Leviticus 20:7-8 - Homilies By W. Clarkson

Sanctity-demand, inducement, promise.

Once "again" ( Leviticus 20:2 ) Moses utters the Divine will in this great matter of holiness (see Le Leviticus 11:44 ; Leviticus 19:2 ). We have—

I. GOD 'S IMPERATIVE DEMAND OF SANCTITY . "Sanctify yourselves." "Ye shall keep my statutes, and do them." The Creator of the universe, the Author of our being, the Father and Sustainer of our spirits, has sovereign right to speak to us in such decisive tones. He demands of us that we shall be "holy," i.e.,

(2) that we shall approach him, honour him, and pay him the tribute he asks of us, and also act righteously and blamelessly toward our fellows, "keeping his statutes and doing them."

II. THE HIGH INDUCEMENT HE PRESENTS TO US . "Be ye holy: for I am the Lord your God." We may gird ourselves to good and great things, animated by different motives; of these some may be higher, others lower. God summons us to be holy for the highest reason of all, viz. because we shall thus resemble him. "Be ye holy; for I am holy" ( 1 Peter 1:16 ). Other reasons abound: holiness

III. HIS PROMISED HELP . "I am the Lord which sanctify you." The action of God upon our souls has been treated, both by the foolish and by the wicked, as a reason for human impassiveness. Foolish men have said, "God is working for us and in us, therefore it would be irreverent for us to attempt to do anything; we should only interfere." Wicked men have said, "God works for us, therefore we may safely live in comfortable unconcern and guilt while we wait his time of deliverance." The "children of wisdom" have said, "God is ready to work with us, there[ore let us strive with all our energies, for, with his help, we shall not strive in vain." This is the apostle's argument: "Work out your own salvation,… for it is God which worketh in you," etc. ( Philippians 2:12 , Philippians 2:13 ). All our endeavours might be unavailing; we might contend against the strong current of sin and be baffled and borne along its stream, but if God himself is sanctifying us, we shall prevail. Let us go forth unto the struggle, for we shall assuredly succeed. God sanctifies us in such wise that he acts with us while he acts in us and for us. He sanctifies us by

Leviticus 20:9 (latter clause)

The unforgiven.

"His blood shall be upon him;" "their blood shall be upon them" ( Leviticus 20:13 , Leviticus 20:16 , Leviticus 20:27 ). These words have a deeper significance than a mere repetition of the sentence, "He shall be put to death." They signify this: his sin cannot be forgiven him. It was the blood of the animal that "made atonement for the soul" ( Leviticus 17:11 ). It was the shed blood, therefore, that was associated, in thought, with the penalty due to sin. And when the legislator said.

"His Mood shall be upon him," he meant his penalty shall rest upon him—it shall not be borne and taken away by the blood of the substituted victim. In other words, "He shall bear his iniquity," or the penalty of his iniquity, himself (see Le Leviticus 7:18 ). There have always been, and there will always be, in the world "the unforgiven;" men, like Cain, who bear about them the brand of an unpardonable offense; sons and daughters who have erred and have not been taken back into parental love; criminals that have lost the place in society which they have no hope of regaining; forlorn wretches that have so sinned against their conscience that they cannot forgive themselves, and have abandoned themselves to a terrible despair. But what of the Divine forgiveness or refusal to forgive? We are taught—

I. THAT PROVISION WAS MADE IN THE LAW FOR THE PARDON OF MANY OFFENSES . This was the end of all the sin and trespass offerings, and on the Day of Atonement "all the iniquities of the children of Israel, and all their transgressions" were "borne away" into the uninhabited land, into the wilderness of oblivion ( Leviticus 16:21 , Leviticus 16:22 ).

II. THAT UNDER THE LAW THERE WERE OFFENSES WHICH COULD NOT BE THUS ATONED , AND WERE NOT FORGIVEN . Those who wrought shameful acts of idolatry or immorality could bring no oblation to the altar; they could look for no mercy; no blood of atonement was availing; their "blood was upon them ;" they died before the Lord.

