What Have We Done?

Wednesday February 4, 2026

What have we done?  The Old Testament should not be considered obsolete.  All Scripture is given to us for our learning and our good.  Yes, I thank the Lord that we live in the dispensation of grace!  I thank the Lord for His Son, Jesus Christ, my Savior and am thankful that because of Jesus, I have been made righteous.  So, why go back and read the Old Testament.  Consider our passages from today’s reading.  Particularly, consider God’s instructions to Moses for the people of Israel.  God says, “Do not follow the practices of the land of Egypt, where you used to live, or follow the practices of the land of Canaan, where I am bringing you.  You must not follow their customs.  You are to practice my ordinances and you are to keep my statues by following them” (Leviticus 18:3-4).  God knew the people would be prone to live the way the society lived wherever they lived.  Whatever they witnessed the people in Egypt do, they were prone to start living the way they did.  When they got into Canaan, they would be prone to do the same.  In other words, there is a vulnerability to change with the culture, adopt the practices of the world.  While we are not living under the Law of Moses, we are living in the grace of God through Christ, and even Christ said, “if you love me, keep my commandments” (John 14:15).  What have we done?  And then, at the end of that chapter, after listing some depraved examples of sinful behavior, such an abomination and detestable to God, God told them that the people of Canaan (land where they were going) had committed all of these (Leviticus 18:24).  God states that these sins committed by mankind had defiled the land, and that the land would “vomit out its inhabitants” (v.25).  The warning to Israel was that if they followed by committing the same sins, it would defile the land, and the land would vomit them out too (v.28).  Sin defiles a land.  As we look around at our own nation, can we not see and agree that this is still true?  Two lessons we might draw for this truth in God’s Word:  (1) as Christians, we are vulnerable to take on the practices of our culture.  We must, keep our eyes on Christ, repent, give attention to God’s Word, learn to pray, and not forsake the assembling of ourselves together; (2) as Christians, we must not lose sight of the goal and answer.  The help of our nation will not come from her capital(s) and the strength of a nation is not in her military power.  Our help comes from the Lord.  We must see the holiness of God, understand His compassion for mankind and His desire for their salvation, and boldly proclaim the truth in love that sin must be repented of and turned from, and that there is everlasting life in Christ only to those who believe.