We are called to be holy.
We struggle knowing what exactly this means and we often find ourselves tumbling between this world and the Kingdom of our God. Unsure of what we are supposed to do, we tend to divide these worlds in two and we try our best to navigate them both. Sadly, teetering between the two ensures we are less than effective in both.
But we don’t live in two worlds and we don’t have a unique job in each. We have a job to do. One singular job.
The whole book moves like concentric circles around the theme of God dwelling among His people. Let’s see if we can navigate this process and somehow figure out what exactly we’re supposed to do as we take our walkabout on this giant marble.
These opening chapters describe the five primary offerings:
Each one reveals a different facet of worship and reconciliation: from complete surrender (burnt offering) to gratitude (grain), fellowship (peace), forgiveness (sin), and restitution (guilt). This structure answers humanity’s most fundamental question:
How can sinful man approach a holy God?
The answer is through substitution -- life for life. Every sacrifice involved blood or offering something costly to represent the giver’s heart.
For believers today, this points directly to Yeshua, who fulfilled all offerings in Himself (Hebrews 10). He is both the perfect substitute and the open door into the Father’s presence. Spiritually, these chapters teach that the approach to God still requires sacrifice -- not of animals, but of self: surrender, repentance, and gratitude.
Worship isn’t casual, it’s covenantal. When we offer ourselves as “living sacrifices”, we echo the pattern of Leviticus, total devotion that brings peace with God and communion with His presence.
Once the offerings establish how to approach God, Leviticus 8-10 reveals who may minister before Him and how. Aaron and his sons are consecrated through washing, anointing, and the application of blood -- marking ears, thumbs, and toes as symbols of hearing, serving, and walking in obedience. The goal is not status but sanctification: priests exist to represent the people before God and God before the people. But immediately, the seriousness of this calling is demonstrated when Nadab and Abihu offer “strange fire,” and God consumes them. Holiness cannot be approached on human terms.
In Yeshua, this consecration finds its ultimate fulfillment. Every believer is now part of a Royal Priesthood (1 Peter 2), anointed by the Spirit to minister through lives of obedience and intercession. The broader application is that spiritual authority requires purity.
Service to God is not performance but representation. Just as Aaron’s sons bore the weight of holiness, so we, as living temples, must guard what we bring before God. The “fire” of our worship must be lit by His Spirit, not by personal ambition or emotional zeal. Leviticus 8-10 reminds us that God’s presence is precious, but also perilous when treated casually.
These chapters extend holiness beyond the tabernacle and into ordinary life. They cover distinctions between clean and unclean animals (ch. 11), childbirth and ritual impurity (ch. 12), skin diseases or tzara’at (chs. 13-14), and bodily discharges (ch. 15).
To modern readers, these details can seem obscure, but the reality is that God’s holiness touches every area of human existence, from diet to hygiene, from sickness to sexuality. Purity laws taught that holiness wasn’t confined to the sanctuary, it must saturate daily living. Uncleanness wasn’t always moral failure. Often it represented contact with death, decay, or disorder -- anything opposed to the life and order God brings.
For believers, Yeshua reinterprets these principles by internalizing them (Mark 7:14-23). Purity now flows from the heart, yet the call remains the same: to separate from that which defiles and embrace life-giving patterns.
This section reminds us that holiness is not reserved for “religious” moments. It governs how we eat, work, speak, and interact. The priestly call means daily attentiveness, keeping our lives free from contamination that dulls sensitivity to God. We are to live in such a way that the presence within us remains undimmed in a world filled with death.
This central section forms the heart of Leviticus -- the bridge between atonement and holy living. It begins with the Day of Atonement (ch. 16), establishing that the entire nation must be reconciled annually to remain in covenant fellowship.
From there, chapters 17-20 outline how holiness governs community: respect for blood and life (ch. 17), sexual and moral boundaries (ch. 18), ethical and social holiness (ch. 19), and separation from idolatry and impurity (ch. 20). These laws display a holistic holiness. One that merges worship, ethics, and justice. We are called to reflect God’s nature not only in ritual, but in relationship, business, family, and compassion.
