Links for today’s readings:
Read: Leviticus 22 Listen: (4:41) Read: Acts 18 Listen: (4:06)
Links for this weekend’s readings:
Read: Leviticus 23 Listen: (6:31) Read: Acts 19 Listen: (5:47)
Read: Leviticus 24 Listen: (2:58) Read: Acts 20 Listen: (5:22)
Scripture Focus: Leviticus 22.17-20
17 The Lord said to Moses, 18 “Speak to Aaron and his sons and to all the Israelites and say to them: ‘If any of you—whether an Israelite or a foreigner residing in Israel—presents a gift for a burnt offering to the Lord, either to fulfill a vow or as a freewill offering, 19 you must present a male without defect from the cattle, sheep or goats in order that it may be accepted on your behalf. 20 Do not bring anything with a defect, because it will not be accepted on your behalf.
Malachi 1.8, 14
8 When you offer blind animals for sacrifice, is that not wrong? When you sacrifice lame or diseased animals, is that not wrong? Try offering them to your governor! Would he be pleased with you? Would he accept you?” says the Lord Almighty.
14 “Cursed is the cheat who has an acceptable male in his flock and vows to give it, but then sacrifices a blemished animal to the Lord. For I am a great king,” says the Lord Almighty, “and my name is to be feared among the nations.
Reflection: Examine Your Sacrifices
By John Tillman
Where does food come from? We know the answer is “farms,” yet the first image in our head is probably a grocery store.
Most people in modern societies, whether we live in cities or the countryside, are socially and geographically disconnected from our food sources. Few have ever grown and harvested our own crops or raised or butchered our own animals. This isn’t bad or good—it’s just different than biblical societies. This agricultural disconnection distances us from some aspects of the sacrificial system.
We might cringe at the perceived cruelty of animal sacrifices but fail to blink at the financial cost. When a family sacrificed an animal they weren’t sacrificing a pet. They sacrificed all the things the animal could give them over its life. They sacrificed the labor the animal could perform, the goods it could be traded for, the offspring it could reproduce, in addition to most of the food it could provide.
Leviticus 22 stressed that animals for sacrifices must be “without defect,” to head off a financial temptation to keep the best animals for breeding, working the land, or market, sacrificing to the Lord less valuable stock. You wouldn’t want to breed the runts, the deformed, or the sickly animals. Yet, God forbids using sacrifices to cull the weak. He demands their best.
Israel struggled with this. Malachi condemned the priests and people of his day. They brought God offerings so deformed and diseased that no human wanted to eat them. (Malachi 1.12-14) God challenged the people to offer food like this to human rulers and endure their reaction.
Just as the Israelites were prone to give to God lame, blind, diseased, or deformed animals, we are prone to give up to God things we didn’t want anyway and keep for ourselves what we find most valuable.
Our salvation is secured by the sacrifice of Jesus the “spotless lamb.” But we are still called to many works of sacrifice. Jesus asks us to take up our cross and lay down our lives. He asks us to feed the hungry, hydrate the thirsty, welcome the stranger, clothe the naked, and visit the sick and the prisoner. (Matthew 25.34-40)
If a human leader had assigned these tasks, would the state of our world indicate acceptable job performance? Are our sacrifices and efforts at these tasks (our orthopraxy) lame, blind, or weak like a diseased lamb?
Examine your sacrifices. Give your best.
Divine Hours Prayer: The Call to Prayer
I cry out to you, O Lord; I say, “You are my refuge, my portion in the land of the living.” — Psalm 142.5
– Divine Hours prayers from The Divine Hours: Prayers for Springtime by Phyllis Tickle.
Read more: Holidays are Tabernacles
At home or in pursuit of a new community, taking periodic days to focus on our relationship with God will help us gain a sense of identity
Read more: Pleasing Sacrifices
We have been called to imitate our self-sacrificing savior, Jesus, by giving of ourselves to do good for the benefit of others.