Week 15 Friday
Leviticus deals with the discomfort of physical uncleanness, David looks back over a long life of God's faithfulness in Psalm 71, and Paul takes the lead as the gospel spreads through Antioch.
Leviticus 12
📖 What are we reading?: A difficult passage for us in today's terms, dealing with the ceremonial uncleanness that followed childbirth.
✞ What does this passage say about God? As one IVP commentary puts it, none of this uncleanness was a matter of sin or moral blame - blood was life, and its loss in any form was a rupture of normal health, making a person temporarily unfit for sanctuary worship. God is concerned with wholeness, not with shaming His people.
🛐 How does this passage teach us to live? We can read these ancient categories without fear or confusion, remembering that Christ has done away with them, and thanking Him that we now come to God through faith rather than ritual cleanness.
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➡️ The bigger picture: Leviticus was given to Moses shortly after the tabernacle was completed, around 1400 BC, and no other book in the Bible contains as much direct speech from God. Its theme is holiness and separation, though a careful reader will find Jesus in the details of these ancient rituals.
Psalm 71
📖 What are we reading?: An older man looks back over a long life, full of praise and worship for God's faithfulness to him.
✞ What does this passage say about God? He remains our rock and refuge, for He is faithful across a whole lifetime, worth trusting from youth to old age.
🛐 How does this passage teach us to live? Do you relate to verse 20, where the psalmist admits to "troubles, many and bitter"? Then pay attention to verses 21-24 too, where hope and praise have the final word.
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➡️ The bigger picture: The Psalms is a collection of 150 poems and songs, written by David and others, expressing the full range of human emotion in response to God and to life.
Acts 13:13-52
📖 What are we reading?: Paul and his companions arrive in Pisidian Antioch, where Paul preaches powerfully in the synagogue - and though the Jews receive them well at first, jealousy soon rises up when many Gentiles believe.
✞ What does this passage say about God? Verses 38-39 sum up the gospel beautifully - through Christ, everyone who believes is set free from every sin the law could never free us from.
🛐 How does this passage teach us to live? Notice that from this point on, it is Paul who takes the lead over Barnabas. Whatever we feel about being first or second in ministry, the disciples' great joy at what God was doing mattered far more to them than who got the credit.
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📝 More thoughts on Barnabas, seen here stepping back for others to lead.
➡️ The bigger picture: Luke's second book outlines the ministry of the early church - though it could just as well be called the Acts of the Holy Spirit, as He guides and grows Jesus' small movement into something that changes the world.
A Prayer for the Day
🙏 Lord, thank You that You care for our wholeness, not our shame; that You remain faithful to us across a whole lifetime; and that through Christ we are set free from every sin the law could never free us from. Teach us, like Barnabas, to rejoice in what You are doing even when someone else takes the lead. Amen.
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