For followers of Yeshua, this is where priesthood becomes practical. Holiness is no longer about ritual compliance, but about becoming the visible character of God in community. We embody His justice by fairness, His compassion by care for the marginalized, and His purity by moral integrity. Yeshua summarizes Leviticus 19 in the command:
“Love your neighbor as yourself”
Living as His royal priesthood means being a people among the nations whose collective life points upward -- a society where holiness and love coexist, and where justice flows like the fragrance of an acceptable offering.
The final section of Leviticus describes a fully ordered holy society.
Chapters 21-22 set higher standards for priests -- those who lead must live closest to God’s character.
Chapters 23-25 establish sacred time through festivals and Sabbaths, creating a rhythm of remembrance: weekly rest, annual feasts, sabbatical years, and jubilee. These feasts retell redemption -- from Passover’s deliverance to Tabernacles’ dwelling presence.
Chapters 26-27 then conclude with covenant blessings and warnings, and laws about vows and the redemption of property, ensuring that even land and promises belong to God. The entire closing section reminds Israel that everything -- time, people, possessions, and soil -- is holy when devoted to YHVH.
For believers, this final act of Leviticus reveals the goal of redemption: not merely forgiveness, but ordered holiness. Yeshua fulfills the priesthood (Hebrews 7), embodies every feast (Colossians 2), and brings us into God’s eternal Sabbath rest (Hebrews 4). Our role as a Royal Priesthood is to live with the same rhythm of sacred time, faithful stewardship, and covenantal integrity. Even our land and labor belong to Him.
In a world obsessed with ownership, Leviticus 21-27 calls us back to sacred stewardship. We are to see every moment, resource, and relationship as part of God’s kingdom economy, where holiness governs the whole of life. As Bob Lotich pointed out:
“When you realize that every penny belongs to God and you’re just the manager, you stop making decisions based on what you want and start making decisions based on what honors him.”
From slavery to sonship, this is the final step.
Leviticus thus unfolds like a five-part symphony of holiness:
In Messiah, this entire pattern is internalized. We now approach by His blood, are consecrated by His Spirit, purified in our walk, shaped into holy community, and sustained in His rhythm of grace. To live as His Royal Priesthood among the nations means carrying this Levitical pattern within us. We are to approach God rightly, representing Him faithfully, and structuring our lives so that His presence is at home among us.
Simple, right?
Understanding how to approach YHVH is something we can grasp. While we may not fully understand why the sacrifices work, we can trust that they do.
We can also embrace the process of consecration. Putting on beautiful garments adorned with jewels and having the authority and access into the courtyard and sanctuary are all things every good believer grabs hold of. Most believers make it easily to this level of holiness. Sacrifice? Check. Adorned with jewels and fine linen? Check.
Then it starts to get complicated and confusing.
While we may not like the fact that our lives, stuff and homes can become tainted because of our grumblings and slanderous ways, we (hopefully and eventually) learn to live a life of repentance. Living with the effects of tzara’at (being distanced from community and being uncomfortable in our own skin) are usually enough to get most people to finally find a way to repent so they can begin the slow progression back into community. The harder part still is learning to live within our own skin but that too can be had by the eager follower.
Now, we don’t really get being clean and unclean, but we can sit, study, interpret and debate its meaning. Either way, we learn to develop skills and attend seminars that help us not grumble as much and, if we’re really lucky, help us sin less. Our spiritual lives land on perpetually working on ourselves and trying to crack that code of true holiness.
It’s at this level most advanced believers live. But then we hit chapter 16.
At the beginning of Leviticus 16, Aharon’s sons make a very poor decision surrounding what their job really is. They take it upon themselves to do something Abba never said to do, and when God’s holiness was challenged those two men died as a result. Sons, husbands, dads -- gone.
