After Pentecost Devotional - Day 41

“The people of the Levi tribe, including the priests, will not receive any land. Instead, they will receive part of the sacrifices that are offered to Yahweh, because he has promised to provide for them in this way.” Deuteronomy 18:1-2

For most people, this kind of arrangement is a recipe for disaster. It places one class of people in a very vulnerable position. It makes them dependent upon the faithfulness and generosity of those who control the wealth of the land. In a society with reasonable economic equality, it is not as much a problem as when inequality grows. In the presence of great inequality, the dependence of a prophetic class upon the powerful elite makes it much more difficult to be the mouthpieces of Yahweh.

That was the situation in ancient Israel. The land was the basis for all economic wealth. Any sense of prosperity was tied to agricultural production. Being a merchant, laborer, or craftsman was of marginal importance in the economy of the day. Land meant food, which in a subsistence economy was so very central to every definition of prosperity.

Yahweh determined that the Levites and priests would focus their efforts on coordinating the sacrifices and other services at the temple. They would be in charge of the religious life and practices of Israel, including teaching the people Yahweh's guidance for living. In the process, the people would repay them in kind from the agricultural bounty of the land. In Western society, that would be the equivalent of sharing the profits of business enterprise.

Underlying this concept of land distribution and distribution of labor, was the idea that the land and its bounty belonged to Yahweh for the welfare and benefit of all. Along with requiring that the landholders provide for the needs of the Levites and priests, we also see many other passages that stress meeting the needs of all other classes of non-landholders. The bounty of the land was to meet the needs of the entire nation. It was to provide for widows, orphans, immigrants, slaves, servants, blind, poor, lame, priests, Levites, and the landholders, as well.

Yahweh had claimed to be taking the people into a land flowing with milk and honey. It was a land whose abundance would be sufficient to meet the needs of the entire population without exclusion. The question would be simply whether or not the people would live up to God's expectations for them. The question would be whether their faithfulness would measure up to Yahweh's requirements.

The land would produce wealth. Some would seek to hoard wealth for themselves and ignore the needs of others. Some would act as though they were the owners of the land and fully responsible for its production. They would see themselves as entitled to all of the production under their supervision.

We see the same concerns in our own society. We see the same issues regarding being faithful to God in regard to the resources at our own disposal. Many want to use their resources as a means to control or influence others. When that happens, we are refusing to acknowledge Yahweh's ownership of the resources at our disposal.

Determine to administer your resources as a steward of God's bounty.

"Lord, mold and remake me after the abundance of your grace as a faithful steward."

—©Copyright 2016, Christopher B. Harbin

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