"A Strange Fire" - Leviticus 10:1-11

Leviticus 10:1-11

       Acts 5:1-11

“A strange fire”

I just want to give you a quick reminder of where we are up to in the book of Leviticus.

I want to give you a broad overview before we zoom in on Leviticus chapter 10.

If you remember, the Israelites had 400 years of slavery under the Egyptians.

The Egyptians cried out to God to save them…….and God did save them.

God raised up a man- Moses, who saved God’s people, and led them out of Egypt into the desert.

Now God didn’t just save his people, so they could be free from the Egyptians, but he saved them with the purpose that they could worship and serve him together at the mountain in the desert.

When God first spoke to Moses on the mountain through the burning bush, this is what God said to Moses.

He said, “But I will be with you, and this shall be the sign for you, that I have sent you: when you have brought the people out of Egypt, you shall serve God on this mountain.”

That was God’s purpose for his people when he rescued them from the Egyptians, brought them through the red sea and brought them to the desert- to give them a place where they could freely worship Him together.

This is why God instructed Moses to build the tabernacle (like a mobile temple). This was the place where God dwelt amongst his people, this is the place where God was to be worshipped by his people.

Friends, this is why God has saved us (not from the Egyptians), but from our sins, so that we can worship and serve Him. God saved us from our sins, so that we could do what God created us to do in the first place, worship and serve Him.

If the salvation that Jesus has given you at the cross, does not lead you to serve and worship Him, then I doubt that you are really saved: although God knows.

God created us to worship Him, and if we are not worshipping God, we are worshipping something else other than God, and that thing, whatever it is, will never satisfy or fulfill us, be it the worship of money, career, house, or family, those things we may worship will never fulfill us. Only worshipping God will satisfy us now and for eternity.

The Israelites learnt this lesson the hard way.

When they eventually reached the foot of the mountain, remember with the purpose of worshipping and serving God…..they didn’t……instead they worshiped a golden calf which they had made with their own hands, and Aaron, Moses’ brother had allowed all this to happen, and when Moses questioned Aaron about his lack of oversight of letting the Israelites break loose, he just made excuses, “well Moses, people just started throwing gold into the fire, and boom all of a sudden, a golden calf popped out and suddenly we just fell to our knees and worshipped”

On that day, that day, the Israelites worshipped an idol created by their hands instead of worshipping God, 3,000 men perished by the sword. The worship of the golden calf only led to death.

God wasn’t going to share his Glory that day, God still doesn’t share his glory, since he is God alone, He is the only one worthy of praise and glory.

God wasn’t going to put up with his people worshipping others- still today, God does not want us to worship others, he wants us to worship him and him alone, he wants all our hearts, not just parts.

And so after the tabernacle was built back in the book of Exodus, God then instructed Moses, how the people where to worship and serve God.

And how God was to be worshipped was and still is very important.

And for all the rules and regulations that God set up for tabernacle worship, he was as he is today, focused on how their hearts were shaped for worship.

In Leviticus chapter 8:1-13, we read that the priests were to be dressed a certain way in order to serve the Lord in the tabernacle. Now, I haven’t got time to go into all the symbolism of what the priests wore, but the main point of the priests dressing a certain way, was to show to God and his people, that these men had been set apart for the work of the Lord. I think that is the main purpose of any uniform, - it shows you belong to a particular group, a particular school, a particular work place, a particular football team, the priests wore the uniform, to mark out that they were doing God’s work.

Of course a priest could wear all the correct gear, but their hearts could be far from God.

Some of the pharisees and scribes in the days when Jesus walked this earth, wore long tassels with scriptures sown on them, they wore long robes and may have looked the part, but their hearts were far from God.

Anyway after the priests had been dressed, ready to serve God, they then had to go through the ordination process, which was seven days and nights of sacrifices at the tabernacle. They were not to leave the tabernacle for seven days. If these priests were going to serve God in his tabernacle, they needed to atone for all their sins, they needed to be made pure from head to toe, hence the dabbing of blood on their ear lobe and their big toe.

