Sermon Tone Analysis

Ha-Foke Bah Hebrew

Ha-Foke Bah English

Review: We are in our series through the book of Leviticus.

This whole series I have said that “We all want a world that is good.”

A world where there is love, joy, peace and patience.

We know that our world is lacking this and so we yearn for it.

The answer starts with the world's need for God’s unrelenting love to renew and create us.

Leviticus drops us right at one of the ugliest moments in Israel’s history, the golden calf, and shows us how much God loves us, he moves from mountain-top-throne to soil-bound-tent to be with his people and heal us from sin.

Sin destroys and vandalizes.

Today: If you prioritize happiness over holiness you will create a hot mess.Most people believe the Bible teaches that “God does not want you happy.

He wants you Holy.”

False Dichotomy, bad teaching, that has done more to turn people away than singing hymns.

You are hard wired for happiness.

God takes joy and happiness in all that His hands have made.

The fruit of the Holy Spirit is “joy,” we are admonished to sing and rejoice, to be glad.

What is tragic to me is to watch people undermine their own happiness.

Who has the greatest potential to steal, hurt or kill your happiness?

Don’t you look at your spouse.

Don’t look at your children.

You need to look in the mirror.

You are the greatest threat to your own happiness.

Here is how I know it:

You bought it.

You leased it.

You dated it.

You slept with it.

You married it.

You ate it.

You drank it.

The number one reason we tragically undermine our own happiness is because we prioritize happiness over holiness.Happiness and holiness are not opposed to one another.

Happiness is a natural by-product of holiness.

Holiness seems like such a big scary religious word but it is not.

Holiness just means to be set-apart for a reason.

Like your bathrobe is set-apart for home use not going to the office.

Like your toothbrush is set-apart for your teeth and not cleaning your oven.

Holiness - in the most common sense means just to be set-apart.

Holiness, in Leviticus, is to be set-apart as an extension of God’s nature and His will to bring about love, joy, peace and justice.

I would argue that you experience greater happiness to the degree you submit to God’s holiness.

If you prioritize happiness over holiness you will experience the Law of Diminishing returns.

Definition - benefits gained become significant decreased compared to energy and resources put out.

Happiness by itself has limitations, Holiness is unlimited because its origin is in the One who is Infinite, Eternal, and Unmeasurable.

The greatest threat then to true happiness is Sin.Sin vandalizes your relationship with God, others and yourself.

Sin destroys your relationship with God, others and yourself.

Sin separates you from God and the renewed world of love, joy, peace and justice He wants to cocreate through you.Sin reprioritizes your heart.

We all know what we reach for to make ourselves “happy” when we are “unhappy.”

We all know what we to do other people for to make ourselves “happy” when we are “unhappy.”

We all know what we buy to make ourselves “happy” when we are “unhappy.”

We all know what it is like to regret making ourselves “happy.”Sin

always reprioritizes the heart and threatens what can truly make you happy.

People think that if they become “religious” they can no longer have fun.

I am sorry that is the projection some religious people have put out there.

That is just not true.

Bible: The Food Laws, actually the Birth Law, Leprosy Laws, Discharge Laws, are about One Thing, prioritizing holiness over happiness.

Transition: This ancient priestly document called Leviticus speaks directly to our prioritizing problem.

I remember about 15 years ago I was reading this section of Leviticus and thought, “What in the world is going on.”

This section called “Shemini” which means 8th because in the narrative of Aarons’ ordination that started in Chapter 8 we have completed the 7 days of rituals and now on the eight day we are supposed to be entering into Jubilee.

This is like the Genesis narrative of seven days of making the earth and on the 8th they enter into the good world.

Look at how things go down:

God’s Man starts His Ministry on 8th day

God’s Fire Consumes Sacrifices

God’s People Worship Him

Aaron’s sons offer God’s fire in a strange way

Aaron’s sons die tragically by God’s fire

Aarons must teach Israel, Even Moses, to Discern what is Holy.

Here is a bunch stuff to not eat, be Holy.

This whole section makes me feel so uncomfortable as a reader.

I felt like we started with this interesting story then it took an unexpected turn.

Like a real twist with Aaron’s boys.

Then it gets interesting when Aaron corrects Moses.

Big moment for Aaron.

I am looking for the resolution back to Jubilee and all I get are rules about food, childbirth, leprosy and icky body discharges that are called “Torot” and followed by “be holy.”

This was not good story writing.

Until you realize maybe it is great story writing.

These chapters leading to Yom Kippur and thereafter are working like the section in Lord of the Rings Book 1 when everyone meets in Riven dale to decide the fate of the ring and their a coalition is formed and terms are drawn up for a quest.

The chapters are how Aaron and future generations of Priest will teach Israel how to prioritize for holiness.

Starting in chapter 11 with the food laws we are introduced to the next five Torot.

Remember there were five Torot of sacrifices now there are five Torot of holy living:food, childbirth, leprosy, cleaning a leper, and icky body discharges.

For centuries and centuries the food laws have been at the heart of endless debate.

In the Jewish community the arguments were around degrees of Kashrut and what animals were on and off the list.

For Christians it was the abolishing of the food laws as a special designation.

People argued that the food laws were instituted for “hygienic” purposes but a thorough study of the banned foods and clean foods will prove that the “hygienic” theory has many, many holes in it.

Others argued that they were for “religious” purposes.

In other words, don’t eat the animals other peoples worship they might get the wrong idea.

But, Egypt had a Cow God and Cow was on the Menu.

Many holes in that theory.

Others sited “behavioral” reasons for the food laws.

You act like what you eat.

Most of these animals are either predators or easy prey.

That falls apart because animals like the Rhino or Horse or neither predators nor easy prey.

They are like the pig they don’t one but not the other of split the hoof or chew the cud.

Then came along a social anthropologist, Mary Douglas in 1966, who proposed another theory “dirt theory” we will call it the value theory.

She said Customs and rituals of any society are reflections of its values.

So too a society’s taxonomy of the animal world will mirror its value system.

What you eat mirrors what you value.

She said we all have “dirt.”

In other words, there is always something we consider out of place but not just out of place but contaminating.

Like, I believe placing my dinner on top of a toilet is dirt, out of place and contaminating.

If you put my dinner on a toilet, I would not eat it.

I would either remake my dinner or wait until the next evening.

Which by the way that is what happens with the dietary laws.