Leviticus 24–27

Chapter 24, let's get into it. I'm going to start by putting an outline up on the screen for you so that you can see what we're going to be dealing with in this chapter. Chapter 24 Outline  Oil and instructions for the lampstand  Bread for the Tabernacle  Punishment for Blasphemy  An Eye for an Eye Instructions will be given related to the oil for the golden lampstand that was in the tabernacle and later in the temple. Bread for the table of showbread. Then the Lord is going to talk about, actually, there's a narrative that is given in this chapter concerning someone who blasphemed the name of the Lord. And then the Lord gives some instructions on an eye for an eye. It begins in verse 1 by saying, “The LORD spoke to Moses, saying, 2 “Command the people of Israel to bring you pure oil from beaten olives for the lamp, that a light may be kept burning regularly.” And of course, this is referring again, to the golden lamp stand that we read about back in Exodus. You might remember when we were in chapter 25, all the instructions were given as it relates to the making of this lampstand. And it was to burn continually, the light was not to go out. And the reason for that is that it spoke, or it was a sign, or a symbol of the ongoing presence of the Lord among His people. So it was not to go out in that way. Verse 3 says, “Outside the veil of the testimony,…” And by the way, when it says the testimony, that is a term that's used to describe the Ten Commandments that were inside the Ark of the Covenant. All right? It says, “Outside the veil (where the Ark was kept and) …the testimony, (in the Ark) in the tent of meeting, Aaron shall arrange it from evening to morning before the LORD regularly. It shall be a statute forever throughout your generations. 4 He shall arrange the lamps on the lampstand of pure gold before the LORD regularly.” Next, the Lord gives provision for the arrangement of the bread of the Presence. “5 “You shall take fine flour and bake twelve loaves from it; two tenths of an ephah shall be in each loaf. 6 And you shall set them in two piles, six in a pile, on the table of pure gold before the LORD. 7 And you shall put pure frankincense on each pile, that it may go with the bread as a memorial portion as a food offering to the LORD.” This was the Table of Showbread, is what it's also referred to as, I believe it's the King James. Anyway, eating, as you know from the Bible, eating or breaking bread was a sign of fellowship. And that term moved its way into the New Testament, and we read it there as well. Whenever…, it was a huge deal for these people in the Middle East, to have people come into their home and to break bread together. And that was a sign of intimacy and communion and fellowship. And so this is another element of what God wanted to communicate to His people concerning just His heart to have a relationship with them. And it says in verse 8, “Every Sabbath day Aaron shall arrange it before the LORD regularly; (and that means new bread would come in on the Sabbath. He said) it is from the people of Israel as a covenant forever. 9 And it shall be for Aaron and his sons, and they shall eat it in a holy place, since it is for him a most holy portion out of the LORD's food offerings, a perpetual due.” Again, weekly, on the Sabbath, the bread would be replaced with fresh loaves and the ones that were taken away would be eaten by Aaron and his sons. Verses 10 and following is where we get into this narrative concerning a man who cursed and blasphemed the name of the Lord. We're told, “Now an Israelite woman's son, whose father was an Egyptian, went out among the people of Israel. And the Israelite woman's son and a man of Israel fought in the camp,” And you know when two guys start fighting, tempers flare and you start saying things. “11 and (it says) the Israelite woman's son blasphemed the Name, and cursed.” And I want you to notice that blasphemy and cursing are two different things, but it sounds like the son of mixed parentage here, cursed the Israelite man using the name of the Lord in that in some derogatory and blasphemous way. We're not told exactly what he said but you have to understand, blasphemy is defined as speaking in some abusive and purposely demeaning way using profane and grievous language. It says “…they brought him to Moses. (here in the middle of verse 11) His mother's name was Shelomith, the daughter of Dibri, of the tribe of Dan. 12 And they put him in custody, till the will of the LORD should be clear to them.” In other words, they didn't know what to do. All they know, knew, is this guy blasphemed the name of God. And it says, “13 Then the LORD spoke to Moses, saying, 14 “Bring out of the camp the one who cursed, and let all who heard him lay their hands on his head, and let all the congregation stone him. 15 And speak to the people of Israel, saying, Whoever curses his God shall bear his sin. 16 Whoever blasphemes the name of the LORD shall surely be put to death. All the