Holiness is the opposite of filthiness. That's one of the definitions, one of the meanings of holiness. It's what purity is. 2 Corinthians 7, verse 1. Therefore, having these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh.
And spirit. perfecting holiness. in the fear of God. Holiness. It is learned and developed.
through challenges to holiness. This is Cross Reference Radio with our pastor and teacher, Rick Aston. Rick is the pastor of Calvary Chapel, Mechanicsville. Pastor Rick is currently teaching through the book of Leviticus. Please.
Stay with us after today's message to hear more information about cross-reference radio. specifically how you can get a free copy of this teaching. And now here's Pastor Rick in Leviticus chapter 19 with a brand new study. called holiness disassociates. Leviticus 19.
Holiness Dissociates, that's the title. The do's and don'ts that are in here are Very helpful to us. It is too easy to downsize the holiness of God and our faith that is supposed to include holiness. And I think that we Christians sometimes downsize the holiness. Mistakenly.
to appeal to those who are not believers. Our message is not, see, I'm a Christian and I'm still cool. Our message is truth. He is risen. repent, be converted.
from this perverse generation or else That was the message of the apostles. It was the message of Christ. It's said in love, of course. It's backed up by. An enormous amount of truth.
One of Peter's first sermons, he said, Be saved. from this perverse generation.
So, trying to be a cool Christian likely will end up drawing more attention to you. But then to Christ. God's messengers are supposed to be notorious for decreasing so that Christ can be exalted. In the last verse of the preceding chapter, Leviticus 18, verse 30, we read: Therefore, you shall keep my ordinance.
So that you do not commit any of these abominable customs which were committed before you. And that you Do not defile yourselves By them I am Yahweh your God.
Well, God has this thing for wanting to be obeyed. He wants things done his way. They're right. And then we have a flesh that objects to that. As we go through this nineteenth chapter, Bearing in mind the less, Chapter last verse, he said, My ordinance in this chapter He will say, My Sabbaths.
My name, my statutes, my judgments, my sanctuary The ownership of God. And We love this about him. We love his holiness, his purity. We want it. We're commanded to pursue it.
And that comes out in this chapter.
So we look at the first two verses. And Yahweh spoke to Moses, saying, Speak to all the congregation of the children of Israel, and say to them, You shall be holy, for I, Yahweh, your God, am holy. That's what he wants. The first verse The Lord spoke to Moses. Shows up.
19th, well, this is the 19th time it shows up in Leviticus out of 34 times. It's 104 times in the Bible. we read that the Lord spoke to Moses in various forms, Fifty of them are in Numbers, the next book we come to, where Moses is going to need God to speak to him because he's going to encounter a lot of resistance from his own people. And the remaining few times are in Exodus and 20. The Lord spoke to Moses profound statement, the God of creation.
In the second verse, There we are. Reminded by Jesus that this is still in effect. You shall be holy, for I, Yahweh, your God, am holy. In Matthew chapter 5, Peter repeats this in 1 Peter: Holiness is the opposite of filthiness. That's one of the definitions, one of the meanings of holiness.
That's what purity is. Second Corinthians seven, verse one. Therefore, having these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh. And spirit. Perfecting holiness.
In the fear of God. Holiness. It is learned and developed. through challenges to holiness. When you start off in Christianity with the zeal to follow the Lord, and you find out that.
Well especially if you were self-impressed. That you're not all that you thought you were. And of course, that belongs to humility and is something that God is eager to work with because he resists the proud. From the beginning God intended mankind to be like him. That was his design plan.
Genesis 1, God said, Let us make man in our own image, according to our likeness. There is no higher ambition for man. Than to be Christ-like. Galatians 4, My little children, for whom I labor in birth again, until Christ is formed in you. This is who we are as Christians.
And we find it. In the Old Testament, Well, what is the alternative to be holy? Be somewhat holy. Be okay, be this. No, God is.
This is my, I want you. To aspire, to throw everything you've got at this, and is very difficult. But look how far along we get By making the effort We tend to want our children to be better than us. Un unless, of course, you're dealing with some big insecurity and you just got real problems. But overall, I think all good parents hope that their children will do better than them.
in life, even as believers. Only in Christ Can people be a reflection of God Rather than The fallen Man, that we are born into or the devil You know, the moon has no light of its own, but it reflects the light of the sun. And every time you look at the moonlight, you see the moon shining in the sky, you're being reminded of the gospel. of Christ's likeness. Verse three.
