Disease נֶ֫גַע

We are in chapter fourteen of Leviticus with our word for today. נֶ֫גַע afflicted with a rash or skin disease, leprous, be struck with leprosy. It is used 78 times in the Old Testament, 14 times in our chapter today. Our word is used in the sense of an infection, a state of ill health resulting from the invasion of the body by something harmful. Leviticus 13:45-46 The leprous person who has הַנֶּ֗גַעthe disease shall wear torn clothes and let the hair of his head hang loose, and he shall cover his upper lip and cry out, ‘Unclean, unclean.’ He shall remain unclean as long as he has הַנֶּ֥גַע the disease. He is unclean. He shall live alone. His dwelling shall be outside the camp. We also find our word used in the sense of a substance that contaminates. This is how our word is used 12 out of the 14 times it is used in our chapter today. Leviticus 14:33-45, 48 The Lord spoke to Moses and Aaron, saying, “When you come into the land of Canaan, which I give you for a possession, and I put a case of leprous נֶ֣גַע disease in a house in the land of your possession, then he who owns the house shall come and tell the priest, ‘There seems to me to be some case of כְּנֶ֕גַע disease in my house.’ Then the priest shall command that they empty the house before the priest goes to examine הַנֶּ֔גַע the disease, lest all that is in the house be declared unclean. And afterward the priest shall go in to see the house. And he shall examine הַנֶּ֗גַע the disease. And if הַנֶּ֙גַע֙ the disease is in the walls of the house with greenish or reddish spots, and if it appears to be deeper than the surface, then the priest shall go out of the house to the door of the house and shut up the house seven days. And the priest shall come again on the seventh day, and look. If הַנֶּ֖גַע the disease has spread in the walls of the house, then the priest shall command that they take out the stones in which is הַנָּ֑גַע the disease and throw them into an unclean place outside the city. And he shall have the inside of the house scraped all around, and the plaster that they scrape off they shall pour out in an unclean place outside the city. Then they shall take other stones and put them in the place of those stones, and he shall take other plaster and plaster the house. “If הַנֶּ֙גַע֙ the disease breaks out again in the house, after he has taken out the stones and scraped the house and plastered it, then the priest shall go and look. And if הַנֶּ֖גַע the disease has spread in the house, it is a persistent leprous disease in the house; it is unclean. And he shall break down the house, its stones and timber and all the plaster of the house, and he shall carry them out of the city to an unclean place … But if the priest comes and looks, and if הַנֶּ֙גַע֙ the disease has not spread in the house after the house was plastered, then the priest shall pronounce the house clean, for הַנָּֽגַע the disease is healed. Like we looked at a few days ago the Bible sometimes uses disease as an illustration of the damage and danger of sin. Let’s look at a few more of these. Sin defiles. The word “unclean” is used fifty-four times in Leviticus 13–15. It describes the ceremonial defilement that makes the victim unfit for social life or for participation in worship at the house of God. The Prophet Isaiah confessed that he was “a man of unclean lips” (Isaiah 6:5), and then he spoke for all of us when he wrote, “But we are all as an unclean thing, and all our righteous deeds are as filthy rags” (64:6). Whatever sin touches, it defiles; only the blood of Jesus Christ can wash away that defilement (1 Corinthians 6:9–11; 1 John 1:7; Revelation 1:5). When you read Psalm 51, David’s prayer of confession, you can’t help but notice how his sins defiled every part of his being: his eyes (vs. 3), his mind (vs. 6), his ears (vs. 8), his bones (vs. 8), his heart (vs. 10), and his mouth (vs. 13–15). His hands were stained with Uriah’s blood (vs. 14), and all he could do was throw himself on the mercy of God and cry out, “Wash me!” (vs. 2, 7) Sin isolates. The leper had to tear his clothes, put a covering on his upper lip, cry “Unclean, unclean!” whenever anybody approached him, and remain outside the camp until either he died or was healed. God struck King Uzziah with leprosy, and he had to dwell in a “separate house,” which was isolated from everybody else (2 Kings 15:5). The consequences of leprosy were temporary, but the consequences of sin are eternal. The Israelites knew no cure for leprosy, but there is a remedy for sin—faith in Jesus Christ, the Savior of the world.