The worshiper offers purification and reparations offerings in order to repair breaches in the relationship caused by sinful and impure actions. Then the worshiper offers himself in total surrender to Yahweh, drawing near to him as a pleasing aroma in the ascension offering. And he may offer a tribute to Yahweh for all of his kindness to him. But even these aren’t the end. All of these offerings — purification, reparation, total surrender, and tribute — are meant to lead to communion. There are two different terms for the tabernacle in Leviticus: “tabernacle” (or “dwelling”) and “tent of meeting.” Both terms are important. God doesn’t merely want to dwell with his people; he wants to meet with his people. And he doesn’t just want to meet with his people; he wants to dine with his people.

Comedian Brian Regan tells a funny story about his struggles in school as a kid. He talks about the public humiliation of the spelling bee and his difficulty with the i-before-e rule. A particularly funny portion describes the teacher’s questions to him and Erwin (the smart kid in class) about how to make a plural.
Teacher: “Brian, how do you make a word plural?”Brian: “You put an s at the end of it.”Teacher: “Erwin, what’s the plural for ox?”Erwin: “Oxen. The farmer used his oxen.”Teacher: “Brian, what’s the plural for box?”Brian: “Boxen. I bought two boxen of doughnuts.”Teacher: “No, Brian. Erwin, what’s the plural for goose?”Erwin: “Geese. I saw a flock of geese.”Teacher: “Brian, what’s the plural for moose?”Brian: “Moosen. I saw a flock of moosen. . . . There were many of them . . . many, much moosen . . . out in the woods, in the wood-es, in the wood-es-en . . .”
Superficially, the joke is about Brian’s ignorance. But it actually demonstrates the complexity and difficulty of the English language (to which anyone who has learned English as a second language can attest). As native English speakers, we don’t always think about this difficulty and complexity because we’re so familiar with it. We inhabit the language, we use the language, and therefore, it feels (mostly) comprehensible to us.
For many of us, the book of Leviticus mystifies us. We find the sacrifices, rules, and regulations to be complex and confusing. To us, Leviticus is like a foreign language. It mystifies because we’re unfamiliar with it. Like Brian Regan and making plural words, the intricacies elude and confuse us.1
Levitical Language
Thinking of Leviticus as a language can help demystify it. Consider what goes into a language. First, we have an alphabet. We arrange the letters of the alphabet to form words. There are different kinds of words — nouns, verbs, adjectives, prepositions, adverbs. We arrange the words into sentences with meaning and purpose. We modify words by adding letters at the beginning or end in order to make plurals or speak about the past or future or communicate ongoing versus completed action.
What’s more, in English, in order to make sense, we must arrange the words in a certain order. “Bill throws the ball” means something very different from “The ball throws Bill.” Arranging the words rightly is necessary in order to communicate clearly.
The sacrificial system is similar. Instead of nouns, verbs, and adjectives, we have people, places, sins, animals, animal body parts, and actions, and they are arranged and combined in various ways in order to say something, in order to communicate.
The sacrificial system resembles language learning in another way. In truth, we don’t actually learn our native language by first learning the alphabet, then learning words, and then arranging words into sentences. In other words, we don’t move from the smallest parts up to the larger parts.
Instead, as children, we first learn nouns — like “Mommy” and “Daddy” and “milk” — and sentences — simple ones like “Yes” and “No” and “Help, please.” Then as we mature, we learn more nouns and more complex sentences. At a certain age, we’re taught to read, and we learn to break words down into letters and then to break sentences down into subjects, verbs, and direct objects so we can grasp the rules of spelling and grammar.
The Bible teaches us the sacrificial system in the same way. We get glimpses of it early on: God provides Adam and Eve with animal skins after their sin in the garden (Genesis 3:21). Cain and Abel offer tribute to God (Genesis 4:3–4). Noah offers whole burnt offerings of clean animals after the flood (Genesis 8:20). Abraham prepares to offer Isaac as a burnt offering, and God substitutes a ram at the last minute (Genesis 22:1–19). Moses makes burnt offerings and peace offerings and sprinkles blood on the people at Sinai (Exodus 24:4–8).
Then finally, in Leviticus, it’s like we pick up a grammar textbook that sets forth more detailed rules for how all of these sacrifices work in the covenantal arrangement established by God with his people after the exodus. Leviticus, along with Numbers, provides the basic spelling, grammar, and syntax of the sacrificial system, and in learning the language, we can better understand what God is saying to us.
Three Images
To grasp the symbolic system of Leviticus, we begin with three images. Leviticus builds on the book of Genesis, especially the early chapters. Recall the basic story. God made the world and everything in it in six days. The crown of his creation is man, made on the sixth day, male and female, in God’s own image, as his representatives and stewards. He gives the first man and woman a commission — be fruitful, multiply, fill the earth, subdue it, and have dominion over its inhabitants. He places them in a garden to work and keep it, and gives them one prohibition: “Of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die” (Genesis 2:17).
Under the influence of the crafty serpent, Adam and Eve rebel against God, eat the fruit, and are confronted in their rebellion. God judges them for their rebellion, cursing the ground, multiplying pain and hardship in their relationship, and dooming them to die and return to dust. But he mingles mercy with his justice, promising them descendants, and especially a redeemer who will crush the serpent’s head. He then clothes them with animal skins and exiles them from the garden.
