BLOG

Repentance, part 2

In Exodus 23 the law of impartial justice is protected by a variety of laws which declare certain actions to be sin (or crime). Exodus 23:1 forbids false testimonies, which reiterates the Ninth Commandment, “You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor” (Exodus 20:16). To tolerate false witnesses is to deny equal justice to all, and the people must rise up and demand repentance from their judges and the judicial system itself.

Exodus 23:2 forbids judges from perverting justice by acquiescing to popular opinion. Here is where democracies may fail, as we see even today. Just because the public is in agreement that certain practices are good does not give judges a mandate to please the crowd. Whenever such decisions are made, both the people and the judges must repent.

Exodus 23:3 forbids partiality toward a poor man as well. In today’s world, it seems good to many people that taxes should be increased beyond the biblical limit in order to assist the poor. To raise taxes beyond the biblical limit itself is theft, a violation of the Eighth Commandment, “You shall not steal” (Exodus 20:15). It is a sin to steal from the rich to give to the poor, even if it appears to be an act of love. Of course, if a rich man has gotten his wealth illicitly, then he ought to pay restitution to his victims.

Exodus 23:7 says,

⁷ Keep far from a false charge, and do not kill the innocent or the righteous, for I will not acquit the guilty.

The unborn are the most common souls among “the innocent” and “the righteous” today. They have been slaughtered by the millions just since 1973. Recently, the Supreme Court nullified Roe v. Wade which gave women the right to murder their own children before they were born, but the Court left the issue to the states, rather than to the federal government. So this did not fully resolve the problem from God’s point of view.

Those states in particular which continue to allow abortions need to repent, along with the people who see such murder as a human right. Our Declaration of Independence says that all rights come from God, not from governments. Killing the unborn is not a right given by God but is a mere privilege given by ungodly men.

Exodus 23:8 says,

⁸ You shall not take a bribe, for a bribe blinds the clear-sighted and subverts the cause of the just.

In many countries, men use their positions of authority as a source of income. When given the authority to issue permits or to allow passage or some other authority, they often demand a bribe from the public to supplement their salaries. In many countries, such bribery has become a way of life and has been so normalized that even Christian believers practice it with no twinge of conscience.

This “subverts the cause of the just,” and God demands that they repent. When believers do such things, their works do not match their “faith,” and we must remind them that “faith without works is dead” (James 2:26). James demands repentance so that works prove one’s faith.

Oppressing Strangers (Aliens)

Exodus 23:9 says,

⁹ You shall not oppress a stranger, since you yourselves know the feelings of a stranger, for you also were strangers in the land of Egypt.

This is repeated in Exodus 22:21. As we have already seen, equal justice is due to aliens and sojourners who are in the land. Even if they do not live in the land, they must keep its laws and are also afforded equal justice if their rights are violated.

We have already seen from Numbers 15:15, 16 how God demands a single-tier justice system for all. The prevailing Jewish opinion says that Jews are responsible to keep the law of Moses, while Gentiles are bound only by the so-called Noahide laws in Genesis 9:1-7. This belief is based on the view that Gentiles are incapable of understanding or of conforming to the law of Moses. This view, in turn, is rooted in the belief that non-Jews are mere animals, while Jewish souls are of a higher order.

Yet Exodus 23:9 overthrows this idea. God reminds the Israelites that they were “strangers” in the land of Egypt, where they were treated as unequal to Egyptians. It implies too that God had brought the Israelites into bondage in order to instill in them an abhorrence of inequality. Unfortunately, they forgot this lesson and reverted to interpretations based on self-interest.

Saul Persecutes the Gibeonites

The Gibeonites were a Canaanite tribe that made a covenant of peace with Joshua in Joshua 9. Even though they tricked Joshua into thinking they were from afar off, God held Israel to their word. They were given the responsibility of assisting in the tabernacle at Shiloh (Joshua 9:27), which was essentially the role of the Levites themselves.

Some centuries later, King Saul, in his rebellion against God, persecuted the Gibeonites and even killed seven of them. We read in 2 Samuel 21:1,

¹ Now there was a famine in the days of David for three years, year after year, and David sought the presence of the Lord. And the Lord said, “It is for Saul and his bloody house, because he put the Gibeonites to death.”

No doubt Saul thought he was pleasing God by getting rid of Canaanites. His view of the law was warped. So God brought famine to the land, not while Saul was alive but toward the end of David’s reign. The famine was not caused by David, but David had to resolve it in order to end the famine. This is a case where David re-established equal justice with the Canaanites.

Isaiah Interprets the Law

Isaiah gives us the clearest interpretation of the law of equality in Isaiah 56, 6-8,

⁶ Also the foreigners [ben nekar, “sons of foreigners”] who join themselves to the Lord, to minister to Him, and to love the name of the Lord, to be His servants, every one who keeps from profaning the Sabbath and holds fast My covenant, ⁷ even those I will bring to My holy mountain and make them joyful in My house of prayer. Their burnt offerings and their sacrifices will be acceptable on My altar; for My house will be called a house of prayer for all the peoples. ⁸ The Lord God, who gathers the dispersed of Israel, declares, “Yet others I will gather to them, to those already gathered.”

Foreigners were to enjoy equal access to God in His “house of prayer” (temple). Isaiah was referring to Solomon’s prayer of dedication in 2 Chronicles 6:32, 33,

³² Also concerning the foreigner who is not from Your people Israel, when he comes from a far country for Your great name’s sake and Your mighty hand and Your outstretched arm, when they come and pray toward this house, ³³ then hear from heaven, from Your dwelling place, and do according to all for which the foreigner calls to You, in order that all the peoples of the earth may know Your name and fear You as do Your people Israel, and that they may know that this house which I have built is called by Your name.

Isaiah elaborated on Solomon’s dedication prayer to let us know with no uncertainty that the temple was a house of prayer for all people, including foreigners. Centuries later, in the decades just before Jesus was born, King Herod dismantled the Second Temple and reconstructed a temple that was far more elaborate and beautiful. In doing this, he constructed a dividing wall in the outer court that would forbid non-Jews and women from getting too close to God. No doubt he did this to please the religious leaders of the day.

There was no command in Scripture to build such a dividing wall, so Herod’s wall was built according to the precepts of men.

The Result of Jesus’ Work

Jesus Himself abolished that wall by His teachings, as we read in Ephesians 2:13, 14,

¹³ But now in Christ Jesus you who formerly were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. ¹⁴ For He Himself is our peace, who made both groups into one and broke down the barrier of the dividing wall.

Those foreigners and women who formerly had to worship God from a distance were invited into the presence of God as equals with the Jewish men. This, of course, scandalized the religious Jews of that time. Their religious fanaticism, in fact, was seen when they suspected that Paul had brought “Trophimus the Ephesian” through the gate of the dividing wall (Acts 21:29). This caused a riot. The charge was unfounded, but in the law no one was to be excluded.

Paul’s gospel and revelation was inclusive of all ethnicities. He fought hard for the rights of non-Jews to be treated as equals. Paul explains this in greater detail in Galatians 3. He shows that the blessings of Abraham were not to be given exclusively to his biological children but were to be distributed to all families of the earth (Galatians 3:14). He concludes in Galatians 3:27-29,

²⁶ For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus. ²⁷ For all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. ²⁸ There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free man, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus. ²⁹ And if you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s descendants, heirs according to promise.

There are many who disagree with Paul, while others give him lip service but ignore certain of his teachings. Such people need to repent, change their views and their behavior. God is impartial and judges people not by their ethnicity but by their faith and obedience.