Author: Gary

Leviticus 24 teaches us that God is holy, His presence is gives life, His provision is constant, His name is to be honored, and His justice is perfect. Every section of this chapter ultimately points to Jesus Christ and the New Covenant. The continually burning lampstand symbolized God’s presence and His light among the Israelites. The priests were to keep the lamps burning day and night. This reminded Israel that God was always with them. John 8:12 says “I am the light of the world. Anyone who follows me will never walk in the darkness but will have the light of life.” Just as the lamp gave light to the Tabernacle, Jesus is the true Light who reveals God to us and leads us out of spiritual darkness. We are now called to reflect His light before others (Matthew 5:14–16).

The Bread of the Presence reminded Israel that God continually provided for the twelve tribes and desired fellowship with His people. Every Sabbath, fresh bread was placed before the Lord, symbolizing His faithful provision. John 6:35 says “I am the bread of life. No one who comes to me will ever be hungry, and no one who believes in me will ever be thirsty again. Unlike the bread that had to be replaced each week, Jesus gives eternal life to everyone who trusts in Him. Through Jesus we have continual fellowship with God and are spiritually nourished forever.

The scenario about the man who blasphemed God’s name shows the seriousness of sin and the holiness of God. God’s name was not to be treated with contempt because He alone is worthy of honor and worship. Romans 6:23 says “the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. Every one of us has sinned against God and deserves judgment. Even though Jesus Christ was completely innocent and was falsely accused of blasphemy (Matthew 26:63–66). He willingly accepted the punishment that we deserved so that all of us who believes in Him could receive forgiveness and eternal life.

Leviticus 24 ultimately reminds us that God is perfectly holy and that sin cannot exist in His presence. It also reveals His gracious plan of redemption through Jesus Christ. Jesus is the Light of the World (John 8:12), the Bread of Life (John 6:35), the innocent Savior who bore our judgment (2 Corinthians 5:21), and the One who perfectly fulfilled God’s justice and mercy. Because of His death and resurrection, all of us who place our faith in Him are forgiven, brought into God’s presence, and called to walk in His light until He returns. Love y’all! Have a great day!

Leviticus 23 reveals God’s appointed festivals, which were much more than annual celebrations for the nation of Israel. I think that there is no coincidence that there are 7 of them. 7 is the number of completion. They formed a prophetic calendar that pointed to Jesus Christ and God’s complete plan of redemption. Each festival highlighted a different aspect of our Messiah’s work, showing that God had planned salvation through Christ long before His birth.

The weekly Sabbath pointed to the true rest that is found in Jesus. While Israel rested from physical labor one day each week, Christ offers spiritual rest to all of us who trust in Him. We no longer strive to earn God’s favor through our own efforts, but rest in the finished work of what Jesus did for us on the cross.

The Passover foreshadowed Jesus as the perfect Lamb of God. Just as the blood of the Passover lamb protected Israel from God’s judgment in Egypt, the blood of Jesus saves all of us who believe in Him from the penalty of sin. His crucifixion during Passover fulfilled this feast perfectly.

The Feast of Unleavened Bread symbolized holiness by removing leaven. Leaven often represents sin in Scripture. Jesus, the sinless Son of God, was buried during this feast after offering Himself as the perfect sacrifice. Through Him, we are called to leave behind a life of sin and pursue holiness.

The Feast of Firstfruits pointed to Jesus’ resurrection. Just as the first portion of the harvest was offered to God as a guarantee that more was to come, Christ rose from the dead as the “firstfruits” of all who will one day be raised to eternal life. His resurrection guarantees the future resurrection of all of us who belongs to Him.

The Feast of Weeks, or Pentecost, celebrated the harvest fifty days after Firstfruits. Fifty days after Jesus’ resurrection, the Holy Spirit was poured out on His followers, empowering the church to proclaim the gospel. Just as the feast celebrated a physical harvest, Pentecost marked the beginning of a great spiritual harvest as thousands came to faith in Christ.

The Feast of Trumpets looks forward to a future gathering of God’s people. The sounding of the trumpet called Israel to prepare themselves before the Lord, and many Christians understand this feast as pointing to the return of Christ, when the trumpet will sound, believers will be gathered to Him, and His kingdom will be fully established.

The Day of Atonement foreshadowed Jesus as our perfect High Priest and perfect sacrifice. Unlike the high priest who entered the Most Holy Place once each year with the blood of animals, Jesus entered the heavenly sanctuary once for all through His own blood, securing eternal forgiveness for all of us who trust in Him. His sacrifice completely accomplished what the Old Testament sacrifices could only symbolize.

Finally, the Feast of Tabernacles reminded Israel that God faithfully dwelled with and provided for them during their years in the wilderness. It pointed first to Jesus, who came to dwell among His people, and ultimately to the future when God will dwell forever with His redeemed people in the New Heaven and New Earth. What began with temporary shelters will end with God’s eternal presence among all of us who believe in him.

