Translation & Sermon by Nate Wilson for Christ The Redeemer Church, Manhattan, KS 09 Oct 2016
· When I started into Leviticus 18, I had no idea that it would become three sermons! I had been assuming I would briefly cover it and move on from the awkward subject of adultery, but this chapter has furnished a rich source of crucially-important principles about relating to God and to each other.
o In my first sermon on Lev. 18, we looked at the covenantal way God relates to us,
o then we looked at the list of statutes themselves which define adultery in terms of who God does not permit you to marry,
§ namely, you are forbidden to marry close family members, and you are forbidden to marry an animal or a member of the same sex or multiple people, or someone who is currently married.
§ (Logically, these same prohibitions apply not only to who you can marry, but also serve as a warning not to commit adultery in any of these ways outside of marriage as well.)
o Now, I want to mop up some topics that are related to the importance of covering our bodies and conclude with what those who are guilty of breaking these statutes should do. So, let’s begin with the summary statement on “covering” in Leviticus 18:6 -
· As we consider what this verse has to teach us about covering and uncovering, I want to point out two things about the wording of this verse and then make applications first to the men and then to the women.
· First, I believe the choice of Hebrew words in verse 6 creates an intentional parallel between the closeness of the marriage relationship and the relational closeness between God and His people.
o The verb qrb translated “approach” or “come near” has been used in Leviticus up to this point only to indicate movement into the presence of God for fellowship.
§ Sacrificial animals were “brought near” to God at the altar, and
§ people who were consecrated to God were “brought near” to the Tent of Meeting.
§ Now it is used in relationship to a marriage partner.
o Similarly with the Hebrew word for “uncover” (which the NIV unfortunately omits) – one third of the times that galot (or “uncover”) is used previous to Leviticus 11 in the Bible refer to God revealing Himself to make a covenanted relationship with someone.
§ For instance, Gen. 35:7 “He [Jacob] built an altar there, and called the place El-bethel, because there God had revealed Himself to him when he fled from his brother.”[1]
o Ephesians 5 makes this parallel between human marriage and God’s love clear: “Therefore, just as the church is subject to Christ, so let the wives be to their own husbands in everything. Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself for her...” (Ephesians 5:24-25, NKJV)
§ Our marriages are to create a picture to the world of what it is like for God to be close to His church.
o However, in the “Caananite” culture around us, we are increasingly seeing the closeness of marriage turned into something that is common, cheap, even ho-hum, and something that is interchangeable with multiple people instead of holy to one person for life. In some cases the world around us even portrays the closeness of marriage as despicable.
§ For us to walk in such worldly ways is to act out lies about God through dysfunctional relationships with other people.
§ On the other hand, “coming close to” or “approaching” your spouse in marriage is a holy and beautiful thing created by God to show on earth His love and character.
· Now, the second thing about the words of verse 6 that I want to point out is that the literal wording of the prohibitions in Leviticus is, “you shall not uncover the nakedness of...”
· God built grown men’s brains, as a general rule, to respond to the sight of a woman’s body by releasing hormones that block out thoughts of work, raise heartbeat and blood pressure, and drive him mentally and physically toward the consummation of marriage.
o There is nothing intrinsically sinful about this; it is just part of God’s masculine design.
o However, this doesn’t mean that it’s o.k. for men to act like animals and let this natural tendency overrule their duty before God.
o Men can process the sight of a defraudingly-dressed woman under the control of the Holy Spirit and resist going down the path of adultery, but it takes real mental effort to do so – effort that must be put out to walk in purity in the midst of a corrupt world.
· The point is that God knows that adultery usually starts with merely looking, and so His prohibittion starts well before the act of adultery. It starts with not uncovering the body of a woman if she’s not available to you as your wife!
o The Bible story of David and Bathsheba is a classic example of this. All it took was the sight of Bathsheba bathing to start them down the road to adultery.
o David could have avoided standing in a place where he might see a woman uncovered.
o In Job 31, a godly man made a promise with his eyes not to look upon a woman’s body as an object for his pleasure. Women were created to glorify God!
o At least David could have taken the thought captive by turning away and reminding himself that God made that woman off-limits so it would be a great offense against God to commit adultery. His calling was to demonstrate unfaithfulness to the world.
o David could have prayed for God to comfort and bless Bathsheba while her husband was away at war and prayed for protection and strength for Uriah while he was deployed.
o David could have called Nathan the prophet and said, “Hey man, I’m struggling with something I saw, can you remind me what God says about adultery and hold me accountable?
