Episode 3: Leviticus: The problem with 'little' sins: Chapters 4–7

Do the small sins really matter? Leviticus says yes—but it also reveals a God who graciously provides a way back. Discover why failure never gets the final word.

• Questions to Dig into over a Cup of Tea

  1. How do these chapters show God's heart towards his people and their sin?

  2. How do these chapters grow your appreciation for all that was accomplished through Christ's death and resurrection?

  3. How do these chapters challenge how we talk about sin, and forgiveness with other believers?

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• Episode Transcript

  The following is an uncorrected transcript generated by a transcription service. Before quoting in print, please check the corresponding audio for accuracy.

  Felicity: You're listening to the Two Sisters and a Cup of Tea Podcast, the Bible study podcast for everyday life. Every week we bring you 20 minutes of honest Bible conversation over tea and biscuits as we work through a book of the Bible together, discovering how God's word speaks into our everyday lives. This season we're diving into Leviticus and we're delighted you've joined us. This season has been brought to you by the generosity of our listeners. Whether you're in the UK, the USA, Australia, or Europe or Singapore, thank you to every one of you who has sacrificially partnered with us, either with a one off gift or a monthly donation to make this happen. We're so very grateful and thank God for you all.

  Sarah: Welcome to Two Sisters and a Cup of Tea. My name is Sarah. I live in London in the UK. I'm with my sister Felicity, who lives in Illinois in the USA. And today we're jumping into Leviticus chapters four to seven. We're thinking about sin, being cleansed from sin. Felicity, I have my box of cleansing teas that I actually got sent free the other day, and I thought, wow, what brilliant timing to get a feel good collection. It helps my metabolism glow, cleanse, balance, and immune support. There you go. Beat that!

  Felicity: I don't think it's beatable actually. I think then that's such a niche kind of thing, isn't it? That you'd receive a book a box about cleansing teas and then think, Well, well that is exactly what I need all the more so because I'm in Leviticus. Yeah. Who could I you know that

  Sarah: I nearly email Twinings going, Did you know we couldn't be more well timed? But I thought, No.

  Felicity: Excellent. I mean are are they even nice though? You know. Cleansing I mean my cleansing teeth doesn't sound like it's gonna be that pleasurable.

  Sarah: Yes, it's got a little bit too much like cucumber going on for a tea bag for me. And nettles are in here as well. So yeah.

  Felicity: Interesting. Okay. Okay, so Sarah, last time we had a little brief conversation about AI and just whether we were choosing to use that or not as we get into this slightly hard and unfamiliar book. So we have been doing some thinking about it as a team and and talking about where AI fits into life from a bigger point biblical point of view. Why is it that we're bothering to engage with this kind of AI debate? Obviously it it's everywhere at the moment and so we've chosen to kind of go there. Why are we beginning to think it through and consider where it sits in relation to us and the podcast and all these things?

  Sarah: Because it is everywhere, isn't it? And everyone's talking about it and it's becoming increasingly part of everyday life. I can't go onto a search engine without AI giving me a summary or its answer first. and actually that that in itself it's I just think it's such a temptation to do that not only with kind of mundane kind of chores through life, but actually with the deep hard stuff and so we need to go there, we need to talk about it. And where we've particularly been focusing our chats about it as a team is on the reality that as we read the Bible, as we study it, as we seek to dig deep into it, the Lord is forming us as we do that. That it's not just where we end up at the end of a study and the answer that we may have to a particular question. But it's the journey along the way. What he's doing as his word, his living word, is at work in our hearts through the dissonance, through the questions, through the challenge of not knowing, but I'm gonna keep praying. We don't want to shortcut the Holy Spirit's work, is what we're saying. and so we have had some really fruitful, helpful conversations as a team on this, and we're continuing to talk about it. And we want our listeners to be those who are thinking deeply about it because it actually really is an important thing when we come to opening the Bible and letting God speak rather than letting an AI give you a summary.

  Felicity: Yeah, and I think I absolutely and in that, kind of contained with that, is is a question about trust, isn't it? So as we are receivers, consumers of whatever is being presented, whether it's through a podcast like this or an article, whatever it may be, just just like the trust level is important, isn't it? We want you to know as our listeners that we are wrestling with God's word and a and and praying and trusting that He is shaping us through that. We're not going for the AI summaries, but also as our listeners and us are consumers of things in the world, like that level of discernment that actually an AI bot is not is not concerned for your well being, your spiritual well being in the ways that a pastor would be or someone who's who's kind of really eager to be like Jesus in how they're presenting these things. And so it's just it's just things it's kind of like a spur to just kind of think about it a little bit, isn't it? And to consider. All right. I'm gonna read. Leviticus four. We're gonna read two chunks, not all three chapters, but two chunks. We've got Leviticus four, verses one through twenty-one, and then we're gonna flip over to chapter seven and read twenty-eight through thirty-eight. So, Leviticus four, one through twenty-one. 

