Tag: New Testament

Unclean!

On By AaronIn UncategorizedLeave a comment

Every firstborn of a donkey you shall redeem with a lamb, or if you will not redeem it you shall break its neck. Every firstborn of man among your sons you shall redeem (Exo 13:13).

Recently I have been reading through Exodus and often I struggle because it is so foreign to our contemporary culture and worldview.  Granted, the Western/Christian world view is a Judeo/Christian worldview but the sacrificial system which was the central and defining element of the Jewish worldview as found in the Old Testament has not been my experienced worldview.  It is often difficult for me to understand. 

“Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!”

John 1:29

The redemption of the firstborn among the sons of Israel by a lamb is familiar to me.  In the Gospel of John, John the Baptist announces “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world (Joh 1:29)!”  Jesus is presented as the Lamb of God and an exploration of that concept leads to The Law as established in the Pentateuch (the first five books of the Bible).  The lamb that is the redemption price is of those animals designated as clean and as such it represents a righteous sacrifice.  A righteousness that an unclean animal could never represent.  The Donkey, an unclean i.e., unrighteous animal, could not redeem itself, it needed to be redeemed through the death of a clean or righteous animal.  What caught me by surprise though is that to declare a Donkey needs to be redeemed because it is unclean is followed by a declaration that the firstborn of Israel needed to be redeemed.  By implication that declaration declares the firstborn of Israel as equivalently unclean.

What follows then is that the declaration of every firstborn of Israel as unclean is symbolic of the fact that everyone in Israel is unclean.  And because Israel is the firstborn of nations (Jer 31:9) that everyone in Israel is unclean is symbolic of the fact that everyone in every nation is unclean.  Moreover, they are unclean in and of themselves not because they have been made unclean by contact with uncleanness.

However, by nature, apart from redemption, mankind is unclean before God.

Hold on a minute A~A~Ron (That’s a reference to a Saturday Night Live skit just in case the translation was lost in the typing.)!  The Law does declare that to touch an unclean animal is to become unclean (Lev 11:24-26) and this implies that the person who touched the unclean animal was clean before the touching.  I would agree that could be implied but I think it would be the wrong implication.  The declaration that touching an unclean animal makes a person unclean follows that portion of Leviticus that designates the sacrifices required to make a person clean.  They were made clean from their uncleanness prior to touching the unclean animal.  However, by nature, apart from redemption, mankind is unclean before God.

Fast forward to the New Testament and Jesus makes the same statement when He says, “Hear me, all of you, and understand: There is nothing outside a person that by going into him can defile him, but the things that come out of a person are what defile him (Mar 7:14-15).”  When His disciples were confused, he had to elaborate, “What comes out of a person is what defiles him.  For from within, out of the heart of man, come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, coveting, wickedness, deceit, sensuality, envy, slander, pride, foolishness.  All these evil things come from within, and they defile a person (Mar 7:20-23).”  This, I think, also sheds some light on that from which we are being redeemed.  We are being redeemed from the judgment required for our evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, coveting, wickedness, deceit, sensuality, envy, slander, pride, and foolishness.  They are all unclean acts that come from an unclean heart.

However, the truth is that this system was only intended to point to Christ.

I think the Israelites had made the wrong assumption; that they by nature were clean and were not made unclean until they encountered uncleanness when in fact, they were unclean because of what was coming out of their own hearts.  Perhaps they thought that the lamb offered at their birth was sufficient for their redemption.  Perhaps they thought that the sacrifices offered after those encounters in which they became unclean would be sufficient.  However, the truth is that this system was only intended to point to Christ.  It could never make a person truly clean (Heb 10:1) because it could not change the heart of man.  If this is true, then the Jew like the Gentile remains unclean, or unrighteous before God.

The good news for us is that the Gentile too has been declared clean.  When Peter was offered in a dream all kinds of animals to eat, he responded, “By no means, Lord; for I have never eaten anything that is common or unclean (Act 10:14).”  Peter was still operating under the assumption that he could be made unclean by eating an unclean animal.  But God rebuked Peter by reminding him that he had declared those animals clean (Act 10:14).  This occurred just before Peter was to meet Cornelius, a Gentile.  God was using this dream to show Peter that Jesus had cleansed not only the Jewish believers but also the Gentile believers.

The need to be cleansed is there and it is universal.  Only the blood of Jesus can cleanse.

