The law is designed to keep the people in right relationship with God. Today the Pastors explore how this strange and broad ranging set of rules were intended to reveal the compassion of God by protecting the weakest and most powerless in society. To those who are willing to listen, there are lessons to be learned for today from these laws which were written a LONG TIME ago.
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Transcript
00:00:00:55 – 00:00:25:49
Clint Loveall
Hey, everybody. Welcome back. Thanks for being with us. As we continue here through the 22nd chapter of Exodus. A reminder, if you’re joining us watching this later, we will be off next week following Christmas and be back on Tuesday of the next week, which will be the second, third, I believe, of January. So thanks for being with us today and keep that schedule in mind.
00:00:26:15 – 00:00:55:34
Clint Loveall
We move into a section today as we try to close out chapter 22. That is a collection of laws, some interesting laws under the heading Social and Religious laws. But there’s also some religious I mean, there’s some kind of idolatry stuff in here. There’s just kind of there’s a little bit of everything. And Michael, I don’t know, I find this maybe the most difficult so far in terms of a common thread.
00:00:55:35 – 00:01:21:48
Clint Loveall
There’s a there’s a lot of moving parts in this one. There’s a lot to do with how we treat There’s some community stuff here. Let’s jump in and we can kind of see where we end up. So in the first instance we have here laws that have to do with relationships. When a man seduces a virgin who is not engaged to be married and lives with her.
00:01:21:48 – 00:01:45:09
Clint Loveall
So in other words, when a man takes advantage of a woman, he shall give the bride price for her and make her his wife. But if the father refuses to give her to him, he shall pay an amount equal to the bride price for Virgin. So if a man makes a woman less desirable by taking advantage of her, then he is responsible to her family.
00:01:45:09 – 00:02:16:10
Clint Loveall
And and again, this is a holdover from kind of a patriarchal, hierarchical society in which, you know, there is a cost to be paid to marry a woman, that kind of thing. But it says something about the responsibility, it says something about practices. And then we go right to other strange laws. You shall not permit us a sorceress to live, and whoever lives with an animal shall be put to death.
00:02:16:10 – 00:02:27:46
Clint Loveall
So we have here very harsh punishments in regard to sorcery, bestiality. You know, we’re covering a lot of ground today.
00:02:27:55 – 00:03:01:24
Michael Gewecke
Yeah, we’re moving quickly. And I think it’s worth noting here that we have a lot of different things happening. But I do think there are a few narratives that will help us. Looking back to the Ten Commandments, you shall have no other gods before me. And here, especially when we move our attention to verse 18, this idea that you shall not permit a female sorceress to live, you shall not permit met someone who goes to another God, or who consults another God who represents another God.
00:03:01:35 – 00:03:29:47
Michael Gewecke
That person cannot live within the community that is a pretty straightforward connection to that commandment. I mean, at the end of the day, anyone who will try to circumvent God’s leadership and lordship to the people of Israel will consistently have capital punishment applied to them because that that is a complete subversion of the beginning of all of the of the covenant of the laws themselves.
00:03:29:47 – 00:04:10:12
Michael Gewecke
So that is a just a straightforward in some ways understand, but yes, incredibly, incredibly deep cost, but understandable how you might get there, I think. Can you move your client to verse 19? You know, bestiality? It’s interesting because we we don’t have the same conception of the natural law that is inherited by the people of Israel. These are the people of Genesis, the people for whom each and every step of creation is not only a part of the story of how it happened, but actually teaches why it happened and how God intended for the world to be.
00:04:10:30 – 00:04:40:10
Michael Gewecke
And they do conceive of hierarchical relationship between humans, but they also conceive of that relationship between the different created orders that humans have a different responsibility towards their animals than they do to their slave, than they do to their family member. I mean, all of these things have laws that apply to the natural ordering of them. And the point here, Clint, is it is a violation of that natural order for a human to lay with an animal.
00:04:40:10 – 00:04:54:21
Michael Gewecke
Another created order. It’s a mixing of things that God did not intend from the very beginning. This is the conception that comes to the people of Israel. And so since it defies God’s ordering, therefore it is forbidden in the law.
