Scripture reading: Acts 5:1–11

Better Wear a Helmet!

For our God is a consuming fire. (Hebrews 12:29)

The book of Leviticus served worshippers in the days of the Old Testament in a similar way that a safety manual serves workers in a nuclear power plant today. Nuclear reactors are dangerous. And those who enter radioactive areas carelessly or unprepared can be seriously hurt. So it is with holiness. Our God is holy and approaching him in worship must not be done unadvisedly. Leviticus therefore lays out precautionary measures for those desirous of approaching God: rules, protocols, procedures, rituals, etc.

The Lord said to Moses, “Tell Aaron your brother not to come at any time into the Holy Place inside the veil . . . so that he may not die. . . . But in this way Aaron shall come into the Holy Place . . .” (Leviticus 16:2–3)

God wants us to come into his presence in worship. But he wants us to come in the right way. The consequences can be devastating for those who come into his presence in the wrong way, with the wrong attitudes, and for the wrong purposes:

,. Aaron’s sons Nadab and Abihu worshipped God in an unauthorized manner and were consumed by fire. (Leviticus 10:1–3)

,. Korah, Dathan and Abiram complained against Moses and how he was lead- ing the people. During a worship service, the ground under them split apart and the earth opened its mouth and swallowed them. (Numbers 16:31–32)

,. Seventy men from the town of Beth Shemesh dared to look inside the Ark of the Covenant and God struck them dead. (I Samuel 6:19–20)

,. When Uzzah inappropriately touched the Ark of the Covenant the Lord’s anger was kindled and he struck Uzzah dead. (I Chronicles 13:9–10)

,. Even in the New Testament we see the danger of worshipping in the wrong way when Ananias and Sapphira lied about their offering. Both of them were immediately struck dead. (Acts 5:1–11)

Perhaps churches should put a sign on the doors of the sanctuary: Enter at your own risk!  To worship the  Holy One  is  serious business.  Author Annie Dillard captures the drama of what it really means to worship the Holy One in her book, Teaching a Stone to Talk.

Does anyone have the foggiest idea what sort of power we so blithely invoke? Or, as I suspect, does no one believe a word of it? The churches are children playing on the floor with their chemistry sets, mixing up a batch of TNT to kill a Sunday morning. It is madness to wear ladies’ straw hats and velvet hats to church; we should all be wearing crash helmets. Ushers should issue life preservers and signal flares; they should lash us to our pews. For the sleeping god may wake someday and take offense, or the waking god may draw us out to where we can never return.

Yes, worship is serious business. Our God is a consuming fire (Hebrews 12:29). You can’t say we weren’t warned. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom (Proverbs 9:10).

 

The remarkable thing about God is that when you fear God, you fear nothing else, whereas if you do not fear God, you fear everything else.—Oswald Chambers

 

point to ponder • Why does no one seem to fear God anymore?

prayer focus • The attributes of God: his kindness, mercy, love, power . . .