Fear No Fear

(All scripture from the World English Bible, ebible.org, all rights reserved)

“Yahweh spoke to Moses, saying, “Speak to Aaron, and to his sons, and to all the children of Israel, and say to them, ‘Whoever is of the house of Israel, or of the foreigners in Israel, who offers his offering, whether it is any of their vows or any of their free will offerings, which they offer to Yahweh for a burnt offering: that you may be accepted, you shall offer a male without defect, of the bulls, of the sheep, or of the goats. But you shall not offer whatever has a defect, for it shall not be acceptable for you. Whoever offers a sacrifice of peace offerings to Yahweh to accomplish a vow, or for a free will offering of the herd or of the flock, it shall be perfect to be accepted. It shall have no defect. You shall not offer what is blind, is injured, is maimed, has a wart, is festering, or has a running sore to Yahweh, nor make an offering by fire of them on the altar to Yahweh. Either a bull or a lamb that has any deformity or lacking in his parts, that you may offer for a free will offering; but for a vow it shall not be accepted. You must not offer to Yahweh that which has its testicles bruised, crushed, broken, or cut. You must not do this in your land. You must not offer any of these as the bread of your God from the hand of a foreigner, because their corruption is in them. There is a defect in them. They shall not be accepted for you.’”
(Leviticus 22:17-25)

“See how great a love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God! For this cause the world doesn’t know us, because it didn’t know him. Beloved, now we are children of God. It is not yet revealed what we will be; but we know that when he is revealed, we will be like him, for we will see him just as he is. Everyone who has this hope set on him purifies himself, even as he is pure. Everyone who sins also commits lawlessness. Sin is lawlessness. You know that he was revealed to take away our sins, and no sin is in him. Whoever remains in him doesn’t sin. Whoever sins hasn’t seen him and doesn’t know him.“
(1 John 3:1-6)

Sacrifices aren’t a sacrifice if you’re giving Grade B material. To acknowledge the Lord and His Holiness, He deserved the best. He didn’t do that so that they wasted their best. He did it so that they realised holiness was an effort. It couldn’t be fudged. It took the best of the best of the best. Even the slightest thing would mar it. Even the smallest blemish would make it unacceptable. In addition to that, many of these sacrifices were the basis of the food for the priests and their families. The Lord was ensuring that He provided them with the best. Holiness isn’t about what will fit. Holiness is about the VERY best.

We are not under a system of ‘rules’. We’re not going to be cut off or thrown out if we misstep. But God is HOLY and to be like Him we also should strive to be Holy. This isn’t so that we will GET something. It is so we can be close to the One we love because HE is holy. The more we have a relationship with Him, the more we will WANT to be holy. Our very nature has been changed. We are NOT sinners. We do NOT have a sin nature. Our default setting isn’t selfishness and wrongdoing. We are holy because we are in Jesus and HE is holy. Our nature is Jesus’ nature. In order to sin, we have to CHOOSE it. We have to force ourselves to sin – and sadly, we will. But that sin mars the perfection of who we spiritually are. It isn’t evidence of how bad we are. And it won’t sit right with us. It will bother us. It will chafe us. We will NOT be content or happy until we have restored our relationship with God, our closeness to Him, our HOLINESS. Because THAT is our nature. THAT is our default setting. THAT is who we are in Jesus.

Summary

The small things matter as much as the large things. Our nature has been changed in Jesus, by Jesus, and through Jesus. We have become more than what we were and that is precious to us. The more we love Jesus and the more we know of the love Jesus has for us, the more natural it will be to reject sin. To avoid sin. To strife with everything we are to kick evil from our path. To embrace who we are in Jesus because that’s who and what we want to be like. We love Him and we want to be like Him. THAT is our nature. THAT is who we are in Jesus. THAT is who a child of God is.