Missions Paul

Most of us live by our diaries. Is this week busy for you? Will God have to take whatever space is left?

Before anything happened, God wrote his appointments into the Israelites’ diary first.

“Three times a year you are to celebrate a festival to me. ¹⁵ “Celebrate the Festival of Unleavened Bread; for seven days eat bread made without yeast, as I commanded you. Do this at the appointed time in the month of Aviv, for in that month you came out of Egypt. “No one is to appear before me empty-handed. ¹⁶ “Celebrate the Festival of Harvest with the firstfruits of the crops you sow in your field. “Celebrate the Festival of Ingathering at the end of the year, when you gather in your crops from the field. ¹⁷ “Three times a year all the men are to appear before the Sovereign Lord. ¹⁸ “Do not offer the blood of a sacrifice to me along with anything containing yeast. “The fat of my festival offerings must not be kept until morning. ¹⁹ “Bring the best of the firstfruits of your soil to the house of the Lord your God. “Do not cook a young goat in its mother’s milk.” (Exodus 23 v 14-19)

Three times a year, God said, “Stop what you are doing and come meet with me.” In this diary of festivals, we also see the shape of the gospel.

Unleavened Bread remembered the redemption when God brought them out of Egypt so quickly their dough had no time to rise. “Get rid of the old yeast, so that you may be a new unleavened batch—as you really are. For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed. Therefore let us keep the Festival, not with the old bread leavened with malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth”. (1 Corinthians 5 v 7-8)

The Festival of Harvest celebrated the firstfruits of the crops, the first sign that the seed in the ground had not died for nothing. “But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep.” (1 Corinthians 15 v 20)  Fifty days later, at the Feast of Harvest, the Spirit was poured out and “Those who accepted his message were baptised, and about three thousand were added to their number that day.” (Acts 2 v 41)

The Festival of Ingathering came at the end of the year, when everything was finally brought home. We might say we are living in the Acts 29 moment; the Spirit’s work continues, and an ingathering is still to come.

So God not only gives these 3 great festivals, fulfilled much later. He also sets the terms of how we come to Him. God doesn’t want the time left over at the end of a busy week or the energy after we have worked for everyone and everything else. Nor do we “appear before me empty-handed.” This is not to earn anything but because He has already given to bring us out.

One final thought on the strange verse, “Do not cook a young goat in its mother’s milk.” It is a bit strange and hard to understand. One possibility is that it prohibited a practice associated with the religious customs of Israel’s neighbours. Whatever the precise background, Israel was taught to live differently from the surrounding nations and to follow the Lord’s instructions rather than simply adopt their customs. That principle still matters.

“For six years you are to sow your fields and harvest the crops, ¹¹ but during the seventh year let the land lie unploughed and unused. Then the poor among your people may get food from it, and the wild animals may eat what is left. Do the same with your vineyard and your olive grove. ¹² “Six days do your work, but on the seventh day do not work, so that your ox and your donkey may rest, and so that the slave born in your household and the foreigner living among you may be refreshed. ¹³ “Be careful to do everything I have said to you. Do not invoke the names of other gods; do not let them be heard on your lips.” (Exodus 23 v 10-13)

At first, I am sure no farmer thought this made sense. Every seventh year, do not plough, do not sow, and do not harvest.

This was a test of trust. Six years were to carry them through the seventh. That was God’s promise. He would do it.

But notice who benefits, for this is not to help the landowner. God has his eye on the poor and even the wild animals.

God insists on rest not only for our sake but for others. It is always about others. The same was true of the weekly Sabbath. God’s rest flowed downhill, to those with the least power to claim it for themselves.

That is still the test of our rest.

We must take the weekly Sabbath and, if possible, a sabbatical in the seventh year.

The most important thing is this: God wants us to build rest into our lives.

Not just for ourselves, but for others.

How can we help the vulnerable, those still working hard, overlooked, and in need, as we take rest? That’s what we should be asking.

The inability to rest is often a kind of idolatry. We can’t stop for all kinds of reasons. But the drug is usually because something else has become our provider.

God commands rest because he is enough.

Perhaps a field in your life needs to lie fallow for a while. Not because you are failing, but because you are trusting.

The land rested because God provided. So can you.

Today’s social media feed featured a picture of one of my Pastor friends. Actually, it was a before-and-after picture. They look very different, and not because of age. He wrote alongside the picture, “I am 20 years free from heroin addiction today.” It is a lovely post. It ends with, “If He can do this for me, He can do it for anybody. Roll on the next 20 years. God gets all the glory.”

Very timely as I turn to verse 9.

“Do not oppress a foreigner; you yourselves know how it feels to be foreigners, because you were foreigners in Egypt.” (Exodus 23 v 9)

You know this, for you were foreigners. You’ve been there, and you know how it feels.

That’s what God was saying to them about foreigners.

