God wants us to become ‘biblical foodies’ and to follow His clean eating plan. We are instructed in the Bible not to eat bats, buzzards, pigs, cats, coyotes, camels, or rabbits etc. Markets trading in giant salamanders, snakes, rats, and porcupines are likely to contribute to sharing viruses between animals and people. COVID-19 is thought to originate in bats.
It is no coincidence these animals are designated unclean by God’s food laws found in Leviticus 11 and Deuteronomy 14.
These laws still apply today and were given to mankind for all time. We’re not, however, talking about kosher law. The rabbis took some of these ideas and added man-made regulations. God’s instructions to mankind concerning the food we should eat was an established law of God long before the time of the Mount Sinai covenant. Noah already knew about them when God told him in Genesis 7:2, “You shall take with you seven each, or seven pairs of every kind of clean animal, a male and its mate, and one pair of every kind of unclean animal, a male, and its mate.” Notice God did not explain to Noah which creatures were clean and unclean because he already knew.
Some mistakenly think that Jesus Christ did away with the food laws in Mark 7:18-19: “Don’t you perceive that whatever enters a man from outside cannot defile him because it doesn’t enter his heart, but his stomach, and is eliminated, thus purifying, all foods.” Be sure to click on the next article in this newsletter ‘Did Jesus Cancel Dietary Food Laws?’ for the explanation about what this Scripture is really referring to.
Ten years after Christ’s crucifixion, the Apostle Peter had a dream. Acts 10:13-35 records this account in which Peter initially thought God was instructing him to eat unclean food. Later Peter realises God was showing him He is calling people from all races and backgrounds. “God has shown me that I should not call any man common or unclean. (verse 28)”
Peter’s dream of the sheet coming down with all these exotic animals had nothing to do with God’s food laws. It is clear from Peter’s reaction however, that the Apostles and followers of Jesus Christ did not think Christ had abolished the food laws of Leviticus 11 and Deuteronomy 14.
God wants us to choose to be holy people in every aspect of life. Right after He reminded the ancient Israelites of the food laws in Deuteronomy, which Noah and their forefathers had kept before the captivity in Egypt, He tells them in verse 21, “For you are a holy people to the Lord your God, and the Lord has chosen you to be a people for Himself.”
Your body is a spiritual temple (I Corinthians 6:19), so choose clean eating, according to God’s biblical food laws as well taking care to follow God in the other areas of your life.
