Leviticus 16:34 And this shall be an everlasting statute unto you, to make an atonement for the children of Israel for all their sins once a year. And he did as the LORD commanded Moses.

God gave the children of Israel a way to atone for their sins! From the very first He has been there, uninvited, giving the opportunity for salvation.

Do you remember that Adam and Eve sinned. They hid themselves. He found them. They were trying to cover their own sins. He sacrificed an animal and covered their nakedness.

Here He takes the time to explain to them a method whereby He will allow the consequences of their sin to be placed on an animal and them to have their sins atoned. They sinned. They did not deserve forgiveness or salvation but God provided.

Jesus came as the Lamb of God. He took the sins of the world upon Him. He died in our place. We do not deserve it but there God is again making a way of atonement, salvation for us!

Will you believe? Will you accept that God loves you so much that He sent Jesus to pay your sin debt?

Leviticus 14:46 Moreover he that goeth into the house all the while that it is shut up shall be unclean until the even.

God taught His people how to avoid diseases and infections way before science knew anything about it! When people have colds or the flu they will not shake hands, may stay home from church, cover their mouths when they cough or whatever. Those are good precautions but imagine this.

Moses gave detailed instructions about something that could be similar to a mold contamination in our homes today. They were to try and treat it the home. They were to scrape it, abandon it for a certain amount of time and if that didn’t work they were to destroy the house.

Even if you went in the house you were considered contaminated and to stay away from others for a certain amount of time. I am always super impressed when I read these things in the Bible.

It makes me know that the Bible is the very Word of God. How else could men have known the risks of infection and disease so long before it was discovered by science. It was 1668 before men started learning how disease spread and it would take them 200 more years to learn what God told Moses nearly 4,000 years before.

You are reading an awesome book. Read it and worship.

Leviticus 11:25 And whosoever beareth ought of the carcase of them shall wash his clothes, and be unclean until the even.

It took years for scientist to learn that touching death, or sickness contaminated them. Medical cleanliness was slow to be learned but God’s Word taught it hundreds of years before.

You read a book that has an obvious divine touch. Only God could have told men like Moses to write down things that no on knew. If you touch the carcase, dead body then you are unclean. Wash your clothes. Stay away from everyone until the next day!

I never hold the Bible without thinking to my self how great our God is and how great His Word is.

I hope you will get a case of that awe! How could a poor Jewish shepherd know the things about health that Moses knew unless God revealed it to him. It is obviously a God thing. It is God’s book.

Read it. Trust it. Believe it.

On this day in 1812

In June of 1810, Judson and his three friends came to Bradford to attend the Massachusetts General Association of Congregational Churches.  They were hoping to present themselves to the board as foreign missionaries and ask for the boards support.  During the first few days of the convention, the young men were invited, with other delegates, to the home of Mr. Hasseltine, a lead deacon at the church, for dinner.  During the night, Judson continually noticed a beautifully stunning young woman serving food.  It was truly love at first sight.  Judson’s son later recorded his parents first meeting:

  “During the sessions the ministers gathered for a dinner beneath Mr. Hasseltine’s hospitable roof. His youngest daughter, Ann, was waiting on the table. Her attention was attracted to the young student whose bold missionary projects were making such a stir. But what was her surprise to observe, as she moved about the table, that he seemed completely absorbed in his plate! Little did she dream that she had already woven her spell about his young heart, and that he was, at that very time, composing a graceful stanza in her praise!”

Soon opportunity came for Ann and Adoniram to spend time together and they began to write often back and forth.  In compliance with a hint from Miss Hasseltine, Judson wrote to her father asking his consent to the proposed union.  His letter was direct, because it had to be.  No one in America had ever gone out as a foreign missionary before.  The future was dark, uncertain, and dangerous for any man.  But for him to take a wife down such a road! So Judson, fully aware of this, writes to Ann’s father:

“I have now to ask, whether you can consent to part with your daughter early next spring to see her no more in this world; whether you can consent to her departure for a heathen land, and her subjection to the hardships and sufferings of a missionary life? whether you can consent to her exposure to the dangers of the ocean; to the fatal influence of the southern climate of India; to every kind of want and distress; to degradation, insult, persecution, and perhaps a violent death? Can you consent to all this, for the sake of Him who left his heavenly home, and died for her and for you — for the sake of perishing immortal souls — for the sake of Zion, and the glory of God? Can you consent to all this, in hope of soon meeting your daughter in the world of glory with a crown of righteousness, brightened by the acclamations of praise which shall redound to her Saviour from heathens saved, through her means, from eternal woe and despair?”