All together, these festivals tell the entire story of the gospel. The first four feasts were fulfilled during Jesus’ first coming through His death, burial, resurrection, and the sending of the Holy Spirit. The final three point forward to His second coming, the completion of His saving work, and God’s eternal kingdom. This chapter demonstrates that from the beginning, God’s redemptive plan centered on Jesus Christ. Every festival served as a shadow of the greater reality that would be fulfilled in Jesus, they reveal God’s faithfulness and it invites all of us to trust in our Savior Jesus Christ. He promised this from the very beginning. Love y’all! Have a great day!

Leviticus 22 focuses on the holiness of both the priests and the sacrifices offered to God. This chapter teaches that God is holy, and anything brought into His presence must be treated with reverence and purity. It also points forward to Jesus Christ, who became the perfect High Priest and the perfect sacrifice for us. God instructed the priests that if they became ceremonially unclean, they could not eat the holy offerings until they were cleansed. This included uncleanness from disease, bodily discharges, touching a dead body, or other ceremonial impurities. It is clear that God’s holiness cannot be approached carelessly. Jesus is the perfect High Priest for us. Unlike the priests of Israel, He was never spiritually or morally unclean. Jesus Christ fulfilled what the earthly priests could never do.

Hebrews 7:26
“For this is the kind of high priest we need: holy, innocent, undefiled, separated from sinners, and exalted above the heavens.”

Because Jesus is perfectly holy, He can bring us into God’s presence forever. This Chapter also shows how only members of a priest’s household could eat the sacred offerings. Outsiders were not permitted because these offerings belonged to God. This taught that fellowship with God came through His appointed covenant. Under the New Covenant, everyone who trusts in Christ becomes part of God’s family and can now sit at the table because we have been made righteous by the blood of Jesus.

Ephesians 2:19
“So then you are no longer foreigners and strangers, but fellow citizens with the saints, and members of God’s household.”

Through Jesus, we are welcomed into God’s family and we now share in His blessings. God required every sacrifice to be, without blemish, healthy, whole, and without defects. They could not be blind, crippled, injured, or diseased. Why was this? It is because God deserves our very best, not our leftovers. The sacrifice represented perfection before a holy God. Jesus fulfilled this perfectly. He lived a completely sinless life and became the flawless sacrifice for our sins.

1 Peter 1:18-19
“…but with the precious blood of Christ, like that of an unblemished and spotless lamb.”

Just as no blemished lamb could be offered, Jesus was completely without sin. God also gave instructions about how to treat sacrificial animals properly. Newborn animals had to remain with their mothers for seven days and thank offerings had to be eaten according to God’s instructions. These commands reminded Israel that worship must follow God’s ways, not human preferences. Jesus completely obeyed the Father. He never offered partial obedience.

Phillipians 2:8
“He humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death—even to death on a cross.”

His perfect obedience is credited as righteousness to everyone who believes in Him. Christ redeemed us from slavery to sin. Now we obey not to earn salvation, but because we have already been saved.

1 Peter 1:15-16
“But as the one who called you is holy, you also are to be holy in all your conduct; for it is written, Be holy, because I am holy.”

We pursue holiness because we belong to Jesus. Jesus has earned our love and respect. Not because he had to, but because he first loved us. Love y’all. Have a great day!

Leviticus 21 focuses on the holiness of the priests. While all of the Israelites were called to be holy, the priests were held to an even higher standard because they represented God before the people and the people before God. This chapter emphasizes that those who serve in God’s presence must reflect His holiness. Today, Christians do not follow these ceremonial priestly laws because Jesus fulfilled them. However, the principles behind them still teach us about God’s holiness and point directly to Christ. God instructed priests not to become ceremonially unclean by touching dead bodies except for their closest family members. The high priest had even stricter requirements. Jesus came to conquer death itself. Although Jesus touched dead people (like Jairus’s daughter and Lazarus), instead of becoming unclean, His holiness brought life to the dead. Under the Old Covenant, death made someone unclean. Under Jesus, His power overcomes death.

The priests were also forbidden from adopting pagan mourning practices or living immoral lives. They were to be examples of holiness because they offered sacrifices to God. The Israelites needed priests whose lives reflected the God they served. Jesus lived a completely sinless life. He perfectly fulfilled the holiness that every priest was supposed to display. Jesus Christ is the perfect High Priest whose life was completely pure. The high priest could not mourn publicly like others, he couldn’t leave the sanctuary, he had stricter marriage requirements, and he was completely devoted to God’s service. This showed that his relationship with God came before everything else. Jesus is now our eternal High Priest. Everything about His life was devoted to doing His Father’s will. He never abandoned His mission, even when it led Him to the cross. The hardest part to understand about this chapter is what it has to say about the priests in Aaron’s family who had defects. God says that a priest with certain physical defects could still eat the holy food, belong to the priesthood, and live among God’s people. However, he could not perform the sacrificial duties. This was not because God loved him less or viewed him as spiritually inferior. Rather, the sacrifices pointed to perfection. Since the sacrifices symbolized God’s perfect holiness, those who performed them also had to outwardly reflect that perfection. The emphasis was on the symbolism of the office, not the value of the individual. Jesus is the only truly perfect Priest. Every Old Testament priest had limitations, Jesus has none. He is morally perfect, spiritually perfect, and eternally perfect. The physical perfection required of priests foreshadowed the complete perfection found only in Christ. As Jesus Christ fulfilled these symbols, believers are no longer accepted by God because of outward perfection, but because we are clothed in Christ’s righteousness through faith. Love y’all! Have a great day!