God was causing them to remember the difficult days, not so they would look and become hardened, but so they would remember how it felt and become compassionate toward those in the same position.

Painful times can sometimes make us even harder. But God insisted that they must never do to others what had been done to them.

God doesn’t erase our history; instead, He redeems it and puts it to work.

Paul reminds Gentile believers that they were once “foreigners to the covenants of the promise, without hope and without God in the world” (Ephesians 2:12). Every Christian was once an outsider; we had a past. We were brought near, not because we belonged but because Christ made room for us at great cost.

Have we forgotten where we came from? A church that remembers its own Egypt will never be a hostile place for the outsider. It will be the place where strangers discover they’ve come home.

We know how it feels. Let’s make sure no one else has to feel it among us.

Sometimes bribes come as a favour we can’t refuse. 

“Do not accept a bribe, for a bribe blinds those who see and twists the words of the innocent.” Exodus 23:8

It’s not the ignorant a bribe blinds. It’s those who see clearly. And it rarely looks like a bribe. It looks like a favour or a gift.

Judas took thirty pieces of silver and could no longer see who Jesus was. The chief priests paid soldiers to twist the testimony about the empty tomb (Matthew 28:12–13). But Jesus was offered the greatest bribe of all, all the kingdoms of the world, and refused (Matthew 4:8–10). He would not take a shortcut to the throne. He took the cross.

So ask yourself: what has been given to you that makes it harder to see clearly? A position or someone’s approval?

The One who could not be bought has already paid for you.

We all know what it feels like to be in a system stacked against us, and we may know what it’s like to be the wrong end of a travesty of justice. For some it costs everything. They are never the same again. God has something to say about this.

“Do not deny justice to your poor people in their lawsuits. ⁷ Have nothing to do with a false charge and do not put an innocent or honest person to death, for I will not acquit the guilty.” (Exodus 23 v 6-7)

In Egypt the powerful made the rules and the weak paid the price. But at Sinai, God is shaping a different kind of nation, one marked by fairness.

1. Protect the poor
The poor can’t afford the best advocate and have no friends in high places. Their word is easily dismissed. In God’s economy, the poor man’s case must be heard as carefully as the rich man’s.

2. Keep clear of the false charge
God says, “Have nothing to do with it.” Don’t go along with it. Don’t stay silent while it does its damage. Injustice often only needs decent people who would rather not get involved.

3. Guard the innocent
Innocent people are still put to death today, not always physically, but in name and in ministry. God takes it seriously.

4. Remember the Judge
Sitting alongside point 3 is this: “I will not acquit the guilty.” Human courts can be fooled or pressured. God’s court cannot. Heaven will review every travesty of justice on earth. For the wronged, that is comfort. For the one who has bent the truth, it is a warning.

How much more for those of us who are cross-carriers.

Those who have received mercy at such a cost cannot be careless with justice. Stand with the voiceless. Refuse the false word. Never sacrifice the innocent for an easy outcome.

Because we know what justice cost God, we dare not treat it cheaply.

We can all be kind to people we like. But let’s say you have someone who has criticised you or has just never been nice to you. We all have people we would rather avoid. When they’re in trouble, the temptation to look away and not get involved is real.

We leave the courtroom and enter the field and roadside. God has something to say about how we conduct ourselves there.

“If you come across your enemy’s ox or donkey wandering off, be sure to return it. ⁵ If you see the donkey of someone who hates you fallen down under its load, do not leave it there; be sure you help them with it.” (Exodus 23 v 4-5)

God expects not everyone will like you. In the same way, He knows you won’t like everyone either. However, He expects us to do the right thing when we see our enemy’s stray or fallen ox or donkey (or the equivalent). Take the ox back. Stop for the donkey. And more.

You can’t simply drop the animal back at the gate and walk off. You stand alongside your enemy to help them.

Jesus took this further. “Love your enemies,” he said, “and pray for those who persecute you” (Matthew 5:44). The Apostle Paul wrote that it was “while we were God’s enemies” that we were reconciled to him through the death of his Son (Romans 5:10). We were the ones who had wandered off. We collapsed under a load we couldn’t carry. Jesus came to us, stooped down, and lifted us.

Have you noticed a need and quietly stepped around it because it belongs to someone you don’t like?

Grace that has lifted us doesn’t let us walk past anyone else’s fallen load.

Do you know the truth? You hear about something that happened, and your first thought is, did it happen the way you were told? Sometimes we read or hear stories long before the facts are established.

“Do not spread false reports. Do not help a guilty person by being a malicious witness. ² “Do not follow the crowd in doing wrong. When you give testimony in a lawsuit, do not pervert justice by siding with the crowd, ³ and do not show favouritism to a poor person in a lawsuit.” (Exodus 23 v 1-3)

These verses were written for the courtroom, but they reach into every conversation. They raise three questions we all face whenever someone tells us a story.

