Presented to Swift Current Corps of The Salvation Army, 20 May 2012.
By Captain Michael Ramsay
Has anyone read Leviticus recently? Rebecca, Sarah-Grace and I have been reading Leviticus together as part of our evening Bible time. Parts of it remind me of a traditional fairy tale. Leviticus, in content, is like a Grimm’s fairytale in that it can be a little bit bloody: It speaks in great detail, among other things, about the sacrifices that people are to offer and the different animals that are killed for those sacrifices. Sometimes the priests will even put the sacrificed animal’s blood on their own ears or toes and sometimes a live bird is dipped in the blood of a sacrificed bird and then let go (Leviticus 8:23-24, 14:6, 14-28, 51-52). Leviticus, in content, in some ways is like a Grimm’s fairytale.
Leviticus, in style, is some ways is like a contemporary children’s book: it can be quite repetitive. Almost every chapter of the 27 chapters in this book begin with the phrase “The Lord said to Moses, (Chapters 6, 8, 14, 16, 17, 21, 22, 25; cf. Leviticus 1:1)” or “The Lord said to Moses, ‘Say to the Israelites…’ (Chapters 4, 12, 15, 18, 19, 20)” or for a change sometimes it says, “The Lord spoke to Moses and Aaron” (Chapters 11, 13, 15; cf. also Leviticus 18:1; 19:1; 20:1; 21:1, 16; 22:1, 17, 26; 23:1, 9, 23, 26, 33, 24:1, 13; 25:1; 27:1)
One evening Sarah-Grace, Rebecca and I were discussing how, in Leviticus, everyone was supposed to take one day off work a week to worship the Lord – the Sabbath day – except for the Levites, the priests and their families (Leviticus 16:31-32; 19:3,30; 23:3-38): they still had to work on the Sabbath and they didn’t get Monday off in lieu of Saturday as their own personal Sabbath. My girls weren’t so fond of clerical families not getting an extra day of rest; so one night just after Bible time and just before bed time, they presented me with this ‘ancient scroll’ they found, here in Swift Current, written in blue pen ink on lined foolscap paper; this is what it said:
“Then Moses was told to tell Aaron this: “If a female relative of the priest works it is very, very bad!!!!! If the girl is twenty or below [and sins by working] she must watch the priest shave two doves and then sell them. If no one buys them the priest must pay his wife the amount the doves were worth and then cage them and keep them. The girl who sinned by working must set free the doves from captivity after 17 days. Twenty-one and up must shave the birds themselves but the priest must do the selling and just as before if no one buys them the priest must keep them and pay his wife. Then after only seven days the women who worked must set free the shaved birds. After [this] the priest must quit his job and he will be out away from his people. His family may come with him if they choose but they don’t have to. The only way a woman can work is if it’s for learning but if the work is cleaning up or housework, this process must not be done.
To this I replied that we are not priests; we are Salvation Army Officers and as such we believe in the priesthood of all believers, so they still get the privilege of working – especially cleaning up and housework. It was a nice attempt though.
Leviticus is part of the Pentateuch. It tells us the many laws and rituals that the ancient Israelites needed to follow. The Pentateuch teaches us about the Law, Sabbaths, tithing... Tithing has come up a bit this week in various conversations so I have a little quiz for us today generally relating to tithing (answers below):[1]
1) What is a tithe?
2) Who can tell me where in the New Testament it tells us to give God 10% of our money?
3) How much of our income belongs to the Lord?