Ann’s father, in his wisdom, turned to his daughter and told her, “This is your decision.”  Her choice would create one of the most powerful missionary couples God has ever used.

Happy 200th Anniversary, Adoniram and Ann!

Source:

 Memoir of Adoniram Judson: Being a Sketch of his Life and Missionary Labors

On this day in 1858, Miles Knowlton, the Baptist missionary and author, wrote a letter to his mission society regarding his visit to the small mission work in the city of Chusan, China.

It was during his trip here that he was able to spend a lot of time with the people and he was able to develop a clear understanding of their culture and mindset.  In his letter, he talks about the obsticle that hinders many of the Chinese to come to Christ:

The gospel is, emphatically, the only hope for this poor people.  Yet, like the Jews, they are far, very far, from being to receive it. In the first place, they are too proud to give any earnest attention to anything that is not taught in their own sacred classics. These, in their estimation, contain all the truths and doctrines that man needs or can know. It is confidently believed by all that Confucius knew all that can be known from any source by man and to hint anything to the contrary to a literary man is a very grave offence. Preach repentance, Confucius taught the same and they take it for granted that he taught it much better than we red haired barbarians can. Preach morality, goodness, love, benevolence, holiness, the relative duties of life -the classics teach the same in language of surprising elegance and perfection…..

They are literally without hope and without God in the world! How sad their condition. How should the hearts of all those whose minds have been illumined by the light of life yearn over them!  The church of Christ has intrusted to it that which alone can impart to them hope, can transform their character, and fit them for endless life! The atonement of Christ lays a foundation upon which, with the aid of the Holy Spirit, the superstructure of a holy and godlike character may be reared. The gospel, Christ and Him crucified, is that which alone is adapted to meet the exigencies of this people’s case!

Source:

The Missionary Magazine (Read the full letter)

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Leviticus 10:11 And that ye may teach the children of Israel all the statutes which the LORD hath spoken unto them by the hand of Moses.

God gave His men clear instructions even here in Leviticus that they were to teach all the statutes to the people. I want to challenge each of you to realize how much teaching the Bible is important to God’s people. We want it taught with all within us, as much as possible, to all possible!

It affects the way we live. How we seek to live a holy life and so much more as we seek to get God’s truth into the hearts of His people. Make teaching the important thing that takes place in your class and pulpit!

Teach, preach, announce, make clear God’s truth to all!

On this day in 1888

While Jonathan attended Knox College in Toronto preparing to go to China, Rosalind was at the Toronto School of Art, preparing to be an artist like her father.  But Rosalind was never truly satisfied with her life.  In her own words, she described the inner struggle:

From that time, and increasingly as the years passed, there seemed to be two elements contesting within me, one for art, the other—an intense longing to serve the Master to whom I had given myself.  In the early part of 1885, when still in my twentieth year, I began to pray that if the Lord wanted me to marry, He would lead to me one wholly given up to Him and to His service. I wanted no other.

But since Rosalind never found a man, she continued on her art career.  She finished her schooling in Toronto and began preparations to go to London to further her education.  But just weeks before she left, she went to a meeting at a mission to play the organ.  Here, she found a man who had a heart, commitment, and love for the Lord: Jonathan Goforth.  For the next two years, Jonathan and Rosalind spent time together and worked together at different missions across Toronto.  In the end of October of 1887, they were married.  In February, they set sail for China.

This young couple, completely sold out to God, would see God use them in a might way.  When they arrived, they made their home in the northern Henan Province,  which was to be their home for decades to come.  They faced hardships and challenges, trials and temptations, but they continued to look to the one who sent them.  Slowly, the work grew.  But all this time, the Lord was simply molding and preparing his servants for the great task that was ahead.