congregation shall stone him. The sojourner as well as the native, when he blasphemes the Name, shall be put to death.” This was a very serious thing because the presence of the Lord was in the midst of the people and that's what makes this act on this man's part so grievous, is that God's presence is among them. They are daily being fed with manna, supernatural food on the ground that they collect. They are daily seeing a pillar of cloud standing guard over the camp by day and a pillar of fire doing the same at night. And they've heard and seen supernatural things and yet this young man just blasphemes the name of the Lord. And it's a terrible thing, they end up putting him to death. And at this point, the Lord uses this situation to speak to the people about various levels of punishment saying, “17 “Whoever takes a human life shall surely be put to death. 18 Whoever takes an animal's life shall make it good, life for life. 19 If anyone injures his neighbor, as he has done it shall be done to him, 20 fracture for fracture, eye for eye, tooth for tooth; whatever injury he has given a person shall be given to him. 21 Whoever kills an animal shall make it good, (in other words, pay it back) and whoever kills a person shall be put to death. 22 You shall have the same rule for the sojourner and for the native, for I am the LORD your God. 23 So Moses spoke to the people of Israel, and they brought out of the camp the one who had cursed and stoned him with stones. Thus the people of Israel did as the LORD commanded Moses.” And by the way, it's passages like this, in fact, this very passage in Leviticus that motivated the Jews to be determined that they were never going to speak the Name of the Lord because they decided if they never spoke His name, there was no way they could blaspheme the Name. And that was just their way of fearing God, but they threw a little bit of superstition in there as well. I've gotten so many notes from people who have written me because they were afraid that they had blasphemed the Lord and that they now could no longer be saved. And they're just usually in a tither. And I got to tell you something, most of what people tell me has happened, was spoken either accidentally or in a moment of emotional upheaval or something like that. The one thing that I've learned is that things like blasphemy, they originate in the heart. It's not just exactly what comes out of your mouth. Sometimes what comes out of your mouth is just flippant, something of the moment, but blasphemy originates in the heart. I usually spend some time encouraging people who have done something like that, who just had a moment of anger or something like that. I don't believe that's what was going on in the story that we've just read here in Leviticus. I think there was something much deeper in this man's situation for them to respond the way they did. As we move on to chapter 25, let's put the outline up on the screen once again for you. This refers in this chapter to, Chapter 25 Outline  A Sabbath rest for the land  The Year of Jubilee  Redemption of Property  Kindness toward the poor  Redeeming a poor man A Sabbath rest for the land. The Year of Jubilee. They are given instruction on the Redemption of Property, I'll explain what that's all about. Kindness toward the poor and then also Redeeming a poor man. And I'll explain that as well. “The LORD spoke to Moses on Mount Sinai, saying, 2 “Speak to the people of Israel and say to them, When you come into the land that I give you, the land shall keep a Sabbath to the LORD.” He then explains how it’s going to work. “3 For six years you shall sow your field, and for six years you shall prune your vineyard and gather in its fruits, 4 but in the seventh year there shall be a Sabbath of solemn rest for the land, a Sabbath to the LORD. You shall not sow your field or prune your vineyard. 5 You shall not reap what grows of itself in your harvest, or gather the grapes of your undressed vine. It shall be a year of solemn rest for the land.” Now, we know today that this was actually necessary for reasons that went beyond anything sacred or religious. It was necessary for the ground to simply replenish itself. We know that if you keep planting in the land without replenishing the nutrients of the soil, you can actually strip the land from those nutrients, and you won't be able to grow anything anymore. Now, we've gotten around that, you know, today with fertilizers and chemicals and things like that. And we know how to put the nutrients back into the land so that we can continue to get a crop from it every year. But there, those things didn't exist back in, in biblical times. And so the Lord said, let the land rest. Let the rent land take a year off. And just in case someone was worried that taking a year off would cause them to starve, the Lord went on in verse 6 and said, “The Sabbath of the land shall provide food for you, for yourself and for your male and female slaves and for your hired worker and the sojourner who lives with you, 7 and for your cattle and for the wild animals that are in your land: all its yield shall be for food.” In other words, what grew on its own during the Sabbath year would feed them. Now, the Lord gives instructions about the year of jubilee. He says, “8 “You shall count seven weeks of years, seven times seven years, so that the time of the seven weeks of years shall give you forty-nine years. 