Sapate Fepueli 15, 2026

NOMIPA 9-10; TEUTALONOME 30:15-20

The way to live in light of the grace of the constant presence of the Lord is to willingly and joyfully submit to his commands.

Ko e founga ‘o ‘ete mo’ui ‘i he maama ‘o e kelesi ‘o e ‘ete ‘i he lotolotonga ‘o e ‘Otua, ko ‘ete loto fiefia ke te lalo’aoa ki he’ene ngaahi fekau.

"On the day that the tabernacle was set up, the cloud covered the tabernacle" (Num. 9:15). This was not just another cloud in the sky. This was the most wonderful and important cloud ever. It was the cloud of the presence of God that hovered like a covering over the tabernacle. This cloud was a visible sign that the Lord God Almighty, the Creator and ruler of all that is, had set his love on these people and had chosen to dwell with them. This was so wonderful and amazing, it is hard for us to take it in. God had taken them for his own. He had made covenant promises to them. He had blessed them with his law. He had designed a system of sacrifices so that their sins could be confessed and forgiven and they could be cleansed and restored. And then the Lord of lords demonstrated that he would not be a distant monarch, with little attachment to his people. No, he chose them so he could be with them. The glory of his presence therefore hovered above the tabernacle, a constant reminder of the amazing grace of his presence.

But it is important to recognize that the cloud above the tabernacle was not just a cloud of presence; it was also a cloud of guidance. The God who dwelled with his people was the supreme guide of his people. The cloud of God's presence wasn't stationary. It moved, and, when it moved, the people of God were called to follow and move with it. They had to disassemble the tabernacle and their personal dwelling places, pack up their things, and follow. This cloud of presence and guidance moved not at a regular or predictable pace but according to the will of the Lord. When he decided to move, his people had to willingly move with him. When the cloud remained, they had to stay in that place. The children of Israel were called not only to celebrate the presence of the Lord but also to submit to his guidance: "At the command of the LORD they camped, and at the command of the LORD they set out" (Num. 9:23). The guidance of the cloud wasn't advice. The movement of the cloud represented the command of the Lord. For the children of Israel, the way to recognize and celebrate the Lord's presence was to follow his commands. The cloud represented not only the grace of his presence but also the call to submit to his rule.

So it is with us. The grand mystery of the Christian life is that we celebrate the grace of God's love and presence and accept his claim on our lives and the call to submit at all times and in every way to his commands. So we are thankful for the grace of Jesus, who empowers our resistant hearts to follow him, desiring and doing what he commands.

 Tokonaki Fepueli 14, 2026

NOMIPA 7-8; HEPELU 7:26-27

The need for the Old Testament priests to be repeatedly cleansed should make us thankful for the coming of a priest who needed no cleansing.

Ko e tu’utu’uni ki he kau taula’eiki ‘o e Fuakava Motu’a ke nau toutou fakama’a, ‘oku fakaake ‘iate kitautolu ha fakafeta’i ‘i he hoko mai ha taula’eiki ‘oku ‘ikai toe fiema’u ke fakama’a.

Luella has been known to say, "I can't understand, with just the two of us living here, how things get so dusty." Have you ever noticed that nothing in your life stays clean? Your clothes don't stay clean; your house doesn't stay clean; your car doesn't stay clean; your teeth don't stay clean; your garage doesn't stay clean--the list goes on and on. We spend a large portion of our time working to keep things clean. Even more important to recognize is that your heart doesn't stay clean. Sin causes us to wander away from God's holy standards and expose ourselves to things that are not morally pure. Temptation seduces us into seeing as beautiful the things that God calls ugly. The dirt and dust of a heart not yet free of sin causes all of us to need a constant cleansing stream of God's grace.

So we find this directive in Numbers 8:5-6: "The LORD spoke to Moses, saying, "Take the Levites from among the people of Israel and cleanse them." Before the priests could do their holy sacrificial work before God and on behalf of his people, they needed to be cleansed. It is important to understand that the priests did not stand above the need for sacrifices to be made to atone for their sins and to grant them forgiveness and cleansing before God. The priests did not live above a need for God's grace. They were men with sin still living inside of them, which meant they desperately needed for themselves what they had been called to offer to the rest of God's people. No one has ever lived above the need for a sacrifice for one's sin, just as no one has ever lived above the need for God's forgiving and cleansing grace. No one.