· Men, this command not only tells us that it is a sin to rip a woman’s clothes off of her physically, it teaches us that it is a sin to uncover a woman in any way. Consider the wider application of this principle:
o Undressing her in your mind is the sin of adultery.
o Taking advantage of gaps in her clothing to catch glimpses of her body - or peeping into private rooms to catch a glimpse of a woman is the sin of uncovering nakedness.
o Opening magazines or browsing web pages or watching movies that contain pictures of undressed or defraudingly-dressed women is the sin of uncovering a woman’s nakedness.
o Of course these things are all commonly practiced by the majority of men in our culture, but they are still sin, and they must be turned away from.
o Men, you cannot tolerate these things in your life or, for that matter, in the lives of your sons.
o This sin must be ruthlessly confronted and rooted out, or else you will be vomited out, as God promises at the end of the chapter.
· So, Husbands, when you think of “coming near” your wife, do so with an attitude of treating her like God has treated you – with loving self-sacrifice, faithfulness, and kindness. And don’t pursue or tolerate the uncovering of any other woman in any way, shape, or form!
· Wait a minute. Humans were created without clothes. Where did the need for covering come in? Clothing is not a result of women trying to be fashionable or of men imposing puritanical standards on women; clothing was to deal with the effects of human sin in the first place, and God Himself instituted clothing as a covering. Genesis 3:9-11 “Then the LORD God called to Adam and said to him, ‘Where are you?’ So he said, ‘I heard Your voice in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; and I hid myself.’ And He said, ‘Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree of which I commanded you that you should not eat?’ ... 21 so for Adam and his wife the LORD God made tunics of skin, and clothed them.” (NKJV)
· So what exactly did God want covered? Does it have to be all your skin – like a Muslim burkha? 1 Corinthians 12:23 indicates otherwise: “And those members of the body which we think to be less honorable, on these we bestow greater honor; and our unpresentable parts have greater modesty[3].” This indicates that there are certain body parts which are “un-presentable” which should be covered modestly. What are those parts of the body?
· If you look through every Bible verse which speaks of “covering” a woman’s body, you will see that two body parts are specifically mentioned which Godly women covered: the thighs and the head. (This is not to say that no other body part should be covered; these are just the only ones which the Bible actually talks about Godly women covering, so they bear special consideration.)
· Since I have already delivered a long sermon on headcoverings back in May 2009, and since I think that the covering of the head is not so much about adultery, I will simply refer you to that sermon on the church website and only share this morning what the Bible says about covering the thighs.
o Isaiah 47:1-3 says, "Come down and sit in the dust, O virgin daughter of Babylon; Sit on the ground without a throne, O daughter of the Chaldeans! For you shall no more be called Tender and delicate. Take the millstones and grind meal. Remove your veil, Take off the skirt, Uncover the thigh, Pass through the rivers. Your nakedness shall be uncovered, Yes, your shame will be seen; I will take vengeance, And I will not arbitrate with a man." (NKJV)
o Jeremiah 13:22-26 “And if you say in your heart, ‘Why have these things come upon me?’ For the greatness of your iniquity Your skirts have been uncovered, Your heels made bare... That your shame may appear.” (NKJV) God considered it shameful to hike the skirts and reveal the thigh – even to reveal the “heel” of the foot (unfortunately mistranslated “body” in NIV and negligently omitted from the ESV)
§ Now, the reason why the “heel” is mentioned as being revealed when the “thigh” is uncovered is that the Hebrew word generally translated “thigh” is a general word that refers to the whole “leg,” but which is often used in the Bible to refer merely to the upper part of the leg from the knee to the waist.
§ If God’s word says it is shameful to reveal the “thigh,” then it could be interpreted conservatively as meaning the whole leg, or it could be interpreted minimalistically as meaning just down to your knees.
§ Ladies, when you get dressed, will you consider covering your thighs at least down to your knees so that you do not have reason for shame in God’s eyes?
o Let me also add that God considered revealing the buttocks to be shameful in Isaiah 20:4 “so shall the king of Assyria lead away the Egyptians as prisoners and the Ethiopians as captives, young and old, naked and barefoot, with their buttocks uncovered, to the shame of Egypt.” (NKJV) When there is nothing covering your buttocks but a thin, tight piece of fabric that reveals all of your topography, I suggest that is not a modest response to what God calls shameful.
