Colour-Coding Leviticus

I've just finished Exodus and started Leviticus, the third book in the Bible. There are a LOT of repeated words in these instructions to the Jewish priests and people. Serious themes emerge as one examines what gets stressed.

This time as I read it, I am colour-coding various repeated words. It helps me to:

a) see what is repeated and emphasized (and therefore important to God)
b) think about the themes and how they relate to me
c) get through it without drowning!
d) make pretty Bible pages...?

So this is how I decided to underline:

WORD/PHRASE	COLOUR
Sin	Brown
Guilt/Responsible/Unclean/Guilty	Gold
Burn/Burnt/Burning/Fire	Orange
Acceptable to the Lord/Pleasing to the Lord	Light Green
Without defect	Pink
Before the Lord/To the Lord	Yellow
Holy/Most Holy	Purple
Blood	Red
Atonement	Light Blue
Wash	Dark Blue
Forgive/Forgiven	Dark Green

See how it starts with sin and ends with forgiveness? I sure need and like that ending. But it has to go through offering something without defect and pleasing/acceptable to the Lord, coming before the Lord, being atoned for with blood... the Israelites used "perfect" animals...but they had to keep on sacrificing them day after day, never finished, thus they didn't really take away the sin. Every sacrifice was pointing towards the one final, really perfect, voluntary one: Jesus, once for all, finished and done. Thank You for washing me, making me clean, taking away my guilt, forgiving me and making me holy.

Posted via web from K's Café