Justice and Love

I realized as I was reading through my journal that I keep on my daily devotions that I hadn't written a blog on anything that I had read in Leviticus. So before I share what I'm currently learning as I read Numbers, I'll post this short blog about my overall impression of Leviticus. The book of Leviticus is mostly about the rules that God sets up for the new nation of Israel. A lot of these rules are things that we don't follow anymore, such as the laws for mildew in houses or what not to eat. It may be puzzling to think about the difference between how we perceive the New Testament God and the Old Testament God. Yes, we do have a different relationship with God after Christ came; the new covenant sets up the possibility for a closer and more personal relationship with God. But I think that sometimes we think of God as one or the other, the Old Testament God full of justice, or the New Testament God of love and mercy. I think that it's a mistake to separate these aspects of God and to choose which side we want Him to be. The way that I see it, the fact that God finds sin so disgusting and is so full of justice only furthers the scope of His love for us. After reading all that He had the Israelites do to be His nation I saw how truly far we are from hitting the mark. I know that we are no longer under the law in the same way, but the benefit I find in reading the law is remembering that side of God's character. It is His justice and law that makes His mercy and love for us so amazing. He saw how far we fall short and took the punishment on Himself so that He could be with us. "Greater love has no man than this, that he lay down his life for his friends." But then remember that it was our own actions that made it necessary for him to lay down his life for us, and he still willingly did. There is no greater love than God's for us. There is no greater justice and truth than God's. And those two traits increase the value of the other. Negating one diminishes the value of the other.