What does Tribe teach about god's holiness?
Drawn from the messages where it was actually addressed: the words said from the front, the passages taught, and where to hear the whole thing.
At Tribe, the teaching on God's holiness starts with an honest admission that most people carry a distorted picture of who God is. Brian Hunter points out that the ancient pagan world lived in fear of gods who had to be appeased with sacrifice, and that most people quietly import that same frame into the Bible without realizing it. The result is a God who barely tolerates people as long as the killing continues, with Jesus cast as a big brother jumping in front of the belt. Brian says that picture could not be further from the truth.
The deeper teaching is that God's holiness is not a mild thing, and the sacrificial system in Leviticus was not designed by an angry God demanding payment. It was designed by God himself so that people could draw close to him. Brian grounds this in the moment in Exodus 40 where the glory of the Lord fills the tabernacle and Moses cannot even enter his own tent. Leviticus, in this reading, exists to solve that problem. The fire that came from God's presence in Leviticus 9 and consumed the offering produced worship and awe, and Brian compared the congregation's reaction to standing in a solar eclipse, that mix of fear and emotion no one quite knows how to contain. The same fire in Leviticus 10 consumed Nadab and Abihu on their first day on the job. Brian gave people permission to ask why, but pressed the point that God does not owe anyone an explanation for anything he does, and that his holiness sets the terms of relationship rather than the other way around.
What holds all of this together, Brian says, is that God himself provided the way through. The blood of the fellowship offering in Leviticus 3 is not a picture of divine anger but of divine initiative. Brian says, "God has provided an incredible, beautiful way for us to have intimate relationship with God." And that relationship has a cost: "For a life giving relationship with God, something has to die." The whole sacrificial system, read through Jesus, is the story of a holy God making a way for sinful people to come near, not by lowering the standard of holiness, but by meeting it himself.
Taught from Leviticus 3:1-17 · Leviticus 9:18-24 · Leviticus 10:1-6 · Exodus 40:34-38 · 1 John 4:9-10
“God has provided an incredible, beautiful way for us to have intimate relationship with God.”
From The Sin Offering
The passage taught · 1 John 4:9-10
9 By this God’s love was revealed in us, that God has sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him.
10 In this is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son as the atoning sacrifice for our sins.
World English Bible
The messages that teach on it
- March 3, 2025 The Sin Offering Leviticus 3 shows that God designed blood sacrifice not to satisfy his anger but to draw us into intimate relationship with him.
- February 23, 2025 Finding Jesus in Leviticus A pastor and congregation wrestle with Leviticus 9-10 and Hebrews 9 to ask how a holy, consuming God can love sinful people without ever compromising his holiness.
Mentioned along the way
- February 16, 2025 The Series: Two Men Enter, One Man Leaves A Jackson Hole pastor opens a series on Leviticus and Galatians, exploring why something must die for a life-giving relationship with God to begin.