Leviticus 8

This chapter begins and ends with the speech of God. This has been noted in other places so it will not be necessary to rehearse the full implications and power of His spoken word, yet we must focus in on at least one aspect of the result of God’s speech, and that is obedience.

Not only does Leviticus 8 begin and end with the speech of God but nine other times it is mentioned directly (vv. 4, 5, 9, 13, 17, 21, 29, 34, and 35) and one time indirectly (in verse 31 when Moses tells Aaron and his sons to obey what he (that is, Moses) had commanded them, but even this is sandwiched in statements of the Lord’s imperatives). So, in all, 11, possibly 12 times we have reference to the speech of the Lord in 36 verses! That is almost one out of every three verses! It could have been said one time throughout the chapter that all of this was a command of the Lord and that would have been sufficient. Usually when the Scriptures reiterate something, it is not just for the sake of, to fill up space, but there is a definite purpose – an emphasis, to make a certain point. So, what is that point?

Chapter 8 deals with worship, and specifically, those who are to lead in worship, Aaron and his sons (the Levites). We see the first command given in verses 2 and 3 where we read “Take Aaron and his sons with him, and the garments and the anointing oil and the bull of the sin offering, and the two rams and the basket of unleavened bread, and assemble all the congregation at the doorway of the tent of meeting.” One of the first observations that we could make is that it is somewhat obvious what is about to occur – Aaron and his sons were to be anointed with oil, that is to say, set apart or consecrated for their service to the Lord. Without jumping ahead too much, one must wonder at the fact that God did not just give the list of necessary items and say “okay, go for it!” Hopefully a thought like that would make one cringe, for we know that is not how the Lord has chosen to reveal Himself through the Scriptures. God doesn’t leave us wondering, especially when it comes to the area of worship. There are areas in our lives today where we cannot look to a single solitary imperative (as we wish we could) that says “thou shalt do such and such,” or “thou shalt not do such and such,” but we see here that God was (and may I submit, still is) very particular about our worship of Him. Notice secondly the location of this service of dedication and consecration. This was to take place at the tent of meeting, or the tabernacle. In this particular time, when God was working with His people in a way far different from today, the tabernacle was where God dwelt with His people. The Israelites did not have the Holy Spirit tabernacling within them permanently as we do today. Thus it is significant that it would be here. Also, the tabernacle was not only the place where God came and dwelt among the people, but also it was where the people worshipped. This draws our attention to another fact, namely that this service of consecration was not a private one. Notice that verse 3 indicates an assembly of the entire congregation of Israel. When a man today is called of the Lord to preach the Word and to enter into that particular service he is ordained in the sight of God and before the people of the church. The analogy breaks down here because the people of Israel did not have a say in the matter, whereas today the congregation would agree or not that the hand of the Lord is on this person (though it does seem pretty obvious here that the hand of the Lord was involved with the consecration of Aaron and his sons).

Following this first command we see obedience – “so Moses did just as the Lord commanded him” (v 4). Obedience is key. Not only do we see that the order to follow is of the Lord but that everything that was done was in obedience. It is almost two sides of the same coin here. On the one hand we see the Lord commanding, showing that it is not up to man how we conduct ourselves before the Lord in worship (which is an extremely important principle), yet on the other hand we see that Moses did all these things, just as the Lord had commanded him – obedience. The two are inseparable. Now it becomes easy to note the following: in each of the sections of this chapter (each one dealing with certain aspects – i.e. the dressing of the men, the slaughter of the animals, the anointing with oil, etc.) we see a series of events described in great detail. We must remember that these things are not just happening as the events happened to unfold. At the end of each of the aforementioned sections we are reminded that it was the Lord who specifically ordered these events.

Take the first section for instance, in verses 6-9. Do you think that Moses just decided that Aaron and his sons needed a bath? Or what about the order of their clothing? They quite possibly could have put it on a different way. The point here is that the Lord even had words to say about how they prepared themselves for the anointing!

What do we learn from this (and all the other sections in this chapter)? That the Lord is particular about His worship and that we must obey down to the last detail, as much as has been revealed and commanded of us – there is no option!

“Lord, you are great God, and greatly to be praised. You are jealous about Your worship and command us, Your servants, to worship You in spirit and in truth. We confess to You that we do not fully know how to worship You in this way. In some ways we would love to have a manual of explicit detail like the one here which You gave to Your people so long ago, but we do not have such an item. Yet Lord, You have given us the Word of Life, and in it are principles to live by and principles about You and Your magnificent character. Open the eyes of our understanding so that our lives would be more pleasing to You in every aspect!”