Leviticus 19
McGeeCHAPTER 19THEME: Man’s relationship to God; man’s relationship to the poor; man’s relationship to his neighbour; man’s relationships in different life situationsWe are in that section of the book where the Ten Commandments are explained in terms of the social life of the nation. I can’t think of anything more practical than this particular section. God’s law is to tell us this one thing: “…Ye shall be holy: for I the LORD your God am holy” (Lev_19:2). This was fundamental and basic to all facets of the life of Israel. It explained everything which God commanded or demanded. It entered into the web and woof of their daily routine.
Holiness in daily life with all of its relationships was paramount in the everyday living of God’s people. That is something that needs to be reemphasized today, by the way. This is not just theory. God intended it to be brought right into our lives. The law cannot produce the holiness which it demands. It demanded, but it did not supply. It revealed the righteousness of the law, but the high level which it demanded could not be attained by human effort. “Now we know that what things soever the law saith, it saith to them who are under the law: that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God. Therefore by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in his sight: for by the law is the knowledge of sin” (Rom_3:19-20). How wonderful it is that God has given us His Holy Spirit to indwell us. This is the dynamic that is needed for Christian living. The reason given in this chapter, “I am the LORD your God” or “I am the LORD” occurs sixteen times in this chapter. God draws the line between right and wrong. He alone makes the sharp distinction between the holy and unholy. No other reason needs to be given.
Leviticus 19:1
MAN’S RELATIONSHIP TO GODGod gives these instructions to Moses the lawgiver, and they amplify a portion of the Ten Commandments. God exacts holy conduct on the basis that He is holy. It is well to note that God still enjoins the same conduct today. “Whether therefore ye eat, or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God” (1Co_10:31). “Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new” (2Co_5:17). “Wherefore gird up the loins of your mind, be sober, and hope to the end for the grace that is to be brought unto you at the revelation of Jesus Christ; as obedient children, not fashioning yourselves according to the former lusts in your ignorance: but as he which hath called you is holy, so be ye holy in all manner of conversation; because it is written, Be ye holy; for I am holy” (1Pe_1:13-16). The major difference between the conduct required under law and under grace is that today the dynamic is supplied to the believer in the person of the Holy Spirit. We are joined to the living Christ. Old things have passed away. We are no longer joined to Adam, and we are no longer joined to a legal system. We are joined to Christ and we are to seek to please Him. You see, under the Law they tried to keep the commandments by their own effort.
They were to learn that the flesh will always fail. In contrast to this, we have the Spirit of God in us. “For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh: That the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit” (Rom_8:3-4). “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance: against such there is no law” (Gal_5:22-23). The Law never went as far as this. The Son of God wants to bring us up to a high plane. Now, in emphasizing certain of the commandments they were to keep, God will emphasize those particular areas in which they were weak. The history of Israel will show us that God understood their weak points. They were instructed about the Sabbath, the avoidance of idolatry, the bringing of proper offerings to God. These are areas in which they later broke down. God is asking them to be holy in their daily life.
Leviticus 19:3
One might think it is strange that God should begin with the commandment to honor father and mother. But it is not so strange when we consider that the parent stands in the place of God for the child and that the child learns to obey God by first obeying the parent. When you are going to get down to the nitty-gritty, you must begin at home. Then He adds, “And keep my sabbaths.” God demanded one-seventh of man’s time as well as one-tenth of his possessions. These two commandments mentioned first encompass the two major divisions of the Ten Commandments. There is duty to man and duty to God. The Lord Jesus Christ summed it all up as love to God and love to man. He said this is the sum total of the law (Mat_22:36-40). The Sabbath law does not rest upon a moral basis but was an arbitrary command of God given to Israel. Israel, in apostasy and decline, sinned at this point. They refused to observe the sabbaths. “Saying, When will the new moon be gone, that we may sell corn? and the sabbath, that we may set forth wheat, making the ephah small, and the shekel great, and falsifying the balances by deceit?” (Amo_8:5). This was God’s charge and case against the nation.