  The Lord said to Moses, Say to the Israelites, when anyone sins unintentionally and does what is forbidden in any of the Lord's commands. If the anointed priest sins, bringing guilt on the people, he must bring to the Lord a young bull without defect as a sin offering, for the sin he has committed. He is to present the bull at the entrance to the tent of meeting before the Lord. He is to lay his hand on its head and slaughter it there before the Lord. Then the anointed priest shall take some of the bull's blood and carry it into the tent of meeting. He is to dip his finger into the blood and sprinkle some of it seven times before the Lord, in front of the curtain of the sanctuary. The priest shall then put some of the blood on the horns of the altar of fragrant incense that is before the Lord in the tent of meeting. The rest of the bull's blood he shall pour out of the base of the altar of burnt offering at the entrance to the tent of meeting. He shall remove all the fat from the bull of the sin offering, all the fat that is connected to the internal organs, both kidneys with the fat on them near the loins, and the long lobe of the liver, which he will remove with the kidneys, just as the fat is removed from the ark sacrificed in a fellowship offering. Then the priest shall burn them on the altar of burnt offering. But the hide of the bull and all its flesh, as well as the head and legs, the internal organs and the intestines, that is, all the rest of the bull, he must take outside the camp to a place ceremonially clean, where the ashes are thrown, and burn it there in a wood fire on the ash heap. If the whole Israelite community sins unintentionally and does what is forbidden in any end of the Lord's commands, even though the community is unaware of the matter, when they realise their guilt and the sin they committed becomes known, the assembly must bring a young bull as a sin offering and present it before the tent of meeting. The elders of the community are to lay their hands on the bull's head before the Lord, and the bull shall be slaughtered before the Lord. Then the anointed priest is to take some of the bull's blood into the tent of meeting. He shall dip his finger into the blood, sprinkle it before the Lord seven times in front of the curtain. He is to put some of the blood on the horns of the altar, that is before the Lord in the tent of meeting. The rest of the blood he shall pour out at the base of the altar of the burnt offering at the set entrance to the tent of meeting. He shall remove all the fat from it and burn it on the altar, and do with this bull just as he did with the bull for the sin offering. In this way, the priest will make atonement for the community, and they will be forgiven. Then he shall take the bull outside the camp and burn it as he burned the first bull. This is the sin offering for the community. 

  Chapter seven, verse twenty-eight through thirty eight. 

  The Lord said to Moses, Say to the Israelites Anyone who brings a fellowship offering to the Lord is to bring part of it as their sacrifice to the Lord. With their own hands they are to present the food offering to the Lord. They are to bring the fat together with the breast, and wave the breast before the Lord as a wave offering. The priest shall burn the fat on the altar, but the breast belongs to Aaron and his sons. You are to give the right thigh of your fellowship offerings to the priest as a contribution. The son of Aaron, who offers the blood and the fat of the fellowship offering, shall have the right thigh as his share. From the fellowship offering of the Israelites, I have taken the breast that is waved, and the thigh that is presented, and have given them to Aaron, the priest and his sons, as their perpetual share. From the Israelites. This is the portion of the food offering presented to the Lord that were allotted that were allotted to Aaron and his sons on the day they were presented to serve the Lord as priests. On the day they were anointed, the Lord commanded that the Israelites give this to them as their perpetual share for the generations to come. These then are the regulations for the burnt offering, the grain offering, the sin offering, the guilt offering, the ordination offering, and the fellowship offering, which the Lord gave Moses at Mount Sinai in the desert of Sinai on the day he commanded the Israelites to bring their offerings to the Lord.

  Sarah: Brilliant. Thank you, Felicity. So we've had kind of the bookends of those chapters. There's lots in between them, but the defining kind of one of the defining themes through those chapters is that the Lord provides a way, that He provides a way for sin to be dealt with, doesn't he? that sin doesn't have the final word. Grace does, because the Lord knows that his people are sinners and he gives them a way. yeah, he gives them a way.

  Felicity: Isn't that isn't that just amazing? Because if you were God, if I was God, I probably just wouldn't bother. Like bunch of sinners throw them on the ash heap rather than actually all this provision and all this protection. And I love how there's so many different facets of sin that is covered here. You know, there's the unintentional, the intentional, that which we didn't realise we were doing and that's which we did realise we were doing. There's whether you're you're the sin of a mission that you didn't say what was happening or like there's so there's so much going on here and in that there's just an enormous amount of protection and provision and this pursuit that God is in of his people for relationship is really evident here.

