Talk—Stan Allan
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All right, maybe we just look to the Lord before we start.
Our God and Father, we come before thee this evening, and we thank Thee for the very happy time we've enjoyed here the last two days.
And we think of how each one of us now are going to be returning to our homes.
And we're going to have the opportunity to put what we have heard into practice in our daily life. And we know how important this is for each one of us, including the speaker. And so, Lord, we would pray that Thou would help us to honor Thee and all that we say and do as we return home.
And we might be willing to walk in the path to this pleasing to thyself.
And so we pray as we open my word for a few moments that there might be something that would be an encouragement.
And the instructor for each one of us. And we ask it now in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, Amen.
I know there's a lot of young people here this year, and a lot of younger ones, and I thought it might be nice to look at a a scripture from the Old Testament. But before we do, I'd like to read just two scriptures that are often quoted.
One is found in Romans chapter 14. I think it is. I'm sorry, Romans 15.
And verse 4.
It says this whatsoever things were written aforetime.
Were written for our learning that we, through patience and comfort of the scriptures, might have hope.
And then one verse in First Corinthians 10.
1St Corinthians 10 and verse 11.
It says this now all these things happened unto them.
For in samples or, as the margin says, four types and they are written for our admonition.
Upon whom the ends of the world are come.
So it's made very plain that the Old Testament was given to us for our admonition and for our learning. And I'm sure we have learned a great deal this past couple of days from the story of David and Goliath.
A story that's often told to the boys and girls in Sunday school, but we who are older have much to learn from it as well. But I was wondering.
If today, or at least right now, we might look at it some scriptures in Leviticus Chapter 11.
I'm sure that many of us here are familiar with these verses, but I think they're very practical and we can learn a lot from it.
It says here in Romans in Leviticus 11, starting at verse 4. Nevertheless these shall ye not eat of them that chew the cud, or of them that divide the hoof as the camel, because he chews the cud, but divides not the hoof, he is unclean unto you.
And the Coney, because he choose the cud, but divides not the hoof, he is unclean to you.
And the hair, because he chews the cud, but divides not the hoof. He is unclean to you. I should have read, you know the third verse whatsoever who, whatsoever part of the hoof, and his cloven footage. And chew with the cud among the beasts that shall ye eat.
And then I'm going to skip down to verse 9.
These shall ye eat of all that are in the waters whatsoever have fins and scales in the waters, in the seas, and in the rivers, them shall ye eat. And then down to verse 13.
These are they which ye shall have an abomination among the fouls, they shall not be eaten. They are an abomination. The eagle, the ossifrage, the Osprey, the Vulture, and the kite after his kind, every Raven after his kind, and the owl and the nighthawk, and the cuckoo, and the hawk after his kind.
The Little Owl and the Cormorants and the great owl. We'll just skip down a little bit.
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Verse 20 All fouls that creep going on all four shall be an abomination unto you, yet these may eat Of every flying, creeping thing that goeth upon all four, which have legs above their feet to leap with all upon the earth, even these of them he may eat.
The locust after his kind, the bald locust after his kind, the beetle after his kind, and the grasshopper after his kind. And then I'm just going to ask you to read one other verse, verse 29. These are these also shall be unclean unto you.
Among the creeping things that creep upon the earth, the weasel, the mouse, the tortoise after his kind, and the ferret, and the chameleon, and the lizard, and the snail and the mole, these are are unclean to you. Among all the creep. Whosoever doth touch them when they be dead shall be unclean until the even.
Well, these are very.
Interesting verses, and I'm speaking mainly to those who are young, and many of us here, of course, have enjoyed what we have in these verses. And no doubt God has in it for us important instruction that each one of us can glean.
And you'll notice the first group of animals that were mentioned, it says.
If they parted the hoof and were cloven footed and chewed the cud.
Among the beasts, then shall that shall ye eat? So there were two things here that were important. One, they had to have a cloven foot. Secondly, they had to be able to chew the cut. Now, what can we learn from that? Well, you know, I believe there are.
Many scriptures that would really illustrate what is meant by chewing the cud and having a cloven foot. I'll just mention this, that chewing the cod makes us think of the cow, doesn't it? You know, the cow is one of those animals.
That goes along and it eats the grass and the grass goes down into its first stomach and then it goes and, and sits under a tree perhaps, and it regurgitates what it had been eating and it chews and it chews and it chews and then it goes down into the second stomach. And you know, I believe that that brings before us the importance of meditation.
You know the Lord has given us the word of God.
To feed on we've enjoyed a lot of good food here this past couple of days but you know, we need spiritual food for our souls as well as the physical food for our bodies and.
The Lord here is bringing before us, I believe, the important.
Of meditation, you know, I think many of us think, well, you know, someone was mentioning today how?
They read through the Bible every year. Or is that some people do this and that's very good.
