The Bible in a Year (with Fr. Mike Schmitz) - Day 40: Laws of Justice (2023)

Episode Date: February 9, 2023

Today, Fr. Mike explains how God's heart is revealed through his commandments, and how we are all called to a life of justice, as we read from Exodus 22, Leviticus 15, and Psalm 76. For the complete reading plan, visit ascensionpress.com/bibleinayear. Please note: The Bible contains adult themes that may not be suitable for children - parental discretion is advised.

Hi, my name is Father Mike Schmitz, and you're listening to the Bible in a Year podcast, where we encounter God's voice and live life through the lens of Scripture. The Bible in a Year podcast is brought to you by Ascension. Using the Great Adventure Bible Timeline, we'll read all the way from Genesis to Revelation, discovering how the story of salvation unfolds and how we fit into that story today. This is day 40. My gosh, day 40 already. You guys, we've been trucking along and this is one of the things that has been such a blessing, has been being able to

journey with you and has been able to, I know that it's been a tough road for a lot of people. These first 40 days, first 39 days, we have reached our kind of our Lent in the sense of like 40 days, kind of like, I don't know, there's something there. There's something there that'll preach. But basically that faithfulness that you've experienced and that you've held on to, even if this isn't literally day 40 for you, maybe you're catching up. Maybe this is like 50 days into the program or into the Bible reading, but you're here on day 40. That is completely fine. In fact, it's one of the things that is encouraged. I think striving for perfection is fine, but striving for what I can do is probably even better because what the Lord requires of us is to do simply what we can. He never asks us to do what we can't.

He is there to do what we can't. And yet he calls us to do what we can. So regardless of what day it actually is for you, today is day 40, and we're reading from Exodus chapter 22, Leviticus chapter 15, and Psalm chapter 76. A couple of reminders. The Bible translation that I'm reading from is the Revised Standard Version, second Catholic edition. I'm using the Great Adventure Bible from Ascension.

It's awesome. It works really, really well at helping us with those notes. There's extra notes in it, and there's also the time periods that as we're walking through the time period of the Egypt and Exodus, it's really helpful. Next, if you want to be able to follow along so that you can know what's happening, what's going to be happening, what we're going to be reading any given day, you can download your Bible in a Year reading plan by visiting ascensionpress.com slash Bible in a Year. Also, if you haven't subscribed to this podcast yet, please do that because that really will probably help you. And I know it helps us. Let's keep on going. This is Exodus chapter 22.

Exodus 22, laws of restitution. If a man steals an ox or a sheep and kills it or sells it, he shall pay five oxen for an ox and four sheep for a sheep. He shall make restitution. If he has nothing, then he shall be sold for his theft. If the stolen beast is found alive in his possession, whether it is an ox or a donkey or a sheep, he shall pay double. If a thief is found breaking in and is struck so that he dies, there shall be no blood guilt for him. But if the sun has risen upon him, there shall be blood guilt

for him. When a man causes a field or a vineyard to be crazed over or lets his beast loose and it feeds in another man's field, he shall make restitution from the best of his own field and in his own vineyard. When fire breaks out and catches in thorns so that the stacked grain or the standing grain or the field is consumed, he that kindled the fire shall make full restitution. If a man delivers to his neighbor money or goods to keep and it is stolen out of the man's house, then if the thief is found, he shall pay double. If the thief is not found, the owner of the house shall come near to God to show whether or not he has put his hand to his neighbor's goods. For every breach of trust, whether it is for ox, for donkey, for sheep, for clothing, or for any kind of lost thing, of which one says, this is it,

the case of both parties shall come before God, who whom God shall condemn shall pay double to his neighbor. If a man delivers to his neighbor a donkey or an ox or a sheep or any beast to keep, and it dies or is hurt or is driven away without anyone seeing it, an oath by the Lord shall be between them both to see whether he has not put his hand to his neighbor's property. And the owner shall accept the oath, and he shall not make restitution. But if it is stolen from him, he shall make restitution to its owner. If it is torn by beasts, let him bring it as evidence, he shall not make restitution for what has been torn.