By the end of his life, Jonathan was leading revival meetings all over China. Often he would preach for eight hours a day, to crowds of up to 25,000 people. Thousands of sinners experienced the saving grace of Jesus Christ, and multitudes of Christians were awakened to a more vital relationship with God. The meetings were often characterized by public confession of sin and repentance.

The Goforths were some of the greatest missionaries of their time.  But they never forgot their beginning.  They knew they were really nobodies and that it was simply the spirit of God working through them.  Whenever someone would praise the work the Goforths were doing and elevate them to a high level, Jonathan would smile and tell this little story:

Friends, if you and I take glory to ourselves which belongs only to God, we are as foolish as the woodpecker about which I shall tell you. A certain woodpecker flew up to the top of a high pine tree and gave three hard pecks on the side of the tree as woodpeckers are wont to do. At that instant a bolt of lightning struck the tree, leaving it on the ground, a heap of splinters. The woodpecker had flown to a tree nearby where it clung in terror and amazement at what had taken place. There it hung expecting more to follow, but as all remained quiet it began to chuckle to itself saying, “Well, well, well. Who would have imagined that just three pecks of my beak could have such power as that!

Source:

History Makers

Wholesome Words

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Leviticus 6:13 The fire shall ever be burning upon the altar; it shall never go out.

The fires were for the sacrifices that were being offered. They constantly burned before God and the people. God smelled a sweet smell from the sacrifices as a sign of their faith was exhibited. The people could rejoice that God heard and answered their prayers, their sins were forgiven.

Today Jesus ever lives to make intercession for us! He paid our sin debt! He is our salvation. We live, move, and have our being in Him!

I just think it is wonderful to think about how He has always made a way to get forgiveness. You can be sure your sins are forgiven. Go to Him now! Rest in what He has done. Believe and accept.

If you are saved just remember it is done not what you do! The fire never goes out!

Leviticus 1:3-4 If his offering be a burnt sacrifice of the herd, let him offer a male without blemish: he shall offer it of his own voluntary will at the door of the tabernacle of the congregation before the LORD. 4 And he shall put his hand upon the head of the burnt offering; and it shall be accepted for him to make atonement for him.

God made provision for sin! It was almost always through the death of a substitute. There are a couple of things that I would challenge you to notice this morning.

First, they offered the sacrifice of their own voluntary will! They chose to recognize that they had sinned. They chose to believe God’s method of accepting. They had to believe His Word and Him enough to do what He commanded.

Secondly, they were to lay their hands on the sacrifice. That was a way of acknowledging that their sin was on the animal. That the animal was dying in their place taking what they deserved. God had provided for them a substitute.

You today decide whether or not to believe and act on God’s revealed will. He has made it clear in the Scriptures. You must decide to believe, accept, and act on it.

You must realize that God’s plan is always that a substitute take our sins on Him and that substitute is Jesus. Do you believe that Jesus is God in human flesh? Do you believe that He carried your sin debt to the cross for you?

Those are the important questions today!

Spurgeon, C. H. (2005). Exploring the Mind and Heart of the Prince of Preachers: Five-Thousand Illustrations Selected from the Works of Charles Haddon Spurgeon (487). Oswego, IL: Fox River Press.

Exodus 40:38 For the cloud of the LORD was upon the tabernacle by day, and fire was on it by night, in the sight of all the house of Israel, throughout all their journeys.

The children of Israel had clear and obvious evidence of both the presence of God and His leadership. He sent the cloud and the pillar of fire. They were protected, warmed, directed, and given light by His presence.

Today that is not as obvious for us often. He is even more present and we have even greater promises but we can not see them with our physical eyes. We walk by faith and not by sight!

He is not present in a cloud or pillar of fire but actually has taken up residence in our hearts. He has given us His Word to direct our paths. He, personally, convicts us of sin, directs our hearts, shows us His will as He works in our hearts.

We must learn to believe in His direction and protection as much as they did. We must get into His Word to get direction. We must submit to what we know that He wants us to do!

Actually we are privileged to be in a much better spot today than the children of Israel. We have His promise that He will never leave us or forsake us! We have Him living in our hearts and always with us! We have His written Word.

Not much more you could ever ask for or desire!