Hey everybody. Welcome back to another edition of the Daily Bible Podcast. Hello. We are gonna get into some more interesting territory today. We're dealing with the sons of Aaron here, naab and Abba, who and some others. But we also have a question that was written in that's a unique question. I don't know that I've ever thought about it before. Pastor out, have you thought about this question before? I have. Have you? Yeah. Do you have firm convictions and, and answers on it? Of course not. No. Okay. The question is this written in by Matt Morgan. He's one of our podcast editors, and so he asked the question did the Tabernacle have a rug or flooring? Also, did the priest wear shoes when ministering in the tabernacle? Seems like we have a fairly exhaustive catalog of tabernacle, furnishings, and a priestly clothing, yet I don't recall any flooring or shoes. Were they barefoot on the desert floor in the Holy of Holies? I mean, I'll, I'll answer the last part first, I imagine. Yes, that they were barefoot when they entered the Holy of Holies because of what we see with Moses before the burning bush. I, I have to imagine that that was carried over, even if not explicitly commanded by God. I imagine that Moses probably told them, Hey, there was this one time I was in the desert and I saw this thing and, and I was told, Hey, take your shoes off for the ground on what you're standing as holy. So I would venture a guess is to say yes when it came to ministering the Holy of Holies. Outside of that, I, I don't know, we often think of them wearing their sandals. There are no specific in instructions for flooring or any sort of floor coverings. And I think that makes sense because the tabernacle was heavy as it was. If you consider all of the, the things that they had to transport all these silver bases, the frames and everything else, to have to transport some sort of temporal, movable flooring on top of that would've been quite the burden for the people to do it, whether, if it would've even been possible at the time. So my guess is that it was. Probably a bare floor just a dirt floor. And then when the priest went into the Holy Holies, he probably would've taken his shoes off at that point. Yeah, the only thing I would agree that that's probably, that's where my mind would go, bare floor, bare feet, probably what God intends. The only thing that gives me slight pause is and in as Isaiah chapter six, when he encounters the glory of God the seraphim. Are flying with two wings and with two, they're covering their face and with two they're covering their feet. Mm-hmm. Now there's a chance that feet is a euphemism for something else. Yep. But if it is feet, if it, if it is what it looks like, then I could say, okay, maybe there's something about not exposing yourself to the Lord in an unnecessary way. So that would be the only thing that would make me say, maybe there was something, some kind of footwear that Moses is like, Hey, just put, put on these booties. They're, they're blue and they're cute. Put these on now. But otherwise, I, I'm, I'm totally fine with saying probably barefoot, probably bare floor. And that was communicative. Man, man, man himself was from the dust. And so I think there could be a connection there about what that teaches the man and, and what it has to do with their relationship to God. So I think there's something there that could work. But there's nothing in the text that tells us for sure this is what they were. You know, it's interesting as well that. When the priestly garments are described, there are no shoes. And yet when we get in, not, again, not a one for one correlation, but when we get in the New Testament and you've got the armor of God, there are shoes that are part of the armor of God. That's right. And so there, there's no specific instructions. I saw something else that said that the priests part of the, the role when they went into war to wash both their hands and their feet when they're there, which would might. To support the idea that they had taken off their sandals at some point in time when they entered into to serve there. So that's a good point. Yeah. But, but good observation. Good question. Good thoughtful thinking here. Alright, let's get into verses 10 or chapter 10, 11 and 12. Nate, Evan, and Bahoo. So this is. Strange fire. And if you remember a while back probably what, 10, 15 years maybe? MacArthur did the Strange Fire Conference and he compared that to a lot of what was going on in the, the extreme charismatic movement at the time. And it comes from here and there's debate about what the Strange Fire was. Even what it, what it meant, what it was made up of. It may have not been anything that was unique chemically, but it could have simply been that they came in at a time that they were not prescribed to enter into the Holy of Holies and tried to make an offering there when they were not permitted to be in there. And then the result, though we do know, is that fire comes out from before the Lord and consumes them, and they die there before the Lord. And then there is the statement that's made. Moses said to Aaron, this is what the Lord has said. Among those who are near me, I will be sanctified. And before all people I will be glorified. And it says there that Aaron held his peace. Some of the instructions after this are, are going to be even more significant where God is gonna prohibit Aaron from mourning. For his sons lest you die and the wrath come upon the congregation. And so this is serious. God takes his holiness serious. God takes how we worship serious in, in the way we go about it seriously. And he's going to condemn these two, forgo it about it in the wrong