Out of Neutral | Grace Baptist Church

[https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/56b23a868a65e24fb5da70bb/65ec33f6-115d-4102-8575-deae14335d4b/OON+2024m11w4v2.jpg?format=1000w] I thought I had strong convictions. Maybe you do, too. What I learned was that many of my beliefs were borrowed from other people and hadn’t been tested, applied, or internalized. What I thought were convictions were loosely held ideas that wouldn’t hold up. I’ve come to recognize the cheaper substitutes to convictions that we often mistake for the real thing. As you consider them, reflect on your own beliefs and try to discern whether they’re truly rooted or just borrowed. 1. THINGS WE DON’T HAVE STRONG REASONS TO DENY Maybe it’s something you heard from your parents or picked up in a sermon. It sounded right, so you assumed that you believed it. In reality, though, you just didn’t deny it. You may not have thought deeply enough to test it against alternatives you might face. The example of the Bereans is helpful here – they took the things they heard and then personally examined them in light of Scripture “to see if these things were so” (Acts 17:11). When we skip this step, true conviction isn’t formed. 2. THINGS WE GO ALONG WITH WHEN OTHERS AROUND US DO When we’re surrounded by people who act and speak in certain ways, our tendency is to mirror them. We may not be birds, but we tend to flock together. There are certain truths that we think we believe because we like a preacher who believes them or because we attend a church that teaches them. And it’s a positive thing when your beliefs and actions are shaped by the people around you, but unless you take the time to personally own those beliefs, you’ll find them slip away when you’re in the company of people who oppose them. In Jesus’ day, John tells us, “Many even of the authorities believed in him, but for fear of the Pharisees they did not confess it” (John 12:42). If you’re a different person depending on who’s watching, you don’t have convictions, you just have opinions. 3. THINGS WE MIGHT DENY IF IT COSTS US SOMETHING TO BELIEVE THEM Jesus talked about people who are genuinely excited when they hear the good news, but he warned of the person who “has no root in himself” and so “endures for a while, and when tribulation or persecution arises on account of the word, immediately he falls away” (Matthew 13:20-21). It surprises many today to hear about individuals deconstructing their faith. We assume their enthusiasm reflected deeply held convictions, but often it didn’t. But the real test of a conviction is how it stands up to testing. Today, Christian beliefs in North America are being tested in ways that they haven’t been for a long time. It costs something to hold to biblical truth today and many are unprepared to pay the price. Jesus’ disciples faced the same challenges we do. At one point, “many of his disciples turned back and no longer walked with him” (John 6:66). When Jesus asked the twelve whether they wanted to turn back as well, Peter showed us the path to true conviction. He replied, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life, and we have believed, and have come to know, that you are the Holy One of God” (John 6:68-69). You build convictions by recognizing that the alternatives are counterfeits. Convictions are founded on “the words of eternal life.” And they form as you choose to follow “the Holy One of God” when other voices compete for your loyalty. True convictions take time, testing, and trust in Christ. May we pursue beliefs that will stand when the pressure is applied to them. In awe of Him, Paul

[https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/56b23a868a65e24fb5da70bb/69ad0642-ce2d-4dc4-93e0-4a816eb04c77/OON+2024m11w2.jpg?format=1000w] The mob hitman confessing his sins in church after another brutal killing is cliché. We instinctively know that God doesn’t forgive people so that they can go on sinning. Yet we struggle to understand the tension. We say things like “God gives you a clean slate,” and “Jesus helps you turn over a new leaf.” There’s a sense in which those statements are true, but they can also be misleading. God’s forgiveness isn’t like pressing CTRL-Z on your computer. It doesn’t erase the sin as if it never existed. The “guilt offering” or “reparation offering” in Leviticus helps to clarify the tension. A SACRIFICE THAT WAS ALL ABOUT MAKING THINGS RIGHT Each offering in Leviticus taught God’s people something different about the nature of sin and forgiveness. Despite the name, the purpose of the “guilt offering” wasn’t to make people feel guilty. It taught people about the debt of sin and the restitution required of His people. It dealt with sins like financial corruption (Leviticus 6:2), theft, and oppression (Leviticus 6:3). When the person became convinced of their wrong, they wouldn’t just confess it to the priest. And they didn’t just offer a sacrifice to God. They were to first go to the person whom they had wronged and restore to