9 Then (and this is at the end of the 49th year,) you shall sound the loud trumpet on the tenth day of the seventh month. (and that is) …the Day of Atonement you shall sound the trumpet throughout all your land.” We know that, you know, the trumpet would sound for many other reasons, but at the end of the 49th year, it would sound in a special way to announce the year of jubilee. Now, it's interesting that the Hebrew word for Jubilee is related to a term that means ram or ram's horn, which is what they use to sound the trumpet. It was called the shofar and it was to be sounded as we've read, at the beginning of the 50th year and it isn't it interesting that it sounds on the same day that the day of atonement also begins, right? Because as you know, the day of atonement is all about forgiveness. It's all about freedom. And in the same way, the year of Jubilee was to be a year of release. And a year of freedom, liberty. The Lord explains more as we read on verse 10. “And you shall consecrate the fiftieth year, and proclaim liberty throughout the land to all its inhabitants. It shall be a jubilee for you, when each of you shall return to his property and each of you shall return to his clan.” Think of it this way, the year of jubilee was a year for the Jews to hit the reset button and to go back to the way things began. If they had sold a piece of property prior to the year of jubilee, and we're going to read about this in a moment, the land would go back to them in the year of jubilee. If somebody had become indebted to someone and was working under them in the year of jubilee, they would be set free. And by the way, this is just an interesting side note. I don't know if you're aware of it, but the verse that we just read, verse 10, did you know that's inscribed on the Liberty Bell? That very verse. If you go and see the Liberty Bell you'll see it there. Here's a picture up on the screen. It's hard to see because it wraps around the bell, but the full inscription on the bell says, “Proclaim liberty throughout all the land unto all the inhabitants thereof.” The language of course, taken from the King James version of the Bible. But one of the things that tells us is that our forefathers were very aware of the year of jubilee and what it meant and what the implication might also be for the people of the United States as they were stepping out in liberty. Verse 11 goes on. “That fiftieth year shall be a jubilee for you; in it you shall neither sow nor reap what grows of itself nor gather the grapes from the undressed vines.” This is a little bit different from the Sabbath year where what grew in the fields naturally could be gathered. But now during the Jubilee, He says that they can't gather the grapes. Got to let the grapes just go. But notice what it says in verse 12. “For it is a jubilee. It shall be holy to you. You may eat the produce of the field.” They can eat what grows naturally in the field, but not from the grapevine. I'm not exactly sure the significance of the one prohibition. Now, the Lord goes on to describe more about granting freedom and liberty. He says, “13 “In this year of jubilee each of you shall return to his property.” And what that means is they were to return to their original Tribal allotments in the land that were given under Joshua originally. They would go back to their land. “14 And if you make a sale to your neighbor or buy from your neighbor, you shall not wrong one another. 15 You shall pay your neighbor according to the number of years after the jubilee, and he shall sell to you according to the number of years for crops. 16 If the years are many, (In other words, somebody sold a piece of land right after the year of jubilee) you shall increase the price, and if the years are few, (in other words, there's only two years left before the year of jubilee) you shall reduce the price, for it is the number of the crops that he is selling to you.” Honestly, what God is truly saying is, you guys can sell land if you want to, but it's not going to belong to you. Ultimately. The land is given to you by Me and I gave it to you. And on the year of jubilee, it goes back. and I don't care if you'd sold it to somebody else. At the jubilee, it goes back, and that's all there is to it. Pretty interesting. Verse 17. “You shall not wrong one another, (And that's another way of saying, just don't cheat one another by not taking the year of jubilee into consideration) but you shall fear your God, for I am the LORD your God. 18 “Therefore you shall do my statutes and keep my rules and perform them, and then you will dwell in the land securely. 