Forbidden foccacia
This week's verses are Exodus 12:14-15:
These verses are part of God's instructions to the Israelites about how to celebrate Passover. One of the things he wants them to commemorate is the hurried exit they made from Egypt, travelling so quickly that they didn't have time to make normal bread. So as part of the celebration, he has them relive the experience of simple rushed cuisine: Unleavened bread, hastily roasted lamb, whatever herbs could be quickly gathered up, etc. He's saying not to just talk about the history, or read about it, but to actually live it out and experience it.
The shocking thing, though, isn't the museum diet but the fact that anyone who doesn't follow it will be cut off from Israel. Being cut off meant being cut off from worshiping God and from the blessing he promised to Israel. In medieval times, they would have excommunicated someone. In modern times, we practice such extreme inclusivity that there's no cutting off of anyone from the church, no matter how ungodly they may be. But in ancient times, being cut off was a very serious punishment and a very real worry for people who were part of the church.
Think about it though. How holy would God have to be to cut himself off from someone forever just for eating a sandwich on soft bread? It's a victimless crime, right? If even that tiny of a detail can result in damnation, what hope do we have of earning a perfect score? If it were not for the mercy Jesus died on the cross to bring us, we would have no hope at all!
But it's not exactly a victimless crime. It's a kind of statement against multiculturalism, the same as some of the recent laws against ostentatious religious displays being passed in Europe are. If you want social cohesion, you can't have one set of people living in one culture while others declare that culture to be worthless and live another tribe's culture among them. What you end up with then is infighting, and a loss of the sense of oneness. A culture that lives that way is easily defeated, as an enemy can simply exploit the differences and divide and conquer. Someone declaring themselves to be above the rules is declaring themselves to be superior to the people who follow them, and therefore is a threat to that society itself. It's not about the yeast, but about whether you identify as part of the team.
In Israel's case, they were a weak tribe surrounded by stronger tribes. They had a different religion than their neighbours. The fact that God had delivered them miraculously from Egypt was a huge deal. They were slaves. Egypt was as modern and powerful as any nation the world had known up to that point. And yet God rescued them completely, even bending the very laws of nature! One of the most central points of their shared cultural identity was how amazing their God was, and how they all struggled together to follow him.
If someone was like "Yeah whatever, you guys eat your flatbread. I'm good," it would create a rift in their society and introduce division and defeat by their neighbours. Not honouring the tradition was to dishonour the God who introduced it. And the only solution to maintain cohesion was to eject the offenders from the tribe, just as God ejected the offenders from the garden of Eden.
It's such a demonstration of God's holiness for him to be as serious about this as he was about the forbidden fruit in the garden. There's no three warnings. There's no sending people to "timeout" on their first violation of the rule. It's deadly serious in a way we can barely grasp. That's why he's like "Don't even have it in your house. Don't let there even be a question of your devotion, or grounds for temptation by having it."
Life without grace means no safety net, no reconciliation, no do-overs. For forty-nine years you could get it perfect every time, but if at age fifty on a business trip you're like "Oh come on, what difference is one slice of pizza going to make?" You're done. That's it.
Grace is amazing in its own right, but it really shows its value when you can see the alternative. God is so holy that we need to have that protection in order to be around him. If we get cut off from him we need only turn around and ask his forgiveness and we are made new again.
This day will become a memorial for you, and you will celebrate it as a festival to the Lord—you will celebrate it perpetually as a lasting ordinance. For seven days you must eat bread made without yeast. Surely on the first day you must put away yeast from your houses because anyone who eats bread made with yeast from the first day to the seventh day will be cut off from Israel.
These verses are part of God's instructions to the Israelites about how to celebrate Passover. One of the things he wants them to commemorate is the hurried exit they made from Egypt, travelling so quickly that they didn't have time to make normal bread. So as part of the celebration, he has them relive the experience of simple rushed cuisine: Unleavened bread, hastily roasted lamb, whatever herbs could be quickly gathered up, etc. He's saying not to just talk about the history, or read about it, but to actually live it out and experience it.
The shocking thing, though, isn't the museum diet but the fact that anyone who doesn't follow it will be cut off from Israel. Being cut off meant being cut off from worshiping God and from the blessing he promised to Israel. In medieval times, they would have excommunicated someone. In modern times, we practice such extreme inclusivity that there's no cutting off of anyone from the church, no matter how ungodly they may be. But in ancient times, being cut off was a very serious punishment and a very real worry for people who were part of the church.
Think about it though. How holy would God have to be to cut himself off from someone forever just for eating a sandwich on soft bread? It's a victimless crime, right? If even that tiny of a detail can result in damnation, what hope do we have of earning a perfect score? If it were not for the mercy Jesus died on the cross to bring us, we would have no hope at all!
But it's not exactly a victimless crime. It's a kind of statement against multiculturalism, the same as some of the recent laws against ostentatious religious displays being passed in Europe are. If you want social cohesion, you can't have one set of people living in one culture while others declare that culture to be worthless and live another tribe's culture among them. What you end up with then is infighting, and a loss of the sense of oneness. A culture that lives that way is easily defeated, as an enemy can simply exploit the differences and divide and conquer. Someone declaring themselves to be above the rules is declaring themselves to be superior to the people who follow them, and therefore is a threat to that society itself. It's not about the yeast, but about whether you identify as part of the team.
In Israel's case, they were a weak tribe surrounded by stronger tribes. They had a different religion than their neighbours. The fact that God had delivered them miraculously from Egypt was a huge deal. They were slaves. Egypt was as modern and powerful as any nation the world had known up to that point. And yet God rescued them completely, even bending the very laws of nature! One of the most central points of their shared cultural identity was how amazing their God was, and how they all struggled together to follow him.
If someone was like "Yeah whatever, you guys eat your flatbread. I'm good," it would create a rift in their society and introduce division and defeat by their neighbours. Not honouring the tradition was to dishonour the God who introduced it. And the only solution to maintain cohesion was to eject the offenders from the tribe, just as God ejected the offenders from the garden of Eden.
It's such a demonstration of God's holiness for him to be as serious about this as he was about the forbidden fruit in the garden. There's no three warnings. There's no sending people to "timeout" on their first violation of the rule. It's deadly serious in a way we can barely grasp. That's why he's like "Don't even have it in your house. Don't let there even be a question of your devotion, or grounds for temptation by having it."
Life without grace means no safety net, no reconciliation, no do-overs. For forty-nine years you could get it perfect every time, but if at age fifty on a business trip you're like "Oh come on, what difference is one slice of pizza going to make?" You're done. That's it.
Grace is amazing in its own right, but it really shows its value when you can see the alternative. God is so holy that we need to have that protection in order to be around him. If we get cut off from him we need only turn around and ask his forgiveness and we are made new again.
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