Now, here’s the important image: in order to prevent Adam and Eve from eating from the tree of life in the midst of the garden, God “drove out the man, and at the east of the garden of Eden he placed the cherubim and a flaming sword that turned every way to guard the way to the tree of life” (Genesis 3:24).
This is crucial. The holy presence of God is in the garden. Life is in the garden. And there is an angelic bouncer with a sword of fire separating man from divine life. There’s no way to draw near to God without losing your head and being burned up.
The second image comes from the book of Exodus. Yahweh has just delivered his people from bondage and gathered them at the holy mountain. God descends in a thick cloud of smoke and lightning, and he says to the people through Moses,
You yourselves have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and how I bore you on eagles’ wings and brought you to myself. Now therefore, if you will indeed obey my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my treasured possession among all peoples, for all the earth is mine; and you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation. (Exodus 19:4–6)
There is a profound tension between this image and the one in Genesis. In Genesis 3, we see life and glory in the garden, with an angel guarding the way with a flaming sword. In Exodus 19, we see life and glory on the mountain, with the words “you are my treasured possession; I have brought you to myself and intend to dwell with you.”
The tension between these two biblical scenes yields a third image. Imagine if the sun — the giant ball of flaming gas in the sky — wanted to come live in your neighborhood. What would happen? There is no atmosphere to protect you, no sunscreen strong enough, no covering to shield you: just the blazing inferno of the sun and your weak, frail, human self. How would that work out for you? Can you handle that heat?
The answer is obvious. We can’t handle that heat. The scene at Sinai confirms it. Yahweh invites the people to draw near, but he also commands them to consecrate and prepare themselves; they are to wash their garments and abstain from sexual relations for three days prior (Exodus 19:10–11, 15). What’s more, he sets limits around the mountain, a boundary that they are not to cross, on pain of death (verses 12–13). It seems we have not left the angelic guardian entirely behind. To cross the boundary, to touch the holy mountain, is to court death. And the passage couldn’t be clearer: the real danger is that the Lord will break out against them (verses 21–24). The danger is that they would get too close to the sun. And they can’t handle that heat.
We can summarize the basic problem in this way. The living God is holy. We are a sinful people in a world of death. But the living and holy God desires to dwell with his sinful people in this world of death. How is that possible? If we’re going to return to the garden of life, if we’re going to draw near to the holy God, how do we get past the angel and his flaming sword?
Basics of the Grammar
God’s answer to this problem is the whole Levitical system. It’s an entire symbolic system — a language — that testifies both to God’s holiness and life and to our sinfulness and death. And at the center of that system is atonement — the God-given covering that enables us to remarkably, miraculously, mercifully draw near to God and handle the heat.
So what are the basics of the grammar of this Levitical language? Let’s think in terms of nouns, adjectives, and verbs.
Nouns
Back in elementary school, we learned that there are three basic categories of nouns: people, places, and things. These categories offer a good way to approach the grammar of Leviticus as well.
Start with people. First, we have men and women. The book opens with a call-back to Genesis: “When an adam brings an offering . . .” (Leviticus 1:2). The word adam reminds us that we are sons of earth, since adam was taken from the dust of the adamah. But we aren’t merely “earth-men”; we are men and women, ish and ishshah (Genesis 2:23).
In the Levitical system, we can break God’s people down even more. First, we have the congregation as a whole. Within the congregation, we have the Levites, the priests, and especially the high priest. Beyond them, we have the leaders or rulers of the people. Then we have individual Israelites, some of them rich, and some of them poor. So the Levitical system recognizes distinctions in terms of people.
What about places? Here we need to connect sacred geography and sacred architecture. Leviticus is built on Genesis, especially the early chapters. And there, we remember the garden, in the land of Eden, and the world beyond (unsubdued and unfilled): garden, land, world (Genesis 2:8). The garden was on a mountain, and a river flowed down to water the garden, and then from there it split into four rivers spreading out over the earth (Genesis 2:10). So in terms of geography, think of a summit, a mountain, the land around it, and then the waters/ocean at the edge.
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Esau had his mind firmly fixed upon the things of the world rather than the things of God, and that is the road to apostasy for both individuals and congregations. In a way, Esau embodies all three of the dangers listed in verses 15-16. He failed to obtain God’s grace because of his apathy to the blessings of God. He was also a bitter root among God’s covenant family. His unholy life broke the peace within his family. Of course, there are certainly far greater sinners found within the Scriptures, but the reality is that most people will not fail to enter the kingdom of God because of how heinous and outrageous their sins were. Like Esau, they will fail to obtain God’s grace simply because they are secular and worldly, striving for neither peace nor holiness. 

