Leviticus- Let’s Go!

“Leviticus is my favorite book of the Bible.”

Said no one ever.

I know that “all Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness,” (2 Timothy 3:16) but let’s be honest- we all have our favorite books and for most of us Leviticus just isn’t one of them.  However, we’re choosing to take up the challenge to study Leviticus as we read through the Bible one chapter a day with Good Morning Girls and I know that God really will use it to help “train us in righteousness”.

This week we began by reading Leviticus chapters 1-5 which give instructions for worship and sacrifice.

Sacrifices were an important part of the relationship between God and his people but they are so foreign to us.  Our ideas of modern worship and even intimacy in a relationship with God are so different that I find it somewhat hard to relate much to these verses but there are some lessons that God can teach us here.

Jesus Christ was the ultimate sacrifice and made it possible for us to have an intimate relationship with God without the need to sacrifice animals.  But we can still worship God by offering sacrifice to him in the form of offering our money, things or time to him and the work of his kingdom.

I was most struck by the description of the grain offerings in chapter 2.  Having been a Christian for a few years now I’m familiar with the Old Testament practice of sacrifice offerings of animals but I had never given too much thought to the grain offering.  Verses 4-10 speak of a type of grain offering that I had never noticed before- one that is baked.

Now to me personally the idea of sacrificing your first fruits (things) seems difficult because you are giving something up but to me it seems even more difficult to sacrifice something that you put work into (like baking a grain offering).

And I think the baked grain offering speaks to me the most because it’s the one that feels like the biggest sacrifice to me.  Sometimes God calls us to sacrifice something that we have put work into and that’s hard for me because it’s personal.  Before becoming a stay at home mom I was a teacher and I was once told that I took my job too personally but honestly, I don’t know how to work any other way.

When I’m in, I’m all in… heart and soul.  Work is very personal to me and so to sacrifice something that I worked on is difficult because it feels like I’m letting go of part of myself.  While it will never be easy, I know that God is faithful.  He will use that sacrifice to help others, to open me up to something new in my life, to bring glory to himself, to draw me closer in relationship to him, and/or most certainly to further the kingdom in some way.

 

Anyone out there love Leviticus?  I’d love to hear your thoughts on the book if you have any.

Please feel free to join in studying Leviticus with us.  Next week we will be reading chapters 6-10.  Courtney over at Women Living Well has some great resources to help in your study.