them whatever they had cheated them of. In fact, the law required that the person “restore it in full and shall add a fifth to it, and give it to him to whom it belongs on the day he realizes his guilt” (Leviticus 6:5). It was only then that he was to bring his sacrifice to the Lord and receive God’s forgiveness. NEW TESTAMENT ECHOES OF THE GUILT OFFERING Hundreds of years of guilt offerings shaped the conscience of the Jewish people. So, it’s not surprising that when someone like Zacchaeus who had extorted people’s money as a tax collector responded to Jesus’ message, his first instinct was to try to make things right. He immediately vowed to give half of his possessions to the poor and pay back four times the amount of anyone whom he had cheated (Luke 19:8). Similarly, John the Baptist called people to “bear fruit in keeping with repentance” (Matthew 3:8) and the Apostle Paul told people to perform “deeds in keeping with their repentance” (Acts 26:20). It’s not that you have to earn your forgiveness, but you do need to make things right. A CLEAN SLATE? When you put your faith in Jesus, you’re not only completely forgiven by God but also credited with the righteousness of Christ (Philippians 3:9). And there’s nothing extra we have to do to earn it. But while our slate with God is wiped clean that doesn’t change the fact that there are people we may have hurt, wrongs we may have left undone, and things that we need to make right. A murderer can be forgiven by God but still need to go to jail. In my case, I tried to list the people I felt I owed something to. I thought of something I had broken but never replaced and sent money and an apology. I thought of someone I had hurt deeply with my words and called to express my remorse. I wasn’t trying to earn God’s forgiveness or add to my salvation, but what Jesus did in making things right between me and God taught me that I needed to take measures to make things right between me and the people I had offended. The guilt offering reminds me of that. Is there anyone you need to make things right with? Any wrongs you’ve left undone? God’s grace gives us the courage to face our sins rather than deny them. It offers us a new start with Him, but part of the new start involves taking responsibility for the people we’ve hurt. May God give you help as you do. In awe of Him, Paul

[https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/56b23a868a65e24fb5da70bb/7f2f219d-a672-4c06-9985-589c2a49d5a2/OON+2024m11w1.jpg?format=1000w] The hippie movement of the 1960s sought peace through drugs. Celebrities like Julia Roberts seek it through yoga and meditation, while Richard Gere looks for it in Tibetan Buddhism. Stress at work, problems with kids, and our mental health push us to look for peace in different ways. But the instructions for the Peace Offering in the Book of Leviticus give us a unique insight into how God intends for us to experience lasting peace. 1. TO KNOW PEACE, YOU NEED TO END THE WAR The Peace Offering in Leviticus 3 begins similarly to the Burnt Offering in Leviticus 1. The worshipper would offer an animal as a substitute sacrifice – an action that points back to the Garden of Eden. It was in the Garden that we lost our peace, and so we can’t reclaim it without addressing what happened there. Sin destroyed the peace we enjoyed with God, each other, and our conscience, so God uses the sacrifice to point to His means of resolving that problem. The sacrifice of the Peace Offering teaches us that you can’t find peace without dealing with your sin. If you’re at war with God, your neighbour, or your brother, no amount of meditation is going to make it easier to sleep at night. To know peace, you need to end the war – at least as far as it depends on you. The sacrifice that begins the Peace Offering points to Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross. As Romans 5:1 says, “We have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.” 2. TO KNOW PEACE, YOU NEED TIME IN GOD’S PRESENCE Some people have confessed their sins and made peace with God through faith in Jesus, but they still struggle to feel that peace. That’s where the Peace Offering is so helpful. The Peace Offering was prepared as a meal. It describes it as “a food offering to the LORD” (Leviticus 3:3) and details which part of the offering is for God. Specifically, God gets the fat which is the juiciest, tastiest part of the animal. Imagine setting aside the best cut of marbled Kobe beef for God as a way of expressing your love to Him. To know peace, you don’t just need to end the war, you spend time in God’s presence expressing to Him what He means to you. Separation from Him robbed us of the peace we crave, and so drawing close to Him fuels that peace and deepens our experience of it. 3. TO KNOW PEACE, YOU NEED TO CELEBRATE IT WITH OTHERS The unique thing about the Peace Offering was that it was enjoyed in the context of a group meal – a kind of “shalom party.” Leviticus 7:11-13 describes various kinds of breads that were