Thoughts on Leviticus 7 & 2 Thessalonians 1

Today’s reading: Leviticus 7; 2 Thessalonians 1-2

Thoughts on Leviticus 7

This isn’t a huge or practical observation for us today, but I do think it is important for us if we are going to put ourselves in the mind of an ancient Israelite as we read through the Scriptures.

I mentioned yesterday that, having never personally participated in any temple or tabernacle sacrifices, I tend to see it as a pretty hands-off experience for everyone except the priests. I need to make a sacrifice, so I pull up to the tabernacle drive-thru, let the priest know what my offering is for, hand it over, and drive off cleansed. But this is not the picture we are given.

Take a look at the second to last paragraph of Leviticus 7 (sorry, the Bible I like to read doesn’t have verse numbers in it so I don’t have a reference for you…):

The Lord spoke to Moses, saying, “Speak to the people of Israel, saying, Whoever offers the sacrifice of his peace offerings to the Lord shall bring his offering to the Lord from the sacrifice of his peace offerings. His own hands shall bring the Lord’s food offerings. He shall bring the fat with the breast, that the breast may be waved as a wave offering before the Lord. The priest shall burn the fat on the altar, but the breast shall be for Aaron and his sons. And the right thigh you shall give to the priest as a contribution from the sacrifice of your peace offerings.

Notice here that whoever brings the peace offering, “His own hands shall bring… the fat with the breast.” This isn’t the offerer dropping it off to the priest and the priest doing all the work. The offerer brings it to the priest, they remove the fat and the breast, then the offerer himself will carry the fat and the breast to the altar in order to present it to the Lord, and it is only there, in front of the altar, that he hands it over to the priest and the priest is the one who burns the fat on the altar.

Notice too that the whole offering isn’t burned up. The fat is burned, the breast and right thigh are given to the priest (as payment for their services), and the rest was for the offerer and anyone ritually clean who was going to eat with him. The only stipulation was that, because it had been offered to the Lord, it was made holy, so you had 2 days to eat it, after which you had to burn anything that was left over. You can’t just throw it out because it was offered to the Lord.

All this to say though, that the non-priestly Israelite had much more of a role in the offerings they brought to the Lord than I tend to given them credit for.

Thoughts on 2 Thessalonians 1

2 Thes. 1 puts me in mind of a question the pastor asked at our church on Sunday morning. He asked, “If all Jesus ever did for you was die for your sins, would that be enough?”

His point was that we tend to want more from Him than just the promise of eternal life in the presence of God Himself as our adoptive Father. If we are going to follow Jesus, we want Him to fix things up for us in this life too. We want Him to answer our prayers for that new house, that new job, healing from that sickness, a baby in the midst of infertility, etc. We want Him to give us the “good life” we envision for ourselves.

Jesus does promise us joy, but it is joy in the midst of suffering that he promises. He does promise that His yoke is easy and His burden is light, but it is still a yoke and a burden, and they are His yoke and burden, not the ones we choose. Ultimately, Jesus tells us that if we want to be His disciples we have to pick up our cross (an instrument of torture and execution) daily and follow Him, and He tells us that, if we follow Him, the world will be against us because it was against Him first.

We want the first half of all that without the second half. We want the joy without the suffering. We want the easy and light without the yoke and burden. We want to call ourselves disciples and followers of Jesus without having to touch the cross or be hated by the world because of Him.

But Paul’s encouragement to the Thessalonians brings us back to reality in all this:

This is evidence of the righteous judgment of God, that you may be considered worthy of the kingdom of God, for which you are also suffering— since indeed God considers it just to repay with affliction those who afflict you, and to grant relief to you who are afflicted as well as to us, when the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven with his mighty angels in flaming fire, inflicting vengeance on those who do not know God and on those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. They will suffer the punishment of eternal destruction, away from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his might, when he comes on that day to be glorified in his saints, and to be marveled at among all who have believed, because our testimony to you was believed.

Look what Paul tells them. He tells them that God does care about their suffering and that He will repay those who are causing that suffering, but when is that repayment coming? On the day when the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven…

God is good. He is righteous and just and He will not leave the wicked unpunished, but His is not the timeline we tend to be looking for. We aren’t looking to be relieved of our suffering in heaven, we want it now. We aren’t looking for the wicked and evil of this world to be judged and punished later, we want it to happen immediately so that it stops our suffering immediately. But none of this is what God has promised us, and in fact, Jesus made explicitly clear during His ministry and before He ascended to the Father that this is how it would go.

If you are following Jesus for an easy life, you’ve hitched your wagon to the wrong horse. Jesus doesn’t offer us an easy life, but He does offer us a significant and meaningful life. Jesus doesn’t offer us a life devoid of suffering, but He does offer us a life of steadfastness and joy in the midst of whatever storm life may throw our way. But if we are going to experience the fullness of the life that He has for us on this side of heaven, we have to begin to let go of the life we are seeking and let Him lead us in the life He desires for us.