Tag: God

Posted in Through the Bible Devotions

From temple service to retirement: Lessons from the Levites

Posted on by William Douthwaite

A “through the bible” devotion from Numbers 8.

“You’re too young to retire!”

Yeah, I’ve heard that a few times since my retirement from full time pastoral ministry two years ago.

  • I heard that from people who took early retirement in their fifties.
  • I heard that from folks who didn’t even know how old I was.
  • I heard that from a few who were still working well into their seventies.
  • I heard that from some who simply didn’t want me to retire.

Sometimes I would reply with the Lord’s instructions to Moses, “This is what applies to the Levites: from twenty-five years old and upward they shall enter to perform service in the work of the tent of meeting. But at the age of fifty years they shall retire from service in the work and not work anymore” (Numbers 8:24,25). I often got a puzzled look from those who didn’t know what a Levite was. Whatever.

I detect a double standard there. It’s fine to retire from other occupations but not from church work. If you’re called to be a pastor, you’re in it for life. But if you’re called to be an engineer, a roofer, a police officer, or a graphic designer, retirement is expected.

A Levite engaged in tabernacle or temple work when he was twenty-five and retired at age fifty. Theirs was not an easy job. The Levites attended to the daily, weekly, monthly, and festival sacrifices of Israel. They cared for the facilities and equipment, the oil, incense, and bread, played music and sang songs, and collected the animals, grain and wine used for worship.

I’ve found retirement to be surprisingly busy. My time is filled with grandparenting, writing, teaching, travel, learning, reading, home improvement, and baking. I’ve added new dogs, new friends, new neighbors, and new grandchildren to the adventure, blessings, and joy of life.

Too young to retire? Too old to keep working? I’m not sure you can put a number to it. It’s better to take it one day at a time.

Posted in Through the Bible Devotions

Every gift matters

Posted on by William Douthwaite
Photo by Good Free Photos on Unsplash

A “through the bible” devotion from Numbers 7.

Not long after my family moved from northeast Philadelphia to a suburb south of the city, our church built a new sanctuary. At the dedication, I paged through the memorial book which listed many specific donations made by members of the congregation. Families donated pews, stained glass windows, tall brass candlesticks, communion ware, hymnals, and everything else needed to furnish the new church. Every gift was needed and everyone could give something.

Numbers chapter 7 reads like such a memorial book. Every tribe brought a gift for worship at the altar. In this case, every offering was identical and significant. Each tribe is equally important. Each tribe makes possible the work of the priests, worship at the tabernacle, and sacrifices on the altar. It’s like commencement, when every graduate’s name is listed in the program and read aloud as he or she walks across the stage to receive their diploma.

How often have you compared yourself with someone else? I know, too often. We all do it. We look up to some and down on others. However, in God’s eyes, you are the most important person he created. So is the one you put on a pedestal and anyone you disparage. Each is precious enough to die for, demonstrated by Jesus’s death on the cross.

And so are you.

Posted in Through the Bible Devotions

Taking a break from the barber

Posted on by William Douthwaite
Photo by Brooke Cagle on Unsplash

A “through the bible” devotion from Number 6.

If you want to start a new habit or break an old one, it might help to cut things out of your life. Get the junk food out of your house if you want to eat healthier. Delete social media apps off your phone so you don’t waste time scrolling through them. Charge your phone in another room at night, so you aren’t tempted to check your messages before you go to sleep. A lot of life changes are a matter of changing your environment.

Maybe that’s the idea behind the Nazirite vow. It’s interesting that there’s a whole chapter in the bible defining what it means “When a man or woman makes a special vow, namely, the vow of a Nazirite” (Numbers 6:2). It’s not that tough, really. You don’t drink, you don’t get a haircut, and you don’t come near a dead person for a period of time. You cut some things out of your life.

It’s a time to consecrate, or separate yourself, from some of the normal things of this world. It’s a spiritual discipline that sounds like giving up something for Lent. You don’t have to do it. But if you do, you do it for God and you do it for good.

We know of a few who did this. Samson was raised in that lifestyle. John live like that when he was preaching in the wilderness. Paul did it to show that he had not abandoned his Jewish roots by embracing Christ.

I ran into J.C., a car salesman we’ve bought several vehicles from. I almost didn’t recognize him with shoulder length salt-and-pepper hair. He said, “No more haircuts for me!” He was with customers, so I never got a chance to find out why.