I think particularly of the leaders of Christ's church. This portion of God's word has been retained for you as a warning and a calling. There has only ever been one priest who needed no cleansing, the Messiah Jesus. He alone lived without the need for the forgiving and cleansing stream of God's grace. It is vital that you look at the people to whom you have been called to minister and see yourself as another person in need of God's grace. A seminary degree doesn't make you a grace graduate. A ministry calling doesn't make you a grace graduate. Ministry gifts don't make you a grace graduate. Ministry experience and success don't make you a grace graduate. Like the priests of old, it is important to recognize that, this side of eternity, the school of God's grace has no graduates. It is spiritually vital for you to humbly acknowledge that every part of the gospel that you hold before your people, you desperately need yourself. And it is good to remember that no one gives grace better than a person who knows he needs its cleansing stream himself.

 Falaite Fepueli 13, 2026

NOMIPA 5-6; SAAME 32:1-5

If you seek and celebrate God's forgiving grace, then your life will be shaped by humble, heartfelt confession.

Kapau ‘oku ke fekumi mo katoanga’i ‘a e kelesi fakamolemole ‘a e ‘Otua, te ke mo’ui’aki ‘a e fa’a vete ho’o angahala mei he loto mo’oni mo e angavaivai.

Luella and I had just been introduced to a famous pop singer and his wife. They looked so young to us. They knew we had been married for a long time, and they were newlyweds, so their question was predictable: "What would you say is the key to a good, long-term marriage?" People often ask me this question, and I always give the same practical, biblically supported answer: "Confession and forgiveness." This is true not only of marriage, but it is true also of any other relationship you will ever have. You cannot have a relationship of any quality or longevity between one sinner and another sinner in a fallen world without committing to the humble habit of confession.

If this is true of human relationships, how much more is it true of a relationship between a far-less-than-perfect human being and a perfectly holy God? How can you acknowledge God's holiness and your sin and not be committed to confession? How can you meditate on the impossibly high standards of God's law and not be committed to confession? How can you believe in the presence of real evil and a real evil one and not be committed to confession? How can you confess that your life is not your own and that God has taken you for his own possession and not be committed to confession? Personal holiness and humble confession cannot be separated. As long as God calls us to be holy as he is holy, and as long as sin still lives inside of us, confession must be an essential ingredient in the life of every child of God.

Confession is baked into God's law, as we see in Numbers 5-6. The holy God who gave these wise and holy laws is a God of glorious grace. He knows his people, he knows the condition of the world in which they live, he knows the temptations they will face, and he knows that they will fall short of his commands. So he calls them to a humble life of confession. You cannot grieve what you don't you cannot confess what you haven't grieved. So even this command see, and to confess has redeeming grace built into it. If God doesn't grant his children eyes to see their sin for what it is, then they will never confess it as they should.

These chapters are another reminder that the Old Testament system was not all law and no grace. Embedded in God's holy law are offers of his forgiving and restoring grace. Is it any wonder, then, that the biblical story of God and his people would march toward the coming of the ultimate gift and giver of grace, the Lord Jesus Christ?

 Tu’apulelulu Fepueli 12, 2026

NOMIPA 3-4; LOMA 15:1-7

We should always live in life-shaping awe of the dangerous holiness of God.

‘Oku mahu’inga ke tau mo’ui ofoofo mo e loto ‘apasia ‘i he’etau vakai ki he ma’oni’oni fakalilifu ‘o e ‘Otua.

If you and I were able to stand as we are in the presence of God, not only would we be overwhelmed with his incalculable holiness, but we would be filled with dread and grief at the extent of our unholiness. In fact, it is only in light of the perfectly perfect holiness of God that we can have a sense of the sinfulness of our sin. It is easy to have a casual attitude about things that are deeply offensive to our holy God. It is easy to rise to our own defense when accused of a wrong that, before God, should grieve us. It is easy to minimize the importance of God's holy standards for us in little moments of choice, little moments of behavior, and little moments of talk. God is so holy that he is unapproachably holy.