Pertaining to questions 1&2: Tithing is spoken about a few times in the Pentateuch (Leviticus 27:30-32. Numbers 18:21-28, Deuteronomy 12:6- 17, Deuteronomy 14:22-28, Deuteronomy 26:1,12). But outside of the Pentateuch, accepting 2 Chronicles 31, tithing is only mentioned in the prophets (2 Chronicles 31:5-12, Nehemiah 10:37-38, 12:44, 13:5-12, Amos 4:4, Malachi 3:8, 3:10.). Tithing is an ancient Israelite custom. It is neither a New Testament custom nor an early Christian tradition: God doesn’t just want a tithe; everything is His, God wants more than just 10%; He wants 100%. (Matthew 19:20-21, Mark 10:21-24, Luke 18:22, Acts 2:42-47, cf. Romans 14:1-23, Hebrews 4:1-13).[2] I was going to speak more directly on tithing this week but in the end I thought we would address Question 3 from our test today and look at an Old Testament passage that reflects the eternal principles of financial management instead. Ancient Israelites were herdsmen and farmers. Their primary source of income was the land.[3] Today, we are looking at Leviticus 25:23b where the God, foreshadowing Jesus’ New Testament teachings, says, “the land is Mine and you are but aliens [strangers] and My tenants.”
Leviticus 25: “there are three subdivisions to this section: the sabbatical year, the Jubilee, and the laws of indebtedness. The basis of the land laws God gave to Israel is God’s statement that ‘the land is Mine’”(v.23).[4] How many people here either farm or have farmed or grew up on the farm or had parents who grew up on the farm? Try and relate this passage that we are looking at today to your experiences and knowledge.
Verses 1-7 record God’s command to farmers that for six years they are to farm: planting and reaping and also gathering fruit off their trees. In the seventh year they are not allowed to plant anything in their fields and they aren’t allowed to prune a single tree. You aren’t allowed to reap anything for profit.[5] In year seven the combines aren’t going all day and night. Even if they had combines, they wouldn’t be going at all. The only harvesting that you are allowed to do is to get enough food for yourself, your employees, your animals, and the poor people in town (cf. Exodus 23:11). Nothing else. Now you also have to remember that – as a backdrop to this commandment – throughout the history of ancient Israel, most of the time the people were on the verge of starvation. There were no supermarkets. E.I. wasn’t as difficult to get as it is becoming in Canada today because there was no E.I. and on top of this, every seventh year there was nothing that was to go to market at all. No farmer was allowed to sell anything. The only food that was to be grown was for subsistence.[6]
Why would God do this? Especially given that historically speaking, Israel was always on the verge of starvation; as Israel was always on the verge of starvation, why in every seventh year would God forbid them from selling, harvesting, or even planting any food?[7] One reason is to remind us that God says -Leviticus 25:23b- “the land is Mine and you are but aliens [strangers] and My tenants.” The Land is not ours, it belongs to God and God wants us to trust Him to provide for us.[8]
Today, sometimes I think we need this kind of reminder. Today, I think that sometimes we get so caught up in our affluent North American lifestyle that we forget that our wealth, our income, our food, our homes, the land and everything in it is not ours. It is God’s. Has anyone here ever rented any land or rented any land out? This is what God is doing with ancient Israel in Palestine. It’s His land. He is simply renting it out to Israel just like He rented it out to the previous tenants, the Amorites (Genesis 15:12-16). Part of the rent that Israel owes God is to let God’s land rest every seventh year and for Israel to just eat what they can glean. The Israelites are simply His tenants and when they don’t take care of God’s land the way He asks them to take care of His land; when they don’t pay this rent, the scriptures tells us -Leviticus 26:33-35- that God will evict Israel from the land and the prophet Jeremiah confirms that indeed He did evict them, just like He evicted their predecessors (Genesis 15:12-16). 2 Chronicles 36:20-21 records: “He carried into exile to Babylon the remnant…The land enjoyed its Sabbath rests; all the time of its desolation it rested, … in fulfilment of the word of the LORD spoken by Jeremiah”
God, as His rent, wants Israel to trust Him. He wants us to trust Him. Everything in creation belongs to God. In Leviticus 25:25-55, it records that the Israelites are to trust God and that they are not to sell God’s land because it is not theirs to sell. It records that they are not to sell each other into slavery because even they do not belong to themselves; they belong to the Lord. If people do wind up selling themselves or their land, in the fiftieth year the people and the land is to return. The land is to return to the family that God personally chose through sacred lot to manage His land for Him (Number 26:55, 33:54, 34:13, 36:2; Joshua 18, 19:2). In that regard, any sale of property was to be more like a term rental agreement. For an ancient Israelite to sell his property would be like if you were a tenant farmer and/or renting a house in town and then when the owner was out of the province, you decided to try to sell his house. You can’t do that.