I’ve often wondered, “Why would you do that?” Why would you take a Nazirite vow? Josephus writes that some did it in times of need, kind of like a time of praying and fasting. Maybe someone would do it to prove their commitment to God. Or as part of a promise to leave a part of their life behind to start something new.

Jesus said, ““If anyone wants to come after Me, he must deny himself, take up his cross, and follow Me” (Matthew 16:24). Sounds like the same kind of practice, updated for New Testament believers, doesn’t it?

Posted in Through the Bible Devotions

God counts. And so do you.

Posted on by William Douthwaite
Photo by Austris Augusts on Unsplash

A “through the bible” devotion from Numbers 1.

“Numbers” is an appropriate title for the fourth book of the bible as God instructs Moses to “Take a census” (Numbers 1:2).

I’m a math guy. I like numbers, equations, statistics, calculations, and graphs. I love the truth that God is a math guy, too. God counts things.

  • “Does [God] not see my ways, and count all my steps? (Job 31:4)
  • “The Lord will count when He registers the peoples” (Psalm 87:6).
  • “[God] counts the number of the stars” (Ps. 147:4).
  • “Even the hairs of your head are all counted” (Matthew 10:30).

This census of Israel is impressive. It reveals an impressive fighting force, “all in Israel who are able to go to war” (Numbers 1:3). It’s not going to be easy. God will give them the victory, but they will have to fight. And it’s not just physical. It’s the “good fight of faith” (1 Timothy 6:12). You’ll need armor to take a stand (Ephesians 6:13). Christian soldiers march onward into war, right?

I’m just one person on a planet where eight billion people live. And yet I am not just a number. I am somebody. God knows my name. He listens to my prayer. I count. I matter. I’m important enough that he sent his son Jesus to die for me.

One of the most important things you can do is let someone know they’re important. They matter. They count. Always start with that, before you tell them they matter to God. Make it real.

Posted in Through the Bible Devotions

A community of mutual care and support

Posted on by William Douthwaite
Photo by RDNE Stock project on pexels.com

A “through the bible” devotion from Leviticus 25.

I’ve read that about 2/3 of Americans live paycheck to paycheck. That doesn’t sound good. That means a household is one case of the flu, one injury, one unexpected expense, or one layoff from not being able to pay bills or buy food or cover some other expense.

In the Old TestamentGo made provision for such a family:

“Now in case a countryman of yours becomes poor and his means among you falter, then you are to sustain him, like a stranger or a resident, so that he may live with you” (Leviticus 25:35).

If you keep reading, there are specifics about how to care for someone who has become poor. Don’t charge him interest if you lend money. Sell him food for cost. Hire him on as a worker. Treat that person with compassion, dignity, and encouragement.

One could boil down God’s commands into one simple idea: “Take care of each other.” Paul wrote, “Love is the fulfillment of the law” (Romans 13:10).

Stuff happens. It might happen to you. Life throws curves at us. But if a faith community, whether a chosen people or a gathered church, takes care of each other, no one has to do it alone. God provides for us in many different ways. Sometimes it’s through me. Sometimes it’s for me.

And just like that, we’ve made it through Leviticus. I hope you enjoyed the journey as much as I did!

Posted in Through the Bible Devotions

Add this to your schedule

Posted on by William Douthwaite
Photo by Dan Loran on Unsplash

A “through the bible” devotion from Leviticus 23.

As you might imagine, God was on my mind a lot in full-time ministry. If I wasn’t at church teaching or preaching or preparing to preach or teach, I was visiting a member of the congregation in the hospital or their home. Many of my daily tasks orbited around the Lord. My daily habits of scripture reading, prayer, devotional writing, and listening to Christian music followed me into retirement.

It was and still is hard to remember that even in church circles, not everyone’s life is infused with spirituality. Thoughts of God are a weekly occurrence, typically on a Sunday morning. Faith is there, but so is work, household chores, schoolwork, family commitments, hobbies, sports, self care, friends, sleep, and screen time. God is just one of the many priorities that vie for our attention, energy, and affection.

So God puts himself on the calendar. Pretty clever. The cycles of planting and harvesting were punctuated with feasts and celebrations that acknowledged God as provider and gave him thanks (Leviticus 23). He made himself a scheduled part of their work and rest each day, week, season, and year. It was virtually impossible to forget that he gives us life and breath and all things.

I guess we could do that. Put God on your daily schedule. In fact, put him on first, so that nothing else interferes with your time with him.

Posted in Through the Bible Devotions

A lesson in cleanliness

Posted on by William Douthwaite
Photo by Curology on Unsplash

A “through the bible” devotion from Leviticus 15.