  Sarah: Yes. And as you say, protection, because he is a holy God dwelling in their midst. Holiness and sin cannot dwell together. And so he is protecting them by guarding them and giving them away and for them to be able to draw near, for them to be able to come to the tent of meeting where he wants to meet with his people. So the first sacrifice that you were reading of, that was for the high priest when he unintentionally sins and then we get one for the whole community and it's again it's a similar to what we saw last time, like the laying the hands on that kind of whole kind of identifying with the animal as you come. We've got the whole community. We then got any member as well further along in chapter four. As you say, we've got sins of omission in chapter five, and we've got sins towards the Lord's holy things, and unintentionally sinning against the Lord's commands or being unfaithful to the Lord, deceiving others. There's loads of different different ways that sin is provided for, as you say, and guarded against here. And I just think that kind of that thread of grace that kind of binds this all together is just is really, really beautiful.

  Felicity: It's a beautiful, it's a beautiful thing, isn't it? Absolutely. And I think though, what we do see as well is the responsibility of the people. Whether you're a priest or just an ordinary person, we the people are responsible for our sin, whether it be intentional or unintentional. And that I love I love that leaning on, like the laying on of the hand that that we would be able to pass on. But in our own action, there's definitely lots of people involved here, aren't there? There is the priestly situation, this mediator, and we're going hear more about that in the in the following chapters. But but even though there's a priest who's doing a lot of this sacrificial work, actually there's there's clear responsibility for the sin for all the people. The whole community is bearing the weight of their sin and need these means by which they might lean on these sacrificial animals and put and pass it on, like give it on to them.

  Sarah: Yes. And the repetition that comes the way all the way through, atonement atonement will be made and they will be forgiven. Atonement will be made and they will be forgiven. And I think what struck me as I was reading this through again and again, just that the forgiveness is is by faith, isn't it? They have faith in the sacrifice that because it's they're doing it as the Lord commands and by faith they will be forgiven as they identify with this sacrifice being burnt on their behalf and that's yeah, that's just good. That's a good pointer, isn't it, towards the Lord Jesus, but just kind of a reminder that it is by faith in the Lord's word and in his commands. This is different this is different to the first three chapters, isn't it? So the first three chapters as we've said last week, that that was a kind of voluntary invitation to give and to sacrifice an overflow of their thankful hearts. Here it's a you must, isn't it? You must come and you must deal with the sin in your community. Whether you know about it or not, whether you think you know exactly what's been going on or not, there's provision for it all, but you must come.

  Felicity: Yes. And and in that, as we begin to think how it takes us through to Jesus, I mean, this is our problem as well. We must have a solution for our sin. And what what an amazing provision, a a better than provision, a kind of all sufficient provision, purifying provision we have in Jesus. So 1 John chapter 1, 7 through to really chapter 2, you get just this sense: the blood of Jesus purifies us from all sin. And again, in Romans, you hear the law was powerless to do it. It was weakened by the flesh. God, this is Romans 8, verse 3. God did by sending his own son in the likeness of sinful flesh to be a sin offering. And all of this as we see the seriousness of sin, the pervasive nature of sin, the necessity of sin being dealt with in order for us to live, and then we see Jesus. And wow, wow. The wow, I feel like the wow of seeing the provision here of a means by which sin can be dealt with in the Leviticus times that wow is is only exponentially increased as we see the blood of Jesus.

  Sarah: Yes. And that every sin is covered. Every sin, whether we know it, whether we don't know it, unintentional, intentional, every corner of our sinful lives is wholly covered by his blood. And that it's all initiated by God. It's and that we can't bring anything, can we? And it's at no cost to ourselves. Holy cost to the Lord who gave of himself and I love that as you were referencing that bit in one John because I love the I love the beginning of that when it says “if we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. But if we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.” And I I love that because it just helps me to remember that I have real freedom and safety to confess my sin. I can do it because I'm safe in Jesus. And actually, if I start denying that there's sin in my heart, that's a dangerous space to be. And Leviticus 4 through 7 says, Don't don't do that. Like confess it, come to the Lord with it. I've made provision for you to do that. And I think that just has been really I've been encouraged to confess my sin more because I know I've got such safety in the Lord Jesus to do so.

