Leviticus 5.14 - 6.7, Psalm 60
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READ Leviticus 5.14-6.7 Psalm 60 ESV
Verses chosen for devotion : Leviticus 5.14-15
14 The Lord spoke to Moses, saying, 15 “If anyone commits a breach of faith and sins unintentionally in any of the holy things of the Lord, he shall bring to the Lord as his compensation, a ram without blemish out of the flock, valued in silver shekels, according to the shekel of the sanctuary, for a guilt offering.
REFLECT
The passage contains the law of guilt offerings and as we would have read there were sacrifices that needed to be brought to the Lord before the priest could make atonement for someone who sinned against the Lord. The person who committed the breach must also make restitution in full plus one-fifth more. Lev 5:14-15 wrote that if anyone who sinned against God UNINTENTIONALLY he shall bring a ram to the Lord as compensation for guilt offering. Hence even if a person commits a breach of faith without knowing it he is guilty too! That is a very tall order isn’t it?! There is a Chinese saying that goes “those who unintentionally offend are not guilty”. Not so true in this case as we read in this passage. But if we think about it, God is Holy and if we are sinful and unclean, it doesn’t change anything whether the sinful act we committed was intentional or unintentional. A sin is a sin. We can’t expect God to lower His standard of holiness to match ours. Hence the ritual of sacrifice and atonement is necessary for the Israelites to obtain the forgiveness from God even for acts committed unintentionally.
RELATE
Very often we act in breach of faith against God, unknowingly or even in full knowledge of the consequences. We thank God for His mercy to send Jesus as our unblemished sacrifice once and for all so we do not have to go through what the Israelites did in the OT. We are of sinful nature and there is always the strong tendency to act according to the flesh. But we have to be mindful - “For if we go on sinning deliberately after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins,” Hebrews 10:26. Acknowledging that our flesh is weak we need to repent (1 John 1:9) and strive to live the way God wanted us to. We do not want to repeatedly go back to the old sinful ways after we have sought God’s forgiveness and repentance (read 2 Peter 2:20-22).
REST
Heavenly Father, forgive us for we are sinful. Help us walk in Your light as this pleases You. In Jesus name we pray, Amen.
Alan Wong
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