Leviticus

Through the book of Leviticus, a few themes have been jumping out to me.

One of them is how God stressed holiness for not just the priests but also the rest of the nation. I love how God wanted to be the God of everyone, not just the priests.

Sadly, I think it is a tough cultural default that people see a separation between them and preachers, Pastors or Catholic Priests  or gurus or whatever other kind of spiritual leader exists for people to come seek spiritual guidance  For the most part, popular belief says "just leave the heavy duty spiritual knowledge for those guys, but I'm going to continue my life pretty normal and not try to seek God out personally. Seeking God out for myself would be impossible or too difficult."

I hate how the presence of spiritual leaders give people an excuse to be more distant from God instead of the presence of a spiritual leader bringing people closer to God. But in the book of Leviticus I observed how the priest's job had a lot to do with cleansing the people of their sins and making atonement for the nation in order for God to dwell with them. The Levite's job was directly related to bringing God and the nation closer together. Baby, that's how it should be!! 

Once I made that connection, the challenge came. Am I relying on a spiritual leader in order to be closer to God? Or am I trying to have direct relationship with God? Also, do other people see me like their spiritual guru now because I'm going to bible school so I must have all the right answers? Or am I encouraging people to go find God on a personal level themselves?

God wants EVERYONE. He wants everyone to get to know his character, and share inside jokes, and exchange gifts, and frolic through flowers, and share pictures of their grandchildren and I'm going overboard but I hope you get the point. He wants every single person to know him personally because he is the best thing even before sliced bread. 

Some one during my DTS said they used to have a date night with God every week. She would start out by asking God where he wanted to go and then spend the night doing whatever with God. That's the kind of effort God is asking for in Leviticus (like with the solemn assemblies or all the festival days) . Take a day out for God and just be with Him. We do it for our best friends and significant others. Why don't we do it for God?