For I am the Lord your God. You shall therefore consecrate yourselves, and you shall be holy; for I am holy…..For I am the Lord who brings you up out of the land of Egypt, to be your God. You shall therefore be holy, for I am holy. (Leviticus 11:44-45)
There is an urgent need for a standard, a measuring stick by which we can distinguish between good and evil.
Modern philosophies erroneously tell us that there is really nothing harmful, and that it is only our perverted thinking which makes things wrong, and that if we could change our thinking then everything would be all right.
The Bible tells us that we are living in a world where truth and error are intricately mixed and one cannot easily tell the difference.
In Leviticus 11, you have dietary laws distinguishing clean animals from unclean, and various sanitary practices are included as well. Many of these practices have a common-sense basis in staying healthy. God kept his people physically whole through many of these regulations.
The word holy essentially means whole. He wants us to be whole and to fulfill our humanity. It is not the religious activities you go through that God is really interested in. He is after the expression of his character in the midst of where you are.
In this verse we see the first of fifty times the phrase, “I am the Lord your God,” is used in the Old Testament. It was because the Lord was their God that they were to be different, that they were to be separate and holy.
On the cross, Jesus exchanged His life for ours. And the result of Him living in us is a new heart, a heart separated to Him. We find ourselves desiring to be holy and to do the right thing because He is in us.
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