02.15.2015 Old Testament: Lev 20.24–26

To read the Bible in a year, read Leviticus 20–21 on February 15, In the year of our Lord 2015

By Don Ruhl

The children of Israel were not the first people to inhabit Palestine, but descendants of Canaan did, which explains why the land was called the Land of Canaan. However, the Canaanites did abominable things, and the Lord brought Israel into the Land of Canaan to remove the Canaanites, and He did not want the Israelites copying the Canaanites, but to be holy to the Lord,

But I have said to you, “You shall inherit their land, and I will give it to you to possess, a land flowing with milk and honey.” I am the Lord your God, who has separated you from the peoples. You shall therefore distinguish between clean animals and unclean, between unclean birds and clean, and you shall not make yourselves abominable by beast or by bird, or by any kind of living thing that creeps on the ground, which I have separated from you as unclean. And you shall be holy to Me, for I the Lord am holy, and have separated you from the peoples, that you should be Mine (Leviticus 20.24–26). 

It was not so much that they were not to imitate the Canaanites, but that the children of Israel were to be holy to the Lord and that meant not imitating the Canaanites.

Let us as disciples of Christ remember why we exist. We do not imitate the world, but we imitate our Master and Lord, Jesus of Nazareth. He was holy to God; therefore, we shall be holy to God.