Yes, the priests job was to make sacrifices for the people and to teach people the laws of Moses, but more important than all of that, was that these priests needed to be Holy, they needed to be living a holy life. They needed to reflect who God was, since they were God’s representatives.

Friends: a pastor, an elder, a shepherd, whatever term you want to use, needs to be living a holy life, a life that is dedicated to God and following his ways. A pastor could be a great communicator, a great organiser, a great counsellor, but if he is not living right before God, it all counts for nothing.

Anyway, after the priest had been dressed for action, and gone through the week of sacrifices in the tabernacle, they would then have the ordination service in front of all the people. Aaron and all his sons were set apart for the work of the tabernacle and then look at what happened in Leviticus 9:23-34

And Moses and Aaron went into the tent of meeting, and when they came out they blessed the people, and the glory of the Lord appeared to all the people. 24 And fire came out from before the Lord and consumed the burnt offering and the pieces of fat on the altar, and when all the people saw it, they shouted and fell on their faces.

You can tell there was a sense of Joy and celebration.

God was worshipped in his place by his people, the people saw the Glory of God, God sent a fire to burn up the priests offering and the people fell on their faces in awe. They knew, just like Moses had stood many years earlier in the same place, they were on Holy ground, because God was there.

Everything was going so well, and then, looked what happened…….

Look at Leviticus chapter 10 verses 1-3 with me:

Now Nadab and Abihu, the sons of Aaron, each took his censer and put fire in it and laid incense on it and offered unauthorized fire before the Lord, which he had not commanded them. 2 And fire came out from before the Lord and consumed them, and they died before the Lord. 3 Then Moses said to Aaron, “This is what the Lord has said: ‘Among those who are near me I will be sanctified, and before all the people I will be glorified.’” And Aaron held his peace.

The sons of Aaron, two priests, who had just gone through the ordination process, had offered some unauthorised fire before the Lord. T                  hese priests should have known better.

Some translations describe this “unauthorised” fire it as a “strange” fire.

Now no-one is sure exactly what this strange fire was or how it was offered strangely in the tabernacle, but what we can be certain of from the scriptures here, is that whatever this strange fire was, it wasn’t something that the Lord had commanded them to do. It was something that they did without consulting Aaron or Moses, who spoke on behalf of God.

In Leviticus chapters 8-10, a phrase which is repeated a lot is…..”as the Lord commanded”…..in other words, all the dress, all the sacrifices were done as the lord commanded.

This particular “strange” fire was offered not at the command of God.

Now, some think that possibly, these two priests, the sons of Aaron, had too much wine, became drunk, and in their drunken state entered the holy of Holies, or a place of the tabernacle they shouldn’t have, and made a fire while drunk.

Why do some think they may have been drunk?

Because after this strange fire was offered, God commanded Aaron that all priests must keep off the grog. Which makes sense, since the priests needed to keep sharp and not given into drunkenness, which may lead to offering “strange fire”

Some think that this strange fire, was an offering the priests made to other gods, since it was common in the ancient world to offer incense offerings to please gods.

As I said, we don’t know for sure exactly what this strange fire was, but we do know God wasn’t pleased with it and as a result, God sent a fire which consumed and killed them.

At the end of chapter 9, God sent a fire to consume the sacrifices and his glory was shown and the people fell in worship.

Now, in chapter 10, God sent a fire and it consumed the priests who had offered some strange fire.

By the way how devasted would Aaron had been?

His sons had messed up and now they were dead. I wonder if he thought back to the golden calf, when he let the people go loose and built the golden calf- did he perhaps take some of the blame for his son’s going rogue with this strange fire?- Perhaps.

Anyway, what was God teaching his people?

Well, it tells us in chapter 10 verse 3, look at that verse again with me:

This is what the Lord says, “Among those who are near me, I will be sanctified, and before all the people I will be glorified”

The first lesson that God was teaching his people was this……..

God will be Glorified before all people.

When we talk about God’s glory, the Hebrew word is rooted in the meaning of weight- and so in that sense everyone will know, there is nothing weightier, more important than God,  we often talk about the word of someone carrying more weight than someone else. God is to be worshipped alone, since He is the creator and sustainer of all things. His word carries the most weight.

