When you give blind animals as sacrifices, isn’t that wrong? And isn’t it wrong to offer animals that are crippled and diseased? Try giving gifts like that to your governor, and see how pleased he is!” says the LORD of Heaven’s Armies. [Malachi 1.8]
Why was it wrong to offer blind, crippled, or diseased animals as sacrifices to God?
It wasn't because they were blind, crippled or diseased, but because of why they were blind, crippled, or diseased...
Here is where we need to read and understand Deuteronomy 28.15-68. Blindness, incapacitation, and disease are all curses for man's disobedience - they always have been and always will be.
As curses, the undesirable human conditions (and many others described in Deuteronomy 28.15-68) are unacceptable to God Who is, and requires, perfect holiness. If blindness, incapacitation and disease were not associated with disobedience, it might be different, but, that is not the case. Blindness, incapacitation and disease are as nasty as the idolatry and the subsequent sin against God they represent.
With this in mind, it should come as no surprise to us that Jesus, as the Great Reconciler of Man Unto God, came to earth healing the sick and raising the dead. It should furthermore be of no surprise that Jesus instructed his followers to do the same things.
“I tell you the truth, anyone who believes in me will do the same works I have done, and even greater works, because I am going to be with the Father. [John 14.12]
What's more, prophecies of Jesus long before His Advent, revealed what Jesus would do with these curses:
Yet it was our weaknesses he carried; it was our sorrows that weighed him down. And we thought his troubles were a punishment from God, a punishment for his own sins! But he was pierced for our rebellion, crushed for our sins. He was beaten so we could be whole. He was whipped so we could be healed. [Isaiah 53.4-5]
Jesus undeservedly, but intentionally received and died in these our curses, took them to hell where they belong, broke free of them there, and ascended to the Father in heaven without even the smell of smoke. But Jesus did all this at a huge risk - the risk that man would not believe it and therefore not receive the benefit of His having done it.
“For this is how God loved the world: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life. God sent his Son into the world not to judge the world, but to save the world through him. “There is no judgment against anyone who believes in him. But anyone who does not believe in him has already been judged for not believing in God’s one and only Son. And the judgment is based on this fact: God’s light came into the world, but people loved the darkness more than the light, for their actions were evil. All who do evil hate the light and refuse to go near it for fear their sins will be exposed. But those who do what is right come to the light so others can see that they are doing what God wants.” [John 3.16-21]
The "judgment" Jesus spoke of in John 3.16-21 can only be the curses described in detail in Deuteronomy 28.15-68 ultimately leading to physical and then spiritual death. Faith in Jesus transports the believer by association with Him into the realm of "no judgment" - no curses.
But Christ has rescued us from the curse pronounced by the law. When he was hung on the cross, he took upon himself the curse for our wrongdoing. For it is written in the Scriptures, “Cursed is everyone who is hung on a tree.” [Galatians 3.13]
So, the proverbial "elephant in the room" looms... "Why do 'believers' still suffer curses?" Let's ask ourselves this question in another, more revealing way: "Why do people call themselves believers when they still suffer curses that God says identify them as unbelievers?" We find the obvious answer to this question in God's Word, but we refuse to consider the implications of it:
“The human heart is the most deceitful of all things, and desperately wicked. Who really knows how bad it is? [Jeremiah 17.9]
The One Who knows how bad it is, is the One Who indicates how bad it is through curses. Curses do not lie because God did not lie when He said that they are the just reward for disobedience.
Like a flitting sparrow, like a flying swallow, So a curse without cause shall not alight. [Proverbs 26.2 NKJV]
The fact is, Jesus could not have come to earth and NOT perform miracles! Jesus could not redeem anyone from curses except that healing was the result. Jesus' followers can have no less results!
But, what about those who cried Lord, Lord...?
“Not everyone who calls out to me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ will enter the Kingdom of Heaven. Only those who actually do the will of my Father in heaven will enter. On judgment day many will say to me, ‘Lord! Lord! We prophesied in your name and cast out demons in your name and performed many miracles in your name.’ But I will reply, ‘I never knew you. Get away from me, you who break God’s laws.’ [Matthew 7.21-23]
Performing miracles in Jesus' name is not the same as believing in Jesus' name. According to Jesus in Matthew 7.21-23, it is entirely possible to perform miracles in His name without ever being known by Him. Notice that those who cried Lord! Lord! were not necessarily recipients of the miracles they passed on - Jesus' reply, "I never knew you," would confirm this. Everyone Jesus encountered in the New Testament was spiritually and, as needed, physically "healed" as a result.
The Bible is actually quite clear on all of this. It is religion that has made it difficult - proud religion that refuses to acknowledge the obvious implications of curses, deceptively damning would-be believers to the fate of unbelievers excusing their curses as "random" entirely usurping Jesus' demand to repent and believe. Religion denies that curses are a 'cut and dry' indicator of idolatry (violation of the first three Commandments) and the sin it propagates (violation of the last six Commandments). Consequently, religion today is idolatrous, sinful, and lacking the power of God demonstrated and commanded by Jesus (Who happens to be the 4th Commandment Sabbath Rest).
In light of all this, Jesus' demand in Matthew comes into laser-precision focus:
If any of you wants to be my follower, you must give up your own way, take up your cross, and follow me. [Matthew 16.24]
If we can see it, grace is found in 'giving up our own way' - giving up our self-centric idolatry that includes religion and all other man-made idols. Grace is found in 'taking up our cross' - owning up to the fact that curses don't lie - that every curse we experience is deserved and indicates our need to repent and believe in Jesus. And then... grace is found as we follow Jesus mirroring Him in every word and action - effectively evangelizing the world.
If however, we fail to understand (intentionally or unintentionally) why blind, incapacitated or diseased animals were unacceptable to God, not one bit of what is said here will make sense. Perhaps this is precisely why Jesus made this harrowing prediction ...to jog our senses:
“You can enter God’s Kingdom only through the narrow gate. The highway to hell is broad, and its gate is wide for the many who choose that way. But the gateway to life is very narrow and the road is difficult, and only a few ever find it. [Matthew 7.13-14]
Father, help me to understand what Your Word has being saying all along. Help me to see that all my religious cheap-grace explanations and self-centric living is the broad highway to the wide gate of hell. Help me to see that if I look like everyone else then I am without question on that highway to hell. Help me to see that unless I give up my own way, take up my cross, and follow Jesus - distinctly looking and acting like Him, then I am NOT one of the few. So be it.
