I was reading Leviticus 13, and then it dawned on me.
“You have leprosy.”
Now to frame this, I don’t actually carry any form of physical Hansen’s Disease or anything that the Scripture deals with when it discusses various forms of leprosy.
But here is the punch line and the principle. I have been carrying something that has gnawed at me and has negatively affected how I present to others, and it does not reflect well.
I understand that there might be those that say “what does presentation matter? G-d allows us to come as we are (oftentimes taken to mean, any old way we damn well please).
And ther are others that might say, “yes, we present our best to G-d”, complete with the religious spirit of dressing in a suit or summer dress for Easter and looking down one’s nose at anyone else who should dare to wear anything resembling shorts, t-shirts, or flip-flops.
And yet both miss the mark.
ἕκαστος ἐν τῷ ἰδίῳ νοῒ πληροφορείσθω. Let everyone be fully convinced in their own thought (Romans 14:5).
Again with the Romans passage, how many times will David continue to harp on that old horse?
Until each and everyone quits measuring the holiness of another by outward appearance, festal holidays, celebrations, and personal convictions on matters of conscience.
Now, with that under our belts, consider this thought.
How many of us carry something that, for years, Father has been on us about getting rid of? How many of us have been hounded by the HOLY Spirit to drop that crappy thing that has been keeping us from a new level of HOLINESS. He is the Spirit that wants to make us HOLY, and implement a new way of living in every aspect of our lives, such that our presence and fragrance cleans up that which is around us and not in alignment with G-d’s best.
How many of us have leprosy in our hearts, our minds (brain rot), our sexual lives, our skin and appearance and presentation, or our relationships, or even our reins? What is toxifying our capacity to sanctify others so they can be the best versions of themselves?
What is holding each of us back?
That thing will keep the Priest from pronouncing us clean, gang.
Clean in order that we might proceed into that next season.
Lest we forget, sowing two different fabrics, or two different crops, or two different natures together causes the thing in question to become defiled.
G-d wants our essence to become 100% our essence.
We should be possessed of zeal toward those many ends, and transforming from glory to glory, and from strength to strength, from deep to deeper, and from everlasting to everlasting.
What is defiling you that is causing your spirit to cry out to others “UNCLEAN! UNCLEAN!”?
These are universal, non-optional, cause-and-effect relationships.
Just in case we forget, there is the next thing that Father wants to highlight and remove.
He wants us equipped both not to care when the fear of man may be the issue, and to care, when a lack of the fear of G-d may be the issue. He wants fullness and the capacity to walk when we need to walk, in the manner in which we need to walk.
“To walk with kings yet not lose the common touch” (Rudyard Kipling).
To care when it is time to care. And to give no care when it is time to give no care.
Being held hostage to the taskmasters of either disdain for appearance, or vanity towards appearance are not our aim.
Rather, we ought, nay, we must needs, walk with a higher goal in view.
The fullness of capacity to walk as the context demands.
A Greek to the Greek, and a Jew to the Jew.
“There is nothing outside a person that by going into him can defile him, but the things that come out of a person are what defile him.”