Leviticus 19:4
This covers the first two commandments. The thought here is not even to cast a glance at idolatry. Heathen worship appealed to the eye with its pomp and ceremony. It still does. Look at the pageantry and meaningless rituals that you see in religion today. It is “eye service.” They were not to look on idols and they were not to make idols. God ridicules the idols because they are nothing and can do nothing.
Leviticus 19:5
There is nothing new added here. However, we should point out again that the peace offering was to be made voluntarily. Even though it was a voluntary offering, the offerer was not relieved from following scrupulously the rules that were prescribed. Any deviation from the prescribed order penalized the man as an example to the people. I find today that there are those in Christian service who seem to think they can take special liberties that no one else can take. Or some people think that because they have given a large contribution to the church they should have special privileges and special attention. Notice that the peace offering was given voluntarily, but the detail had to be followed through meticulously. We must all come to God on God’s terms. Any deviation from the prescribed order penalized the man as an example to the people. This was a positive law, not a moral law.
Because of that, there was the more danger of failure. How many people today make a pledge to the church and then feel that they don’t need to go through with it if they don’t wish to. God says, “If you are going to do it voluntarily, then do it right.” I had to go out to a television station to make a tape to be aired locally. They were taping a very popular program and so I stayed to watch. I was so impressed by the dedication of the people who were putting it on that I stayed a long time to watch and someone might ask me why I did that. Well, I’ve been among Christians so long that it did me good to get among people who were dedicated. Of course I understand why they are dedicatedthey are dedicated to greed. They were being paid a handsome sum to do that show, but I’ll tell you, they gave it everything they had. Too many Christians excuse what they are doing by saying it is just volunteer work. God may say, “If you are going to do it, then do it right when you come to Me.” Don’t volunteer to do God’s work unless you are going to give it everything you have. I’m of the opinion there will be a lot of Christians judged someday because of their laziness. Some folk glory in the fact they took a job. “Look, I taught a Sunday school class.” My friend, how many times were you late? How many times did you fail to prepare the lesson? I tell you, the crowd in the television show knew their parts.
But I see Sunday school teachers flipping through the quarterly, trying to find something to say. I think God is going to judge us on that someday. He tells us not to come to Him with a voluntary offering unless we come the right way.
Leviticus 19:9
MAN’S RELATIONSHIP TO THE POORThis was God’s marvelous provision for the poor. God did not put anyone on charity. He never let anyone sit down and do nothing and receive a welfare check. The poor were taken care of by being given the opportunity to work. This was a marvelous balance between heartless capitalism and godless socialism. Whatever a farmer did not reap his first time around must be left for the poor.
The ancient method of harvesting by hand left 10 percent to 20 percent of the grain in the field. The same law applied to their vineyards. I was at a meeting in Turlock, California, and a man told me to go out to the vineyard and help myself to the grapes because he knew how I loved grapes. It was after the harvest and the pickers were all gone. I could have filled a truck with grapes if I had had one there. That night at the meeting I told the folk that I had been out gleaning.
That is the way God took care of His people. His method of dealing with poverty enabled both rich and poor to acknowledge the good hand of God.
Leviticus 19:11
MAN’S RELATIONSHIP TO HIS NEIGHBORThis restates the eighth and ninth commandments. “Thou shalt not steal. Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour” (Exo_20:15-16). Stealing, defrauding, lying, and perjury are all included here. To deal falsely is a form of stealing according to God’s definition. The third commandment is included in verse Lev_19:12. God’s name is holy. In business God’s man is to demonstrate the holiness of God’s name by his honest and true business dealings.
Leviticus 19:13
We are to pay any man working for us. May I say to you, I think God would be on the side of labor. My dad was a working man and I remember him in overalls more than any other way. He built cotton gins in Texas and many times, I found out, he was beaten financially. Listen to James: “Go to now, ye rich men, weep and howl for your miseries that shall come upon you. Your riches are corrupted, and your garments are moth-eaten” (Jas_5:1-2). Verse Jas_5:6 of the same chapter goes on to say, “Ye have condemned and killed the just; and he doth not resist you.” Godless labor is a terrible thing and so is godless capitalism. Right now I think we are in real danger from the latter.