Every one of you shall revere his mother and his father, and keep my Sabbaths. I am Yahweh your God.
Well, where parenthood is disrespected, God will be disrespected also. Such societies will be depraved. Making great contributions to hell. populating hell And so we No, the Bible is very clear. about honoring mother and father.
Hmm. The Sabbath spoken about here in verse 3. Is a sign between God. And Israel. Exodus 31, verse 17, God specifically says that.
It's not the church, not the Sabbath day, as the Jews were to honor. Jewish Christians are under the new covenant, not the old one. You know, Sabbath doesn't show up. After Acts chapter 18 in our New Testament, except one time, and this is it: Colossians 2, verse 16.
So let no one judge you in food or in drink. or regarding a festival Or a new moon? or Sabbaths. We're not under those things. But we understand The teaching of the Sabbath, that God created the world in six days and rested on the seventh day.
And that's what he tells the Jews when he gives them the Sabbath.
However, when Christ comes along and He did not treat the Sabbath the way they thought he should treat it. And one thing he said in John's Gospel. My father has been working until now, and I am working. There's too much work. to rest because of sin.
And this is What the church understands. When I say the church, the Christians understand this. I don't want to take too much time on the Sabbath. We've done it in other places, and we'll do it as we go through the epistles in the New Testament. Verse 4.
Do not turn to idols, nor make for yourselves molded gods. I am. Yahweh your God. Concocted representations of God are forbidden. I mean, imagine if you never met someone and you were going to meet them.
Maybe you've been, you know. communicating electronically, and they don't know what you look like. And when you get there, say I drew a picture of you. I mean, you look at it, you say, oh man, I hate you. But people do that with God.
They've not seen him. That doesn't stop him. A shroud of terrain and all that other stuff is nonsense. We don't need it, we don't want it, we've got better stuff because the just shall live by faith. Verse 5: And if you offer a sacrifice of a peace offering to Yahweh, you shall offer it.
Of your own free will. Verse 6: It shall be eaten the same day you offer it. and on the next day and if any remains until the third day it shall be burned in fire. Verse 7: And if it is eaten at all on the third day, it is an abomination, it shall not be accepted. Verse 8: Therefore, everyone who eats it shall bear his iniquity, because.
He has profaned the hallowed offering of Yahweh. and that person shall be cut off from his people.
Well God in verse five God honours free will. Romans 5.1 It speaks about. God Honoring, we have peace with God. Because we receive his invitation to come to him. In verse 6 here, The peace offering meal was voided after two days.
So you could eat it, you could have leftovers the next day, but the third day you were not to eat it, you were to burn it with fire. It was a crime. To eat it after. It wasn't just voiding out the offering, It was adding to you The wrath of God. Cut off from his people.
That's the punishment. And this is a difficult. Phrase in Scripture is because it has a variety of applications that suggest a range of punishments. The first one, of course, is capital punishment. And oftentimes, it will tell us that.
This is a sin. You'll be cut off from your people. But maybe in the next book it brings that sin up again and says and they shall be stoned. The example is the Sabbath day. In one section, if you work on the Sabbath, if you violate the Sabbath, you'll be cut off from your people.
But then you have to go further on and find out that means he when the Person Gathered sticks on the Sabbath, they stoned him to death. They took it to the Lord. The Lord says he has to be executed. But in other sections, Where it seems to be more of a missed Well, comparatively, uh a lesser crime The cutoff has the implication of excommunication. Making a social outcast, which is big.
How do you survive like that? And so does it always mean Does it always mean executed? Likely no. But If somebody wants to argue it. Let them argue.
And now we come to verse 9. And from verse 9 to 18, we're reminded of Jesus' Sermon on the Mount. And you'll see why as we go through it. Verse 9: When you reap the harvest of your land, you shall not. Holy reap The corners of your field, you shall gather the gleanings of your harvest, verse 10, and you shall not glean your vineyard.
Nor shall you gather every grape. Of your vineyard? You shall leave them for the poor and the stranger. I am Yahweh your God.
I am Yahweh your God.
