Leviticus 19:14 Thou shalt not curse the deaf, nor put a stumbling block before the blind, but shalt fear thy God: I am the LORD
Your mom probably told you it was good to play nice and that you should be nice to other people. Nice is a very popular concept today. We like nice and kind people. Kind people are my kind of people. Play nice. We have shirts, coffee mugs, and all kinds of things that say, “Be nice.” I am all for being nice. I believe God is all for being nice. In fact, Leviticus 19 is largely about how we treat other people. However, who would be against being kind to other people? Even the meanest people in the world are nice to their friends.
So, the problem with being nice is that it is somewhat self-serving. Do unto others as you would have others do unto you. That is a Bible precept and is something that has generally been thought of by mankind across the globe for many, many years, However, what if I have a shirt or coffee mug that said, “Be holy”? Well, all of a sudden that is not so popular. The reason it is not popular is because when we are talking about being nice and being kind, we are talking about our relationship to other people, but when we talk about being holy, pure, or moral, all which probably need to be defined, we are talking about our relationship to God.
Leviticus is basically a brick to the modern American face, not because it is obscure, even though it is, and not because of what we don’t understand. It is a brick to the face because of what we do understand. Leviticus 19:2 says, “Speak unto the congregation of the children of Israel, and say unto them, Ye shall be holy: for I the LORD your God am holy.” In following you have thirty-seven verses of precepts, commands, and so on, and the refrain you find throughout the book is “I am the LORD your God.” In other words, the way you live tomorrow indicates who you believe God to be. If you think to yourself, “I don’t see what is wrong with…,” then you have made yourself God. If you think to yourself, “No one will know if I do this,” then you have made yourself God. If you say, “I’m not hurting anyone else by doing this,” you are making yourself God. Sin is not gauged by how many people it hurts; it is gauged by if it offends a holy God.
Let me give you three examples in Leviticus. Leviticus 19:11 says, “Ye shall not steal, neither deal falsely, neither lie one to another.” This is about my dealings with other people, but if I take God out of the equation, then it is nothing more than a social contract that has evolved over time. What Leviticus is stating is that there is a personal and timeless God who has mandated that it is wrong to lie to other people, not because of what it does to them primarily, though that is part of it, but because it is against God Himself. If I lie to someone, do they know? They won’t know I lied if I am a good liar. If I am a bad liar, then everyone knows. If I lie to someone and they don’t know I lied, have I really lied? Yes, not because they know, but because God knows.
In Leviticus 19:14 the Bible says, “Thou shalt not curse the deaf, nor put a stumbling block before the blind, but shalt fear thy God: I am the LORD.” So, it is the fear of God, not the fear of others that keeps me doing the right thing. If I were to curse someone who could not hear, would they know? No, but God would and that is why it matters. If I were to go twenty yards ahead of someone who is blind and put a stumbling block in front of them, would they see me doing it? No, but God would and that is what matters.
Verse 17 says, “Thou shalt not hate thy brother in thine heart.” If I hate my brother, that is wrong, but it is not just wrong because it produces mean actions to my brother. That is bad enough. It is wrong because it is an offense against God. If I hate a brother in my heart, will he ever know that? Possibly not, but God does and that is what matters.
Tomorrow, the way you live dictates who you believe God to be. Either you or God is God in your life. Leviticus gives us a case for the transcendent God who alters, affects, and even empowers the life that we live.