044 Friday, February 13, 2009

044 Leviticus 21 – 23; Hebrews 10.19 – 10.39
Here are some words you don't here at a conference on parenting, "If a priest's daughter defiles herself in prostitution, she disgraces her father. She must be burned at the stake." Now that is tough love. I only point this out to take you into the times of Christ and how He treated the sinners. The Pharisees could not understand that if He claims to be God then He should hang with us because we are not like them. “Them” being the ones who should be burned at the stake or stoned to death. Perhaps if we had been the Pharisees we would have been a little confused ourselves.

I hope you are picking up the words "without defect" which seems to appear in every other sentence. God is holy, therefore God is without defect and those offering the sacrifices and the sacrifice itself should be without defect. This is why Jesus walked a fine line of being tempted and yet without sin. Jesus had to be without defect in order to pay for sins. Also remember that if the sacrifice had a defect then it would bring less in the market place so offer it to God and make money on the bull, goat, or lamb that is without blemish.

This all begs the question, are you, am I without blemish, spot, or some defects? The answer is of course we are defective, we are sinners. In the book of Hebrews these words remind us of the great gift Christ has given to us when we read, "So friends, we can now--without hesitation--walk right up to God, into '"the Holy place."' Jesus has cleared the way by the blood of his sacrifice, acting as our priest before God."

How good is our God? Praise Him this day with all your heart and sing a new song, any excuse for a song to God.