Therefore lift your drooping hands and strengthen your weak knees, and make straight paths for your feet, so that what is lame may not be put out of joint but rather be healed. Strive for peace with everyone, and for the holiness without which no one will see the Lord. See to it that no one fails to obtain the grace of God; that no “root of bitterness” springs up and causes trouble, and by it many become defiled; that no one is sexually immoral or unholy like Esau, who sold his birthright for a single meal. For you know that afterward, when he desired to inherit the blessing, he was rejected, for he found no chance to repent, though he sought it with tears.
Hebrews 12:12-17 ESV
Our first introduction to Abraham is when God calls him to leave the country of his father to walk by faith to a land that God will give to him and his descendants. That was a walk of faith in every way because Abraham wasn’t told which land was going to be his and he did not yet have even single son to be his first descendent. Of course, God proved Himself faithful and gave Abraham a son, Isaac. When Isaac was grown, God gave the same promised blessing to him that He had given to Abraham, and though Isaac’s wife, Rebekah, was barren, Isaac prayed and God gave them twins. The older twin was Esau, and the younger was Jacob.
Once when Jacob was cooking stew, Esau came in from the field, and he was exhausted. And Esau said to Jacob, “Let me eat some of that red stew, for I am exhausted!” (Therefore his name was called Edom.) Jacob said, “Sell me your birthright now.” Esau said, “I am about to die; of what use is a birthright to me?” Jacob said, “Swear to me now.” So he swore to him and sold his birthright to Jacob. Then Jacob gave Esau bread and lentil stew, and he ate and drank and went his way. Thus Esau despised his birthright.
Genesis 25:29-34
The story of Esau continues on in Genesis 27, where Jacob disguises himself as his brother Esau in order to trick Isaac into blessing him. Jacob’s blatant deception and Esau’s pitiful tears can easily leave us confused as to who we are meant to be supporting. Indeed, the remainder of their stories can be just as confusing. Although Esau is not mentioned much more, he evidently went on to be great and prosperous, enough at least to have four hundred men at his command and for chiefs and kings to descend from him. Meanwhile, Jacob’s life was a perpetual struggle and striving with both God and men, and though his son Joseph was the right-hand of Pharaoh, his descendants quickly became a nation of slaves for four hundred years. While Jacob wrestled, Esau prospered. While Jacob’s descendants were enslaved, Esau’s descendants reigned as kings in their own land. Was God vindicating Esau? Was He punishing Jacob? In Malachi 1:2-3 God gives us an answer: “Yet I have loved Jacob but Esau I have hated.” Indeed, God’s disciplining hand upon Jacob and his descendants was a sign of God’s fatherly love for them, while Esau’s being left to his own devices was proof of God’s hatred for him.
In our present passage, the author of Hebrews pulls the racing imagery from 12:1 and the goodness of God’s discipline together to give us this exhortation: our race of faith can only be run with endurance by striving against our sin and for peace and holiness. In verses 12-13, the author recalibrates us to the marathon metaphor, encouraging us to wrestle together against our sin and against growing weary and fainthearted. Verse 14 is the heart of our passage, commanding us to strive for peace and for holiness. Verses 15-16 provide three dangers that will hinder our peace with others and holiness before God, jeopardizing our entire race of faith. Finally, verse 17 concludes with the warning example of Esau, who did not strive for peace and holiness but despised his inheritance of Abraham’s blessing.
Make Straight Paths for Your Feet: Verses 12–13
Therefore lift your drooping hands and strengthen your weak knees, and make straight paths for your feet, so that what is lame may not be put out of joint but rather be healed.
The word therefore is our signal that the author is building directly upon his previous thought. Indeed, he is now reaching back to verse 1 and making an exhortation for us. In verses 1-3, the author painted the Christian life of faith as marathon, a race that necessitates much endurance. In verses 4-11, he then presented the bitter yet beautiful truth of God’s loving hand of discipline upon His children. Here the author brings those two ideas together by returning to the imagery of a marathon and exhorting us to run in a manner that displays that we have been disciplined.
Drooping hands and weak knees ought to make us think of a weary runner who looks as though he will collapse at any minute, failing to reach the finish line. This imagery comes from Isaiah 35:3, which reads: “Strengthen the weak hands, and make firm the feeble knees.” The following verse notes that these are “those who have an anxious heart” and gives them this encouragement: “Be strong, fear not! Behold, your God will come with vengeance, with the recompense of God. He will come and save you” (Isa. 35:4).
