Daily Devotion | Leviticus 5:1–13 | 2026 January 21

Scripture: Leviticus 5:1–13 (ESV)

Date: 2026 January 21

Speaker: Rev. John Chen

Transcribed, translated & edited by: Joseph Wang (Yufan)

Dear brothers and sisters, peace to you. We thank God for His grace as He brings us into a new day to learn our daily spiritual nourishment. The passage we are studying today is Leviticus chapter 5, verse 1, all the way to chapter 6, verse 7. Let us pray.

Our God, we thank You. We thank You that You are willing to show us favor and mercy, so that within Your grace and Your will we may know Your will better. Lord, have mercy on us. We are fragile; we need Your mercy and grace. In the name of Christ, amen.

Alright, let us continue to look at chapter 5 through chapter 6, verse 7. Why do we go to chapter 6, verse 7? Because here we actually run into a difficulty. This difficulty is: from chapter 5, verse 1 to verse 13—what exactly is being talked about here? Is it the sin offering, or is it the guilt offering?

It is very hard here to distinguish: is this sin offering, or guilt offering? Because you see, for example, in chapter 5, verse 6, right? It says here: “and he shall bring as his compensation for the sin that he has committed, a female from the flock, a lamb or a goat, for a sin offering.” But it also uses the language of “guilt,” saying “his guilt offering animal,” and then says it is “for a sin offering.” So then, is it sin offering or guilt offering? This is why it is difficult.

So scholars generally consider that the regulations for the sin offering probably go until chapter 5, verse 13, and then from chapter 5, verse 14 to chapter 6, verse 7, that section is the guilt offering. If we are honest and carefully study the text, this analysis is probably more reasonable. In other words, the record about the sin offering runs from chapter 4, verse 1 to chapter 5, verse 13. We think this is more reasonable.

But even so, sin offering and guilt offering are still hard to separate. For example, by verse 7—chapter 5, verse 7—it says you bring two turtledoves or two pigeons “to the LORD for a guilt offering,” and then it says: one is for a sin offering, and one is for a burnt offering. Then you ask: these turtledoves and pigeons—are they sin offering, guilt offering, or burnt offering? It is not that clear.

Then in verse 9 it says, “this is a sin offering,” and then it says the second is for a burnt offering “according to the rule.” So it looks like sin offering and burnt offering are put together, and it becomes something like a guilt offering. So these things are indeed not easy to understand, not easy to interpret.

But I think at least there are a few things we should know. First, all the offerings—whether sin offering, guilt offering, or burnt offering—have some things in common. There are similarities, so sometimes it is difficult to distinguish them. This is something we should know, because when these passages are placed together like this, it really is hard to make a very precise division. But we also know that between each offering, there are still some differences—there are still differences. This is the first point.

Now, regarding the sin offering portion—chapter 5, verse 1 through chapter 5, verse 13—we should pay attention to a few things. The first is: what is sin? What is guilt? What does it mean to “sin”?

First, it says: “If anyone sins in that he hears the voice of an oath”—that is, he hears a sworn adjuration, a call to testify—“and he is a witness, whether he has seen or come to know the matter, yet does not speak, he shall bear his iniquity.” This means: if someone requires you to be a witness, you cannot pretend you did not hear, you cannot pretend you did not see. You have an active moral responsibility.

Brothers and sisters, in our life, when we obey God’s law, it is not only that we must not actively lie. Even when, for example, in chapter 5, verse 1, if we are required to give true testimony, then we must give true testimony. You cannot say, “I don’t know,” “I didn’t see.” You cannot. You must testify truthfully. So thank the Lord, in the Westminster Larger Catechism—Questions 90 to 150—those sixty questions that expound the Ten Commandments in detail, it tells us how we should obey God’s law.

So here, chapter 5, verse 1 tells us what we should do: we must speak out what we know. If someone puts you under oath, you must speak. If you do not speak, you are sinning. So this is: what is sin?

Then there is another: touching an unclean thing—dead animals, carcasses, dead creeping things—touching uncleanness; and then later, verse 4 says: making a rash oath—speaking thoughtlessly and swearing. Once you realize it, you are guilty.

So chapter 5, verses 1 to 4 are telling us what sin is. There are sins of the tongue: one is in testimony—you must speak what you know when you must bear witness; even if you say “I don’t know” when you do know, that is sin. And then another tongue-related sin: do not swear rashly. Because an oath is not a small thing.

Let me clarify: what is an oath? An oath is when we speak to people, but we call God as our witness. We swear by God. That is an oath. Then what is a vow? A vow is what we speak to God—promising something to God. In the Westminster Standards there is a very clear distinction between vows and oaths.

So what is an oath? It is: I guarantee to you that something will happen, or I guarantee to you that what I say is true. Who is the “object” here? The object is that I am taking God as my surety—meaning, if I do not keep what I swear, I am calling on God to punish me. That is why the other person can believe your oath: because you are placing yourself under self-imprecation. You are saying, “I swear,” “I call God as witness,” “if I am not telling the truth, may God judge me.” So oaths are weighty.