way. I wondered if maybe there was a connection between the fact that God says, do not mourn for these. Offenders and the question that we got maybe weeks ago at this point where someone was asking, what about in the new heavens and the new Earth when I notice or sense that I'm missing relatives or that you know so and so that I knew they're not where they're supposed to be. I wonder if this speaks to that. This is not one-to-one, this is not, this is not the New Testament, obviously. But I do think I might be noticing a principle where God says, when I affect my justice, there are times when it does not warrant your soft hearted response. And that's hard because this, as you me may mention here, these are Aaron's sons. Yeah. These are not just strangers. These are not even as close pals as priests. These are his sons. And yet God forbids it. Now if this is what it is in the Old Testament, when there's still sin and, and Aaron is still in the bondage of his flesh, I wonder if that's playing a role or under the, in the new heavens and the new Earth, we have a new body. If that will in some way change the way that we experience. Some of what we see here, mourning, loss maybe sadness. Again, there's no sadness in the new heavens. Revelation 21 says, so, there's no crying, there's no mourning. So here, there's mourning. And God forbids it because it's right and it's good. And in the future, maybe that speaks to this. Hmm. Yeah. Yeah. That, yeah. That is an interesting thought. It would help reconcile how we're gonna feel about our loved ones in eternity as they're not maybe with us. For sure. I hadn't made the, the connection there. End of the chapter, not that I look forward to that. No. No, and and nobody does. Right? Like you talked about, eternal conscious torment isn't something that we all say, yes, this is a, a doctrine that we love. Yeah, I would say the same about about that as well, that concept. What about the end of the chapter here though? Because Aaron. Fails again here, right on the heels of the death of his sons. He fails to obey the Lord because he doesn't eat what he should have eaten from this sin offering that's offered this goat. In fact, it was taken out and it was burned up. And so Moses confronts him and Aaron said to Moses in verse 19, today they've offered the sin offering and the burnt offering before the Lord. And yet such things of these have happened to me. If I had eaten of the SIN offering, would the Lord have have approved? It's an interesting. Situation because it says after that then Moses heard that he approved. Yep. And so why is there a distinction between Aaron here and naab and Abba? Who, do you have any thoughts on what's going on there? I a couple thoughts. First, I think there's, and this is what makes this so interesting for me. 'cause again, this is, this is just like the women who serve at the tent of meeting or the, the, the entrance of the tabernacle. Who are they? Why are they there? Yeah. Scripture said nothing about them and yet, boom, they're there. And they're mentioned almost in passing without any explanation or reference here. I think we have a similar situation where. Aaron is making a case to Moses that I would say, wow, that makes sense to me. You should have still obeyed the Lord, right? You should. This is what the Lord said. You gotta do this, right? And yet what Aaron says in Moses' mind is theologically compelling, where he says, okay, that makes sense. The Lord would accept that. I, that tells me then that my reading of Leviticus has probably skewed the wrong direction. I'm reading it with a sterile A plus B equal C mentality. Mm-hmm. When in fact what's happening here is God who is in relationship, covenant relationship with Israel does have these strict and and explicit rules that he wants him to follow, but they're not meant to be understood as mere and, and that's an important word, merely black and white. Regulations. They are living in the life of Israel and I think we're gonna get to it at some point soon, where the bread of the tabernacle, the bread of the presence. I was thinking about this recently 'cause David eats it. Yeah. And then Jesus uses that to defend his actions and I think, well wait a minute, he's not supposed to eat it. Right. There's far more that than that's going on than what meets the eye. And I think stuff like this, when when it strikes you like that, I think it's meant to cause us to pause and say, let me just make sure I'm understanding this. Yeah. That I'm understanding God rightly, I don't want to mischaracterize God. And this is one of those places that caused me to scratch my head and say, ah, I gotta. Carefully. I don't wanna assume things I don't wanna presume. Read carefully. Yeah. The only commentary that I saw that that was helpful on this suggested that what Aaron was appealing to may have been the state of his heart at the time that he was still wrestling with what got it done with. Nate, Abba, who, or at least frustrated or or missing his sons and his heart was not in the right place to be able to obey what God had called him to obey. And that's why he's asking Moses, would God have been pleased with me? Had I eaten if I had eaten with an improper posture before the Lord? Yeah. I read too that it could be that he has a, a fear of God, that which is better than carelessness. Yeah. It is a fear that provoked him to say, I can't do this right now. I'm afraid if I do this the wrong way, I, I misstep, I, I I do the wrong thing. God will strike me. Yeah. I read that. I thought, oh, may maybe. That's a possibility. I think that one makes sense too. Short answer is that I don't know for sure which, which to rely on. Right. Except