· In the New Testament, modesty is framed both in terms of having the right attitude inside your heart (1 Peter 3:3-4) and in terms of meeting external, cultural standards of appropriateness. In my 1 Peter sermon series last year, I talked about that internal attitude of modesty, and you can look that up on the church website, so, for now, let me make some comments about external modesty:
o In 1 Timothy 2:9-10 we read, “I desire therefore that… the women adorn themselves in modest apparel, with propriety and moderation” (NKJV).
o In every culture, there is a range of what is considered “modest” and “proper,” and I believe that the Biblical principle of “moderation” instructs us (in matters where the Bible gives us freedom to chose) to find a middle ground that is not on an extreme.
§ In our culture, the secular women’s magazines promote one extreme,
§ and the Amish (and other plain-dressers) promote the other extreme;
§ modesty chooses a moderate position, not one that will stick out like a sore thumb for its old-fashionedness or for its new-fangledness, but sits toward the center of what is considered proper in the culture (while still being informed by God’s word).[4]
o Clothing sends a message about who you are and what you want to do. What message do your clothes send? Is that message consistent with who you are as a Christian?
· In addition to the Biblical principle of covering with moderation and propriety is the Biblical principle of not being a stumbling block. In the Bible, the principle of not being a stumbling block is applied to food, but it is also applicable to dress.
o Multiple men in our own congregation have mentioned to me that it is a stumbling block to them when women wear clothing to church that is revealing. (It’s distracting to me too.)
o Now, this is not because the men in our church are any more perverted than average. In any gathering of men, statistics show that something like 80% of them are involved in pornography. That’s the real world you walk into, ladies, when you get dressed. You don’t walk into a vacuum; you walk into a world full of men with twisted minds concerning women.
o Now, you may be tempted to react to that reality by being disgusted with men and dressing as you please because you think the problem has nothing to do with you,
o but I encourage you to consider what God calls us to do when we are aware that people are stumbling. Consider these verses in that context:
§ I Corinthians 8:9 Beware lest somehow this liberty of yours become a stumbling block to those who are weak.
§ Galatians 5:13b …do not use liberty as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another.
§ Romans 14:13 Therefore let us not judge one another anymore, but rather resolve this, not to put a stumbling block or a cause to fall in our brother's way.
§ I Corinthians 10:32-33 Give no offense, either to the Jews or to the Greeks or to the church of God, just as I also please all men in all things, not seeking my own profit, but the profit of many, that they may be saved.
o You can’t ultimately control whether a man thinks lustful thoughts, but you can cover yourself in such a manner that it does not scream at him to think lustful thoughts.
o Notice how the New Testament points you not towards obsessing about their sin but rather towards love, service, edification, and salvation. Ladies, how can you dress in a way that “serves,” “honors,” and “benefits toward salvation” people who see you?
· One last application to women from the concept of covering in Leviticus 18 is that the Bible teaches you to resist and call out for help if any man but your husband tries to uncover you.
o This is merely implied in Leviticus 18, but it is written out explicitly in Deuteronomy 22:23ff: “If… a man finds [a woman] in the city and lies with her, then you shall bring them both out to the gate of that city [indicating a court trial first], and you shall stone them to death with stones, the young woman because she did not cry out in the city, and the man because he humbled his neighbor's wife... But if … the man forces her… then only the man who lay with her shall die. But you shall do nothing to the young woman; there is in the young woman no sin deserving of death... For [she] cried out, but there was no one to save her.” (Deut. 22:23-27, NKJV)
o A guy might tell you that you’d better not scream or call 911, but you must obey God rather than man and call for help. If you do that and are still violated, God says you have done nothing wrong.
o I was setting up for the National Day of Prayer event next to the courthouse a couple of years ago when a woman and her lawyer burst out the side door followed by a man and his lawyer. The woman was sobbing uncontrollably, but the man had a smug grin on his face. Turns out, the woman had accused the man of uncovering her forcibly, but, since she had not resisted and called for help, the judge didn’t believe her. If you obey God’s law on this point and “Yell and Tell,” even now the courts will honor it!
· So while Leviticus 18 does not contain an explicit command to women, women can still apply its principles by:
o covering themselves modestly and properly,
o having an attitude of serving, honoring, and benefiting brothers toward salvation,
o and resisting and calling for help if you happen to be violated.
· Now, I want to move from these prescriptive applications to men and women about covering and uncovering to address everyone who has already broken God’s statutes regarding adultery.
