“You shall not do as they do in the land of Egypt, where you lived, and you shall not do as they do in the land of Canaan, which I am bringing you. And you shall not walk in their statutes. You shall follow my rules, and keep my statutes and walk in them. I am the Lord your God. These verses are so key, as God says, “Look back to Egypt, look forward to Canaan, and realize I am not calling you to live like the Egyptians, and I’m not calling you to live like the Canaanites.
-Leviticus 18:3–4
Both the Egyptians and the Canaanites worshiped all kinds of false gods. There was all kinds of idolatry and immortality that flowed from that, and God is careful to say to His people, “Do not live like them.” Do not live like the world around you lives. I’m calling you to be separate. You shall follow my rules, keep my statutes. Walk in them. I am the Lord your God. Worship Me, and live your life out of the overflow of worship for Me alone, and that means you will live very different from the world around you.
We are called to worship God alone. We must be aggressive to make sure we are not accommodating our lives to look like the rest of the world.
Leviticus 18:3–4 Calls Us to Follow God’s Laws
That reality in the Old Testament is absolutely the same for followers of Christ in the New Testament, in the New Covenant. We have been called, created, commanded not to live like the world around us. We must hear this Word, and 1 John makes it clear. Do not love the world. The picture we have of the New Testament is we are in the world, but not of the world, which means we live according to different rules, different statutes, different commands. We don’t run after the same idols that others in the world run after, idols of money, and sex, and power, and oh, the list goes on, and on, and on, and all of the immorality that flows from that. We do not do that.
Instead, we live differently. We’ve been called to worship God alone, to live according to His law, His Word, not to that which seems right to the world, that which is right according to God’s Word, so we must be careful, aggressive in our lives, and in our families, and in the church to make sure that we are not accommodating our lives to look like the rest of the world, to live like the rest of the world.
Desiring God’s Ways
Leviticus 18:3-4 calls us to be separate, to live very differently. So our priorities are very different; our plans and dreams are very different. Desires and routines are different. We have totally different priorities, desires, plans, dreams, routines than the rest of the world, and we’ve got to be careful not to lose that. Especially, even in some efforts to try to reach the world with the gospel, we almost convince ourselves that we have to live like everybody else in the world. It’s not true.
We’ve been called to live different. In the process, to show that there is a better way. God’s ways are better than the ways of this world. That’s part of His design in calling this people in the Old Testament, as well as the church in the New Testament to Himself, to say, “I wanna show what happens when people follow Me as God, and how good this is, and how right this is, and how just this is, how loving this is.” That’s what our lives should be, as a reflection of the world, so we pray.
Leviticus 18:3–4 Reminds Us To Remain Steadfast in God’s Word
God, help us. God, help us to see the world around us from Your perspective, according to Your Word, like it says in Leviticus 18:3-4. Help us to live according to Your rules and Your statutes. God, we pray that You would keep us from slowly drifting into worldliness. Keep us from running after what we see everybody else in the world running after. We do not want to indulge. Keep us from pursuing the priorities that everyone else is pursuing.
God, we pray that You would help us to live, in a very real sense, counter culturally. Counter to the ways of Egypt, and Canaan, and the world around us. God, shape our values. Shape our plans, dreams, desires, priorities, agendas, routines, and daily schedules. Shape all of these things according to Your Word, not the pattern of this world, we pray. So open our eyes to ways that we are just running along with the world after all the world is running after.
God, stop us. Help us to turn the other way. Help us to live according to Your rules, statutes and commands. We trust that this will be best for us, and glorifying to You. God, help us do this in our lives, in our families, and in the church. We pray. In Jesus’ name. Amen.
David Platt serves as a pastor in metro Washington, D.C. He is the founder of Radical.
David received his Ph.D. from New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary and is the author of Don’t Hold Back, Radical, Follow Me, Counter Culture, Something Needs to Change, Before You Vote, as well as the multiple volumes of the Christ-Centered Exposition Commentary series.
Along with his wife and children, he lives in the Washington, D.C. metro area.