  Felicity: I mean, that is a profound element of the Christian life, isn't it? That that we would know that we are free to confess our sin, that we're free to say, yeah, I've I've deliberately sinned, I've I've unintentionally sinned. Like that I don't think you can underplay that in a way. But also then the kind of the flip side of that is if we don't do that then how that kind of infiltrates and that begins to take root and fester and and grow. And that's like we see warning of that throughout scripture, and I know that to be true in my own life as well. And so this very I love, I love that as we're hearing this in Leviticus, we're seeing God's heart towards his people. And that as I see it in Leviticus and love that the people were able to trust God back then. I'm all the more persuaded that I can trust him, that he really does want to forgive my sin. I 'cause I think that's sometimes a hard thing to really believe, like especially our repetitive nature of sin. Like I've done it again. And he is still this God who provides a way.

  Sarah: And he still wants to draw near and he still wants to meet with us and he still encourages us to come with us into the foot of the cross. And I think that just that as you say, we're seeing the heart of God in this, which I just don't think I expected to see in the three three, four chapters about sacrifice in such detail about the sacrifices. There's that famous quote, isn't there, by John Owen, and he says, Be killing sin, or it will kill you and I think these chapters kind of just help us to kind of flesh that out, don't they? Because God is wholly serious about sin and we need to be serious about killing the sin in our lives. We saw in Ephesians last season put off the old self, put to death sin in us, and put on the new self. And this is an encouragement to do that, isn't it? Because we we get kind of taken forward to the most costly sacrifice given to take all our sin. It's all been done. It is finished. It is wholly finished with those words that Jesus cries on the cross. So we can come and we can celebrate and we can rejoice. And that's just really good for our hearts, isn't it? To kind of land there.

  Felicity: I wonder if there's just a as we see this and we're struck by it and we're just profoundly moved really by this heart of God, and as we think about the communal nature of what's described in Leviticus, like how these people gather together to do this, that is that is then I think a right and a good thing for us. It's okay for me to confess my sin, not just to God, but actually to others in front of it. Like these people who my brothers and sisters in Christ are walking along with me, and we can point one another to the forgiveness of Jesus. I don't have to hide away and I'm the sinner here, no one else is. But actually, this is true of everyone. And I just I think that's a really just that's just a really helpful thing to remember because it's really tempting to hide away when you're feeling like it's all gone really wrong and but this like everything we've read in Leviticus so far, chapter one through to where we are now, is very public. There's no kind of like, you sinners go over here, you perfect people over here. I know, yeah, exactly. why are you bringing a sacrifice? yeah, 'cause I'm a sinner. right, okay, yeah, right.

  Sarah: Yes, it really is. You can't hide you can't hide your bull, can you? And also it's the priest's role. Yeah. Yeah. But that's the whole priestly role. We're seeing that at the end. Like the priests are serving the people at the end of chapter seven. Like that's their role. That's who what they're there for. Like so do it. Come, because he's beckoning us to come and we can. And as you say, that's so valuable that point about just actually it's not as though we're confessing each and every sin to the people in our Bible study group, but we are just having a posture of honesty and vulnerability and saying, I'm really wrestling with my sin. Please pray for me and please point me to the Lord Jesus because I'm struggling in it. And that is a good and right kind of posture to have, isn't it?

  Felicity: Yeah, absolutely. Sarah, why don't you pray for us as we do that? Seek to have that posture amongst others.

  Sarah: Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we praise you that we can draw near to you by the blood of Jesus. Lord, that we can freely confess our sin and we have freedom to do that, safety to do that, because everything has been dealt with in Christ. As He said those words on that cross, it is finished. And we just pray, Lord, please would we believe those words? And so would we come, knowing that you long for us to come. Lord, knowing that you are rich in mercy, Lord, that your heart goes out towards us in our sin and you beckon us to come. So we pray, please help us. Please help us in our local gatherings as we as we talk about sin, as we think about it, as we just are honest with one another, please do that work of helping us to keep encouraging each other to keep our eyes fixed on Jesus. And we pray for his glory and our good. Amen.

  Felicity: Amen. Well, it's just good, good stuff, Sarah. Now we, Sarah and I obviously love to be talking about these things, but I wonder who could you be talking about these things with? We love that so many of you use the podcast to open up conversations with the Bible open and as we've just been saying, we have such freedom and safety in Christ to have these conversations about sin. Why not let's be spurring one another on, not only on Sundays, but in our everyday lives, to be putting sin to death, cherishing Christ, reminding each other of our forgiveness we have through Jesus. So, who could you be talking about with it this week? Grab a friend, get the Bible open and we will look forward to seeing you next time or we'll get we'll be getting into priestly things as we get into chapters eight through ten.

  Thank you again to our listeners for making this happen. We'll see you soon. Bye bye.

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