If a man borrows anything of his neighbor, and it is hurt or dies, the owner not being with it, he shall make full restitution. If the owner was with it, he shall not make restitution. If it was hired, it came for its hire.

Social and religious laws. If a man seduces a virgin who is not betrothed and lies with her, he shall give the marriage present for her and make her his wife. If her father utterly refuses to give her to him, he shall pay money equivalent to the marriage present for virgins. You shall not permit a sorceress to live. Whoever lies with a beast shall be put to death. Whoever sacrifices to any God, save to the Lord only, shall be utterly destroyed. You shall not wrong a stranger or oppress him, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt. You shall not afflict any widow or orphan.

If you do afflict them and they cry out to me, I will surely hear their cry and my wrath will burn and I will kill you with the sword and your wives shall become widows and your children fatherless. If you lend money to any of my people with you who is poor, you shall not be to him as a creditor. You shall not exact interest from him. If ever you take your neighbor's garment and pledge, you shall restore it to him before the sun goes down, for that is his only covering. It is his mantle for his body. In what else shall he sleep? And if he cries to me, I will hear, for I am compassionate. You shall not revile God, nor curse a ruler of your people. You shall not delay to offer from

the fullness of your harvest and from the outflow of your presses. The firstborn of your sons you shall give to me. You shall do likewise with your oxen and with your sheep. Seven days it shall be with its dam. On the eighth day you shall give it to me. You shall be men consecrated to me. Therefore you shall not eat any flesh that is torn by beasts in the field. You shall cast it to the dogs. Leviticus chapter 15. Concerning men's bodily discharges. The Lord said to Moses and Aaron,

Say to the sons of Israel, When any man has a discharge from his body, his discharge is unclean. And this is the law of his uncleanness for a discharge. Whether his body runs with his discharge or his body is stopped from discharge, it is uncleanness in him. Every bed on which he who has the discharge lies shall be unclean, and everything on which he sits shall be unclean. And anyone who touches his bed shall wash his clothes and bathe himself in water and will be unclean until the evening. And whoever sits on anything on which he who has the discharge has sat shall wash his clothes and bathe himself in water and shall be unclean until the evening. And whoever touches the body

of him who has the discharge shall wash his clothes and bathe himself in water and be unclean until the evening. And if he who has the discharge spits on one who is clean, then he shall wash his clothes and bathe himself in water and be unclean until the evening. And any saddle on which he who has the discharge rides shall be unclean. And whoever touches anything that was under him shall be unclean until the evening. And he who carries such a thing shall wash his clothes and bathe himself in water and be unclean until the evening. Anyone whom he that has the discharge touches without having rinsed his hands in water shall wash his clothes and bathe himself in water and be unclean until the evening. And the earthen vessel which he who has the discharge touches shall be broken, and every vessel of wood shall be rinsed in water. And when he who has the

discharge is cleansed of his discharge, then he shall count for himself seven days for his cleansing, and wash his clothes, and he shall bathe his body in running water, and he shall be clean. And on the eighth day he shall take two turtle doves, or two young pigeons, and come before the Lord to the door of the tent of meeting, and shall give them to the priest. And the priest shall offer them one for a sin offering, and the other for a burnt offering. And the priest shall make atonement for him before the Lord for his discharge. And if a man has an emission of semen, he shall bathe his whole body in water, and be unclean until the evening. And every garment and every skin on which the semen comes shall be washed with water, and will be unclean until the evening. If a man lies with a woman and has an emission of semen,

both of them shall bathe themselves in water and be unclean until the evening. Concerning women's bodily discharges. When a woman has a discharge of blood, which is her regular discharge from her body, she shall be in her impurity for seven days. And whoever touches her shall be unclean until the evening. And everything upon which she lies during her impurity shall be unclean. Everything also upon which she sits shall be unclean. And whoever touches her bed shall wash his clothes and bathe himself in water and be unclean until the evening. And whoever touches anything upon which she sits shall wash his clothes and bathe himself in water and be unclean until the evening. Whether it is the bed or anything upon which she sits, when he touches it, he shall be unclean until the evening. And if any man lies with her and her impurity is on him, he shall be unclean seven days, and every bed on which he lies shall be unclean. If a woman has a discharge of blood for many days,