Hear the sobering warning of these words from Numbers 4:

The LORD spoke to Moses and Aaron, saying, "Let not the tribe of the clans of the Kohathites be destroyed from among the Levites, but deal thus with them, that they may live and not die when they come near to the most holy things: Aaron and his sons shall go in and appoint them each to his task and to his burden, but they shall not go in to look on the holy things even for a moment, lest they die." (Num. 4:17-20)

In the kindness of his mercy, the Lord warned the Kohathites, who were tasked with taking care of the holy things in the tabernacle, that they could not enter the Holy of Holies and look around, or they would die. This was a warning to these tabernacle servants, but it has been retained as a warning for us, too. God's perfectly holy holiness is not something to be messed with. Ignoring the holiness of God and doing what you want to do led to death then, and it does so now.

If God is unapproachably holy (he is), and if he is the Creator and ruler of all that is (he is), and if he is the ultimate moral standard (he is), then everything in life is both moral and serious. There is no area of life where it is okay to take life into your own hands and do what you want to do. There is no room for writing your own rules. There is no time when your passions, pleasures, and desires are more important than God's holy standard. It is dangerous to deny or ignore the holiness of God. God is serious about his holiness, and we should be too. This is why we today - and every day to come - should celebrate the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. In our most holy moments, all of us would fall miserably short of the glory of God's holy standard. So humanity needs a substitute, one who lives a perfectly holy life in every way on our behalf. Because of Jesus's perfect substitutionary righteousness, we can enter into the presence of God without fear. Sinners in the presence of a holy God - what amazing grace!

 Pulelulu Fepueli 11, 2026

NOMIPA 1-2; 2 TIMOTE 3:16-17

In the beauty of his loving care, God numbers, orders, and prospers his people so that through them all the peoples of earth will be blessed.

‘I he masani ‘o ‘Ene tokanga ‘ofaa, ‘oku lau, tu’utu’uni mo fakatu’umalie ‘e he ‘Otua ‘a hono kakai ke fou ‘iate kinautolu ‘a e monu’ia ‘a e kakai ‘o mamani.

Hear what Paul says to Timothy about the gift of the word of God: "All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work" (2 Tim. 3:16-17). This means that every single thing recorded for us in God's word is there for a reason. There are no superfluous, throwaway, or needless passages in your Bible. God recorded and preserved every passage in his word for our spiritual benefit. He retained every passage so that you and I would be spiritually complete and equipped to do what is good in God's sight, wherever we live. You will never encounter a passage, whether historical, didactic, poetic, or prophetic, that has nothing to do with you or your life and is therefore a waste of your time.

But your daily Bible reading plan brings you to the first few chapters of Numbers, where the children of Israel are being listed, numbered, designated, and ordered by tribes. You think, "What does this have to do with anything I'm facing or need in my life?" On the surface these accounts seem like unneeded historical detail, not very interesting, and easily forgotten. But the apostle Paul says that they are in your Bible for your spiritual maturation and readiness. So before you conclude that these particular chapters are unhelpful, ask yourself how your loving heavenly Father, who loves you with an everlasting love, wants you to be helped by what seems so distant and unhelpful.

Consider Numbers 2:32: "These are the people of Israel as listed by their fathers' houses. All those listed in the camps by their companies were 603,550." What do we need to hear from this passage? First, it reminds us of the intimate and specific care God has for his people. He numbers each one of them. God's care is so active and complete that he constantly knows the exact number of those he has taken as his own possession. God loves us so much that he never quits counting us, and he never loses track of one of his children. If a loving father counts his children as they get in the car after a day at the amusement park, how much more does our perfect heavenly Father number each and every one of his own? God's divine attention is constantly on his children.

Second, we learn from this verse that God is not only numbering and ordering his children, but is prospering them as well. This group of former slaves is now a growing nation. Why is this important to you and me? Because the hope of the universe is in the prospering of the children of Israel. Out of them will come the Savior, Jesus, who will provide forgiveness, reconciliation to God, and final renewal of all that sin has broken. It is good for us to know that God's children are always in good hands.

 Tusite Fepueli 10, 2026

LEVITIKO 26-27; HEPELU 10:1-18

Where would we be without God's forgiving and restoring grace?

Na’a tau mei to ki fe, kapau na’e ‘ikai ‘a e kelesi fakamolemole mo fakafo’ou ‘a e ‘Otua?

It is important to have a well-oiled, activated gospel memory. It's important to require yourself never to forget. Few things are more spiritually benefiting than rehearsing the story of God's rescuing, forgiving, and restoring grace in your life. It's vital to remember that we not only experienced his forgiving grace at the moment of our conversion, but continually experience his grace as a lovingly patient process of restoration. God has forgiven you again and again, he has restored you to himself again and again, and he will continue to do so again and again.