19 The land will yield its fruit, and you will eat your fill and dwell in it securely. 20 And if you say, ‘What shall we eat in the seventh year, if we may not sow or gather in our crop?’ 21 I will command my blessing on you in the sixth year, so that it will produce a crop sufficient for three years. 22 When you sow in the eighth year, you will be eating some of the old crop; you shall eat the old until the ninth year, when its crop arrives.” The Lord says, I'll take care of you. Don't worry. But you got to understand, if you're a naturalistic thinker, and you're not necessarily a person of faith, and somebody comes along and says, don't plant this whole year. Nothing. You're going to go, well, we starve. We'll starve. But the Lord made a promise. He would take care of them. He would see them through. But they had to have faith in that promise. Now, beginning in verse 23, the Lord gives direction on the redemption of property. And He says here, “The land shall not be sold in perpetuity, (or, if you will, permanently. Again, this is the whole idea that the land was given to you by the Lord. It's not yours to sell on a permanent basis. He says,) for the land is mine. For you are strangers and sojourners with me. 24 And in all the country you possess, you shall allow a redemption of the land.” And so the Lord's telling them they must allow the land to be purchased back by the original owners or a relative, and that relative is referred to as the kinsman redeemer. Or it's mentioned here as the nearest redeemer. Verse 25 says, “If your brother becomes poor and sells part of his property, (obviously to feed his family) then his nearest (relative) redeemer shall come and redeem what his brother has sold. 26 If a man has no one to redeem it and then himself becomes prosperous and finds sufficient means to redeem it, 27 let him calculate the years since he sold it and pay back the balance to the man to whom he sold it, and then return to his property. 28 But if he does not have sufficient means to recover it, then what he sold shall remain in the hand of the buyer (how long?) until the year of jubilee. In the jubilee it shall be released, and he shall return to his property. 29 “If a man sells a dwelling house in a walled city, he may redeem it within a year of its sale. For a full year he shall have the right of redemption. 30 If it is not redeemed within a full year, then the house in the walled city shall belong in perpetuity to the buyer, throughout his generations; it shall not be released in the jubilee.” And that's because a house in a city really wasn't made up, it didn't involve land. And it was just a house on the land, the land still belongs to somebody else, or it's a city. And so this wasn't a movement of tribal ownership in that sense, not the same restrictions. “31 But the houses of the villages that have no wall around them shall be classified with the fields of the land. They may be redeemed, and they shall be released in the jubilee. 32 As for the cities of the Levites, (you'll remember they didn't own land, they were just given cities to live in) the Levites may redeem at any time the houses in the cities they possess. 33 And if one of the Levites exercises his right of redemption, then the house that was sold in a city they possess shall be released in the jubilee. For the houses in the cities of the Levites are their possession among the people of Israel. (and that's really all they have) 34 But the fields of pastureland belonging to their cities may not be sold, for that is their possession forever.” Alright, now the Lord gives instructions concerning a poor brother. He says, “35 “If your brother becomes poor and cannot maintain himself with you, you shall support him as though he were a stranger and a sojourner, (look at this) and he shall live with you. 36 Take no interest from him or profit, but fear your God, that your brother may live beside you. 37 You shall not lend him your money at interest, nor give him your food for profit. 38 I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt to give you the land of Canaan, and to be your God.” Notice how God, first of all, tells them what to do. He tells them, be generous. And then He says, oh and by the way, can I just remind you? I took you out of Egypt and brought you here, and I gave you, I'm giving you this land that you're going to be going to. In other words, what He's saying is, I was generous. I want you to be generous too. I want you to be as generous to others as I've been to you, bottom line. “39 “If your brother becomes poor beside you and sells himself to you,…” And by the way, that was typical. When people got into debt, they would sell themselves to work off the debt. Once they worked it off, they would no longer be in servitude. But by the way, that could be called slavery and most often in biblical times, slavery was debt related. Now there were other kinds of slavery that followed like wartime. You could spare a people that you