The Glory of God, is also linked to his name.

Many times is the scriptures, God said he worked for His name’s sake, he did things so that everyone would know that He is God and He alone is worthy of praise.

And so when God sent the fire upon the sacrifices and people fell and worshipped him, He was glorified. However, when God sent the fire to consume the priests because they used strange fire, God was also glorified, his weight, his importance was made known and his name was made known.

And so whether God used the fire to burn the sacrifices or to burn the priests, he was glorified.

Friends, when Jesus returns to this earth, on that day of the Lord, that the prophets wrote about, it will be both a great day and dreadful day.

When Jesus returns and brings judgement, God’s glory will be shown to all people.

That judgement may bring eternal life, as people bow and worship him forever, as they did in the ordination ceremony as fire fell on the sacrifice, or that same judgement will bring eternal separation from God, just as the fire fell on the priests.

And so when God brought the fire at the tabernacle, he was glorified. Whether the fire burnt the sacrifices or the priests.

When God brings judgement, he will be glorified.

Whether through giving people eternal life or eternal death.

On that day, there will be no doubt, no question, that he is God and God alone.

The second lesson that God was teaching his people which is a warning for all of us, who claim to be one of his is that:

God will be sanctified amongst those who are near Him

Now when we talk about sanctification, we are talking about being Holy, being set apart for God. And so for those who are near God, like the priests were in the tabernacle, they were to represent who God was, his character, since they had been set apart to do his work.

And so God was telling his people that if they were going to claim that they had been set apart for God, then they truly must be, otherwise, God wasn’t going to put up with it. He couldn’t have people wearing his uniform, claiming to be part of his team but not living obedient lives to him.

Here is the difference between God being glorified and God being sanctified.

God can be glorified through anyone and everyone- this is why he even referred to a pagan king Nebuchadnezzar as his servant, because God will be glorified through all things, but God’s holiness can only be shown through his holy people, since the very definition of holiness, is being separated for God.

As I read this story of Aaron’s sons being struck down instantly as they made this strange fire and we as I read that their bodies were carried out of the camp and no mourning was to be made for them, it reminded me of the story that we read in Acts chapter 5, where we meet two more people who claimed to be on God’s team, but were not.

Ananias and Saphirra, had sold a field, brought half of their profits, gave it to the church, lied and claimed that they had brought all of their money, and as a result, they had lied to God, they immediately dropped dead and their bodies was also carried away.

Now what was similar between the priests strange fire, and the offering of Ananias and Saphirra?

I think the main similarity was this.

Both the priests and Ananias and Sapphira, had offered something to God which looked on the outside close to the genuine thing, but was anything but genuine.

And it is this hypocrisy that God cannot tolerate.

Fire was used all the time in the tabernacle, who would have known or cared if the fire was “unauthorised” or not.

Offerings were given to the early church a lot, we read at the end of chapter 4 that Joseph had just done exactly the same thing, he has sold his field and gave all his money to the church. And now Ananias and Saphirra did the same thing, only this time they lied and only gave half- but who cares, who would have known if they only gave half and anyway, isn’t half better than none.

Friends, God is not a pragmatic.

He is not one that doesn’t care how you do it, as long as you get the “job done”

A pragmatic, would have taken the money thrown at the disciples feet, give Ananias and Saphirra a pat on the back, said thank you, built a statue for them at the front of the church and used the money for the church…… but God is not a pragmatic.

God cares more about hearts, he cares more about the sanctity, the holiness of his name.

God knows, God cares how we do things.

He cares how we worship him.

Yes, now through Jesus sacrifice, we no longer need to go to a certain mountain or a certain temple or a certain city to worship God, but we worship God in spirit and in truth.

We worship God through the truth of his word and through His Holy Spirit, who illuminates the truth of God’s word to us.

Friends, it matters how we do things.

God has given us instructions of how to live, how to worship and we would be fools to try and do it our own way.

God has given us instructions for how we meet together as his church- it would be foolish if we didn’t follow his instructions but just made up our own.

Let us pray.