committing a homosexual act no your father's nakedness is possessive that is it is referring to nakedness that your father owns in this case it's making the point that your father exclusively own sexual access to your mother she is his and his alone I have no intention of spending a lot of time examining the remainder of Leviticus 18 but I do want to look at these verses sufficiently that we see for ourselves that the Torah says some things that many modern liberal teachers and pastors and commentators say aren't there and as uncomfortable as it can be to discuss deviant sexual behavior in a mixed class like this we have to do it because God sees human sexuality and its proper use and purpose is totally important to his overall scheme of things after all the goal of this class of this body is to find out what scriptures actually say rather than just assuming some Christian doctrines that have developed around societal changes and political correctness over the centuries and further these sexual taboos and that is primarily what we have in Leviticus 18 is a list of no no's these are going to play an important role and how humans develop as a species we have all known both experientially and scientifically that there is a great danger than making the gene pool of one's family too small hence our modern laws against incest it is interesting that with all the other absolutely terrible and often embarrassing things discussed with absolute frankness in the Bible that we really don't hear much direct mention of babies with severe birth defects that caused mixed gender a lot of mental retardation we just don't hear of it in the Bible no hint of it I'm sure it existed in some amount but it must have been pretty insignificant at least it was among the Israelites or for sure it would have been mentioned and there would have been some discussion about it what do you do and a major factor that affects these kinds of defects we're so insignificant that can be traced to these laws I think that place strict limitations on what was allowable interbreeding if you would among humans who were related but we must also not assume that this was only about biology or genetics physical things as with so much of what we've come to find out about clean and unclean sometimes there is no direct correlation of the laws and commands to human danger or to even human benefit that we can easily discern anyway it was a decision by God he's sovereign he has his own good reasons for it whatever they may be that's about the end of it he said it we do it we're gonna get in now next time to this dicey subject of incest and deviant sexual behavior next time Father God I just am so glad that you have left this for us to see for Lord it is for our benefit it is for us to know you more and more father to know what is good and what is evil in your eyes and father we are not you you tell us on numerous occasions you are not as superhuman and we're not little gods your mind is not our mind and your ways are not our ways rather father our job is to learn your ways and to do them as much as a physical human being can and father your reasons for these things you don't always explain to us but father where would there be faith if we knew explicitly why and wherefore you did everything and instructed us to do it so father by faith because we trust in you we will do which you command help us father to do it some of these things particularly in modern society your difficult it's even difficult to hear and discuss but father these are real-life things and we need to face them and we need to know how you feel about them and not just go around it particularly father believers we are equipped to hear this we can do this and we can know what you want and what you don't then as you say we'll live real life not what the people around to say his life but real life in your eyes and what a satisfying life that is lord I ask you now to bless us all and as we go out go back to our jobs go back to our families and our neighborhoods help us to make an impact father particularly in this season help us to make an impact help us father to be a light in our neighborhoods to be a light within our family to be a good example to shun the ways of a world father which are further and further away each hour from your ways help us father to take the slings and arrows of insult and offense from a world that says that there's something wrong with us because we cling to the biblical record of a two or three thousand year old document well father this documents ageless it was written in heaven before it was ever written on earth and so father we proudly gladly cling to it but father we don't worship this document we worship only you be with us Lord and bless us and your Holy Name we pray amen okay see you next time [Music] Oh [Music] issue mission you

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Published: Fri Dec 21 2018