V1. Is it true, or just a rumour? God doesn’t just forbid perjury in the witness box; he forbids gossip around the story. Passing on what we cannot verify is taking part in a verdict we have no right to give.

V2. Is it right, or just popular?  If everyone is saying it, surely it must be true, right? If everyone is doing it, surely I cannot be blamed, right? Is the truth based on the majority decision? It can be. So long as the witness hasn’t changed their testimony under the pressure of numbers.

 V3. Is it fair, or just sympathetic? God’s justice isn’t for sale to the rich, and it isn’t won by pity either. The scales are to be held level.

So refuse to join in the whispers. Don’t immediately run with the crowd. Just because your heart is moved isn’t a sign to ignore God’s justice. The crowd will always have a verdict. Make sure yours is the truth.

Most of us have driven past it: a fox or a badger on the verge, and the crows already gathering. Nobody stops to pick it up for tea. In this verse today, we see holiness stretches even to what we eat. God says, don’t pick up roadkill for dinner, for you are holy.

“You are to be my holy people. So do not eat the meat of an animal torn by wild beasts; throw it to the dogs.” (Exodus 22 v 31)

I wouldn’t have put these two sentences together, would you?

I think the declaration to be holy should apply to the Tabernacle, the Temple, or indeed the Church. Doesn’t it?

Holiness is not kept for the tabernacle. It sits down at the kitchen table.

So before we go any further, let’s remind ourselves about ‘torn meat’. An animal that died violently would not have had its blood drained properly (the life was in the blood). God’s people were not scavengers, gathering what was left behind. God’s people were not to eat this meat because they were holy.

God’s people don’t do these things to make themselves holy, but because they already are.

All around us are predators. They lunge at the ideas and voices and tear at what is good, leaving it destroyed in the field. But worse comes next: the cynics and the gossipers gather to chew over the kill.

God’s people are called to a better table: Christ’s. Yes, the application isn’t about roadkill.

Christ was not torn down by the beasts of the field. He laid down His life willingly: “No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord” (John 10 v 18). He says, “My flesh is real food, and my blood is real drink” (John 6: 55). The world’s carcass leaves us defiled. The slain Lamb gives us life.

The calling hasn’t changed. Holiness still shows up in what we choose to feed on.

Leave the torn meat to the dogs. You’ve been invited to the Lord’s table.

Most of us mean to give God our best. The trouble is, we often get to it later, once the bills are paid, the diary is sorted, and we feel we have enough to spare. But God was never after what was left.

 “Do not hold back offerings from your granaries or your vats. You must give me the firstborn of your sons. ³⁰ Do the same with your cattle and your sheep. Let them stay with their mothers for seven days, but give them to me on the eighth day.” (Exodus 22 v 29-30)

The message is simple: don’t give God what remains; put Him first.

Intentions are not enough; whether you give or act, trust is shown by giving what is God’s before you have all the ‘harvest’ in. God

Each firstborn child told the family, “You live because God redeemed you.” But there is a tenderness here. The newborn calf or lamb stayed with its mother for seven days.

Then, on the eighth day, the Hebrew boys were circumcised (Genesis 17:12). The eighth day speaks of new beginnings, of a life marked as belonging to God.

Jesus is the Firstborn, “the firstborn over all creation” and “the firstborn from among the dead” (Colossians 1:15, 18). The Father did not hold back His own Son. He gave the first and the best; in Christ. He rose on the first day of a new week, the eighth day, when new creation dawned.

So when God asks for our first, He is not asking us to give what He has not already given. He gave His Firstborn so that we might be redeemed. The only fitting response is to stop holding back: our time, our resources, our worship, our very lives.

God never asked for our leftovers. He gave us His best. Let Him have our first.

Here’s a law about what comes out of our mouths (or our fingers on our phones and keyboards!).

“Do not blaspheme God or curse the ruler of your people” (Exodus 22 v 28)

Interestingly, God and the ‘ruler’ of people are placed together. This commands how we speak about both. The law puts both together and suggests that the one who curses heaven rarely respects earth’s authorities, and the one who habitually rails at every leader has usually stopped fearing God somewhere along the way. Scripture is full of people who spoke truth to power, and leaders are never above correction. But there is a world of difference between a warning and cursing.

We live in an age when cursing our rulers has become a national pastime. Yet Peter, writing under an emperor who would soon kill him, could still say, “Fear God, honour the emperor” (1 Peter 2:17).

Ultimately, this command points us to Christ. He stood before rulers who abused their power more than any. They struck him, mocked him, and unjustly condemned him. And yet “when they hurled their insults at him, he did not retaliate; when he suffered, he made no threats” (1 Peter 2:23).

Before we post, share, or comment, ask a few questions. Is this true? Is it necessary? Would I say it to their face? Have I prayed for them as often as I have complained about them? It is hard to curse someone you are genuinely praying for.

That is the standard: a tongue governed by the fear of God.

Before we speak of those over us, it is worth asking whether we have first spoken to God about them.