Do it my way. I want things done like this. The right to say, Yes, Lord, I believe. Help my unbelief.
Well I'd mentioned the do's and don'ts. that are in this chapter. The you shall nots of this chapter are evidences of God's commands to counter sin. It is direct and it is personal. When God says, you Don't do it.
It's personal, it's direct. Sixteen times we hear it. In this chapter, Two other times it's phrased a little differently.
So you have 18 prohibitions like this, but there are also some you shall do.
So you have the do's and don'ts. The corners of your field.
So, you're a farmer, you have 20 acres of land. Let's just say.
Well, the perimeters you're supposed to leave alone at harvest time. Jewish tradition tell us that one sixtieth Of the harvest was to be left.
Now, with all the rabbinical writings, where'd they get that from? They don't know. They don't back it up. But that's now you know what I know about the corners of your field. I'm happy to just let it be the perimeter of the field.
And leaving the perimeters Untouched by the farmer, That put fair responsibility on the poor, to earn their keep. They could have the food. But they had to go pick it and haul it away and then Process it. If you picked wheat, you had to go and crush it up into flour. to bake your bread.
This discouraged trekking over landowners' property to some extent by keeping them on the perimeter. But what if he got there late? and the perimeter had been picked by the other poor people.
Well, you could then go into the land, and if you found a sheave of wheat, for example, dropped on the ground by the harvesters, they weren't to pick it up. If it fell off the cart, they had to leave it there. And then you the poor could take it.
So the gleanings referred to here in verse 10. Are what remained after the first run through by the farmer, the harvesting? and whatever fell on the ground or what ripened on the Plant afterward. This is what Naomi and Ruth. We're living off of.
The gleanings. God promised to bless the farmers if they honored this in Deuteronomy 24. And so God is, you know, He's not unjust, He's fair.
So it's not a welfare system.
something to burden society or government.
However, There are good people that through misfortune in life for one reason or another. Benefit from a welfare system. Not everybody on welfare is like, you know, healthy, go get a job. A lot of them just, you know, have. Incurred hardship, and it is, you know, it's good that the poor have such a thing.
Well, there was enough for the poor. to live off of and To take their offerings to the tabernacle. Also, they still had to bring offerings because I'm too poor to give to God. That Jesus said, the poor you have with you always. And that is a fact.
and how we respond to them in our hearts is something that is important. To God, and it should be to us too, because it's so easy to look at someone who's not had the fortune we have had with contempt. That's a trap. Verse 11: You shall not steal or deal falsely nor lie to one another.
Well, what if he didn't say that? I could lie to you. Where's that in the Bible? I don't have to lie to you.
Well, it's a lot of places that you can't lie. Matthew 7, part of the Sermon on the Mount. Whatever you want men to do to you, do also to them. For this is the law. And the prophets.
This is the scripture. It's interesting how thieves don't like having stuff they stole. Stolen from them. Liars don't like to be lied to. I mean, this is madness, right?
Insanity of sin. Verse twelve. you shall not swear by my name falsely. Nor shall you profane the name of your God. I am Yahweh.
Okay. Don't trifle with God's holiness. is purity. The fact of God is not casual. and is not insignificant.
Even the atheists. Treat this God they don't believe exists as though He is a force to deal with. This is why they get so upset. At the mention of God, At all. sensible laws of God, I don't believe atheists exist.
I believe they are people that know God exists. They don't like it. They don't like him. They're angry? And they end up Persecuting those who do believe if they can.
All of communism is atheistic. It's a religion and will not stand for a competitor. Thus the state religions Is there a way of Somewhat controlling it. We Christians assaulted the earth. When it gets that bad, Christians have just taken the church underground and souls get saved there.
Profane here in verse twelve to dishonor, to disrespect, withholding. Respect due. or to treat as common, to deface it's not.
something that is difficult to understand. You not to swear falsely? You're not to profane the name of the Lord. Name is Nature. and nature of God is found in his name.
As the The Saviour. The one who loves us and is powerful enough to save us. From sin. Verse thirteen. You shall not cheat your neighbour.
nor rob him. The wages of him who is hired shall not remain with you all night until morning.
Well, clearly, you know, don't go ripping people off.
Something to tell a market is The scammers might not understand, right? In those days There was no regulated central banking system. I'll write you a check at the end of the way. I mean, it just didn't have that system. Then it was a day's pay for a day's work And you paid up that day.