Now we remember what we were saying about Verses 1-7 and the Sabbatical year. There is even more to this and in Leviticus 25:23b the Lord reminds us that “the land is Mine and you are but aliens [strangers] and My tenants.” Verses 8-22 remind us that you are not to plant or harvest anything in the 7th year and that you are to trust God to provide for you but one is also not allowed to plant or harvest anything in the 14th, 21st, 28th, 35th, 42nd, or 49th year, … and it also records that in every 50th year you are not supposed to plant or harvest anything because it is the year of Jubilee.[9] God says this is our rent to Him. We are just tenants and if we don’t trust Him enough to pay the rent, He’ll kick us off the land and give it to someone else. In verse 20-22 is recorded
“You may ask, “What will we eat in the seventh year if we do not plant or harvest our crops?” I will send you such a blessing in the sixth year that the land will yield enough for three years. While you plant during the eighth year, you will eat from the old crop and will continue to eat from it until the harvest of the ninth year comes in.”
This is the key to it. They need to trust God. We need to trust God. Leviticus 25:23b: the Lord says, “the land is Mine and you are but aliens [strangers] and My tenants.” Everything belongs to God. We are not paying Him out of our abundance; He is providing for us out of His abundance. Do you see the difference?
I saw a comic once. I think it was a Family Circus comic. A child was looking at a bill in the restaurant and asked, “Daddy, why do you give the waiter 15% but you only give God 10%?”
Do we ever do that treat God as if He is our waiter – just tipping Him the 10% minimum that we think we can get away with, or even less in some cases, instead of recognizing Him as our God. God is not our waiter, hoping that we will give Him a 10% tip from our money. God is our landlord demanding His rent and more than that He is our employer expecting us to do our job that we have already been paid to do and more than that He is our father who loves us and as such everything we think we own –like the ancient Israelites and their land – is really His. We are really just managing all that we have and all that we are for God and if we do not do our job as manager, He might just relieve us of our duties like He did with Israel, leading them off to captivity in Babylon (Cf. Luke 19:11-26; Matthew 25:14-30; cf. also TSA doc. 9).
Everything in this world belongs to God. Look outside: that land is not ours; that land belongs to God; we are just looking after it. Look at this building; it is not ours; it belongs to God; we are just looking after it. Think of your job; it is not yours; it belongs to God; you should be doing it as if you are doing it for Him (Colossians 3:23). Think of your home; it is not yours; it belongs to God; you are just looking after it, managing it for him. Think of even your beautiful wife or your intelligent husband: your marriages also do not belong just to you, they belong to God; you are just looking after them. Everything in this world belongs to God. We are just managers, we are just stewards of it. Leviticus 25:23b: God says, “the land is Mine and you are but aliens [strangers] and My tenants.” Everything belongs to God. This is why in the Old Testament people were asked to let the land lie fallow every 7th and 50th year and this is why they were asked to not work on every 7th day. This is why we are asked to love God and to love our neighbours as ourselves (Luke 10:27, cf. Leviticus 19:18, Deuteronomy 6:5, Matthew 5:43). Because, as God reminds us “the land is Mine and you are but aliens [strangers] and My tenants.”
Everything belongs to God. Reading from Luke 18:18-23:
A certain ruler asked him, “Good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?”
“Why do you call me good?” Jesus answered. “No one is good—except God alone. You know the commandments: ‘Do not commit adultery, do not murder, do not steal, do not give false testimony, honour your father and mother.’”
“All these I have kept since I was a boy,” he said.
When Jesus heard this, he said to him, “You still lack one thing. Sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.”