I believe it's important, but you know, we need to ruminate, we need to think, we have to meditate and chew on what we have read. And in that way we grow in our souls. And I believe there are many scriptures that show this kind of thing. Let's just look at a couple.
As we go along here, let's look at Joshua chapter one for a moment.
Just to show you a few verses, I don't want to take too long here tonight. I'm supposed to be quite short so.
But anyway, it says here in Joshua chapter one.
And verse eight I'll read first. It says, this book of the law shall not depart out of thy mouth, but thou shalt meditate therein day and night.
Isn't that the chewing the cud that is so very important? And then we have in the verse before it says the latter half of the verse turn not from it to the right hand or to the left, that thou mayest prosper whithersoever thou goest.
And so how important it is to chew and to meditate on the Word of God.
Let me just give you another example.
Psalm, Chapter one.
Just to give us another example here.
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Psalm chapter one and verse one it says blessed is the man.
That walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly. There's the cloven foot.
And then it says in the second verse, his delight is in the law of the Lord and in his law doth he meditate day and night. There's the chewing of the cuts. And so how important it is to meditate. You know, the apostle Paul said to Timothy.
Meditate upon these things, that thy profiting might appear to all. And so there's the chewing of the cud, but then there's the cloven foot, and the cloven foot has to do with our outward walk. I suppose you could say that the chewing of the cud has to do with our inwards meditation, but we need to walk.
Separate from this world, and that's what we have brought before us with the cloven foot.
And you'll notice that the animals that they were allowed to eat had to have the cloven foot and they had they were to chew the cud. It wasn't good enough to have a cloven foot. And you know, I think that's important too. We might walk separate from the world, but if it were not reading the good, the the word of God.
And meditating on it, what good is it? Or if we're reading the Word of God and going on with the world, that's wrong too. And so we need to have the cloven foot and we need to be chewing the cut. Well then if we go down a little further.
We come to the fish, and it says there in the ninth verse, These shall ye eat of all that are in the waters.
Whatsoever hath fins and scales in the waters, in the seas, and in the rivers, them shall ye eat. So what does the Lord have for us here? I believe, first of all, the fins of the fish, of course enable it not only to swim through the water.
But to swim against the current, and, you know, we're living in a world that has a powerful current. I think we would all agree the current of the world today is powerful and we need those fins to be able to swim against that current.
It's often been said, how can you tell the fish is dead or not? If a fish is dead, it flows with the current, doesn't it? And the proof of a real living fish is one that can swim against the current. And so how important it is for us as Christians to swim against the current.
The current of this world. And yet the other thing that the fish were to have was scales. And what did the scales do? The scales kept out the outward, the outward influence, you might say, not allowing it to penetrate.
And you know, as we go through this world, we have to be careful not to allow.
The world to penetrate us and to influence the way we think and the way we we speak and so on. We need those scales. And so we have those two things brought before us, the fins and the scales. They were both necessary. It wasn't good enough to swim against the current.
They had to have that which would keep out the outward influences that would penetrate and cause harm to the fish. And so we go down further and we come to the 13th verse and it mentions many of the fouls.
It says the eagle, the office office tries the osprey, the Vulture, the kite after his kind.
Every Raven after his kind and you know these, all these birds and, and I can't say that I know every one of them here, but the general thought is that these birds fed on the flesh and you know every one of us.
Have an old nature that loves to feed on the flesh and and or what's what I should say is we have an old nature likes to feed on the things of this world. It's the flesh in US and how important it is to spend our time reading the word of God. Now I'm not saying that we have to read the Bible 24 hours a day. That's not what I'm trying to say, but I'm saying that we should be feeding on.
That which is wholesome and clean. Not like the Vulture. You know the vultures love to find dead carrying around and feed on it. The same with the Ravens. You'll see them on the highway, won't you? And they're eating the flash of dead animals. Well, we're not to feed on the things of this world.
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That are full of corruption and we know that the Internet today is filled with all kinds of corrupt things and we need to be careful because the devil has been very clever. He's given us a device, a computer and telephones that not only are useful in many ways but can bring right into our homes the world.
And so we have to be very, very careful and so.
It tells us here that the Vulture and the Raven and these other birds, they were unclean because they fed on the flesh. And then it mentions the owl and the nighthawk. It mentions the little owl and the great owl.
And I think we understand what that might bring before us. These birds, they might not only eat flesh, but they also are birds of the night. And you know, we had that verse today in First Thatssalonians chapter 5.
I'll just read it.
It says this.
1St Thessalonians 5 and verse 5.
It says ye are all children of the light and the children of the day. We are not of the night nor of darkness. Therefore let us not sleep as do others, but let us watch and be sober. So how important it is to remember that we're left here in this world to be children of light. We are children of light.
And we're not children of the darkness, and the Lord wants us to shine.
You know, boys and girls, we often sing that little hymn, don't we? Jesus wants me for a sunbeam to shine for him each day. And how important that is. And so they weren't to eat those things that were the birds of the night. There's another verse in that connection too, in Romans chapter 13.