Leviticus 20 reveals our need for a Savior. This chapter repeatedly shows that sin deserves death and judgment. Jesus came to fulfill what this chapter foreshadows. Jesus took the judgement that we deserve. Many sins in Leviticus 20 carried the death penalty because God’s holiness cannot overlook sin. Romans 6:23 explains that the wages of sin is death, every person has sinned, and Jesus willingly took our punishment on the cross instead of us bearing God’s judgment. Jesus bore it for all of us who trust in Him. Jesus makes us holy and righteous in the eyes of the Father. Leviticus repeatedly commands to “Be holy.” The problem is that none of us can achieve perfect holiness by our own effort. From the second we were born we were sinful. Jesus solves this problem by forgiving our sins, giving us His righteousness, and sanctifying us through the Holy Spirit. Jesus not only forgives us, but also transforms us to become more like Him. Jesus is the perfect sacrifice. Under the Old Covenant, continual sacrifices reminded the Israelites that sin required death. Jesus became the once and for all sacrifice. His death completely satisfied God’s justice, so no further sacrifices are needed. Although this is true, Jesus still calls us to live holy lives. As Christians, we are not under the civil penalties of Israel’s covenant law, the moral principles remain. The New Testament repeatedly calls for us to flee sexual immorality, worship God alone avoid idolatry, reject occult practices, honor our parents, and live lives different from the world. The blessing is that we now obey out of love and gratitude for Jesus Christ. We are empowered by his gift of the Holy Spirit and we don’t have to earn salvation. We are now a part of God’s chosen people. Just as Israel was set apart among the nations in their day, we are now called to be different in our character and our conduct. Through faith in Jesus we belong to God, we are called to reflect His holiness, and our lives should point others to Christ. Love y’all! Have a great day!

Leviticus 19 teaches that God’s people are called to be holy because God is holy. It helps anytime you see the word “holy” to change it to “set apart.” That is what it means to be oly. Being holy means to be set apart from the sinful world that we live in. This chapter explains that holiness is not just about religious practices but about how we live every day. Honoring God, respecting others, caring for the poor, being honest, acting justly, and loving our neighbors. We do these things not to be saved but because we are saved. The central message of this chapter is found in Leviticus 19:18: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” This chapter points to Jesus because He perfectly lived out God’s standard of holiness. Jesus never sinned and He fulfilled every requirement of God’s law. Jesus also taught that the greatest commandments are to love God and love your neighbor, making Leviticus 19 a foundation for His teaching. Through His death and resurrection, Jesus provides the righteousness we could never achieve on our own and gives believers the Holy Spirit to help them live holy lives. Lives that are set apart. Leviticus 19 shows us what God’s character is like, and Jesus is the perfect example and fulfillment of that holiness, love, justice, and compassion. God calls us to reflect His holy character, and Jesus both fulfilled that standard perfectly and empowers us to live it out through the New Covenant. Love y’all! Have a great day!

“We love because he first loved us.”
1 John 4:19

“Dear friends, if God loved us in this way, we also must love one another.”
1 John 4:11

“If anyone says, ‘I love God,’ and yet hates his brother or sister, he is a liar.”
1 John 4:20

Leviticus 18 reveals an important truth that runs throughout Scripture: God cares not only about outward actions but also about the purity of His people. Holiness was not merely about avoiding certain behaviors; it was about reflecting God’s character in every area of life. This chapter shows us that sin is serious because it damages individuals, families, communities, and our relationship with God. This chapter points directly to Jesus Christ. The standards God set in Leviticus 18 reveal His perfect righteousness, but they also expose our inability to meet that standard. All of us have sinned and fallen short of God’s holiness. Where Israel failed and where we fail, Jesus succeeded. He lived a completely sinless life and perfectly fulfilled God’s law. He embodied the holiness that Leviticus calls for. Leviticus 18 also shows our need for a Savior. The law reveals sin, but it cannot remove it. Jesus came to do what the law could not do. Through His death on the cross, He took upon Himself the punishment for our sin and impurity. Through His resurrection, He offers forgiveness, cleansing, and new life to all who trust in Him. The defilement that separated people from God can now be washed away by the blood of Christ. Under the New Covenant, we as Christians are no longer under the ceremonial laws of Israel, but the moral principles behind Leviticus 18 still reflect God’s design for human relationships and sexual purity. Jesus affirmed God’s design for marriage and called His followers to purity not only in their actions but also in their hearts. Through the Holy Spirit, we as believers are empowered to live in a way that honors God. Love y’all! Have a great day!