God knows that between the "already" and the "not yet," living in a fallen world and with sin still inside of us, we will mess up. There will be times when we think, desire, and do wrong things. There will be times when we willingly step outside of God's holy boundaries. This side of eternity we will sin. This is why God's commitment to forgive us and restore us is so beautiful and hope-inspiring. If you are at all humble, then you know you're not perfect. You know no day in your life is totally sin-free. You know you are a person in need of daily forgiveness.

God's forgiving and restoring mercies didn't begin with the birth of Jesus but were baked into his law. 

If they confess their iniquity and the iniquity of their fathers in their treachery that they committed against me, and also in walking contrary to me, so that I walked contrary to them and brought them into the land of their enemies if then their uncircumcised heart is humbled and they make amends for their iniquity, then I will remember my covenant with Jacob, and I will remember my covenant with Isaac and my covenant with Abraham, and I will remember the land. (Lev. 26:40-42)

How does a person enter into the blessing of God's forgiving and restoring grace? The answer, which is the same in the old covenant and the new, is clear: by humble, heartfelt confession. God will not turn his back on a sinner who comes to him with confession that is free from excuse or blame-shifting. He always greets the humble in heart with the fullness of his forgiving and restoring mercies. God has always been a God of grace, his people have always been in need of grace, and he has always reminded them of his willingness to respond to them with grace when grace is needed.

Leviticus 26 is yet another Old Testament passage that foreshadows the person and work of Jesus. These verses cry out for an ultimate and once-for-all purchase of forgiveness, for a sacrifice to be made that will forever restore us to God. Jesus has come to be that final sacrificial Lamb. In him our sins-past, present, and future--are fully forgiven. As a result of Jesus's work on our behalf, God is in us and we are in him forever, and nothing can separate us from his love. For sinners like you and me, there is no better, more beautiful gift than the gift of forgiving and restoring grace.

 Monite Fepueli 9, 2026

LEVITIKO 24-25; 2 KOLINITO 8:1-15

We see the beauty and tenderness of God in his kindness toward the poor.

‘Oku tau mamata ‘i he faka’ofo’ofa mo e manava’ofa ‘o e ‘Otua ‘i he’ene tokangaekinga ‘a e masiva.

Because I live in the heart of the city, I walk everywhere. I am on the sidewalks almost every day, walking to meet someone for lunch, to pick up something at the store, or to go out to dinner with my wife. As do so many big cities, Philly has a heartbreaking homeless problem. We see people living and begging on the streets every day. Sometimes we literally have to step over someone to get to where we are going. It is easy to get used to diverting your eyes, to act like you didn't hear that cry for assistance, to harden your heart. It's easy to get mad at someone who is messing up the sidewalks or intimidating tourists. I admit that it is often hard to look upon a street person with eyes of love, remembering that, like me, he is made in the image of God, and, because he is, he has value and dignity.

This is why I am struck by the directives in Leviticus on how to treat the poor: 

If your brother becomes poor and cannot maintain himself with you, you shall support him as though he were a stranger and a sojourner, and he shall live with you. Take no interest from him or profit, but fear your God, that your brother may live beside you. You shall not lend him your money at interest, nor give him your food for profit. I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt to give you the land of Canaan, and to be your God. (Lev. 25:35-38) 

God's words here are touching and important. He is instructing his people to take in and provide for the poor in the community. This is a call to loving, radical hospitality. Then God addresses the motivation for such self-sacrificing kindness. God tells them, "Don't do this for personal gain, but because you fear me." God's children should remember how he responded to them when they were poor, needy, and unable to change their circumstances, and then show that same kindness to others. If you live in fearful awe of God's mercy to you, then you will be an agent of his mercy to others. Gratitude is the soil in which kindness grows. God makes the invisible mercy of his kindness visible by sending people of mercy to respond with kindness to people who need mercy. God calls his children to represent his character and will wherever he places them.

Now think about your life. The Bible says that Jesus became poor so that through his poverty we might become rich (2 Cor. 8:9). He looked on us with love and, in the mercy of kindness, did for us what we could never have done for ourselves. May God grant us the grace to show kindness to the needy people we encounter, with gratitude for the mercy we have been given.