III. THAT , UNDER THE GOSPEL , MERCY IS OFFERED FOR THE WORST TRANSGRESSORS IF THERE BE PENITENCE AND FAITH . The one "unpardonable sin" ( Mark 3:29 ) is either

IV. THAT MANY SOULS , THOUGH WALKING IN THE LIGHT OF THE GOSPEL , ARE CONTENT TO RANK AMONG THE UNFORGIVEN . In the light, in the full sunshine of privilege and opportunity, there are thousands of men who do not find, because they will not seek, the mercy and the friendship of God. They live unforgiven; "their blood is upon them." They go through life

V. THAT THE IMPENITENT PASS INTO THE FUTURE WITH UNFORGIVEN SIN UPON THEIR SOUL . How terrible to pass beyond the line which bounds the period of probation with our "blood upon us;" to pass on

Go, in the day of grace, to the "Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world," through whom there is "remission of sins" ( Luke 24:47 ).—C.

Leviticus 20:23 (latter part)

God's displeasure with ourselves.

"They committed all these things, and therefore I abhorred them." This expression arrests us by—

I. ITS SOMEWHAT STARTLING STRENGTH . "I abhorred them." Does God positively abhor man? the Creator his creature? the Father his child? Are we to understand that the Lord, who is "gracious and full of compassion, slow to anger, and plenteous in mercy," feels an actual abhorrence of those beings to whom he is so nearly and intimately related, those human spirits he formed for himself, to reflect his own image and to enjoy his own immortal blessedness? The word startles us; it may well alarm us; it suggests the question, Is it possible that we also may become such that our God may be compelled to look on us with a displeasure which amounts to abhorrence? We look at—

II. THE SAD AND SOLID TRUTH WHICH IT CONTAINS . "God hates the sin and loves the sinner," we say, and truly. Yet this sentence does not cover the whole truth of the case. God does pity the sinner, and seeks to save him. But he is displeased with him also. Of anything like malignity or ill will we rejoice to know that the holy and gracious One is absolutely incapable; but we are bound to believe that he feels a sacred and holy resentment against those who violate the laws of righteousness.

1 . Scripture plainly affirms that he does. "Therefore I abhorred them;" "God is angry with the wicked every day" ( Psalms 7:11 ); "the Lord hath been sore displeased with your fathers" ( Zechariah 1:2 ); "they vexed his Holy Spirit" ( Isaiah 63:10 ); "he looked on them with anger" ( Mark 3:5 ); to "them that obey unrighteousness" God will render "indignation and wrath" ( Romans 2:8 ).

2 . It is impossible wholly to separate the act from the agent. An act has no moral qualities at all apart from the disposition and character of him who does it. If our indignation is aroused by any shameful deed, it is because some one has wrought that which is wrong, and our feeling must extend to the perpetrator as well as to the crime. In theory it must do so; in fact it does so. We cannot see our own children doing that which is guilty without being displeased with them as well as excited with indignation against the wrong they have done. Our feelings of holy anger, indignation, righteous grief, etc; may not be precisely, identical with those which are in the heart of God when he looks down on the sins of his human children, but they answer to them; they correspond with them; they enable us to understand how he, our Divine Father, feels toward us when we do those things which are offensive and grievous in his sight. Let us lay it well to heart that by

These our sins are drawing down upon our own souls the awful anger; the high displeasure, of that Almighty God in whom we live, who has ourselves and our future in his right hand of power, whom it is our chief duty, and should be our first desire, to conciliate and please. We glance at—

III. THE WELCOME TRUTH WITH WHICH IT IS CONSISTENT . While God bates sin and is divinely displeased with the sinner, he yet pities the sinner and seeks to save him. He condemns, but he invites. "Is Ephraim my dear son?… since I spake against him, I do earnestly remember him still" ( Jeremiah 31:20 ). As a human father over his lost son or erring daughter, only with immeasurably deeper love, he yearns over his wayward children, and goes out to welcome them home, when, returning to themselves, they return unto him ( Luke 15:11-24 ).—C.