00:04:54:45 – 00:05:21:57
Clint Loveall
Yeah. And, and part of the law is always where are the limitations of our behavior. So when does blessing? We’ll see it here in a moment. When does blessing turn into greed? When does sexuality turn into sin? What the law exists to differentiate that which is acceptable from that which is unacceptable And and it does so in order to protect the people from themselves in some sense.
00:05:21:57 – 00:05:48:45
Clint Loveall
In other words, following our baser instincts can get us in trouble. And before we move on to some of these others, Michael, and just add verse 20 here, whoever sacrifice vices to a God other than the Lord shall be devoted to destruction. You know, we exist in a culture that by and large prides itself on tolerance. And so things like this are difficult for us to wrap our head around.
00:05:49:06 – 00:06:21:05
Clint Loveall
But this is the absolute seriousness with which the community takes their relationship to God, that they hear God’s law say to them that sacrificing to some other God, trying to balance God and some other commitment, some other allegiance is not only not permissible, it’s punishable by death. It is dangerous for the community to degrade their commitment and their faithfulness to God.
00:06:21:05 – 00:06:32:49
Clint Loveall
And so, again, these might be shocking to us. But I think as we look at them, we see a snapshot of how absolutely seriously this is for the people.
00:06:33:45 – 00:06:55:24
Michael Gewecke
Yeah, well, I mean, just once again, it’s a mis ordering of a creature to their creator. To their creator. There’s a responsibility that comes by being made and called to worship the one true God. And when you have someone within the called covenantal community worshiping to another God, that is a violation of the first and most important tenet of the law.
00:06:55:39 – 00:07:21:54
Clint Loveall
Yeah. Then we move on and I think we get interesting and I think important. You know, maybe some of these other laws make sense to us. I think it is These are important because they give us a sense of what matters to God in regard to the people. So let me read 21 through 24 here. You shall not wrong or oppress a resident alien for you or aliens in the land of Egypt.
00:07:22:12 – 00:07:48:30
Clint Loveall
You shall not abuse a widow or orphan if you abuse them when they cry out to me, I will surely here heed their cry. My wrath will burn and I will kill you with the sword. And your wives shall become widows and your children orphans. And let me let me go on a little bit further. If you lend money to my people, to the poor among you, you shall not deal with them as a creditor.
00:07:48:54 – 00:08:13:03
Clint Loveall
You shall not exact interest from them. If you take your neighbor’s cloak in pawn, you shall restore it before the sun goes down. For it may be your neighbor’s only clothing to use as cover. And what else shall that person sleep? And if your neighbor cries out to me, I will listen for I am compassionate. These are huge themes throughout the law.
00:08:13:04 – 00:08:56:06
Clint Loveall
They tend to get missed. Sometimes they tend to get overlooked or de-emphasized, but built in to what God demands of the people is a a bent, a bias toward taking care of the vulnerable. The alien who resides among you, the poor, the widow, the ones at the bottom of the ladder are especially targeted by God in the protection of the law, and the people are given very explicit instructions not to take advantage of those who really can’t defend themselves, who really can’t protect themselves from those kind of abuses.
00:08:56:25 – 00:09:23:09
Clint Loveall
And that is something of the heart and the character of God that we see throughout the law. You know, it says it here for I am compassionate and it. Okay, compassionate. It’s a tough word in a section that says kill a person for this and kill a person for that. But this does say something about how Israel is expected to treat those who are in danger of being taken advantage of.
00:09:23:09 – 00:09:30:19
Clint Loveall
And the responsibility always lies with those who have power and not with those who don’t know.
00:09:30:23 – 00:09:59:52
Michael Gewecke
Let’s dig into that for just a moment here, Clint, because you’re exactly right. There is a regulatory expectation that we have just received here from the law. Why are we supposed to behave this way towards our neighbor? It says explicitly that God listens because God is compassionate. So this is the revelation of God that God is compassionate. So what kind of compassion is it in the midst with such other difficult language sprinkled in?
00:09:59:52 – 00:10:29:36
Michael Gewecke
And I think if we’re going to reflect on that for a moment, the sins that we’ve seen labeled as being worthy of significant consequence thus far are things that are either undertaken for the sake of personal pleasure or satisfaction, or for the sake of personal advancement, for enriching one’s self, for putting oneself at the center of our financial system or our hierarchical system, and using it for your own gain.