When he heard this, he became very sad, because he was a man of great wealth.
God says, “the land is Mine and you are but aliens [strangers] and My tenants.” Don’t just tip God a ten percent gratuity for the life He provides you like it is some meal at a restaurant that you paid for. He paid the price, not you. Give God 100% control of your money; Give God 100% control of your time and give God 100% control of your talents. He deserves nothing less.
Luke 12:22-34:
Then Jesus said to his disciples: “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat; or about your body, what you will wear. Life is more than food, and the body more than clothes. Consider the ravens: They do not sow or reap, they have no storeroom or barn; yet God feeds them. And how much more valuable you are than birds! Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life? Since you cannot do this very little thing, why do you worry about the rest?
“Consider how the lilies grow. They do not labour or spin. Yet I tell you, not even Solomon in all his splendour was dressed like one of these. If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today, and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, how much more will he clothe you, you of little faith! And do not set your heart on what you will eat or drink; do not worry about it. For the pagan world runs after all such things, and your Father knows that you need them But seek his kingdom, and these things will be given to you as well.
“Do not be afraid, little flock, for your Father has been pleased to give you the kingdom. Sell your possessions and give to the poor. Provide purses for yourselves that will not wear out, a treasure in heaven that will not be exhausted, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
In summary, the land is God’s and we are but aliens [strangers] and His tenants; so let us not get tricked into merely tipping God. Don’t only give Him 10% of your finances; don’t only give Him 10% of your time; don’t only give Him 10% of your talents; don’t only give Him 10% of your life. Give God 100% of your life. He wants it all.
Let us pray.
---
[1] 1) The first 10% of your income, see Leviticus 27:30-32. Numbers 18:21-28, Deuteronomy 12:6- 17, Deuteronomy 14:22-28, Deuteronomy 26:1,12, 2 Chronicles 31:5-12, Nehemiah 10:37-38, 12:44, 13:5-12, Amos 4:4, Malachi 3:8, 3:10; 2) It doesn’t 3) All of it, see Matthew 19:20-21, Mark 10:21-24, Luke 18:22, Acts 2:42-47.
[2] Cf. Captain Michael Ramsay, “How much of my income belongs to God?” Nipawin Journal. (May, 2009). Available online: http://renewnetwork.blogspot.ca/2009_05_01_archive.html#1627607693776242163
[3] F. Ross Kinsler, “Leviticus 25.” Interpretation 53, no. 4 (October 1, 1999): 395-399. ATLASerials, Religion Collection, EBSCOhost (accessed May 18, 2012). P. 396
[4] R. Laird Harris, The Expositor's Bible Commentary, Pradis CD-ROM:Leviticus/Exposition of Leviticus/IX. Laws of Land Use (25:1-55), Book Version: 4.0.2
[5] R. Laird Harris, The Expositor's Bible Commentary, Pradis CD-ROM:Leviticus/Exposition of Leviticus/IX. Laws of Land Use (25:1-55)/A. The Sabbatical Year (25:1-7), Book Version: 4.0.2
[6] Cf. R. K. Harrison, Leviticus: An Introduction and Commentary. Downers Grove, IL : InterVarsity Press, 1980 (Tyndale Old Testament Commentaries 3), S. 226
[7] Cf. F Ross Kinsler, “Leviticus 25.” Interpretation 53, no. 4 (October 1, 1999): 395-399. ATLASerials, Religion Collection, EBSCOhost (accessed May 18, 2012). P. 396.
[8] Cf. Michael Ramsay, Leviticus 25 1-23 in the Context of the Holiness Code: The Land Shall Observe a Sabbath, presented to William and Catherine Booth College (Fall 2006). Available on-line: http://www.sheepspeak.com./OT_Michael_Ramsay.htm#Leviticus 25 1-23
[9] Cf. John E. Hartley, “Leviticus,” in Word Bible Commentary, Volume 4, eds. David A. Hubbard and Glenn W. Barker. (Dallas Texas: Word Books, 1992), 422
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