Which perhaps we could just mention in passing the 3rd Romans 13 and verse 12.
It says the night is far spent, the day is at hand. Let us therefore cast off the works of darkness and let us put on the armor of light. And so we know that John, the Gospel of John, says men love darkness because their deeds are evil. And so we don't want to be going on with those things that are from this world.
Well then it goes on and mentions fouls that creep in verse 20.
Going on all four shall be an abomination unto you.
And so it mentions here things that were creeping along the ground. And what would that bring before us? Well, I can't help but think of the verse in Philippians chapter 3. It's not talking about Christians, but let me just read what it says there in Philippians chapter 3.
It says well, Paul says be followers together of me and mark them which have that which walk. So as you have us for an example for many walk of whom I have told you often and now tell you weeping that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ, whose end is is destruction. And this is what it says here.
Whose God is their belly? Whose glory is in their shame?
Who mind earthly things? What I want to stress there is that last part. Who mind earthly things? These things that creep along the ground?
They're concerned of in eating and eating anything and everything that they see on the ground.
Anything to do with this world and I think is the thought here and so.
We're told that these were unclean, those that ate anything and everything on the ground.
And yet it says if you go on a little further.
It says in verse 22, even these of them ye may eat the locust after his kind and the bald locust after his kind, and the beetle after his kind and the grasshopper after his kind. Why were they allowed to eat grasshoppers and locusts? Well, you know these.
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Insects. They might have been on the ground, but they had the the.
The ability to leap. And have you ever seen grasshoppers and locusts? They have, they have wings, don't they? And they can fly and they can go way up above the ground. And I think that that is the thought that they weren't just interested in eating was on the ground. They got above those things. And you know, there's that verse in Colossians that says.
Set your affection on things above, not on things on the earth. And so those things that were able to leap up and be above the ground, they were clean to eat. There's a verse in that connection too in Habakkuk that I just might mention.
In passing, we know this verse very well.
Of Habakkuk chapter 3 and it says this the very last verse. It says the Lord is my strength and he will make my feet like Hinds feet and he will make me to walk upon mine high places. You know I remember brethren Speaking of this verse in the past they said it was really referring to the mountain goats.
That would climb up the mountains and they would be able to walk across these very narrow ledges high above the ground. And it says here he will make me to walk upon my high places. So the Lord wants us not to be occupied with the things of earth.
He wants us to set our affections on things above. How important? Well, there's just one other.
An animal that I would mention there in Leviticus and that is the chameleon. And I don't know if any of you have ever seen a chameleon. They're a very interesting.
Little animal, and I can't say that I've actually seen one, but.
What characterizes them? If they're sitting on a blue chair, they turn blue. If they're standing on a leaf, they turn green. If they are on a twig, they turn brown or or grey. In other words, they just simply become whatever their.
Sitting on and, you know, we don't want to be chameleons, do we? Coming here to the meetings and and and.
Enjoying the fellowship of Christians and acting like a Christian and then leaving here and going out in the world and acting like the world.
That's like being a chameleon. And so how important it is to try and learn a little bit what the Lord has for sometimes. I remember when I was young, I used to read the book of Genesis and then I would read Exodus up to about the 25th chapter, and then I would skip over to Joshua because it didn't seem like there was anything in those books, you know?
Leviticus and Numbers and Deuteronomy.
Didn't seem very interesting. That's the way I remember it when I was young. But you know, there is a lot of very interesting truths in these books. Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy.
Very practical and of course in the early.
Chapters of litigious you get the offerings that are a picture of the Lord Jesus in many aspects and.
We have in Leviticus 2 The the feasts of Jehovah.
Much that we can feed on and meditate there will be a blessing to our souls and so I encourage those who are younger.
Not to miss a lot of the truth that we have in these early books, and there's some very good.
Expositions on it too, to help, like Chapter Macintosh, who has written the books on the pedicure on the Pentateuch. And so I just leave that with you, study it and meditate and I'm sure you'll find much there for your profit and blessing.
Well, maybe we could just look to the Lord again.
Our God and Father, we just come before thee this evening, and we think of this chapter that we have looked at very, very briefly. We think of how important it is not only to meditate on thy precious word, but Lord Jesus, to walk in separation from this.
Wretched world that is under judgment, and we're going to be leaving very, very soon.
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We pray, Lord Jesus, that we might.
Not be seeking to follow in the dark places of this life, feeding on the filth of this world, but Lord, that we might make it our habit to start every day with the reading of Thy precious Word and meditating on it, and be praying that Thou just preserve us as gathered to Thy name, until out us come. And we pray especially for the dear young people. We know the difficulties they face.
But we pray that they might be preserved, and that they might live for Thy glory, and that each one of us might honor Thee in the little time we have left. And so we asked Thee for these things now, in the worthy and precious name of the Lord Jesus Christ, Amen.