Leviticus 26:12 I will walk among you and be your God, and you will be my people.
One of the news stories to come across my feeds repeatedly over my life has been the desire of humans to develop some type of utopian society. They want to extend their lives, have justice for all, live in harmony with the environment, and get along will all people. Sounds pretty good, doesn’t it! Have we see it yet?
The downside of all these schemes is that they leave out a proper relationship with the LORD. They want to do it in human strength and with human guided ideas and philosophy. They want nothing to do with the LORD, the One who created us with this innate desire for such a life.
Our text, placed near the end of the book of Leviticus, lays out the LORD’s desire for His people. The book has laid out many of the do’s and don’t’s of a relationship with the LORD as a people brought out of slavery from Egypt. These laws were for this specific people at that specific time.
Our text is part of the blessing portion of this speech. There are great promises made to His people if they will but obey Him. And many of these promises harken back to the Garden of Eden. Abundance of food. The LORD’s presence in the mobile Garden, the Tabernacle.
And then the language of our verse, mirroring the language of page three of Genesis. The LORD will walk with them in the breeze of the evening. Think about this. The LORD Himself walking with His people. This is restoration language. The people are being invited back into the Garden with God.
Obedience is the key, not some blind obedience, but an obedience that grows from a heart of gratitude for the grace given. It was not because of their own goodness that the LORD brought them out of Egypt, but because of His promise and desire for restoration of relationship with us. He doesn’t need us, but we need Him!
Three things are stated in this verse. The LORD will walk among them. The Creator of the Universe in close communion with His people. No fear of judgment. No shame of sin. Wow, that would be great.
But He will be their God. Now I want to stop and clarify something. “God” is not a name for the LORD, but a class of beings. The God we serve has a name, and it isn’t “God.” So I think we should use that name, instead of the general classification for divine beings, whether true or false.
He will be their God. There is no other that will be in their lives that fill the role of divine being except the LORD. He is their divine being. The idols of neighboring countries are not to be their god. How many times did they get in trouble by not heeding the first two commands of the covenant!
And the third thing spoken in this verse is that this rebellious and obstinate people will be the object of His attention. They will be His people, “my people.” This denotes a special relationship they are to have with Him and He with them.
I like being my wife’s husband! We are exclusive. No “poly” in our relationship. And this is good.
The same is to be true of our relationship with the LORD. Only and exclusive. He is to be our Lord, Master, “God” and we are to be His people, servants, representatives. And it this there is a restoration of the perfection that our hearts desire and for with they long.
The Arnold Journey 