to say, Hmm, this is a tough one. Right. Alright, let's get to chapter 11. Chapter 11 is another one of those chapters in Leviticus that should make you thankful for the New Covenant because this is the, the list, not exhaustive, but this is a big list of all the things that can make one clean or unclean before the Lord. And, and a lot of it has to do with the dietary restrictions, what they could eat and what they couldn't eat. And so I just wrote out in the margin there, with each one clean. Clean, clean unclean, and, and you can go all the way down there. And these are all things that were things that, that God were, were calling his people to have abstain from. Some of this is because this is what the nations that he was driving now indulged in. And so God is saying, I want you to be different from them others, because God had his. Parameters, and he was saying, I'm, I'm calling you to be separate. I'm calling you out. You are my people. You are not to be like everyone else. And so what I'm going to instruct you is going to be different. And that's really the culmination of chapter 11, which is in verse 44, 4, I am the Lord your God. Consecrate yourselves, therefore, and be holy. For I am holy. And that's the refrain that will sound over and over again throughout scripture, be holy for I am holy. That's why God is laying out all these rules and regulations for the people of Israel. He's calling them out to be different, to be distinct. Yeah. And that's. Part of what explains these, these strange lines that we see here. One author, a commentator makes four observations about what these things could be, and the separateness is part of that. Yeah. The first one is arbitrary. God just said, I want you to do this, and not that. Yeah. And, and God's making decisions for his people and that's what he wants to do. The second one is cultic, and this gets closer to what we were just talking about, the ritual and liturgical purity that God wants for his people. This is meant to be connected to their religious experience. Obviously it's within the Book of Leviticus. That one makes sense. Another one. Is hygienic. Some people have seen that like, oh, pork, you know, it has all these properties and it's not necessarily good for your health. Maybe. The fourth one is symbolic. The, the idea that you have wholeness and you have un wholeness or incompleteness, and God's trying to give them a picture in an image by these. These restrictions to say, I want, I want you to do the, the one that's whole and pure and closer to the ideal and the norm. All of these have their pluses and the minuses. I'm not entirely sure I'm convinced of any necessary one being this is the rightest one, right? They all seem to have some kind of. Potential explanatory power. But which one? I'm not sure. Do you have a strong opinion either way? Man, I don't, it, it's, it's hard when you, like, you get into every animal that parts the hoof and then you get into the animals that walk on their paws. And so it's hard when we get into the detail levels, they're trying to figure out, okay, where, which one of those four. Options fits best with Right. Something like that. Right. So I, I don't specifically have a, a dog in the fight on that one, so to speak. Yeah. And the, at the end of the day, it doesn't matter. It just is what God said. J Jay Gordon Winham this is the guy I referred to quite a bit for this book. So he, I don't know what his commentary's called. Do you know which one it is? Off the top of your head? I know you know this one. I know the author. I don't know. This is, hold on. You know what? You do your thing. Okay. And I will bring it up in a second here. We'll transition over to, to chapter 12. We can come back and, and hit that, that book, N-I-C-O-T, Nikko. Oh N-I-C-O-T. J Gordon. J Winham. Yeah. He's, it's, that's, it's a thick book. Yeah. Don't be too discouraged by that. But it's one of my favorites. Gordon Winham does great work on the Leviticus. On Leviticus. I think numbers too. Yeah. Deals with Hebrew. In it, in the text, you're gonna come across some Hebrew words, but yeah, maybe there's an easier one I can find for you guys. But anyway, that's one that I've been using. Yeah. Well, chapter 12, we get into the loss for purification after a, a woman gives birth to a child and there are different rules for a male child and a female child. The male child's purification came out to about 40 days before she was going to be able to be clean again. And the, for a female child, it comes out to about 74 days if I'm reading things right there before she was gonna be able to be clean again. This doesn't have anything to do with the superiority of males over females or anything else. No one's exactly sure why one was longer than the other, other than the, what we know is at the end, the, the sacrifices for atonement to make her clean were the same, regardless. And so it wasn't as though one required more than the other one. But these are just, again, some of God's law, some of God's regulations and rules as to why he wanted his people to, to behave the way that they did. So the male children, 40 days of purification, female child, 70 foot. Four days of purification, but for both, they came and they offered their sacrifice to bring them back and make them right before the Lord at the end. Yeah. So it's actually, it does speak to the equality. Both require a sacrifice. Yeah. Both require atonement and I think that's, that's a big thing. Yeah. We read with 2026 eyes and we can see like, oh man, this is different. There's more days for this person versus that person. And yet this does highlight the value of the ladies. It may, it may not seem that way to