Then if you swear and you violate your oath, what happens? Then you are guilty. And then you need to bring an offering. This is why in this passage you see overlap: it talks about guilt offering, but then it functions as a sin offering—there is overlap here.

Then there is also uncleanness. What does “uncleanness” mean? In Leviticus there are many kinds of uncleanness—being defiled by death, being defiled by impurity, and so on.

So here we must distinguish a concept: in Leviticus it gives three states—three states. One is “unclean,” one is “clean,” and one is “holy.” These are three. These are three states. In the Levitical concept, being defiled—becoming unclean—means there is sin. So uncleanness must be dealt with.

But everyone, do not think this is about hygiene—whether you are sanitary or not. This has nothing to do with hygiene. It refers to ritual, ceremonial uncleanness. In ritual terms, you are unclean.

Then someone may ask: what does ceremonial uncleanness mean for us today? Because this age is very far from us. We do not really understand. What does it point to today? So this kind of ritual uncleanness, I think, is largely connected to death. When we touch a dead animal, when we touch impurity—things like bodily discharge, things like that—it becomes ritual uncleanness. It is connected to death.

So the meaning is: we should not contaminate ourselves with things that carry the “breath of death.” Do not touch; do not be defiled. If you are defiled by the “breath of death,” you are unclean; and then you have guilt. And if you have guilt, what do you do? You offer a sacrifice. You bring the appropriate offering, and it is offered as atonement.

So when we read Leviticus, we must notice: it introduces this concept of “clean” and “holy.” God required Israel, in their spiritual life—especially as they entered life in Canaan—to maintain ceremonial cleanness and to live a holy life. This is what they had to remember. In that historical background, God required them: do not be defiled by dead things, do not be defiled by impurity, and when you return from outside, you wash your hands. The purpose is not hygiene. The purpose is that you do not carry ceremonial uncleanness.

And these sins include our speech and our oaths. These are “uncleanness,” and they require atonement. So I think we can pause here and reflect carefully.

These texts about uncleanness—being defiled by dead things—what do they mean for us today? For each Christian today, will we still be defiled by dead animals? Will we still be defiled by impurity? What does this mean for us? I think I need to explain, so that everyone will not feel lost when using these texts.

The speech part is relatively clear: you must give true testimony; you must not swear rashly; that is easier to understand. But being defiled by impurity, being defiled by death—does that have practical meaning in our life today? I think it does.

Let me give an example. For instance, Christians living an immoral life in society. Now, can we directly transfer the Old Testament ceremonial laws into moral law? We can discuss that. But I think here it clearly points to this: the Old Testament uses ceremonial uncleanness to symbolize moral uncleanness. I think it is reasonable to apply it in that way.

So what is moral uncleanness? Let me give examples. We always discuss morality against the background of the world. For example: the kinds of jokes we tell—improper jokes. The kinds of things we get involved with—being defiled by “impurity.” For example, gambling—playing mahjong. Or things you might encounter in Chinese life: burning paper offerings, participating in ritual practices. And then things like doing immoral acts—being defiled by bad social customs—bribery, corruption, receiving and giving bribes; smoking and drinking; constant feasting and partying. I think these can be described as being defiled by uncleanness and by the “breath of death.”

When we are craving the world, when we are following the world’s customs, we are being defiled. Of course, this does not mean Christians should not live normal life in the world. We still eat normally, travel normally, buy normal necessities—those are not problems.

But many things in the world are not like that. For example, eating: excessive feasting, excessive drinking, enjoying gatherings that revolve around alcohol, endless banquets—does that have a problem? Some people say, “That seems fine.” No—I think that already is defilement. These worldly affections, these worldly indulgences, in some sense become what the Old Testament pictures as ritual uncleanness.

So we must pay attention to separation from the world—separation from the world. We must live a pure life, a clean life. We must wrap ourselves within certain boundaries. We do not join the world in wild feasting and drinking. We do not follow their casual joking. We do not follow their craving for the world. We do not follow their very careless lifestyle.

The world’s life is very casual: they do what they want, without any boundaries, without the boundaries of God’s law. So what should Christians do? We should live a heavenly life. We should pay attention to the boundaries of our life, the boundaries of morality. These moral boundaries, if we speak in Old Testament terms, are like ceremonial cleanness. We do not touch dead things; we do not touch impurity—because these things, in the end, will stain our life, so that our life becomes more and more secular, more and more unclean.

So to live a clean life means we pay attention to this. Concretely, for Christians, what we listen to, what we watch, how we interact with people around us, what we do—these things remind us: do not be defiled; live a life set apart.

Now someone might say, “Pastor Chen, don’t you want us to evangelize? Don’t we become all things to all people? If you do not let me be with them, how do we evangelize them?” I think we must not get confused here.

Actually, when we relate to outsiders, we must do two actions. The first action is separation: we must separate. We cannot go along with them; we cannot be the same as them; we cannot agree with their values. We must separate—this is the first step.

