Journeying through Leviticus with sisters in faith… has me thinking about clean and unclean… law and love… because ALL God’s law… reduces to two things… Love God… Love others…
“Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?” And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.”
Matthew 22:36-40 ESV
The Levitical law lists all sorts of things as unclean… birthing babies… menstruation… coming in contact with blood… diseases… so many things we have no control over… or cannot avoid if we are to offer compassion… mercy… as the heart of the law commands…
Lost in thought… intently working with my hands… the idea manifested…
Some things are actually worth getting dirty for…
Others… loving others… this is well worth the mess…
When we stoop down into the mess and pain of others… we get dirty… just like Jesus…
He came wholly innocent… clean… into the world…
Straight from heaven… He stooped low… into this unclean… dirty… messy… sin-full… chaos…
Along the way… He took the pain… dis-ease… discomfort… of others on Himself… leaving behind… clean… healed… whole… persons…
He did it all without any fear of becoming unclean… in touching the leper… the bloody… the rebellious…
He never hesitated… to show mercy…
On the cross… the Innocent… Sinless… Son of God… took into Himself… all the uncleanness… all the sin… all the rebellion… all the atrocities… of the human race for all time…
He bore the guilt wholly… because we are… wholly unable… to bear it ourselves…
Through His death… the Sinless… got dirty… for the sin-full… then He was resurrected… perfected… and found to be… Holy… Holy… Holy…
Those who have faith in what He’s done… trust in His work of salvation… can also be holy… redeemed… restored… clean…
Yes… some things are worth getting dirty for…
“A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and he fell among robbers, who stripped him and beat him and departed, leaving him half dead. Now by chance a priest was going down that road, and when he saw him he passed by on the other side. So likewise a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. But a Samaritan, as he journeyed, came to where he was, and when he saw him, he had compassion. …”
Luke 10:30-33 ESV
The Samaritan on the journey… knew it was worth the mess…
The priest and the Levite… missed it…
The contrast being… the Samaritan… excluded from the Levitical law… did what Jesus said was a picture of loving others… while the priest and Levite… well versed in law… failed to… they failed to get the heart of the law… it’s true meaning…
It’s not about staying clean… all the time… it’s about being willing to lay down your life for someone else… to lose your life… to save another…
Just like Jesus…
“…For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospel’s will save it. …”
Mark 8:35 ESV
Loving others is messy… and it may not look right… to those who want to look good…
But… there is no other way… to… love…
“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. …
John 3:16 ESV
For God so loves the world… He sent His Son to get dirty…
“…For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. …”
John 3:17 ESV
The message of the law…
Life is messy… get dirty cleaning it up… in Jesus’s name…
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