00:10:29:54 – 00:10:55:44
Michael Gewecke
These are the places where God says, you know, you can’t circumvent the covenantal relationship with God and you shouldn’t put your own advancement at the center here. There are strict limitations put upon your ability to use the poor to your own gain. If they don’t have another cloak, you can’t take their cloak if they are a resident alien and therefore they don’t have a voice.
00:10:55:57 – 00:11:33:30
Michael Gewecke
You shouldn’t abuse them. This is God expressing concern for his character being reflected in the community itself and yes, the character of God will often cause us to brush up against things that are uncomfortable for us. Because when we do find the line, there’s often stringent expectations held there. But if you’re willing to step back and for a moment to really dig in to what’s happening here, God is revealing that there’s a different order to this law, that it’s not about you using the law to your own gain.
00:11:33:30 – 00:11:57:37
Michael Gewecke
To what extent can I go so that I can exact the most interest and still be legal? No. The question is, how can I, like God, be compassionate? What does it look like for you to have a compassionate relation to a neighbor or for you to have a pure relationship with your animal or for your your, your servant or whatever the the category that the law is addressing at the time?
00:11:57:54 – 00:12:19:13
Michael Gewecke
There is a regulatory intent here. And I think that if we pass by it and if we are maybe even distracted by some of the more difficult themes in this section, we’re going to miss what is intended to be a revolutionary word. I mean, this this is supposed to counter the people’s temptation for self-aggrandizement, and it does so if we’re willing to hear it.
00:12:19:51 – 00:12:55:35
Clint Loveall
Very agreed by Cohen. And I think it also connects them to a sort of communal memory that asks them to keep in mind that they were the vulnerable ones, that in connecting this with the with the land, the you were aliens in the land of Egypt. So you know better. You needed someone to advocate for you. You had an experience of living without power, of being oppressed, and you are now not supposed to revisit that on anyone else because the balance has changed and you now find yourself further up the ladder.
00:12:56:00 – 00:13:30:52
Clint Loveall
You of all people should know better than to take advantage of those at the bottom. And there is that expectation. It’s always interesting, I think, when God connects for the people, the laws that govern their behavior to their previous experience of being set free by God’s grace and power, and that they are now to use those things effectively and wisely and faithfully, and they are not to do what had been done to them.
00:13:30:52 – 00:13:44:34
Clint Loveall
And I think, you know, there is there’s something humbling each and every time they get reminded of that. Michael And I always find it poignant when that is woven into the story.
00:13:44:58 – 00:14:12:25
Michael Gewecke
So the next Locklin makes me smile because it makes me wonder, what does Moses think when he comes to verse 28 and reads, You shall not revile God or curse a leader of your people. Because if you’ve been with us in the study already, you know this has already happened. Many times that the Moses or Aaron or someone has been complained that has been forced into the middle of conversation.
00:14:12:39 – 00:14:47:15
Michael Gewecke
I think that there have been historically very dangerous connections made to attacks like this where you don’t question your religious leadership or or don’t. You can never push back against a decision that doesn’t seem right. And Christian, I mean, that’s not the intent here, that the idea is that God is the leader and so to whatever extent we treat our human leaders of whatever position that their their place, this is very Pauline and the New Testament as well, we should behave in such a way that reflects the kind of honor that you would have for God as leader.
00:14:47:15 – 00:15:04:13
Michael Gewecke
And so I, I do think, though, that there’s an interesting human kind of connection here because this is a law that we now have in this section that surely Moses cared about, and it meant something to him in the midst of his own journey, leading the people yet again.
00:15:04:30 – 00:15:44:49
Clint Loveall
I mean, there would be an assumption here that God has been very proactive in choosing and establishing the leadership ship, and that to speak against them would in some sense be to speak about God. And you rightly so. Michael cautioned that you know, this is not a blank check for leaders to do what they want and not be criticized, though I do think in the moment we live in, this is a good reminder to Christians that generally speaking, we should bite our words when they’re not abide our tongues, when our words are not productive.
00:15:44:49 – 00:16:10:57
Clint Loveall
You know, it’s somewhat ironic that in the Christian family, at least in the American Christian family, many of the people who would be most supportive of the law are also the people speaking out and cursing their leaders the loudest. And, you know, that should give us some pause as we try to listen in this kind of old word.