In the wake of this tragedy, the way into the deepest recess of the Tabernacle was made known: Blood must be shed and sin must be sent away. This is a very serious, weighty and intense moment. There is nothing casual about intimacy and the entire nation saw with their very eyes the outcome of that grave assumption.
We struggle to understand how a loving God could possibly take these two men in this hour. It seems as though they were only trying to honor their God and they were doing so in a manner they thought would be acceptable. And this is precisely the lesson.
It’s in the shadow of this sad and troublesome experience that the journey of the lonely follower begins.
Atonement and Restoration of Fellowship with God:
Leviticus 16 sits at the exact center of the Torah’s five books, both structurally and spiritually. It answers the question raised since humanity’s exile from Eden: How can sinful people dwell with a holy God? Through the annual Day of Atonement, Israel’s entire community is symbolically cleansed. The high priest enters the Holy of Holies with blood to atone for both the people and the sanctuary itself, removing the accumulated defilement of sin. The scapegoat (azazel) carries the nation’s sins into the wilderness, portraying sin’s removal “as far as the east is from the west.”
Broader meaning:
This chapter reveals the cost of access to God’s presence: substitutionary atonement through innocent blood. In Messiah Yeshua, this is fulfilled completely (Hebrews 9:11-14). For believers, it defines the rhythm of spiritual life: repentance, cleansing, and restoration. It reminds us that holiness is not earned, but received, and that intimacy with God always begins with forgiveness.
Application today:
Yom Kippur calls us to continual heart examination, confession, and reconciliation -- living in light of the cross, where atonement was once and for all secured. As priests of the New Covenant, we daily walk in the power of the blood, keeping our “inner temple” pure so God’s presence remains unhindered.
Sanctity of Life and Exclusive Worship of God:
After access is restored in chapter 16, God guards it through restrictions on how life is handled and worship is offered. Leviticus 17 forbids private or pagan sacrifices and emphasizes that the life of the flesh is in the blood. Blood belongs exclusively to God because it represents life, and therefore cannot be consumed. All sacrifices must be brought to the sanctuary -- the place where God dwells.
Broader meaning:
This chapter establishes that all life is sacred and all worship is centralized. It rejects human autonomy in both life and devotion. The blood principle underscores that forgiveness and communion require God’s prescribed means, not human invention. In Yeshua, this becomes deeply personal: His blood is the covenant’s lifeblood (Matthew 26:28; Hebrews 10:19).
Application today:
We live in a world that desacralizes life, treating it as disposable, and decentralizes worship, turning everything into self-expression. Leviticus 17 calls believers back to reverence: to see life as holy, not to be used or consumed for pleasure or power, and to center our devotion solely on Yeshua, the true altar of worship. All that we “offer” -- time, energy, relationships -- must pass through Him.
Moral Purity and Distinction from the Nations:
With worship centralized, God now defines what holiness looks like in human relationships. Leviticus 18 provides an extensive list of sexual prohibitions, contrasting Israel with the nations of Egypt and Canaan. These laws guard marriage, family integrity, and covenant faithfulness. They also warn that the land itself reacts to moral corruption. Sin literally defiles the ground and drives out its inhabitants (18:25).
Broader meaning:
This chapter is about more than sexual ethics; it’s about covenant loyalty. The body becomes a living expression of holiness or defilement. By rejecting pagan practices that distort sexuality, Israel embodies a God-centered anthropology, one that honors His design for creation, gender, and covenant.
Application today:
In Abba’s Kingdom, moral purity remains essential. Yeshua internalizes these laws, showing that holiness begins in the heart (Matthew 5:27-28). As His royal priesthood, we are to live as set-apart people, not through isolation, but through integrity and restraint. The believer’s sexuality, fidelity, and relationships all testify to God’s order and goodness. Living “among the foreigners,” our distinction isn’t superiority but faithfulness, showing that God’s ways protect life and love, not restrict them.
