The first 17 chapters have been all to do with sacrifices and rituals to deal with

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1 Dealing with sin and sinners (Leviticus 18) 29 th November Today is our last look at the OT book of Leviticus And as we have seen all the way through this wonderful book It s another challenging chapter The first 17 chapters have been all to do with sacrifices and rituals to deal with sin in people s lives and how the priests and the people become holy before God through these sacrifices and rituals From chapter 18 onwards we move from ritual matters - to ethical or moral matters if you like we move from matters to do with holiness inside God s sanctuary - to matters of holiness outside God s sanctuary And this chapter chapter 18 - deals with a very difficult and painful subject Matters of unlawful sexual behaviour So please open your Bibles at Leviticus chapter 18 There s an outline in the bulletin to take some notes if that helps you Let me pray first Intro Rudyard Kipling (the guy who wrote Jungle Book) said this about families: [Powerpoint 1 Kipling quote] All of us [in our family] are we and everyone else is they Kipling s point is that a family is supposed to share things like: hopes, dreams, possessions, memories, smiles, frowns and gladness. Page 1 of 12

2 A family is supposed to be held together with the glue of love and the cement of 2 mutual respect. A family is supposed to be the shelter from the storm, a friendly port when the waves of life become too wild. After all no person is ever alone who is a member of a family - right? That s the theory of family at any rate Unfortunately, it s not the reality In my role as a SRE teacher, I deal with about 150 kids per week between the ages of 6 and 12 And a lot of the kids I come across each week don t come from a family held together by the glue of love and the cement of mutual respect. They are from broken homes some who don t see their mum others who don t see their Dad and others who see neither Mum nor Dad some who have foster parents and some who may have 2 Dads - or 2 Mums! Many families in our society today - are broken or fractured! Why? Well primarily as a result of wrong choices that are against God s rules and lead to consequences like the breakdown of the family structure! This chapter of Leviticus chapter 18 lays down rules for sexual behaviour which if not followed would lead to a breakdown of the family unit Unlawful sexual behaviour is not the only reason for the breakdown of the family structure but it s mentioned here in Leviticus 18 to protect the family unit! Page 2 of 12

3 3 General Rule In the World but not of the World In verses 1 to 6 of Leviticus chapter 18 God gives a general rule to the ancient Israelites [Powerpoint 2 General Rule] Don t do what they do in Egypt where you used to live and don t do what they do in Canaan where you re going to live Don t follow their practices but follow God s! In other words don t bring the practices of the surrounding nations into your lives What are these practices that the surrounding nations are doing that God wants the people to keep away from V6 tells us in summary form: [Powerpoint 3 Summary rule] No one is to approach any close relative to have sexual relations. Why does God give this rule? Well - because as He says in v2, v4, v5 and v6 (and later on in v21 and v30) I am the Lord Basically - because He s God and this is not acceptable behaviour And because the practices that are listed from verses 7 to 23 expose families to terrible pain and suffering and the consequences of these practices - ripple through the family unit - for years and years Page 3 of 12

4 4 God doesn t want family relationships to be like that so He gives rules to protect the family What that means for us is today in simple terms is that we must not love or conform to what the outside world says and does - but love our Father in Heaven and love what He loves. The apostle John puts in this way in 1 John 2:15-16: [Powerpoint 4 1 John 2:15-16] 15 Do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, love for the Father is not in them. 16 For everything in the world the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life comes not from the Father but from the world. Basically God wants us in the world but not of the world! The Rules for Sexual Relations and the Punishment In verses 7 to 20 of Leviticus chapter 18 there are a whole bunch of rules I m not going to go through them all Some people will find it painful and don t want to add to that pain you see that s part of the problem as I said earlier that breaking these rules causes lasting, long-term pain for families [Powerpoint 5 Chart] Page 4 of 12

5 5 But to summarize the rules this diagram shows a person in the middle labelled You and all those people listed around You - are off-limits as far as having sexual relationships As well as these rules In v21 the Ancient Israelites are told not to make child sacrifices to the false god Molek as the surrounding nations of Ammon and Phoenicia did And v22 makes it clear that same sex relationships are not acceptable to God either [Powerpoint 6 same sex diagram] Page 5 of 12

6 6 And v23 outlaws sexual relationships with animals too! So there we have a summary of the rules What about the punishment for breaking these rules? Well God gives the punishment in verses 24 to 30 God explains that the nations He is removing to let the ancient Israelites into the Promised Land broke these rules and they became unclean/defiled and so did the land and He says His punishment was to vomit them out of the land they were kicked out. And He says to the ancient Israelites if you break the rules you will become defiled and unclean and you are going to get vomited out of this land too and you will be cut off from your people (v29) God s punishment for breaking these rules is very serious indeed Page 6 of 12