not at the time of her impurity, or if she has a discharge beyond the time of her impurity, all the days of the discharge she shall continue in her uncleanness, as in the days of her impurity she shall be unclean. Every bed on which she lies all the days of her discharge shall be to her as the bed of her impurity, and everything on which she sits shall be unclean, as in the uncleanness of her impurity. And whoever touches these things shall be unclean, and shall wash his clothes, and bathe himself in water, and be unclean until the evening. But if she is cleansed of her discharge, she shall count for herself seven days, and after that she shall be clean. And on the eighth day she shall take two turtle doves or

two young pigeons and bring them to the priest to the door of the tent of meeting. And the priest shall offer one for a sin offering and the other for a burnt offering, and the priest shall make atonement for her before the Lord for her unclean discharge. The law concerning discharges. Thus you shall keep the sons of Israel separate from their uncleanness, lest they die in their uncleanness by defiling my tabernacle that is in their midst. This is the law for him who has a discharge, and for him who has an emission of semen, becoming unclean thereby. Also for her who is sick with her impurity, that is for any one, male or female, who has a discharge, and for the man who lies with a woman who is unclean.

Psalm 76. Israel's God, judge of all the earth. To the choir master, with the stringed instruments, a psalm of Asaph, a song. In Judah, God is known. His name is great in Israel. His abode has been established in Salem, his dwelling place in Zion. There he broke the flashing arrows,

the shield, the sword, and the weapons of war. Glorious are you, more majestic than the everlasting mountains. The stout-hearted were stripped of their spoil. They sank into sleep. All the men of war were unable to use their hands. At your rebuke, O God of Jacob, both rider and horse lay stunned. But you, you are awesome. Who can stand before you once your anger is roused? From the heavens you pronounced judgment. The earth feared and was still when God arose to establish judgment to save all the oppressed of the earth.

Surely the wrath of men shall praise you. The residue of wrath you will bind around you. Make your vows to the Lord your God and perform them. Let all around him bring gifts to him who is to be feared, who cuts off the spirit of princes, who is awesome to the kings of the earth. Father in heaven, we give you thanks. Thank you so much for your word. Thank you for sharing with us your heart. And even in your law today, Lord God, even in your law that can seem so distant, can seem so dry, can seem so otherworldly,

and even so confusing, we thank you because it reveals your heart. And we ask that you please continue to reveal your heart to us as we reveal our hearts to you. You are the Lord and we are yours. Help us to be yours more and more every day. We make this prayer in the name of Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen. In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Well, here we are. That can be a very, very challenging reading we just went through. A couple readings, in fact. The first one from Exodus chapter 22, less challenging, but kind of more commonsensical,

right? And that's exactly what we're talking about. What is happening in the readings that we're going to be diving even more deeply into in the next number of days, both with Exodus and Leviticus, are all about the laws, the laws of the people of Israel. And the good news about that is not that this is the time where people get hung up. The good news is not that this is just simply something that's distant from us, but is that this is revealing something about God's distant from us, but is that this is revealing something about God's heart. So we go back to Exodus chapter 22, right? And we have,

here are some social laws. These are laws for restitution. These are social and religious laws. And what's happening, remember this, rewind a couple of days, where we heard Jethro, Moses' father-in-law say, okay, Moses, you're sitting here in judgment all day long and you're trying to be just to these people. And yet you're making them wait and you're putting a burden upon their lives by them having to wait for you to know what is right and what is wrong. And so, you know, collect other people around you who will know, who will be able to judge. But here we have written down kind of the principles of judgment and their principles according to justice. And this is so,

so key. Their principles according to justice. So we have these laws of restitution. So, which we talked about before, those laws of restitution have to do with justice, not vengeance. Our hearts are inclined towards vengeance, right? If you do that one thing to me, I want to do with justice, not vengeance. Our hearts are inclined towards vengeance, right? If you did that one thing to me, I want to do double back to you. But the laws of justice say, nope, there's a limit. There's a limit here to vengeance. And what's that reveal? It reveals the very heart of God, God who says that he reveals that he is just, that he is justice itself. And so as we go through the next couple of chapters, I mean, almost for the rest of the book of Exodus, what we're going to see is restraint. What we're going to see is here's what's fair.