Practical Holiness in Community Ethics and Relationships:
Leviticus 19 is sometimes called the “Holiness Code in miniature.” It opens with, “You shall be holy, for I, YHVH your God, am holy,” and then weaves together laws on family respect, honest business, social justice, compassion for the poor, fairness in judgment, and love for neighbor. The emphasis is that holiness isn’t confined to ritual or temple -- it’s lived out in daily conduct.
Broader meaning:
This is holiness applied. It reveals that the essence of being God’s people is not rule-keeping but reflecting His character: justice, mercy, and truth. Verse 18’s “love your neighbor as yourself” becomes the ethical center of both Torah and Gospel (Matthew 22:39; Romans 13:8-10). Holiness is relational. How we treat others reveals how we honor God.
Application today:
Leviticus 19 calls us to integrate faith with every sphere of life: work, money, words, and compassion. As Yeshua’s Royal Priesthood, our holiness is demonstrated not only in worship, but in fairness, empathy, and truth. The “holiness of love” transforms neighborhoods, workplaces, and families into sanctuaries where God’s nature is visible through His people.
Accountability, Discipline, and Covenant Separation:
Leviticus 20 enforces the holiness principles of the previous chapters by attaching consequences to rebellion. It lists punishments for idolatry, occult practices, child sacrifice, and sexual immorality -- all considered covenant treason. The statement “You shall be holy to Me, for I, YHVH, am holy” (20:26) anchors the call to distinction: Israel must separate from the nations to belong exclusively to God.
Broader meaning:
This chapter reveals that holiness must be guarded. Grace doesn’t eliminate boundaries, it gives them meaning. God’s people are called to protect what is sacred, not through pride but through discernment and obedience. The severity of the penalties shows how corruption spreads when holiness is ignored. Spiritually, it’s about living as those set apart in a world hostile to covenant loyalty.
Application today:
For believers, Leviticus 20 becomes a warning against compromise. In Yeshua, we’re called to live among the nations yet remain undefiled by their values (2 Corinthians 6:17-18). Our separation is no longer geographic but moral and spiritual. We are to choose purity, integrity, and faithfulness when the culture invites defilement. We “guard holiness” by keeping our hearts, homes, and communities aligned with the presence of God. The priestly calling demands vigilance, not isolation -- a radiant distinction that draws others toward the God we represent.
Most believers make the trek through Leviticus 15 as this defines our own world being in alignment with no curses. But beginning in chapter 16, the path to blessing starts.
Sure, not doing bad things is a great way to live. But this is not the end of our purpose here on earth. No! Israel was called to be a priestly nation, one that was to show the rest of the world what living in covenant looks like. As a result of the blessings that poured forth -- justice, love, shalom -- would serve as signposts to all who desire to live peaceably with others.
Early in Leviticus we learn how to draw near to YHVH, but chapters 19 and 20 reveal to us how we are to carry His presence into the world. In other words, it shows what happens when holiness goes public.
Leviticus 19 is remarkable because it interweaves moral, civil, and ceremonial commands into one seamless vision of life under God’s kingship. It moves from honoring parents to caring for the poor, from honesty in trade to loving one’s neighbor, from reverence for Sabbaths to kindness toward strangers. There’s no division between “religious life” and “real life.”
This reveals a central truth: holiness is not separation from the world, but transformation within it. The priestly life is meant to make the ordinary sacred -- to turn business, justice, family, and compassion into acts of worship.
When God says, “You shall be holy, for I, YHVH your God, am holy” (19:2), He isn’t merely demanding moral behavior. He’s inviting imitation. The priest doesn’t just teach about God’s holiness -- he embodies it. Through righteousness, fairness, patience, and generosity, the priest becomes a living revelation of what God is like.
Every time a believer chooses integrity over deceit, compassion over indifference, or forgiveness over bitterness, heaven is revealed on earth. This is priesthood at its purest: mediating the character of the Holy One into a defiled world.