conquered instead of killing them, you'd make them servants. Put them into servitude and that was frankly an act of mercy to not kill them, but to let them live. But, by in large, most of the slavery that went on happened due to debt. People owed money and so they would become slaves. Don't think of slavery, like the United States dealt with slavery. The Jews did not go and kidnap people, and make them slaves, and bring them to their country. Like Britain and America did, they didn't do that. So don't… Get that out of your head. It's a different kind of slavery altogether. So He says, “39 “If your brother becomes poor beside you and sells himself to you, you shall not make him serve as a slave:” 40 he shall be with you as a hired worker and (just like you would) as a sojourner. He shall serve with you until the year of the jubilee. 41 Then he shall go out from you, he and his children with him, and go back to his own clan and return to the possession of his fathers. 42 For they are my servants, whom I brought out of the land of Egypt; (and) they shall not be sold as slaves. 43 You shall not rule over him ruthlessly but shall fear your God.” Do you see the difference? the connection to all of this. God's people are not slaves to sin and so in God's economy in the Old Testament, they were not to be slaves at all. They were never to be slaves. Now they made themselves slaves through their sin eventually, but that wasn't God's plan. That was man's blunder. Can you see all of the things that go along with the year of jubilee, which keeps coming up? Imagine somebody got deep into debt with somebody? And so he sold himself into servitude to his brother. And let's say it was one year before the year of jubilee. Well, he works for a year and then guess what? Not only does he go free, the debt is forgiven. That's what jubilee is about. Debts are forgiven at that point. Do you see the picture? The picture of the year of jubilee is freedom and forgiveness, which starts with the Day of Atonement. So the picture for you and me is atonement, which we have through Jesus Christ. Which gives us freedom from slavery to sin and death. The picture is quite profound. Verse 44, “As for your male and female slaves whom you may have: (and now He's talking about from other countries) you may buy male and female slaves from among the nations that are around you. 45 You may also buy from among the strangers who sojourn with you and their clans that are with you, who have been born in your land, and they may be your property. 46 You may bequeath them to your sons after you to inherit as a possession forever. You may make slaves of them, but over your brothers the people of Israel you shall not rule, one over another ruthlessly.” All right. The Lord goes on now to speak of, further about redeeming a poor man. 47 “If a stranger or sojourner (meaning a traveler) with you becomes rich, and your brother beside him becomes poor and sells himself to the stranger or sojourner with you or to a member of the stranger's clan, 48 then after he is sold he may be redeemed. One of his brothers may redeem him,” And to redeem him means, he could pay off his debt so his brother can come along and say, hey, I know my brother here still owes you five years of service to pay off his debt. I'm going to give you that money now and pay off the debt and redeem him from this position. And God is basically saying that was a possibility. “ …after he is sold, he may be redeemed. (verse 48) One of his brothers may redeem him, 49 or his uncle or his cousin may redeem him, or a close relative from his clan may redeem him. (again, that's the kinsman redeemer) Or if he grows rich he may redeem himself. (pay off his own debt) 50 He shall calculate with his buyer from the year when he sold himself to him until the year of jubilee, and the price of his sale shall vary with the number of years. The time he was with his owner shall be rated as the time of a hired worker. 51 If there are still many years left, he shall pay proportionately for his redemption some of his sale price. 52 If there remain but a few years until the year of jubilee, he shall calculate and pay for his redemption in proportion to his years of service. 53 He shall treat him as a worker hired year by year. He shall not rule ruthlessly over him in your sight. 54 And if he is not redeemed by these means, then he and his children with him shall be released in the year of jubilee. 55 For it is to me that the people of Israel are servants. They are my servants whom I brought out of the land of Egypt: I am the LORD your God.” All right, in these final 2 chapters of Leviticus, God is going to give messages to the people through Moses concerning how they must live. And as we read through this, you're going to notice that they're very similar to reading through, like the Book of Deuteronomy. The outline is going to be up on the screen here: Chapter 26 Outline  Blessings for obedience  Punishment for Disobedience  Repentance and return Blessings for obedience. Punishments for Disobedience. Repentance and return. He says, “You shall not make idols for yourselves or erect an image or pillar, and you shall not set up a figured stone in your land to bow down to it, for I am the LORD your God. 2 You shall keep my Sabbaths and reverence my sanctuary: I am the LORD. 3 “If you walk in my statutes and observe my commandments and do them, 4 then I will give you your rains in their season, and the land shall yield its increase, and the trees of the field shall yield their fruit. 