Ephesians 2:13, 17-18
"But now in Christ Jesus ye who sometimes were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ...And [He] came and preached peace to you which were afar off, and to them that were nigh. For through Him we both have access by one Spirit unto the Father."
Focus Thought
We live in a blood-saturated society. From books to movies to sports to our news programs..."if it bleeds, it leads." But the world's obsession with blood is a symptom of a deeper, unconscious desire--the desire to be cleansed. And the only way to be cleansed from sin and to gain access to God is through the Blood of Christ.
The Next Step
It's no mistake that Paul talks about the Blood of Christ (v. 13) before he talks about everyone having "access by one Spirit" to God (v. 18). In Leviticus 14, God gives the guidelines for declaring a leper to be "clean," i.e. healed. Lepers were outcasts to society. They had a disease that was lethal, seemingly unstoppable, and thought to be extremely contagious. At the moment a person was found to have been infected with leprosy, he was seperated from the rest of the camp. He no longer had access to his family, to his people, or to the House of God.
But if he was ever healed, he would be allowed to re-enter society. Being "clean" was every leper's dream. In order to come back into the camp, a leper had to do a certain multi-part ritual. At one point, the priest would take blood from an offering and put it on the leper's right ear, right thumb, and right foot. Two steps later, the priest would go back and apply oil to the leper's right ear, right thumb, and right foot. The catch was that the oil could only be placed where blood was present before (v. 17)
As gruesome or primative as it may seen, the symbolism is profound. I'm sure the average person wouldn't have objected to applying oil to their body. It felt good. It smelled good. It represented God's Spirit, His Favor, and His Power. But I'm also just as sure that the average person wouldn't have enjoyed having blood smeared on their ear, hand, and foot.
The amazing thing, though, is that the lepers didn't care. They had a disease and they wanted to take care of it. They weren't happy to be seperated from those around them and to be seperated from God. They didn't care about convenience or what everyone thought. They didn't care about how bad the blood smelled or how weird it felt. They wanted to be clean. And once they had the blood, they could move on to the oil.
In our lives, we really can't expect the awesome, powerful, attractive things of God until we've dealt with the not-so-attractive parts of our lives. In one word, sin. We need to experience the blood before we experience the oil. We need an attitude of repentance--an attitude that says we're sorry and want to change--before we expect the Spirit of God to be active in our lives. It starts with being cleansed. We need to deal with our own leprosy--the sin that seperates us from God and affects our relationships with those around us--and we do that by repenting, by turning away from our sin.
Here are some things to do this week to take Sunday's message one step further:
1. Read
Read Leviticus 14:1-20. Leviticus can be a difficult book to digest. Some parts have the plot of a dictionary. But you can do it and, trust me, it'll be worth the effort.
2. Compare
Compare Leviticus 14:9, 14:14, and 14:17 with Acts 2:37-38. Both texts deal with cleansing, forgiveness, and access to God. Moses mentions water, blood, and oil as being part of the cleansing process. Moving in the same vein, Peter mentions Repentence (blood), Baptism in Jesus' Name (water), and the Infilling of the Holy Spirit (oil).
3. Reflect
Are you a leper or are you clean? Think about the verses we've covered. Do they describe your experience with God? What things that are mentioned are missing from your life? No matter where you stand, the first step is repentance. That's where it all starts. In fact, even if you've experienced everything that's been covered, it still comes down to repentance. It still comes down to saying, "God, reach down and work in my life. Make the changes that need to be made." It doesn't matter if you've been in the church for 5 minutes or 500 years, the concept still applies. we need to deal with our sin--our leprosy, our human nature--and we do it through repentance, through the Blood of Christ.