What we're going to see is, okay, if you want to live in harmony with each other, you have to pursue justice more than vengeance. And this is going to be the restraint that's placed upon the people of Israel. And we're going to dive more and more deeply into this so importantly, because it is important to live like this in order to have real community. And that's in Leviticus chapter 15 about bodily emissions. We talked about this before, but bodily emissions are important. Why? They're important because the life is in the blood, right? They're important because they refer to very intrinsic and necessary parts of our relationships. So there are four kinds of bodily emissions that are described in Leviticus chapter 15. Two for a man, two for a woman.

For the first one for a man would be basically, would most likely be some kind of like venereal disease type of situation. The second kind would be emission of semen. The third, if the first for a woman, it would be her discharge during menstruation. And then the fourth would be a chronic issue of blood, which would not be due to menstruation, but due to something else, most likely due to some kind of venereal disease for her. And so we have is like your two like completely fine things, emission of semen and menstruation, completely fine. And you have two others, which would be linked most likely to some kind of disease. Why would there be rules about this when it comes to uncleanness? Why would

there be rules about this when it came to coming in contact with these things? Well, one is because the body is sacred and because the emissions of the body refer to life, but also because this particular kind of emissions of the body have to do with sex, have to do with reproduction, have to do with relationships. placed upon people when A, either they are engaged in sexual acts with one another, and B, when they're in community with each other. And this is just the part of the genius of God's word is that God's word is saying, okay, we're going to show restraint. And that restraint is not for restraint's sake alone. And it's also not because like, oh, gross. Like that's not what uncleanness means. Doesn't mean like, uh, gross. Uncleanness simply means, okay, whether this is an issue of blood, issue of semen, issue

of whatever this is, those are things that can bring forth life, not gross. But because they bring forth life, we have to be careful around them. And that's so important for us to rediscover as 21st century people, that because there are the things that are so connected to life, we need to be careful around them. It doesn't mean that we have to do exactly what they did back in Leviticus. I mean, that these particular laws have passed away in the new covenant, but we need to be careful around them. Just like we need to be careful around other people in Exodus chapter 22 and beyond. One of the things these rules are doing, these laws that God is giving his people, is he's revealing his heart. His heart is that of a just God, just God who's trying to raise up a just people. And that is absolutely critical for us to understand that we're called to be just people who belong to a

just God. But even more than that, we're also called to be the kind of people who treat sacred things as it's sacred, who treat important things as important, who treat dangerous things because sex is dangerous. I mean, like it or not, I mean, it's a good thing, but it's also a thing that we take our lives into our hands in the midst of this and we need to treat these holy things, these dangerous things, these big things as holy and dangerous and big. And that is part of what God is revealing in Exodus 22 and in Leviticus chapter 15. We will continue our journey tomorrow with day 41 over this little first little hump.

I don't know if that's a hump at all, but we made it past the first day of 40. I'm going into the second half of second set of 40. Why not? Let's not call it that. It'd be so good. Man, let's keep praying for each other because you know by now already a month plus into this journey that some days it's easy. Some days it's easy to press play and just on your drive to work or where you're praying or wherever you are. Sometimes some days is really easy and some days it is tough.

Some days it's easier to do anything other than allow God's word to be proclaimed. And so let's pray for each other. I'm praying for you. Please pray for me. And let's keep on that community of people in this Bible eating air podcast. My name is Father Mike, and I cannot wait to see you tomorrow. God bless.