There are a lot of places in the Bible where God kills people for what to modern Americans seems trivial reasons. So why is that?
Please allow me to digress and build up to that reason.
In Exodus 31, God chooses a pair of people and fills them with the Spirit of God to perform certain tasks. They were appointed - by name - to help put together the Tent of Meeting. No other names were mentioned - just those two people.
Inside that Tent would be the Ark of the Testimony - the box which held the stone tablets on which was written the Ten Commandments. That’s the spot where God would sit when He met (Tent of Meeting ring a bell?) with Moses.
So here’s evidence that individuals receive their gifting from God. Everyone has something God wants us to do. For some, that’s sweeping and mopping, others are made to be surgeons, and others can make gold and silver things for the Tent of Meeting.
What happens when a surgeon tries to mop a floor? It’s not that difficult a task, so a surgeon could probably do a decent job of it. In the process, however, that surgeon might smack a hand into a chair or table and be unable to perform in the operating room. But ask yourself if a floor sweeper could perform surgery?
My wife and I have a food processor. The operating instructions are in a booklet that came with the appliance. Nowhere does it indicate it could be used to drive nails. Using it for that purpose would destroy it, or at least curtail its effectiveness.
The Bible is our Manual of Operation. Those parts where it says “Thou Shalt Not” is not simply the whim of an autocratic deity. There are reasons for each and every one of the commandments, and they’re all for our own good, so we don’t try to do things like drive nails with our foreheads.
A few verses earlier God gives the recipe for incense and anointing oil. That specific formula was for use in worshiping God only. Using that incense or oil for any other purpose carried the severe penalty of “cut off from his people.” Back in those days it could be considered a worse punishment that death. Community was everything, back then.
Our user’s manual, the Bible, indicates repeatedly we are here for His purpose. We’re like the incense in the Tent of Meeting. Each of us has a specific recipe and a special purpose. If we are made to prune grape vines, using that skill to deprive our neighbor of his rose bushes is a violation of our purpose in life. “Thou shalt not steal.” Stealing, according to Old Testament Law was a sin.
In previous messages I explained about sin, and how it carries the penalty of death. But that’s the entire purpose behind why Jesus came. He lived a sinless life, took our punishment, and allowed us access to an unending afterlife with Him.
Deny Him and His sacrifice, and you are in essence telling Him you don’t want to be with Him. All He’ll do is give you what you wanted - eternity without Him. In other words, He “seconds” the motion.
So back to the question I posed at the beginning. Why does God kill people who don’t follow the rules?
To put it simply, He wants to point out to us how serious He is about His commands. He told everyone not to touch the Ark of the Covenant. Uzzah touched it. BAM! Dead. Ananias and Sapphira lied. BAM! Don’t use the oil or incense for mundane purposes. BAM!
(NOTE: After God wiped out a whole slew of Hebrews for the golden calf incident, the ones left after the plague were really careful to follow instructions on building the tabernacle.)
It’s been a while since God has done something like that. In the days of Ananias fear of God was the result.
Nowadays, people don’t fear God.
Nowadays they’re using food processors to drive nails.
Metaphorically, of course.
Comments