5 Your threshing shall last to the time of the grape harvest, and the grape harvest shall last to the time for sowing. And you shall eat your bread to the full and dwell in your land securely. 6 I will give peace in the land, and you shall lie down, and none shall make you afraid. And I will remove harmful beasts from the land, and the sword shall not go through your land. 7 You shall chase your enemies, and they shall fall before you by the sword. 8 Five of you shall chase a hundred, and a hundred of you shall chase ten thousand, and your enemies shall fall before you by the sword. 9 I will turn to you and make you fruitful and multiply you and will confirm my covenant with you. 10 You shall eat old store long kept, and you shall clear out the old to make way for the new.” In other words, such an abundance that you don't even get through all that you stored. “11 I will make my dwelling among you, and my soul shall not abhor you. 12 And I will walk among you and will be your God, and you shall be my people. 13 I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, that you should not be their slaves. And I have broken the bars of your yoke and made you walk erect. 14 “But if you will not listen to me and will not do all these commandments, 15 if you spurn my statutes, and if your soul abhors my rules, so that you will not do all my commandments, but break my covenant, 16 then I will do this to you: I will visit you with panic, with wasting disease and fever that consume the eyes and make the heart ache. And you shall sow your seed in vain, for your enemies shall eat it. 17 I will set my face against you, and you shall be struck down before your enemies. Those who hate you shall rule over you, and you shall flee when none pursues you. 18 And if in spite of this you will not listen to me, then I will discipline you again sevenfold for your sins, 19 and I will break the pride of your power, and I will make your heavens like iron and your earth like bronze. 20 And your strength shall be spent in vain, for your land shall not yield its increase, and the trees of the land shall not yield their fruit. 21 “Then if you walk contrary to me and will not listen to me, I will continue striking you, sevenfold for your sins. 22 And I will let loose the wild beasts against you, which shall bereave you of your children and destroy your livestock and make you few in number, so that your roads shall be deserted. 23 “And if by this discipline you are not turned to me but walk contrary to me, 24 then I also will walk contrary to you, and I myself will strike you sevenfold for your sins. 25 And I will bring a sword upon you, that shall execute vengeance for the covenant. And if you gather within your cities, I will send pestilence among you, and you shall be delivered into the hand of the enemy. 26 When I break your supply of bread, ten women shall bake your bread in a single oven and shall dole out your bread again by weight, and you shall eat and not be satisfied. 27 “But if in spite of this you will not listen to me, but walk contrary to me, 28 then I will walk contrary to you in fury, and I myself will discipline you sevenfold for your sins. 29 You shall eat the flesh of your sons, and you shall eat the flesh of your daughters. 30 And I will destroy your high places and cut down your incense altars and cast your dead bodies upon the dead bodies of your idols, and my soul will abhor you. 31 And I will lay your cities waste and will make your sanctuaries desolate, and I will not smell your pleasing aromas. 32 And I myself will devastate the land, so that your enemies who settle in it shall be appalled at it. 33 And I will scatter you among the nations, and I will unsheathe the sword after you, and your land shall be a desolation, and your cities shall be a waste. 34 “Then the land shall enjoy its Sabbaths as long as it lies desolate, while you are in your enemies' land; then the land shall rest, and enjoy its Sabbaths. 35 As long as it lies desolate it shall have rest, the rest that it did not have on your Sabbaths when you were dwelling in it.” And by the way, that's a prophecy about the fact that the Jews never did give the land rest appropriately. And so when they went into exile in the Babylonian Empire it was the number of years that they owed the land rest. “36 And as for those of you who are left, I will send faintness into their hearts in the lands of their enemies. The sound of a driven leaf shall put them to flight, and they shall flee as one flees from the sword, and they shall fall when none pursues. 