included in the offering, all meant to be shared. These were eaten, along with the sacrifice, in God’s presence. And there were instructions to eat everything right away – leftovers weren’t allowed (Leviticus 7:15). This is unusual since an adult sheep could feed 40 to 50 people. Since eating meat was relatively rare in ancient Israel, the temptation would be to eat a little and take the rest in a doggy bag for the trip home. By requiring it to be eaten in one sitting, it would include the worshipper gathering his relatives, neighbours, and friends. Even then, there would be leftovers, so the poor and needy would be encouraged to join in. And the worshipper would gather everyone and declare to them the wonders of a God who provides peace to people who don’t deserve it. As our culture increasingly turns to mysticism and meditation, looking within for peace, Leviticus calls us to look upward and outward – to confess, to connect, and to celebrate. May God lead you into that peace today! In awe of Him, Paul

[https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/56b23a868a65e24fb5da70bb/0db09f78-5f40-4605-b7ef-14a9683820af/OON+2024m10w5.jpg?format=1000w] The promises and principles of Scripture are comforting and directly applicable. They don’t take a lot of work to relate to. Leviticus has to be read in a different way. It’s like a manual from a different age, but it helps you to visualize scenes of devotion and worship that can help you relate to God in ways that other Scriptures don’t explore so clearly. The grain offering shows you how to express your love to God. AN OPPORTUNITY TO EXPRESS YOUR LOVE The grain offering usually followed the burnt offering, the substitute animal sacrifice that Christians are more familiar with. The worshipper has just offered a lamb from his flock and felt the forgiveness and acceptance of God. He feels clean inside and at peace with the Lord. He’s moved to respond. He wants to communicate to God something of what he feels inside. With the grain offering, God suggests that he bake a cake. The grain offering is essentially an offering of cake. It became a personal way of saying, “Thank you.” BRING A GIFT WITH SOME PERSONALITY There was a lot of variety with this particular gift. It was possible to just bring flour and pour oil and frankincense on it (Leviticus 2:1), but often it was baked in an oven (Leviticus 2:4), fried in a pan (Leviticus 2:7), or cooked on a griddle (Leviticus 2:5) – pancakes anyone? The point was that you could bring some personality and flair to this offering. NO HYPOCRISY IN THIS RELATIONSHIP When you baked a cake for God, there was one thing you had to remember to exclude and another that you had to add. While you’d be tempted to add yeast or leaven to make it rise, God repeatedly warns not to (Leviticus 2:4, 5 11). It was often used as a symbol of sin and hypocrisy and God wanted to make it clear that He wants neither. Honey was susceptible to fermentation, so it was excluded for a similar reason (Leviticus 2:11). PRESERVE OUR RELATIONSHIP Salt, on the other hand, had to be added (Leviticus 2:13). Salt was a preservative, but ancient treaties were often symbolically salted to express a desire for the covenant to last. By adding salt to the cake, the worshipper was saying, “May you sustain this relationship forever!” BUT GOD DOESN’T EAT CAKE! What’s amazing about this offering is that God needs nothing, and He doesn’t eat cake. In His divinity, He’s never been hungry, so it’s not as if He’s craving the taste. And yet twice it says that the fragrance of this offering is “a pleasing aroma to the LORD” (Leviticus 2:2, 9). That tells me that God is pleased with my heartfelt expressions of love for Him, no matter how inadequate they might seem. If they come from a place of sincere worship and covenant relationship, they bring a smile to the heart of God. The grain offering reminds me of when I was in kindergarten. I was walking home through a field and picked some dandelions for my mother. When I got home, I handed them to her as if I had just given her a bouquet of roses. And she took great delight in them! Not because of what they were but because of what they meant. GOD INVITES US TO OFFER OUR LIVES NOT OUR CAKE Leviticus is from a different time. It teaches that responding to God’s forgiveness in tangible acts of love and devotion is appropriate. Today, instead of cake, God says to “present your bodies as a living sacrifice.” He calls this our “spiritual worship” and tells us that it’s “holy and acceptable to God” (Romans 12:1). We might not bake literal cakes for God, but we can offer Him something even more meaningful. Whether it’s taking time to care for a neighbour, setting aside extra time to pray, or giving something extra to support God’s work, these acts are like the grain offering—simple, heartfelt ways to show God our love. And He takes pleasure in them. He’s never thinking, “What did you do that for?” He sees them and notices. Take time today to offer God a piece of your life – a prayer, a kind gesture, or a word of testimony—and know that it’s a pleasing aroma to Him. In awe of Him, Paul