7 Dealing with Sin 7 As we sit here today in 2015 some may argue - and in fact some do argue that these rules on sexual behaviour only applied to the ancient Israelites who were coming out of a corrupt nation like Egypt and were faced with entering a land occupied by another corrupt nation - Canaan. And some will argue that Jesus got rid of all this He s full of love and grace and mercy and He wants us to be happy! So do these rules on sexual behaviour still apply today or not? Are they really sin? Well in our NT from 1 Cor 6 the apostle Paul identifies a whole bunch of sinful behaviour including the stuff we re talking about in Leviticus chapter 18 and he says these bunch of sins if they continue to be practiced and if they are not repented of they will exclude people from the Kingdom of God Here s what he says in 1 Cor 6:9-10: [Powerpoint 7 1 Cor 6] 9 Or do you not know that wrongdoers will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor men who have sex with men 10 nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. So the Apostle Paul is arguing that all these sins (not just the ones in Leviticus 18) separate us from God and exclude us from His kingdom So the rules of Leviticus 18 still apply in the NT and still apply to us today Page 7 of 12

8 But it s worth noting - how Jesus deals with sin and how He distinguishes 8 between the sin itself - and the sinner committing the sin And we have a great insight into this in our other NT passage from John chapter 8 so please turn to John chapter 8 in your Bible In this chapter we come across a woman who has broken one of these specific sexual rules and she has been caught in the act of adultery sleeping with a man who is someone else s husband According to the OT law in Lev 20:20 and Deut 22:22 the punishment for her offence was to be stoned! What does Jesus do about the woman s sin? [Powerpoint 8 How Jesus deals with Sin] Does He get rid of the rule? No her adultery is still a sin! But He challenges the people accusing her to take a good look at themselves! And see what sin there is - in their lives! You see Jesus actually raises the bar He s saying all sin is sin He doesn t categorize - or grade sin He s saying whether we think our sin is a small sin or a big sin sin is sin! And all sin separates us from God! Dealing with the Sinner And look how Jesus deals with the sinner in this passage from John Page 8 of 12

9 It s interesting that before Jesus even deals with the woman 9 He points out that the accusers are sinners too! He s basically saying before you start pointing out this woman s sin have you looked at the sin in your life? See v7 Let anyone of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her Then He turns his attention to the woman [Powerpoint 9 How does Jesus deal with the sinner?] And yes he shows compassion And yes he doesn t condemn her But note he doesn t do what today s society does and treat the perpetrator of the offence as a VICTIM or say to the person whatever makes you HAPPY is okay - to think - or to say - or to do! No He tells the woman in v11 Then neither do I condemn you go and leave your sinful life Literally leave your sinful life means go and sin no more (nuketi = no more, no longer, henceforth, from now on!) Rather than condemning Jesus offers compassion, love and grace He loves the sinner but not the sin He wants the sinning to stop sin no more sin no longer don t sin from now on [Powerpoint 10 stopping sinning] Page 9 of 12

10 How will the sinning stop? 10 Well sin will stop - by an encounter with Jesus What happens when we encounter Jesus? Well Paul tells us in 1 Cor 6 v11 after listing all those sins that keep people out of the kingdom of God he says: 11 And that is what some of you were. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God. So friends, our encounter with Jesus means: We are washed washed clean of our sin by the blood of Jesus on the cross We are sanctified a posh word for being made holy by the ongoing work of Jesus and the Holy Spirit in our lives We are justified in other words found not guilty of our sin because Jesus took the guilt, the blame and the punishment And this is all done for us - in the name of Jesus and by the Spirit of our God! Application Yes the specific sins mentioned in Lev 18 have serious consequences as they do today and they wreck families But Jesus is bigger than all of that Page 10 of 12

11 He hates the sin and loves the sinner 11 However - he does expect a change of behaviour as he did with the woman So let s finish up then with 4 applications from today s Bible passages [Powerpoint 11-Application 1] 1) Is there someone we know (even ourselves) with an habitual sin even like one of the sins described in Lev 18 how will we deal with such a person will we deal with it like Jesus love the sinner not the sin [Powerpoint 12-Application 2] 2) Is there someone we know who needs to have that encounter with Jesus how can we help make that encounter happen? [Powerpoint 13-Application 3] 3) Can we see ourselves in the Pharisees and the teachers of the law with rocks in our hands ready to chuck those rocks at someone? If so we need to ask ourselves what would Jesus have us do? [Powerpoint 14-Application 4] 4) And did you notice verse 9 of John 8, - that the older accusers of the woman - went away first and gave up their condemnation and accusations against the woman these wiser heads realized that they have sin in their life too which equally disobeys and disappoints God whereas perhaps the younger hot heads would be more idealistic and judgmental Page 11 of 12

12 Which category do we fall into the wiser heads who are aware of 12 their own sin in their lives or the judgmental hot heads A challenging passage today Friends well worth us all praying on those 4 applications and thanking God for Jesus our Lord and Saviour Let s pray Page 12 of 12