37 They shall stumble over one another, as if to escape a sword, though none pursues. And you shall have no power to stand before your enemies. 38 And you shall perish among the nations, and the land of your enemies shall eat you up. 39 And those of you who are left shall rot away in your enemies' lands because of their iniquity, and also because of the iniquities of their fathers they shall rot away like them. 40 “But if they confess their iniquity and the iniquity of their fathers in their treachery that they committed against me, and also in walking contrary to me, 41 so that I walked contrary to them and brought them into the land of their enemies—if then their uncircumcised heart is humbled and they make amends for their iniquity, 42 then I will remember my covenant with Jacob, and I will remember my covenant with Isaac and my covenant with Abraham, and I will remember the land. 43 But the land shall be abandoned by them and enjoy its Sabbaths while it lies desolate without them, and they shall make amends for their iniquity, because they spurned my rules and their soul abhorred my statutes. 44 Yet for all that, when they are in the land of their enemies, I will not spurn them, neither will I abhor them so as to destroy them utterly and break my covenant with them, for I am the Lord their God. 45 But I will for their sake remember the covenant with their forefathers, whom I brought out of the land of Egypt in the sight of the nations, that I might be their God: I am the LORD.” 46 These are the statutes and rules and laws that the LORD made between himself and the people of Israel through Moses on Mount Sinai.” And then we finally come to the last chapter of Leviticus which is about up on the screen. Chapter 27 Outline  Vows and dedications to the Lord Vows and dedications to the Lord. The LORD spoke to Moses, saying, 2 “Speak to the people of Israel and say to them, If anyone makes a special vow to the LORD involving the valuation of persons,” I'm going to stop there in the middle of a sentence because we need to ask what's going on. The Lord is giving specific directions here concerning vows, but what you need to understand and keep in mind, a vow, was not required by the Lord. God did not command them to make vows. This was done freely by the individual as a gift to the Lord. And they could vow anything. You could vow your land to the Lord for a period of time. You could vow your animals. You could vow your children. You could vow yourself. And I give myself to the Lord for this period of time. All right. Here what the Lord is doing in verse 2 when He says, “If anyone makes a special vow to the LORD involving the valuation of persons,” He's going to talk to them here about the value that would be required if that person was going to be redeemed from that vow. Okay. In other words I gave my child as a vow or I gave my land as a vow, and then I wanted to redeem it back. Right? This is the price and that's what they're going to be talking about. It says, “then the valuation (verse 3) of a male from twenty years old up to sixty years old shall be fifty shekels of silver, according to the shekel of the sanctuary. 4 If the person is a female, the valuation shall be thirty shekels. 5 If the person is from five years old up to twenty years old, the valuation shall be for a male twenty shekels, and for a female ten shekels.” Again, this is for the redemption. “6 If the person is from a month old up to five years old, the valuation shall be for a male five shekels of silver, and for a female the valuation shall be three shekels of silver. 7 And if the person is sixty years old or over, then the valuation for a male shall be fifteen shekels, and for a female ten shekels. 8 And if someone is too poor to pay the valuation, then he shall be made to stand before the priest, and the priest shall value him; the priest shall value him according to what the vower can afford. 9 “If the vow is an animal that may be offered as an offering to the Lord, all of it that he gives to the Lord is holy. 10 He shall not exchange it or make a substitute for it, good for bad, or bad for good; and if he does in fact substitute one animal for another, then both it and the substitute shall be holy. 11 And if it is any unclean animal that may not be offered as an offering to the LORD, (those could be vowed) then he shall stand the animal before the priest, 12 and the priest shall value it as either good or bad; as the priest values it, so it shall be. 13 But if he wishes to redeem it, he shall add a fifth to the valuation. 14 “When a man dedicates his house as a holy gift to the LORD, the priest shall value it as either good or bad; as the priest values it, so it shall stand.” How do you like that? The priest even gives real estate appraisals. They gave appraisals for real estate. “15 And if the donor wishes to redeem his house, (in other words, buy it back) he shall add a fifth to the valuation price, and it shall be his. 16 “If a man dedicates to the LORD part of the land that is his possession, then the valuation shall be in proportion to its seed. (in other words, the amount of seed required to plant up the land) A homer of barley seed shall be valued at fifty shekels of silver. 