After we separate, then we must bow down and live with them—this is the second step. And the “identification” here is an identification with their feelings, their human experience, their emotions. It is not an identification with their behavior. We must distinguish this clearly. Otherwise, we cannot truly relate to them. It is as if we only have two options: either we are exactly the same as them, or we keep far away from them. But we choose a third way: one step is separation; another step is identification. We choose the second pattern.

Brothers and sisters, do not misunderstand: we are not “the same as them” among them. On the contrary, the first step is separation, the second step is identification. Only in this way can we really feel the difference between us and them, and also how we can love them.

Alright, that is what we say about the regulations concerning cleanness. Next, today we can probably only go to verse 13. That is fine. We will only go to verse 13.

Then we see: regarding this sin offering—if a person’s means are not sufficient, what should he do? If he cannot afford a lamb, then he brings two turtledoves or two pigeons. And if he cannot even bring turtledoves or pigeons, then he can bring one-tenth of an ephah of fine flour. So here we again see God’s mercy.

You see: if you cannot offer a lamb, what do you do? Then you offer birds. And if you still cannot, then you can even offer fine flour. So we see God’s mercy toward people.

And we also see something very realistic: these kinds of sins may indeed be committed frequently. If you had to offer livestock every time, the economic burden might truly be hard to bear. Because being defiled by dead things and being defiled by impurity—this could be something that happens often, not something you can always avoid. Sometimes you simply cannot avoid it. So God, in order to care for people’s situation—also to care for their needs—keeps lowering the standard of what may be brought, step by step.

So these different models of offerings, from chapter 5, verse 1 to verse 13, show us that sin offering and guilt offering have a kind of overlap. This also tells us: in these sacrificial regulations, sometimes it is really hard to distinguish exactly what offering is being used.

You see, for example, by verse 12, it says again: “this is a sin offering.” And then in verse 11 it also says it is a sin offering, and then in verse 12 it again says this is a sin offering. So yes, there are places that are not easy to understand. But regardless, we will talk about the guilt offering tomorrow. The guilt offering has a somewhat different feature—more of a compensatory feature—so it is not exactly the same as the sin offering. So I think it also makes sense to stop at chapter 5, verse 13.

So today, the key thing we learned is the issue of cleanness. Uncleanness and cleanness—this is something we must pay special attention to when we apply this text to our daily life and our moral life.

Uncleanness represents death; cleanness represents life, represents eternity. I think this distinction is a helpful elevation for Christians. We are people who long for eternal life; we long for eternal, everlasting life. And the expression of this eternal life is that you desire to live a clean life. You do not want to be defiled by worldliness. “Worldliness” here is, in a sense, what is unclean. To live a worldly, death-bound life is an unclean life—an “unclean” life. And this “unclean” is not about hygiene; it is moral uncleanness. And moral uncleanness is, in fact, being defiled by the breath of death.

So as God’s people—as people who possess eternal life—we cannot be defiled by these impurities. On the contrary, what should we desire? We should desire a life of eternal life, a life of eternity.

And here, brothers and sisters, we must be changed within ourselves. Of course, fundamentally, we cannot do it ourselves; we need God to do it. But after the Holy Spirit regenerates us, we indeed have responsibility to long for this eternal life, this eternal living.

This is hard to describe. I probably cannot tell you exactly what eternal life “feels like.” And I also cannot fully describe the joy of holy living. But this should become our pursuit: we long for cleanness, we long for holiness, we long for eternal life.

Just as we dislike dirtiness: for example, if our hands are dirty—very dirty—we will wash them. That washing becomes a symbol. If our hearts are stained with many unclean and filthy things, we must also wash them away. We wash by God’s Word. We keep living in God’s Word, and we will receive a kind of “cleanliness.”

In daily life, many people like cleanliness, right? A home that is tidied and clean feels comfortable. But that is only a symbol—only a symbol. We like clean objects, clean rooms, clean houses. What it points to is that, in fact, our souls long for moral cleanness. And this moral cleanness can only be cleansed through the blood of Jesus Christ.

When God’s Word washes us clean inside, people feel “comfortable.” Just like we like a clean room, in fact our souls like cleanness. Our souls like the eternal life that comes from God. When we have eternal life within us, we will receive a kind of joy—a kind of sense. It is difficult to describe.

But I hope brothers and sisters will experience this: when we move away from filthy living—from smoking and drinking, from those dirty and filthy habits; from scrolling all kinds of messy short videos; from being addicted to banquets and drinking tables; from crude and hidden jokes; from loving money; from thinking all day only about how to make money—when we move away from that kind of life, and we live a pure life (what the world might call a restrained life), we long for eternal life, our souls become clean, and we can receive peace in God.

And of course, we know: whether it is sin offering or guilt offering, they all point to Christ. Only the blood of Jesus Christ can truly make us sense this cleanness in Him.

We are living as if in a pile of pig dung and cow dung. It is Jesus Christ who lifts us out and brings us to be with Him, and we begin to live a clean life. So if we truly like cleanness, then we should love Jesus, because Jesus is the cleanest. When we are with Jesus, we live in a clean world.

May God have mercy on us and enable us to live a clean life. Alright, today we can only share up to here. Thank you, everyone.