00:16:10:57 – 00:16:36:50
Clint Loveall
What a word for our time might be. But interestingly enough, this one does not have a punishment with it. It just says this is what you should do, not much else here. In the rest, some idea of consecration. The firstborn Don’t delay or don’t delay. To be generous, don’t hold up for yourself. Be grateful, be thankful. Dedicate your firstborn, your animals, your sons.
00:16:36:50 – 00:17:05:34
Clint Loveall
Animals are sacrifice. The sons are are dedicated. Consecrated is the word here. And then there’s an interesting thing. Verse 31 At the end of this chapter, You shall be my you shall be people consecrated to me. The word consecrated means to set apart or to make holy. Therefore you shall not eat any meat that is mangled by beasts in the field, and you shall throw it to the dogs.
00:17:05:34 – 00:17:35:27
Clint Loveall
Now. Okay, the part that follows that up, don’t eat mangled meat is interesting and we could have lots of conversation about that. But I think whenever the law connects the Israelites behavior to you are my people. You are a consecrated people. I think that’s a helpful conversation. I think that all Christians can benefit from examining our behavior and the expectations of our behavior based in the back part of that sentence.
00:17:35:38 – 00:18:05:20
Clint Loveall
You are a consecrated people, so. Dot, dot, dot. And in this case, it gives an obscure food reference. But we could have lots of conversations about what it means that we are a consecrated people and how that should, in every instance dictate our behavior, our speech, our language, and the way we live. And I think, you know, the law as we continue to work our way through this, you will see this kind of language more often.
00:18:05:38 – 00:18:18:32
Clint Loveall
But keep in mind that what we do in the legal sense, what we are supposed to do, we are supposed to do, because God has already done something. And I think, you know, this is a nice example of that.
00:18:18:54 – 00:18:45:23
Michael Gewecke
I think you said that really well, and I only add to it that there is a human temptation here to say, well, this obscure reference, this idea of the meat mangle, that that makes no sense. And so we throw out the whole idea as if it doesn’t apply to us. I think the force of this argument is, no, there are you are a consecrated people, so it should change something about the practical way that you live.
00:18:45:41 – 00:19:05:45
Michael Gewecke
And let us not get through a text like this and think to ourselves. So I’m off the hook, right? Like the mangled meat comment. No, I’m out. This doesn’t apply to me. No, Every one of us should be able to point to something in our life that is actually different because you’re set apart that a way that another could see.
00:19:05:52 – 00:19:34:44
Michael Gewecke
No, this is a choice or behavior or value that is truly reflected in my life and is there because of what God has done for me. If we couldn’t name that, then I think that’s an invitation to do some self reflection and prayer. I also think it’s a place where we could apply our own ongoing prayers. God help me to inculcate or help me to grow these places by the power of your word.
00:19:35:45 – 00:19:41:45
Michael Gewecke
Real differences in my life so that my faith is not in word alone, but indeed as well.
00:19:42:21 – 00:20:06:55
Clint Loveall
Yeah, you mentioned and maybe we could at some point go into a longer conversation about this. Michael, you mentioned natural theology and the Old Testament law has a bent toward things that are whole things that are, quote unquote pure things that are natural by our own understanding of law, would not share all of those assumptions in in every regard.
00:20:07:13 – 00:20:46:17
Clint Loveall
But the idea of connecting our behavior with God’s work is completely we rely on that. And that foundation is what we build upon our own understanding of the law, because we, we as Christians do not look at the Old Testament and the laws of it in the same way. But the idea that our behavior is based on God’s act, that God’s setting us apart and making us holy should define how we therefore live is woven so deeply into both covenants.
00:20:46:17 – 00:21:03:36
Clint Loveall
The old and New Testaments, that I think it is helpful to at least see how it functions in in both instances, how it looks in the Old Testament, how it looks in the New Testament. But it really is in many ways the same reality. So hopefully that’s helpful.
00:21:03:59 – 00:21:15:37
Michael Gewecke
We’re glad that you spent some time with us today. We wish you, of course, a very merry Christmas and we look forward to being with you once again as we continue our study in the new year. Thanks, everyone.
00:21:15:37 – 00:21:25:03
Clint Loveall
Thanks, everybody. Great holidays.