· Remember that the Canaanite nations which were not founded upon covenants with God were, nevertheless, “visited/held accountable/ punished” by God Himself in v.25, and that the native as well as the foreigner were to follow God’s command not to commit adultery in v.26, so, even though God’s special relationship with Israel might not apply to our nation, still the general principle of accountability to our Creator regarding whether or not we commit adultery still applies to our nation today.
· The early church in the city of Corinth was riddled with sins of adultery, so God gave the Corinthians two books of the Bible to tell all those sex offenders what they needed to do to get right with God. From the books of 1 & 2 Corinthians, we can learn all we need to know about what to:
· 1 Corinthians 6:9-11 “Or have y’all not known that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the immoral nor idol worshipers, nor adulterers, nor gays nor homosexuals, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards nor abusive [speakers] nor graspers will inherit the kingdom of God. And such were some of y’all, but you washed yourselves, but you were made holy, but you were made righteous in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the Spirit of our God.” (NAW)
· Adultery, even though it is grievous and causes deep hurt, is not the unforgiveable sin. Immoral persons, idolaters, adulterers, homosexuals and other sinners will not inherit the kingdom of God, but ex-offenders, ex-idolaters, ex-adulterers, and ex-homosexuals who have had their sin washed away and have been made holy and right by Jesus Christ will inherit the kingdom of God.
· If you doubt that, turn to 1 Corinthians 5 and then to 2 Corinthians 2. Here we have a man who uncovered his mother and bragged about it, then was excommunicated from the church over it, and that woke him up spiritually. He evidently began grieving greatly over his sin and the loss of his relationship with the church. He must have put an end to his incestuous relationship, acknowledging that it was wrong, and he must have asked Jesus to forgive him of his sin, because, in 2 Corinthians 2:7-8, the Apostle Paul tells the church to “forgive and comfort him, lest perhaps such a one be swallowed up with too much sorrow. Therefore... reaffirm your love to him.” That meant re-accepting him into the church. When he died, I believe he went to heaven… and you can too, if you will follow the pattern of repentance and faith to which God calls every sinner.
· The story of Jesus and the woman caught in adultery in John’s Gospel shows the same pattern of repentance and faith. Jesus told the woman, “I do not accuse you; go and sin no more.” Now, I think there are several reasons why Jesus did not demand the death sentence for this woman, which I don’t have time to go into here, but what did Jesus call her to do? “Sin no more” which is another way of expressing repentance.
· If you would like to review more specifics regarding repentance from various adultery-related sins, ask me for our church policy paper on gender, marriage, & divorce.
1) If you have sinned in failing to cover yourself, in uncovering nakedness, in committing adultery, in being indecent with a family member, in degrading your own spouse, or otherwise stepping outside of the one-man-one-woman boundary of marriage as God intended it, then repent of it!
2) Pursue personal integrity, sexual purity, and faithfulness to the marriage vows which you have made (or you will make). In this way we will be the “salt” and “light” that Jesus called us to be (Matt. 5:13-14), and we will constitute a faithful remnant that gives God a reason to withhold His wrath against our nation. Let us be a faithful remnant[5] in the midst of a “crooked and perverse generation” (Matt. 17:17).
3) Exercise the authority which God has given you, whatever is in your sphere of authority, to uphold this law of God which characterizes His faithfulness and purity. Teach this law to your children, to your students, to your disciples, to your fellow-citizens, and hold them accountable to God’s law on this matter, whether it be spanking that foolishness out of your children while they are young, exercising church discipline, upholding righteousness in a business you own, or even implementing the principals of these laws in the civil sphere. Whatever God has given you the authority and ability to do to advance the holiness of God among men, do it!
[1] cf. Deut. 29:29, 1 Sam. 2:27, 1 Chron. 17:25
[2] “Nakedness” (‘ervah) is the object of the verb “uncover.” In the Bible, “nakedness” and “shame” are almost synonymous, which is why the old Geneva Bible translates the word “shame” and the Vulgate translates it “turpitude,” and in a couple of places the NIV renders it “dishonors.” The exposure to the public of what is private is indeed a vile thing, and we have just about lost that sense in our contemporary culture where cameras are everywhere taking pictures of practically everything.
[3] On the other hand, modesty involves not overdoing attention-attracting adornment. Isaiah 3:16-24
[4] My kids often ask me, “How many cookies can I have.” I have made a habit of answering them, “Take a moderate amount.” You know how many you can get away with, but take less than that.
[5] Isaiah 37:4, 2Kings 19:31, Nehemiah 1:3, Jer. 42:2, Ezek. 6:8, Amos 5:15, Micah 7:18, Zech. 9:7, Rom. 11:5