Is that not the message that the author of Hebrews has also been making to his readers? He has been exhorting them to endure in faith and not to shrink back in fear. He has called them to behold Christ, to fix their eyes upon the salvation that He has accomplished for them in His first coming and that He will consummate upon His second coming. Thus, by drawing from this verse in Isaiah 35, the author is telling them again to consider Jesus and to hold fast to the confession of hope that they have in Him.
For those who are already growing weary and fainthearted, keeping to straight paths makes a collapse far less likely. This imagery is drawn from Proverbs 4:26-27, though the whole section (beginning with verse 20) ought to resonate with what Hebrews has been teaching:
My son, be attentive to my words;incline your ear to my sayings.Let them not escape from your sight;keep them within your heart.For they are life to those who find them,and healing to all their flesh.Keep your heart with all vigilance,for from it flow the springs of life.Put away from you crooked speech,and put devious talk far from you.Let your eyes look directly forward,and your gaze be straight before you.Ponder the path of your feet;then all your ways will be sure.Do not swerve to the right or to the left;turn your foot away from evil.
Dennis Johnson notes:
Such paths will keep what is lame from being twisted—in two ways. First, on such paths the lame will not be “put out of joint,” twisted to the point of dislocation, but rather will be “healed.” The verb rendered “put out of joint” (ektrepo) often describes straying “off course” from the way that leads to life (1 Tim. 1:6; 5:15; 2 Tim. 4:4). Hebrews adjusts the wording of Proverbs 4:26 LXX, changing the number of the verb “make straight” and the of the possessive pronoun “your” from singular to plural, transforming a father’s advice to an individual son into an exhortation to an entire congregation. When Christians are spiritually weak (drooping hands, feeble knees) or disabled (lame), fellow believers must gather around them, clearing away obstacles and pointing them straight ahead to the finish line.[1]
Strive for Peace & Holiness: Verse 14
In verse 14, the author gives us a twofold command that forms the essential means of accomplishing verses 12-13: Strive for peace with everyone, and for holiness without which no one will see the Lord.
First, we should consider the principal command: strive. This is a fitting word to use, since no marathon can be completed without much striving. Likewise, it should also remind us of 12:4, which said that our race is also a “struggle against sin.” Like Jacob, who strove with God and with men (Genesis 32:28), so is the life of all God’s children one of striving. It is all too common to find parents who spoil their children, claiming that they love them too much to discipline them. Proverbs 13:24 calls that hatred rather than love: “Whoever spares the rod hates his son, but he who loves him is diligent to discipline him.” Our Father is too loving to tolerate spoiled children; therefore, painful though it may be, He is diligent to discipline us. And we ought to be active in learning from His discipline, striving forward in the faith.
Yet while Jacob’s life was a striving with God and with men, the author of Hebrews is calling us to strive against our own sin so that we may have peace with men and the holiness before God. It is right that the author would connect these two, for our vertical relationship with God is always bound intimately with our horizontal relationship with our neighbors, both Christian and non-Christian. We see this in the two greatest commandments. Love God and love your neighbor. The two are bound together, for we cannot properly love our neighbor without first loving God and we do not truly love God if we do not also love our neighbor. Likewise, Jesus places these two ideas side-by-side in the Sermon on the Mount, saying, “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God” (Matthew 5:8-9).[2] Even so, let us view them briefly one at a time.
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The language of the Overture does not say that a man must no longer struggle with temptation or that he must be dishonest about his temptations. It states that officers may not “describe themselves as homosexual.” This is consistent with Paul’s affirmations that Christians are new creations, are to be unleavened, and are to consider themselves dead to sin. Genuine repentance does not mean perfection, but it does mean a complete break with sin, even in how Christians identify and describe themselves.