17 If he dedicates his field from the year of jubilee, the valuation shall stand, 18 but if he dedicates his field after the jubilee, then the priest shall calculate the price according to the years that remain until the year of jubilee, and a deduction shall be made from the valuation. 19 And if he who dedicates the field wishes to redeem it, then he shall add a fifth to its valuation price, and it shall remain his. 20 But if he does not wish to redeem the field, or if he has sold the field to another man, it shall not be redeemed anymore. 21 But the field, when it is released in the jubilee, shall be a holy gift to the Lord, like a field that has been devoted. The priest shall be in possession of it.” In other words, they're given to the priests of the Lord and it no longer belongs to any of the other people who previously owned it. “22 If he dedicates to the LORD a field that he has bought, which is not a part of his possession, (in other words, not part of his tribal allotment) 23 then the priest shall calculate the amount of the valuation for it up to the year of jubilee, and the man shall give the valuation on that day as a holy gift to the LORD. 24 In the year of jubilee the field shall return to him from whom it was bought, to whom the land belongs as a possession. 25 Every valuation shall be according to the shekel of the sanctuary: twenty gerahs shall make a shekel. 26 “But a firstborn of animals, which as a firstborn belongs to the LORD, no man may dedicate; whether ox or sheep, (can’t do that, cause) it is the LORD's. 27 And if it is an unclean animal, then he shall buy it back at the valuation, and add a fifth to it; or, if it is not redeemed, it shall be sold at the valuation.” Now, verse 28 needs to be read carefully. It says, “But no devoted thing that a man devotes to the LORD, of anything that he has, whether man or beast, or of his inherited field, shall be sold or redeemed; every devoted thing is most holy to the LORD.” Stop there for a minute. Let me explain what devoted thing means. The words there in the ESV really don't tell you. The words devoted thing, it's a single Hebrew word that refers to things devoted irrevocably over to the Lord. In the Hebrew it's, Herem. And some, if something was Herem, it was devoted to God. And it was even used of things that were devoted to destruction, right? Like the cities of the Canaanites were given over to destruction. And so we're going to see that it can also refer to a person who is devoted to destruction because of something they've done or whatever. And that's why He says here in verse 29, “No one devoted, who is to be (Herem) devoted for destruction from mankind, shall be ransomed; he shall surely be put to death.” In other words, if there was a capital offense that caused him to be devoted for destruction, there's no redemption. You can't redeem him back with money or anything like that. Verse 30, “Every tithe of the land, whether of the seed of the land or of the fruit of the trees, is the LORD's; (belongs to the Lord) it is holy to the LORD. 31 If a man wishes to redeem some of his tithe, he shall add a fifth to it. 32 And every tithe of herds and flocks, every tenth animal of all that pass under the herdsman's staff, (that’s the way they counted them) shall be holy to the LORD. 33 One shall not differentiate between good or bad, neither shall he make a substitute for it; and if he does substitute for it, then both it and the substitute shall be holy; it shall not be redeemed.” 34 These are the commandments that the LORD commanded Moses for the people of Israel on Mount Sinai.” And with that, we complete Leviticus so now you can be a priest. Nah, I'm just kidding. Anyway, you at least know more about what that all involved. Let's pray. Father, we thank You for Your Word. We thank You, Lord, for all Your Word. And even though the Book of Leviticus is challenging at times to read, and even though the Book of Leviticus doesn't contain the same devotional content that we like to gravitate to because it calms our hearts and gives us peace still, Lord, this is Your Word. It is the inspired and authoritative Word of God. And even though it speaks of covenant regulations that we ourselves are not bound to, we see many principles and many biblical concepts and ideas that remain true. And that speak of the things concerning our own lives and our walk with the Lord. And so Father, we thank You for this study and we praise you for preserving Your Word all of these years so that we might lay hold of it, so that we might study it, and that we might be nourished from it. Thank You, Lord. We thank You and praise You. We rejoice in You in the name of our Savior, Jesus Christ, amen. Amen.