the Fourth Week after Easter
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Daily Devotionals
Day by Day Devotional - Year 1 of 5
Leviticus 11:1-28
As the Lord Jesus explains, it is not the things which enter into a man which defile him, but those which come out of him (Mark 7:15). So this distinction between clean and unclean animals has only a spiritual application for the Christian. Four groups of animals are considered in this chapter: quadrupeds, fish, birds and reptiles. To be clean, the first had to combine two conditions: to chew the cud and to have a cloven hoof. The cleanliness of the believer depends both on the way in which he is nourished, and the way he walks.
For fish two features are also necessary: fins and scales. Without the first, how can it keep direction, how can it struggle against the force of the current? And without scales, the body is not protected. To resist the attraction of the world and all it offers is the means by which a young believer can remain clean.
The unclean birds were those eating flesh and those eating anything without distinction. If we give rein in our spirit to that which comes from the flesh, or if we are careless about reading matter or things presented by the media, we shall inevitably be defiled by these things.
Finally, there are the reptiles and the animals which are classed with them – a picture of the power of evil, "the abominable thing"! "Abhor that which is evil" Romans 12:9 enjoins on us.