[https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/56b23a868a65e24fb5da70bb/98358799-74ad-43a2-858f-13a7b08238fb/OON+2024m10w4.jpg?format=1000w] In my second year of university, a roommate and I were desperate to be accepted as engineering orientation leaders. They hosted the parties, led the events, and maintained the faculty’s wild reputation. For our interviews, we drank too much and dressed in one-piece long johns and leather jackets to try and look the part. I arrived with a massive, custom-order pizza to bribe them, and my friend swallowed a live goldfish in front of them to prove his qualifications. Looking back, it seems absurd that we were willing to sacrifice so much to be accepted. Why was I so desperate for the approval of people I barely liked? It wasn’t the last time I would wear a mask to try to prove myself to someone. But surprisingly, it was a deep dive into a book that most people avoid that helped reshape my thinking in this area. THE MASKS WE WEAR AND WHY WE WEAR THEM As you begin reading Leviticus, you’re immersed in a strange world of animal sacrifices. You can’t help but wonder what’s going on. The sacrifices in Leviticus can be explained in part by a sacrifice God provides in the opening chapters of the Bible. In the Garden of Eden, the Bible explains that Adam and Eve “were both naked and were not ashamed” (Genesis 2:25). Before God and one another, they lived with nothing to hide. But sin changed that. As soon as they disregarded God’s command, their first instinct was to hide from one another and from God. They famously sewed fig leaves together to cover themselves (Genesis 3:7). They were trying to put something on the outside to hide the shame they felt on the inside. We’ve been doing the same thing ever since. Is it possible that my desperation to be accepted by an orientation committee stemmed from a yearning for the acceptance we lost in the garden? Were the long johns and goldfish antics the fig leaves we chose to hide who we were? GOD’S ALTERNATIVE TO OUR FIG LEAVES You can imagine how ineffective a bra and underwear made out of leaves would be – not to mention uncomfortable! Interestingly, God doesn’t tell them that the idea is silly. He knows that their shame is real. They were covering their bodies as a way of finding acceptance despite the guilt they felt. God graciously provided a more effective covering for them. Genesis 3:21 says, “And the LORD God made for Adam and for his wife garments of skins and clothed them.” God somehow sacrificed an animal and covered Adam and Eve with it. The first fur coat? The birth of the leather industry? At least they wouldn’t have to deal with the constant embarrassment of wardrobe malfunctions. More importantly, God was giving them a hint that the solution to our longing for acceptance lies in a sacrifice. LEVITICUS POINTS TO THE SACRIFICE THAT HEALS OUR HIDING It helps to visualize the Book of Leviticus rather than just read it. It reads more like a manual than a novel. As you try to picture the first chapter, you see a person going through their flock and choosing their very best sheep (Leviticus 1:2-3). You didn’t just hand it over to the priest. You instead had to lay your hand on it and then kill it yourself. As you placed your hand on the animal, you’d remember how God had warned Adam and Eve that the penalty for ignoring Him was death. As you raised the knife to kill your very best animal, you’d be thinking, “It should have been me.” I deserve to die for my sin, but God says that He’ll accept a substitute in my place. You’d think that the result would be mixed. Leviticus tells us that it’s complete. When the sacrifice is burned before the Lord, God calls it “a pleasing aroma” (Leviticus 1:9). God doesn’t just tolerate people whose sin has been covered by a sacrifice, He accepts them fully. They’re covered, cleansed, and received by the God against whom they’ve sinned. JESUS DIED TO PROVIDE THE ACCEPTANCE WE LONG FOR Hundreds of years of those sacrifices prepared people for a greater sacrifice that He was planning. When Jesus came, John the Baptist said, “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!” (John 1:29) God brought the sacrifice, so we didn’t have to. God covered our sins, so we didn’t need any more fig leaves. And through faith in His sacrifice, we experience His full acceptance. As long as we live in a world where people make you jump through hoops to earn their acceptance, we’ll feel the temptation to hide behind long johns and goldfish. But when you know the full and free acceptance of the God who made you, it makes you less desperate for the approval of people who often withhold it. If you know the acceptance of God, re-read Leviticus 1, picture the scene, and rejoice in the God who breathes in the aroma of a sacrifice offered on your behalf and is fully pleased with it. He’s fully pleased with you! In awe of Him, Paul