you because again, we're looking at it from our vantage point versus that culture. Ladies, were not as well esteemed as they are today. Mm-hmm. And here God is showing no. Both require both require some kind of atoning work. Purification rather. Yeah. Let's look. Flip over to the New Testament as we are beginning to wind Matthew down. We are, are getting towards the end here. Remember, I know it's, it's separate from where we're at now. It's been a while ago, but this is all passion week stuff that's taken place. This is all after the triumphal entry. And so this is nearing the end. In fact, in chapter 26, the first part of it, this is gonna take us in our reading today, all the way up to where Jesus sits down in the upper room with his disciples to have that Passover. But the, the. The heat has been turned up. We've seen, again, Jesus against the religious leaders and it's been ratcheting up higher and higher and higher and higher. And finally, they, they agree it's, it's time now is when we have to take him out, but Jesus has been predicting that this is gonna take place. We see another crucifixion prediction right as Chapter 26 opens. Meanwhile, the people at that time are gathering in the, the court of Caiaphas, the Palace of Caiaphas. There. Plotting how they can take him by stealth and kill him by stealth. Why? Because they were afraid of the people they knew. If they went to the Temple Mountain and tried to arrest him, they may have a ride on their hands. So they need to figure out how can they do this? How can they go by stealth and get him? We'll talk about Judas in just a second here. Interject this scene back in Bethany. This is the scene at, at the house of Simon, the leper. And here you have the anointing of Jesus, most likely. Again, Mary Magdalene is the one that's doing this. She's taking this very expensive ointment that would've cost a year's salary. She's anointing probably not only his head, but also from other testimony his. Feet as well with this, which there would've been enough ointment in the jar to do both. So, because John emphasizes one and the other gospel writers emphasized the other, we don't need to be panicked about that. And this is where, again, I think you've made the comment in the past about doing something beautiful for Christ. And we see that again here with this offering of the, the ointment. Yeah. Don't get this confused with another story. This is Luke chapter seven, where. There is a woman of the city who was a sinner and she wipes Jesus' feet with her hair. She cleans him. And that's what Simon, the Pharisee Right. It's a different story. So that's, it's really unfortunate. This is how God worked this out with both Simons. I know, that's, I understand the confusion. Yeah. There's something beautiful there. I like that I verse eight. Someone says, why this waste? And notice here, it doesn't say Judas in specific here. It says the disciples saw it, they were indignant. So this isn't just Judas, this is all of them, perhaps with Judas at the lead. But they say, why this waste? There is no such thing as waste for Jesus, right? You never give him too much. And I know that sometimes it's frowned upon because you wanna be prudent and wise and stewardly with your funds. And I get that. But it's impossible to, to waste anything for Jesus. Whenever you give yourself for him and you give, whether it's your life, your resources, your time, you're never wasting. It's always going to be rewarded and returned to you and multiplied measure. Yeah. Right on the heels of this. This may have been the, the straw that broke the camel's back for Judas. 'cause Judas goes out from here and goes to agree to betray Jesus and, and this is really the aposty of Jesus, of Judas that we're witnessing. Lemme get that right. The aposty of Judas that we're witnessing firsthand here in verses 14 through 16 when he agrees toray Jesus. And we just read this back in Exodus. So note here, Exodus 2132 is where we find out that the price of a slave was 30 pieces of silver. And that's what. Is agreed upon between the Pharisees and Judas when he agrees to turn Jesus over. Meanwhile Jesus goes on to the upper room to organize the Passover. He sends his disciples ahead of him and he prophesies and says there's gonna be somebody there when you meet them. Then tell them this, and this is how it all is going to work out. So it says. Here in verse 19, worth noting. 'cause it's a key time marker that they prepared the Passover. We can talk about this more probably in the next episode or two, but this is the Passover meal and so that tells us, that gives us a time marker for when it is that Jesus is gonna be killed. Mm-hmm. And so that's point important for us to, to note. Well, let's wrap up this episode of the Daily Bible Podcast. God, thanks for your word and for our, our time in it today. We thank you for just being able to see examples of of how much you care about our holiness be, be it Leviticus, chapter 11 or Chapter 10, with Nadab and Abba, who help us to be careful about how we approach you, how we worship you, and we want to be those that worship you in, in full integrity and with great intentionality and offer you what you're due. Thank you for Christ, that we don't have to worry about animals making us clean or unclean anymore, but that we are clean in Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior. So we pray this all in Jesus' name. Amen. Hey, keep reading those Bibles. You're doing a great job. We are trucking along through the year, and we'll be back with you again tomorrow for another edition of the Daily Bible Podcast. We'll see you then. Bye.

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