Today, I am reading and commenting on Exodus 28-29.

When we, as Christians read a passage like today’s we have a tendency to think, “Why do I care how the Israelite priests dressed?”  I often struggle with that very thought, and the fact of the matter is that I don’t care.  However, it is not an accident that this passage is here.  If this passage was not important, it is completely within God’s power for him to have arranged a “scribal error” (or perhaps a series of “scribal errors”) that resulted in this passage being lost.  In fact, I am convinced that the only reason this passage, and all of the rest of the Bible, are here for us to read is because God considered them to communicate something important to us.  Which brings me to why this blog is so important to me: because if I did not need to find something to write about today’s passage I would just gloss over it and pay almost no attention to it.

Which brings me to what I found to write about from today’s passage.  As the passage describes the priestly garments it comes to the breastplate of decision.  Moses was instructed to place Urim and Thummim in the breastplate. the means of making decisions for the Israelites.  Later in the Old Testament it speaks of them being used to make decisions, but nowhere does it describe them, or really how they were used to make decisions.  That has long bothered me, but today a new thought entered my mind.  The passage tells us that the Urim and Thummim were to be in the breastplate so that “Aaron will always bear the means of making decisions for the Israelites over his heart before the Lord.”  What struck me was that it is more important that we take our means of making decisions before the Lord than it is that we use a particular means to make those decisions.  A few verses later, Moses was instructed to make a turban for Aaron to wear to which Moses was to attach a seal which said “Holy to the Lord.”  Aaron was to wear this turban so that the seal was on his forehead when he came before the Lord.  Together these two things tell us that we should remember that all of our decisions should be brought before the Lord and we ourselves should always remember that we are to be holy to the Lord.  God has made us holy through the sacrifice on the cross of His Son and we should strive to remember that, and live our lives accordingly.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.