Leviticus 5

After so many years of reading the Bible, it seems strange to be redicovering it now, but there it is. I am becoming increasingly aware of the call to dwell in the Living Word and let God speak to me and change me through it. Even the old statutes which I struggled to read the first time through the Bible, now speak of relevant and serious commands from God, Leviticus being a particularly striking example.

The LORD said to Moses: "If anyone sins and is unfaithful to the LORD by deceiving his neighbor about something entrusted to him or left in his care or stolen, or if he cheats him, or if he finds lost property and lies about it, or if he swears falsely, or if he commits any such sin that people may do; when he thus sins and becomes guilty, he must return what he has stolen or taken by extortion, or what was entrusted to him, or the lost property he found, or whatever it was he swore falsely about.

God is very concerned with how we treat each other, and speaks to this as seriously as the more obviously "religious" commands. Any speech to another person is taken as seriously as a vow to God! How amazing would it be if all Christians could be so trustworthy! This sense of trustworthiness is extended also to found items and property held in trust or borrowed, which I have observed that most people would not feel so stringently about returning. God tells us the opposite of "finders-keepers", and I wonder if this should be taken to refer to all games of chance and opportunity? Gambling would seem to me to be against the spirit of only taking what you have made or earned or own - perhaps it is a kind of extortion, since one man's gain is another's loss?

If a person sins because he does not speak up when he hears a public charge to testify regarding something he has seen or learned about, he will be held responsible.

The social responsibility side is also emphasized, much more than in our society today where people generally disclaim any responsibility which is not directly ours. The responsibility to "blow the whistle" is positively discouraged in some industries (medicine is one) and the charge to publicly testify to wrongdoing is often subsumed in worries about what such speaking out might to do one's career. Witnessing to the crimes of our society is also not popular, though in some areas it is becoming more so. A Christian responsibility to stand up and make a fuss! Now that would be worth doing!