This year’s General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA) voted to affirm an amended version of Overture 15, which is now being considered by the denomination’s presbyteries as Item 1. It seeks to add the following language to the Book of Church Order (BCO):
7-4. Men who describe themselves as homosexual, even those who describe themselves as homosexual and claim to practice celibacy by refraining from homosexual conduct, are disqualified from holding office in the Presbyterian Church in America.
I would like to give three reasons why I believe presbyteries should vote yes for Item 1 (i.e., PCAGA49’s Overture 15)[1] this cycle, and then respond to a couple objections.

To describe oneself as a “Homosexual Christian,” “Gay Christian,” or “Same-Sex Attracted Christian” is itself a tacit approval of a Freudian worldview. Men who affirm this Freudian foundation are not qualified for office.

Sigmund Freud taught that what defines people is their sexuality, that who you are is ultimately determined by your sexual desires. Before the spread of this Freudian philosophy, homosexuality was viewed as something a person did. Now it is considered who a person is because he feels those desires, even if that person has never been sexually active.
For many in our day, to describe oneself as a “Gay Christian” does not sound as inappropriate as does to describe oneself as a “racist Christian” or “idolatrous Christian.” but this is only a reflection of the fact that we live in a Freudian culture which has convinced society at large that men and women are defined by their sexual desires (hence society’s broad acceptance of the LGBTQ movement that roots identity in sexuality). But this is not a Biblical worldview.
Racism and homosexuality are both sins, yet if one is considered an appropriate self-description for a Christian while the other is not, this only demonstrates that one’s worldview has accepted (at least in part) the world’s Freudian presuppositions. Scripture defines men and women in creation as being made in the image of God (Gen. 1:26) and then in redemption as being united to Jesus Christ. Officers in the PCA must be men who do not accept the world’s philosophies and definitions of men (Col. 2:8), but Scripture’s.  A Christian who describes himself in terms of sexual desires is one who at least in part affirms a Freudian worldview that contradicts God’s Word, and is thus unqualified to hold office in Christ’s church.

PCA officers must embody and walk with the wisdom we teach others to live by.

The Report of the Ad Interim Committee on Human Sexuality [2] includes a section on language which states, “We affirm that those in our churches would be wise to avoid the term ‘gay Christian’…Churches should be gentle, patient, and intentional with believers who call themselves ‘gay Christians,’ encouraging them, as part of the process of sanctification, to leave behind identification language rooted in sinful desires, to live chaste lives, to refrain from entering into temptation, and to mortify their sinful desires” (p. 12).
As this is the wisdom that we are to teach all Christians, it ought to be the standard that officers – being above reproach – likewise pursue. To allow otherwise is to allow hypocrisy. We must walk in accordance with that wisdom we teach to others. It is a great hypocrisy to declare that we are to teach believers to leave behind this language when our officers themselves will not do the same. In such a scenario, the Report’s wisdom becomes “wisdom for thee, but not for me.” Permitting officers to continue to describe themselves with such language undermines our denomination’s exhortations to others that growth in sanctification means leaving behind identification language rooted in sinful desires. Men who will not abide by the wisdom with which we instruct others are not fit for office.

Scripture describes Christians in terms of union with Christ, which is the foundation of Christian ethics.

When Paul rebukes the Christians at Corinth for failing to exercise discipline, he uses the metaphor of the leaven and the lump, with the lump being the church and leaven representing sin. He writes, “Cleanse out the old leaven that you may be a new lump, as you really are unleavened” (1 Cor. 5:7). Notice how he describes these Christians. They must cleanse out the leaven because they are unleavened. Paul grounds the church’s behavior in the church’s being, which he describes with the term unleavened. What Christians do is founded on what Christians are.
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[1] For the sake of simplicity, I will refer to Overture 15 in the remainder of this article.
[2] Visit pcaga.org/aicreport for links both to the printed report and to the video footage of its presentation before the 48th Stated Meeting of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA).
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