Day 55

Leviticus 15:1–16:28; Mark 7:1-23; Psalm 40:11-17; Proverbs 10:13-14

WE HAVE LEARNED that there was much more to the Mosaic law than behavior modification. The law also had spiritual implications and cues, so that the culture itself was a living reminder of who God was and that He had chosen the children of Israel to be holy and set apart to Him. This wasn’t because God had nothing else to do; it was because He wanted the covenantal relationship they shared to be embedded into their every thought, word, and deed.

In Mark’s Gospel today, we had another chance to see how the spiritual implications of the law had been lost. The law had become a means of control, rather than an entrance into relationship.

“Why don’t your disciples follow our age-old tradition?” the religious leaders demanded of Jesus. “They eat without first performing the hand-washing ceremony” (Mark 7:5).

Exasperated, Jesus responded by quoting the prophet Isaiah: “These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. Their worship is a farce, for they teach man-made ideas as commands from God” (Mark 7:6-7; Isaiah 29:13). He went on to tell them that they were ignoring the authentic law of God by substituting their own traditions.

As we read Leviticus, we can certainly see many rituals, customs, and behaviors that were to be obeyed, and we’ve been learning to look beneath the surface to understand that everything has a spiritual implication. By Jesus’ time, the law had more to do with ritual obedience than the life-giving reminder of who God was and who people were in relation to Him. The irony is that Jesus came to reintegrate the physical and spiritual, in part by unmasking the misuse of the law, and the religious leaders became Jesus’ mortal enemies because of it.

Lest we think that customs from three and a half millennia ago, mixed with interpretations of those customs from two thousand years ago, have no bearing on today, we must again look closer. Are we trying to be servants of God because of the repercussions if we don’t? Or are we social believers who in the privacy of our own hearts have no relationship with God? This is what had happened to the world in Jesus’ time, and these questions are no less important today. God wants to set us apart so that we can be in the divine dance of life together with Him. Obedience isn’t about ritual enslavement; it’s about the persistent reminder in all things that He is near and is leading us on the narrow path that leads to life.

PRAYER:

May all who search for you be filled with joy and gladness in you. May those who love your salvation repeatedly shout, “The LORD is great!”