Leviticus 11:7-8. 7The pig has evenly split hooves but does not chew the cud, so it is unclean. 8You may not eat the meat of these animals or even touch their carcasses. They are ceremonially unclean for you.
Pigs are truly incredible animals. They are one of the smartest animals God created. Pigs have great memories, they can solve problems, and they can even “talk” to each other with specific grunts and sounds. Over the years, pigs have been considered to be dirty and disgusting, but the truth is that they are actually quite clean. Unlike other animals, they refuse to poop where they eat and they will even clean up after themselves. Pigs actually make great pets too. They are very social and loyal, even with humans. All of this makes it a bit surprising when God declares pigs to be unclean.
When God brought the Hebrews out of Egypt, he led them into the desert. In the desert God gave his people rules to follow, including rules about what was “clean an unclean.” This included a list of clean animals and unclean animals. But the words clean and unclean are NOT about being literally dirty or disgusting. For example, in God’s law, sheep are clean and pigs are unclean, but sheep are not less dirty than pigs. In fact, sheep are pretty filthy sometimes (and dumber too).
So why were some animals called “clean” while some were called “unclean”? Because God wanted his people to learn a lesson about ourselves. Every one of us is unclean until God calls us clean. The unclean animals were a symbol of our sin, our uncleanness in our hearts, while the clean animals were a symbol of God’s perfection, his purity and cleanness. This is what the word ceremonially means (see Lev. 11:8 above) – only clean animals could be used as a symbol of the perfection of God.
But after Jesus came as a little baby at Christmastime, after he died on the cross and rose again, God’s rules about animals changed. Pigs are no longer unclean (this is good news if you like bacon). But why did Jesus change all the unclean animals into clean animals? Why did he declare that every ceremonially unclean creature was now clean, pure, and acceptable? Because we don’t need animals to teach us about how sinful we are or how perfect God is anymore; we have Jesus to do that for us. We don’t have to look at pigs to know how dirty we are inside, and we don’t have to look at sheep to know how clean God is – we just need to look at Jesus and his cross.
Jesus’ first advent would have never included pigs. I’m pretty sure there were no pigs surrounding baby Jesus on the night he was born. Cows? Yes. Sheep? For sure. These animals were considered “clean.” But no “unclean” pigs allowed. But that’s exactly why Jesus came, to turn the unclean into clean. And I’m not talking about animals, I’m talking about you and me. Just like the pig, we can go from unclean to clean. Unacceptable to acceptable. Sinful to saved. Impure to perfect.
How? By trusting that Jesus came to take away our sins and to give us a new clean heart that loves and trusts God’s love for us no matter what.
Questions: We aren’t clean or unclean based on the things we do, but based on what God declares us to be (like the pig in Leviticus 11). Has God declared you to be clean? If you have been declared to be clean by God, then how should you act differently from when you were unclean?
TLICfamily 