If the commands of Leviticus 19 were lived out globally, society itself would be transformed:
Imagine nations built on those foundations. Holiness would not repel the world, it would heal it. The Torah’s holiness code isn’t about exclusion but restoration: showing humanity what life looks like when love and justice are inseparable.
Yeshua placed Leviticus 19:18 at the center of all Torah observance -- “Love your neighbor as yourself.” He didn’t abolish this command; He embodied it. In Him, holiness becomes incarnational: love in action, mercy in motion. As His followers -- priests of the new covenant -- we now carry His presence into every place where love has been replaced by self.
When we live this way, the world sees holiness not as judgment, but as beauty. Holiness becomes contagious -- not by condemnation, but by the fragrance of Messiah’s character expressed through His people.
Where Leviticus 19 describes the beauty of holiness, chapter 20 establishes its boundaries. It warns against idolatry, immorality, and occult practices -- the very patterns that corrupt and enslave the nations. While chapter 19 teaches how to reflect God’s nature, chapter 20 teaches how to protect it from distortion.
As priests, we aren’t just called to reflect holiness but also to guard it -- to discern, to resist corruption, and to preserve sacred space in a world eager to profane it.
God warns that those who give their children to Molech, consult mediums, or practice sexual perversion are “cut off” from the community. This is not cruelty; it’s covenant realism. Sin desecrates what is holy and destroys the capacity for communion.
For believers, this means our priesthood involves moral vigilance. Grace doesn’t remove the call to holiness -- it empowers it. To be “in the world but not of it” (John 17:14-18) is to walk the fine line of compassion without compromise, mercy without mixture.
Leviticus 20:26 declares: “You shall be holy to Me, for I, YHVH, am holy, and I have separated you from the peoples to be Mine.”
This separation isn’t superiority -- it’s service. Israel’s distinctiveness was never meant to create isolation but invitation. Their difference was meant to draw the nations, to make the world ask, “Who is this God whose people live with such justice, purity, and peace?” (Deuteronomy 4:6-8).
In Messiah, this priestly identity becomes universal. Peter echoes this directly:
1 Peter 2:9 You are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own possession, that you may proclaim the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light.
When the Body of Messiah lives this way -- pure in heart, distinct in ethics, steadfast in love -- the world sees what life under the true King looks like. Entire systems of oppression, greed, and deception begin to collapse under the weight of authentic holiness.
If Leviticus 20 were lived out through the Spirit’s power today:
Holiness would once again become magnetic. People wouldn’t run from it -- they’d hunger for it.
Together, these two chapters form the perfect tension of priestly life:
Leviticus 19: The positive expression of holiness: love, justice, mercy, hospitality, and compassion.
Leviticus 20: The protective boundaries of holiness: truth, purity, discernment, and moral courage.
One without the other distorts the image of God. Love without boundaries becomes permissiveness; boundaries without love become legalism. But together, they form the image of the Holy One: righteous and merciful, pure and kind, separate yet near.
If the body of Messiah, the Royal Priesthood, walked in the fullness of Leviticus 19-20:
The priestly calling is not to escape the world, but to transform it by reflecting the One who dwells within us. Leviticus 19-20 are not relics of ancient Israel, they are the blueprints for the restoration of creation. Through Yeshua, they are reactivated in every believer who lives by the Spirit.
When holiness and love flow together, when the people of God live as both compassionate and consecrated, the world will see the difference, and nations will come to His light:
Isaiah 60:1 “Arise, shine [Yerushalayim],
for your light has come,
the glory of YHVH
has risen over you.
2 For although darkness covers the earth
and thick darkness the peoples;
on you YHVH will rise;
over you will be seen his glory.
3 Nations will go toward your light
and kings toward your shining splendor.
4 Raise your eyes and look around:
they are all assembling and coming to you;
your sons are coming from far off,
your daughters being carried on their nurses’ hips.”
Once we take the next step into who we are actually called to be, the world will literally change.
Are you ready?