To wrap up, all of us by default are unclean.  Not because we were born into uncleanness or because we came into contact with uncleanness.  Our uncleanness is attested to by our own evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, coveting, wickedness, deceit, sensuality, envy, slander, pride, and foolishness.  The need to be cleansed is there and it is universal.  Only the blood of Jesus can cleanse.

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The Perfected Conscience

On By AaronIn UncategorizedLeave a comment

What does it mean to have a perfected conscience?  The writer of Hebrews rights that the Old Covenant is inferior in that the gifts and sacrifices offered under it failed to, “perfect the conscience of the worshiper (Heb 9:9, ESV).”  What does that mean?

The central difference between the Old and New Testaments is that under the New Covenant the blood of Jesus is offered as a sacrifice on behalf of His people.  The Old Covenant, too, required a sacrifice of blood but that sacrifice was insufficient except that it pointed to the the necessity of the sacrifice of Christ.  The writer of Hebrews spends significant amount of time up to this point explaining how the New Covenant is better than the Old and one of his final arguments is that the Old Testament could not perfect the conscience.

Under the Old Covenant, The Law pointed to the guilt of sin.  When an Israelite failed, when he transgressed that law, a sacrifice was required; a sacrifice of blood.  Each time he failed or transgresses another sacrifice was required.  Over and over again the Israelite’s guilt was illustrated as illuminated by the law and specifically as he transgressed against it.  Our consciences are the mechanism or organ that recognizes that guilt; for the Israelite it was recognized specifically within the context of The Law.  When our conscience is functioning properly it is reminding us of our guilt for our own evil deeds and even our own evil desires.

But all the Old Covenant could do is remind of us that guilt.  It could not make the believer innocent and guilt by definition requires a punishment.

What is injustice without justice?  Dare We answer that it is another injustice.  I once watched a video of a sentencing hearing in which a man convicted of raping another man’s daughter was sentenced to a sentence so slight that the father in anguish leapt across a barrier in an attempt to get at the man who had offended against his daughter.  This man’s plea for justice on behalf of his daughter had gone unanswered and I had two thoughts.  First, that the justice which had been refused was in that refusal another injustice.  There was a “rightness” in wanting to see that father reach his intended target and deliver the justice owed.  Second, that the injustice of a failure of justice was directly tied to the love that the father had for his daughter.  Do we realize that in refusing to deal justice for sin God would be committing sin?  He can’t simply wave away our injustice.  And how often do we declare that a good God could not punish that which He loves?  Do we not recognize that not only is His perfect justice at stake but His perfect love if He were to pardon an offense against that which he loves?  When we appeal to God to right an injustice committed against us we are in part appealing to His perfect justice but we are also in part appealing to His love for us.  Why would He answer such an appeal if he was either unjust or didn’t care?

The Old Covenant is limited in that it can only point to our injustices.  Our consciences continually remind us of that guilt until we sear our conscience or deal with the guilt.  The Old Covenant was incapable of dealing with that guilt and so are we.  The power of the New Covenant is that it perfects our consciousness in that it deals with the guilt.  Jesus became the punishment.  When He says that you are forgiven he is not waving away the guilt by simply ignoring it.  He is taking on the punishment that guilt requires.  Justice was delivered on Him for your injustice.  You no longer need to feel the guilt.  Your conscience is perfect before God.

Later in verse 14 of that same chapter in Hebrews we find that the New Covenant not only perfects our conscience it liberates it from dead works.  When we commit an injustice our conscience tells us that we are guilty.  What are we to do?  When we offer any good work, any sacrifice, as payment for that injustice it fails.  It fails because perfection, The Law, requires that we are good all the time.  The good work of today can only pay for itself it can not pay for yesterday’s deed of injustice.  The penalty is still owed.  Every good work that you do is dead and meaningless because none of them remedy the guilt of the offense.  And all are guilty of more than that first offense (Rom 3:23).

However, the offering made to mediate the New Covenant (Heb 9:15) changes that.  It is first sufficient in that Christ’s sacrifice is not needed to atone for Himself.  But He offered it, none the less, as an act of love on your behalf.  He didn’t need to but He did and when you recognize the love that this act demonstrates and signifies you are not simply liberated from pursuing works that can not save but you are liberated to live your life as a response to His love for you.  Your good works do not need to liberate you and they are now free to testify of His love.  You are free to live a life that emulates that love for others.

“Today is the day”

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