“Supper’s ready!”

My brother, sister, and I all thundered down the stairs and took our assigned places at the dining room table.

“Did you wash your hands?”

My brother, sister, and I all scrambled for the bathrooms, one upstairs, one down, to wash our hands.

When we returned to the table, there were follow up questions.

“Did you use soap?” “Did you wash both sides of your hands?” Mom was no dummy. She knew we had much to learn about cleanliness.

So did God’s people in Leviticus 15. Here’s a whole chapter of instructions about washing and bathing that I take for granted. You can read all the details there. I have to remind myself that they didn’t have indoor plumbing with clean, running water. Even if I’m camping I usually have access to showers and a laundry room. Hygiene was different in the wilderness on the way from Egypt to Canaan.

When I traveled to Haiti to help with earthquake recovery in 2010, I saw the expansive tent city populated by hundreds of thousands of people outside of Port-au-Prince. There were no bathrooms or running water. Garbage was piled high. Sewage ran down the street. Clothes were washed in dirty streams. Survival meant there was little if any cleanliness, and a lot of disease.

Tent city

A community like that can’t survive. Without the oversight of the priests, I doubt that Israel would have survived very long either. God’s no dummy. He knew his people had a lot to learn about cleanliness, too.

I learned a lot about cleanliness during the Covid pandemic. I washed my hands more that year than ever before. Both sides! I reached for hand sanitizer at every opportunity. I wiped down everything.

By the grace of God we survived!

Posted in Through the Bible Devotions

Ew. That looks like mold.

Posted on by William Douthwaite
Photo by Nancy Hughes on Unsplash

A “through the bible” devotion from Leviticus 14.

As soon as the water receded, they moved in. Volunteers from all over the country showed up and started mucking out homes that had been under three feet of hurricane storm surge water. Once the sheetrock gets wet, the mold will begin to grow in a humid Florida climate.

If you’re not familiar, “mucking” means ripping out any and all the walls that have been underwater. If you don’t do that, the mold will grow. It will grow behind the walls. It will grow quickly. It will contaminate the air in your home. Before you know it, you’re sneezing, coughing, and sniffing from the black mold growing in your home.

In the bible, it’s the priest’s job to deal with the mold in your home.

“When you enter the land of Canaan, which I am giving you as a possession, and I put a spot of leprosy on a house in the land of your possession, then the one who owns the house shall come and tell the priest, saying, ‘Something like a spot of leprosy has become visible to me in the house.’ The priest shall then command that they empty the house before the priest goes in to look at the spot, so that everything in the house need not become unclean; and afterward the priest shall go in to look at the house” (Leviticus 14:34-36).

I’ve sat in homes that made me sneeze, sniffle, and cough. Maybe it was the cat. Maybe it was the garbage. It could have been the dirty carpet. Mold? Maybe. Maybe it was something else. All I know is that it wasn’t healthy.

God cares about your physical and spiritual health. And sometimes that means you need to clean up whatever is making you sneeze, sniffle, or cough.

Our church had to deal with some roof leaks. A member stopped attending worship, claiming that some of the carpet had gotten wet and moldy. We analyzed the air, replaced the carpet, and fixed the roof. That member never came back to church. Even though the pastor (the priest) said it was all good. Go figure.

Posted in Through the Bible Devotions

Some time off for mom

Posted on by William Douthwaite
Photo by Jonathan Borba on Unsplash

A “through the bible” devotion from Leviticus 12.

When we lived in Iowa, a friend went into labor and gave birth to her third child on a Monday. We had seen her in church the day before and thought it was time, even though the doctor said she had a few more weeks to go. The family was back in church for the baptism the very next Sunday. I thought it was amazing that they didn’t even miss one Sunday!

That’s the exception, not the rule. It’s often few weeks before taking an infant out in public. Of course, we tend to be most cautious with our first child. We relax with number two. Number three and beyond? They’ll be fine.

The idea of maternity leave comes out of the early 19th century when many women went to work during World War I. However, God laid out guidelines for maternity leave during Israel’s exodus from Egypt. After the birth of a child, mom gets to set aside other obligations to bond with her newborn (Leviticus 12).

So why must a mother take off one month for a boy but two for a girl? (Leviticus 12:3-5)? The best explanation I read explained that greater honor was given to sons in that culture. A little extra time with a daughter would ensure a close relationship with her, too.

The sacrificial ritual described in this chapter is a nice way of welcoming a woman back into the community after some time away. Everyone will want to see the little one. These instructions assure that the mother will get attention, too.