Leviticus 19:14
A blind man told me how he was cheated by a salesman who came to him. May I say to you, these terrible things are still done today. God put a double emphasis on His name in consideration of the deaf and blind. It is God’s concern for the weak, helpless, and infirm, and it is His rebuke against the hardheartedness of man.
Leviticus 19:15
Here is a word for the judge sitting on the bench, and how our judges need this word today! The judge on the bench is to understand that he is to judge as God judges. I wish some of them would remember that they are in that position, not because some politician put them there, but because they represent Almighty God. And they are to judge impartially. Shakespeare wrote in King Henry VIII: “Heaven is above all yet; there sits a judge that no king can corrupt.” Socrates said, “Four things belong to a judge, to hear courteously, to answer wisely, to consider soberly, and to decide impartially.”
Leviticus 19:16
Talebearing is slander. It is best to remain silent if to tell the truth will ruin a neighbor. Sir Walter Scott wrote, “Low breathed talkers, minion lispers cutting honest throats by whispers.” Someone else has said, “You cannot believe everything you hear, but you can repeat it.” James has a great deal to say about this, and I wrote a little booklet on his epistle called Tongues on Fire. Do you know what tongues on fire is? It is the little tongue that is in your mouth. It is an awful thing. It is the most dangerous thing in the world, more dangerous than an atom bomb. “Stand against the blood” means to murder. Hatred is not put on a par with murder, but it is forbidden. Our Lord linked them together and said that if you hate, you are a murderer (Mat_5:21-22). The answer to all these negative prohibitions is found in the positive, “But thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.” Paul summed up all this for the Christian: “Brethren, if a man be overtaken in a fault, ye which are spiritual, restore such an one in the spirit of meekness; considering thyself, lest thou also be tempted” (Gal_6:1).
Leviticus 19:19
MAN’S RELATIONSHIPS IN DIFFERENT LIFE SITUATIONSDo you know what happens when you wash such a garment? God is teaching them great spiritual truths with symbols and ceremonies. They were not to have hybrid animals and plants. This was to teach them that there is to be no mingling of truth and error. This is brought out by our Lord’s parable of the wheat and the tares (Matt. 13). Paul says, “Ye cannot drink the cup of the Lord, and the cup of devils: Ye cannot be partakers of the Lord’s table, and of the table of devils” (1Co_10:21). Christ said, “…Ye cannot serve God and mammon” (Luk_16:13).
Leviticus 19:20
This goes back to the seventh commandment. This protects the bond-woman. This raises the natural question, “Is God lending approval to slavery?” No. God is recognizing the sinful situation caused by the hard hearts of men, just as He did in the case of divorce (Mat_19:8). It was recognized as a sin on the part of the man, for he had to bring a trespass offering. The woman did not bring an offering.
Leviticus 19:23
This law seems strange to those of us who are not dendrologists. We are told, however, that young fruit trees will grow faster and yield better fruit if the buds are nipped off (circumcised) the first few years. The Lord knew that. The spiritual lesson was that the first fruits belong to God. And it taught that “Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights …” (Jas_1:17).
Leviticus 19:26
There are six commandments here that condemn the practices and superstitions of the heathen. They were not to eat flesh with the blood in it. They were not to trim their hair and leave little tufts of it. They were not to act like the heathen when a loved one dies.
Leviticus 19:29
This is a condemnation of a heathen practice which prevails to this day among some people. I have read that men in this country go through college with the money their wives earn as harlots. How terrible!
Leviticus 19:30
The Sabbath was a sign of the relationship between God and the children of Israel, and it was to be observed strictly. This is brought out in detail in Exo_31:13-17.
Leviticus 19:31
This is one of the many warnings against spiritism and demonism. The supernatural and satanic character of this practice is recognized in the Scriptures and rejected.
Leviticus 19:32
Respect is to be shown old age. This also is repeated in the Scriptures.
Leviticus 19:33
The stranger among them was to be treated kindly and was to be loved. He was a reminder to them that they were strangers in Egypt. The stranger was a neighbor.
Leviticus 19:35
Business transactions were to be honest. Measures and weights were to be honest. God’s children are to be different from others because they represent God even in their business dealings.
Leviticus 19:37
God is the Lord. That is reason enough for obedience to what He commands. Can you think of anything to add to that?