Leviticus Chapters 25-27

The Year of Jubilee - This is so incredible and progressive that it could only have been instituted by God. God put the year of Jubilee in place so that none of His people could ever be caught in a perpetual cycle of poverty and servitude. Every 50 years, people who were deeply in debt or serving out of poverty, were given a chance to break free of that cycle...to start over...to be reunited wit their land and their tribes. It is such a beautiful and merciful concept. Thin about this in contrast to credit card companies who set monthly payments at a level that does not even cover interest, so the people in debt can rarely break out of the cycle of debt. You can see the heart of God coming through in these commands...you can see that God wants His people to care more about healthy community that fat bank accounts. We could learn a lot as a country from these concepts. The year of Jubilee was also a reminder to the Israelite people that the land was God's anyway...nobody was allowed controlling ownership of God's land...nobody was given unfair advantage.

25:36 - God was calling His people to take care of one another. If a brother was in trouble financially and could not feed his family, other Israelites were supposed to step in beside him and offer hope and help. They would help each other get back on their feet and not charge interest to the help given. Why no interest? Because interest is about making a profit, not helping a brother get back on his feet. God wouldn't allow interest, because it would create a system of slavery where one Israelite basically owned another Israelite through crippling debt. That's not a picture of God's heart. God steps in and helps people who don't deserve it...knowing they will never be able to pay Him back!

26:13 - I love this phrase! God is referring o the Egyptian captivity and how He saved the Israelites through the Exodus, but it speaks to my journey with God as well. Picture the crippling weight of sin weighing on our lives, forcing us to shamble bent backed and broken through this life...ashamed of our failure...twisted and sinful. Then God breaks the yoke of sin and death and we are given the chance to stand proud as men and women made righteous by God. We can walk tall!

26:23 - Hard times and discipline come from God to bring us back to Him - it is all about love. I don't like punishing my kids, but I love them, so I want them to learn how to live as godly men and women. God allows punishment to drive us back to Him, because He loves us so deeply.

26:30 - Such intense language! How many people int he history of man have sacrificed their lives for meaningless junk! And where do they end up...dead in a coffin, as useless as the dead bodies of the idols they worshipped in life. That is heartbreaking!

27:2 - A super intense vow to God sometimes involved giving a child or family member into the service of the temple (Like the story of Hannah and Samuel - we'll get to that in a few months). But let me ask you something, if all the Israelites started making these intense vows to God, what would the priests be able to do with all theses new workers? There wouldn't be enough work to go around, so God institutes a system of values for workers that could be paid instead of literally giving the person to the service of the temple. That's what all those values listed are all about.

It does beg the question though, what is the value of a human life? How can God put prices on people? A.) Well, He is not really putting prices on their lives as much as He is putting a price on their ability to do hard labor - that is why the men are worth more (Although, on mission trips, I have routinely seen young ladies outwork young men!). B.) What is the value of human life? Numbers 35:51 says that no one can pay ransom for the freedom of a person who has murdered, which means that human life is absolutely priceless to God. A murderer cannot walk free because they have taken life and there is nothing that can repay that. C.) Psalm 49:7-9 says that no one can ransom a life...there is no payment that could ever be enough to compensate for the life of a human being. That's how God feels about human life...He looks at it as priceless. In fact, He was willing to die Himself to save us if you can recall!