Read Leviticus 20
Background: God has been giving all sorts of instructions about how worship is to be conducted as well as how life is to be lived under the banner of "Holiness to the Lord." Included in that have been numerous prohibitions of what should by no means be done. In the last chapter we saw that for some of these infractions those who did so would be "cut off." In this chapter we get a glimpse of what that involves.
Key Verses: 1 The Lord spoke to Moses, saying, 2 “Say to the people of Israel, Any one of the people of Israel or of the strangers who sojourn in Israel who gives any of his children to Molech shall surely be put to death. The people of the land shall stone him with stones. 3 I myself will set my face against that man and will cut him off from among his people, because he has given one of his children to Molech, to make my sanctuary unclean and to profane my holy name.
Thoughts: To be "cut off" could mean the death penalty for a number sins. Besides child sacrifice, God goes on to give more examples: turning to mediums, cursing one's parents, adultery, incest, homosexuality, beastiality. Such sins not only offended God's holiness; they destroyed the holiness of life in God's people. God then goes on to remind His people that they were not to be like the Egyptians they had just left or the Canaanites who were being displaced from the land they were going to; they were to be holy unto Him. These things do not fit with His presence.
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