That would go for a contractor. I'm sure you could make a deal with somebody if you so wanted to, but overall you were to not hold back. Proverbs. three verses twenty seven twenty eight Mm-hmm. cover it again.
I just had to hire a contractor to do something, and I got the bill yesterday. And I don't want to pay it. But I will write the check tomorrow. And so You know, you just you can't, you got to pay for it, trust God. Accounts receivable, accounts payable, all that stuff.
Yeah, yeah, but you still got to pay your debts. Verse 14, you shall not curse the deaf. Why, they can't hear you. It could be a little fun, right? for carnality And not if it's you or a loved one, you should not curse the deaf, nor put a stumbling block before the blind.
But shall fear your God. I am Yahweh.
We are not to harass or to bully or to belittle anyone, especially the handicapped. Meanness is not cute to God, is not cute to the righteous, it's an ugly thing. If you have contempt for somebody, Well, that's a key ingredient. Meanness. To be unkind, And if you Honor people.
As God does, you will find that it's much easier to love. than to be harsh towards them. But you know, who would do that? It's a serious thing.
Somebody's blind, you trip him. Hey, watch this. It's something in us when we see somebody fall. You know, slip and fall out in public or something, and no harm is done. It's sometimes you find yourself restraining laughter.
I don't know why that is. If it weren't so, there wouldn't be whole YouTube, you know, 20 minutes of people falling. I saw one years ago. It was just hysterical. This bus driver told the guy, walk across.
The guy said, no, you go. And they both were going to say, and it goes back and forth till the guy slipped and fell. And it was just Hysterical.
Well, I didn't know this verse existed then, so I didn't know you couldn't do that. Anyway. You know, you think you grow out of these things. Be careful. The flesh is sneaky.
and is never your friend That's what let's not take care of anybody. or show meanness to anyone. Verse 15. You shall do no injustice in judgment. You shall not be partial to the poor.
nor honour the person of the mighty. In righteousness you shall judge your neighbour.
Well, injustice is criminal. Playing favorites in the home is an injustice. I'm the youngest in the family. I know my mom loved me more. Then my brothers and sister Because it comes with being the youngest.
It's that tree, right? I never suspected. my parents of loving me more. And whatever punishments my siblings got, they deserved it. I was never made to feel like.
I mean, now they were older and they may have saw things that I didn't, but from my perspective, My parents were always fair. I never felt that I was going to get mistreated. And I think in life I have been fair to people, as fair as I can be. And I would say, well, I learned it.
So, what happens if you live in a home where? There is injustice. The parents play favorites right in front of you. What happens to the other children? How do they grow up perceiving justice?
It's a big responsibility to be a parent. You do it right. Do it as the Scripture says. Do unto others as you'd have them do unto you. Verse 16: You shall not go about as a tale-bearer among your people, nor shall you take a stand against the life of your neighbor.
I am Yahweh.
Well, you can't believe everything you hear, but you can repeat it. That could be bad. I don't gossip, but I'll tell you who does. James 3, verse 5. See how great?
A forest a little fire kindles. And that's what gossip does. It can set something ablaze. Again, Praying for someone that you might feel tempted to gossip about will help you not gossip about them. Nor shall you take a stand against the life of your neighbour, Well, don't be a false witness and don't be negligent if there's something that you see is gonna harm your neighbor.
You do not have the right to look the other way. Maybe you notice a large branch hanging loose over their house. It's time to ring the doorbell. and say you got a big threat. Rather than, boy, this is going to be nasty.
Can't wait to see what happens when that thing hits. Thanks for tuning in to today's edition of Cross-Reference Radio. Pastor Rick Gaston is currently going through the book of Leviticus. We're glad you joined us. We trust that you're gaining some valuable insights into God's Word as we go through this Old Testament book.
Cross-reference radio comes to you from Calvary Chapel, Mechanicsville, in Virginia. If you'd like to subscribe to our podcast, you can do so by going to your favorite app store and downloading from there. For any additional information about this ministry, we invite you to visit our website, crossreference radio.com. Make sure to come back again for the upcoming edition in the book of Leviticus, as Pastor Rick has much more to share. We thank you for being with us right here on Cross Reference Radio.
