A Little Leaven

"A little leaven leaveneth the whole lump."—Galatians 5:9

Contributed

The picture of Jesus as a lamb emphasizes the benefit we all gain from our Lord’s sacrifice in the area of personal sins. It is a picture of an innocent substitute, a price applied before God on our behalf . . . something that we could never do for ourselves, no matter how conscientious and obedient we may become. The picture of the leaven, on the other hand, emphasizes our own role in removing sin from our thoughts, words, and deeds.

To understand the picture of leaven, we must first focus on the scriptural symbolism of bread.

In the Bible, bread is used to depict the provisions God makes for our sustenance. From time immemorial, bread has been known as "the staff (support that we can lean on) of life."

God provides the raw materials of bread: the water, soil, sun and seed. Man prepares the ground, plants the seed, fertilizes, tends, weeds, then harvests and combines the grain with other ingredients to make an edible and digestible product. The entire process represents a partnership in which God provides the ingredients and the recipe and man does the work.

When the nation of Israel wandered in the wilderness, they were unable to plant and harvest grain, so God demonstrated his power and mercy by providing manna, the bread from heaven. Even here God enlisted the cooperation of the people: it was their responsibility to gather the manna each day.

In the pictures of bread presented in the tabernacle, the priests had regular duties of preparation and presentation of the bread on the table of shewbread. The spiritual sustenance of the priest thus required diligence; their food, like the light of the candlestick, was perishable. Only in the Most Holy was the bread permanent: the golden pot of manna in the Ark of the Covenant in the Most Holy represented life which God provides, and in this case the incorruptible, immortal life to which the "Christ of God" is heir.

Leavened and Unleavened Bread

Bread can be made with or without leaven. Yeast causes bread to rise, increasing its volume without increasing its weight. What, then, does leaven signify? Why did God permit it most of the time but prohibit its use during Passover?

Paul is quite clear in 1 Corinthians 5:7, 8 that leaven symbolizes sin: "malice and wickedness." Its opposite, bread without leaven, may therefore typify a pure life of "sincerity and truth."

Two Hebrew words are used to depict leaven: seor, yeast, which comes from a root meaning "to swell"; and chametz, leavened bread, which comes from a Hebrew root meaning "sour." A third Hebrew word, matzah, refers to unleavened bread and literally means "sweet"—the opposite of sour. All three words are used in Exodus 13:7: "Unleavened bread [matzah] shall be eaten during the seven days, and there shall not be seen with thee fermented bread [chametz], and there shall not be seen with thee leavened dough [seor] in all thy borders."

God was very serious about this prohibition: a penalty of death was attached to anyone who ate leaven at this time (Exod. 12:19).

The Sourness and Swelling of Sin

Sourness and swelling: these are the two major results of sin. Sin is sour. It produces all the bitterness of life: hurtfulness, damage, bad fruitage. And behind every sin there is the tell-tale swelling of pride. The swelling propensity of leaven clearly illustrates the deceptive quality of pride: inside our own mind we stumble from self-importance, self-exaltation, vanity, "thinking of ourselves more highly than we ought."

Thoughts lead to words: "swelling words of vanity." Sins become more contagious because the swelling disposition of spiritual pride presents an inflated, deceptive show of righteousness that often upstages the more meek, less poised presentation of the Lord’s faithful (2Cor. 3:12, 10:7-18). Christendom on earth has been dominated throughout its history by the proud, the boastful, and the deceptive, who appear to be larger spiritually than they are (Rev. 2:13-15, 19-20).

"Purge Out the Leaven"in the Congregation

In our self-centered culture personal self-examination prior to the memorial feast is important. But in the context of Paul’s discussion about leaven in 1 Corinthians 5, just as in the Jewish observance in each household, the primary emphasis seems to be the removal of gross sin from the group.

In the 1 Corinthians 5 passage, a man called a brother had been guilty of fornication. Paul is shocked by the church’s sense of complacency about the incident. Perhaps the members of the ecclesia felt that their tolerance of his actions was a sign of love and maturity, but not so to the Apostle Paul. He emphatically used his apostolic authority to do what the ecclesia should have done and disfellowshipped the errant believer. "Do you not know that a little leaven leavens the whole lump?" Just as in natural sourdough bread, the infecting agent spreads until every bit of the dough is laced with bitterness and swollen with false pretensions. Concerning ecclesias, Paul implores them to take action against clear-cut public examples of fornication, idolatry, covetousness, extortion, railing, and drunkenness of those who claim to be members of the ecclesia. If no action is taken, their false liberality will have the effect of allowing worldly and ungodly contamination to damage the church of Christ.

The example Paul records in 1 Corinthians 5 was firm instruction and the ecclesia at Corinth obeyed Paul and disfellowshipped the sinner in their midst. The intended effect of such action is not punishment but the recovery of the sinner through acknowledgment of the sin, repentance from the error, and forgiveness by the injured brethren. Possibly the 1 Corinthians 5 story had a happy ending in 2 Corinthians 2:5-8, where Paul states, "Sufficient to such a man is this punishment, which was inflicted by the majority; so that contrariwise you ought rather to forgive him, and comfort him, lest perhaps such a one should be swallowed up with overmuch sorrow. Wherefore I beseech you, that ye should confirm your love toward him."

Paul is quite clear that the church should never set out on a campaign of judgmentalism, a witch-hunt to find and expose the sinners in its midst. The goal is "speaking the truth in love" (Eph. 4:15, 31). If we want to enjoy the blessings of peace and spiritual prosperity which accompany God’s favor, it is imperative that the simple, clear standards of discipleship are upheld with humility and courage (2 Tim. 2:2, 14).

Two cautions: (1) Paul warns against self-righteousness, by assuring us that any sin that can be found in the world may be conquered by the love of Christ (1 Cor. 6:9-11).

(2) Subtle ostracism should not be used if there is a person in the midst about whom there are doubts or with whom there is disagreement. That is the worldly way. Instead, we should be open with those whom we believe to be acting below biblical standards, and honest-hearted confrontation (sometimes privately, sometimes publicly: Matt. 18:15-17; 2 Tim. 4:1, 2; 1Tim. 4:13-16, 5:1, 19-20, 6:17) is one of the scriptural tools to be used to keep communication above-board and the love-feast pure and unfeigned (Jude 4,12, 16-19).

Three Kinds of Leaven: "Beware"

Jesus warned us to beware of three distinct kinds of leaven. In Luke 12:1, he warns us of the "leaven of the Pharisees," which he defines as hypocrisy. Hypocrites was the Greek term used for the profession of theatrical acting. At that time, actors would wear a mask to depict the public sentiments they desired to project. Behind the weeping mask, the hypocrite could be laughing. Or behind the laughing mask, he could be crying. As Jesus pointed out, anything other than letting your yea be yea or your nay really mean nay is evil (Matt. 5:37).

We should not attempt to bypass an issue in order "to avoid stumbling the brethren." Rather, we should be open about what is happening in our lives. "Confess your faults one to another, and you will be healed" (James 5:16). If we do not, we should not deceive ourselves. As Jesus said in Luke 12:2, there is nothing covered that will not be revealed. The hidden sentiments of our heart will be exposed.

Another type of leaven that Jesus warned of, as distinct from the leaven of the Pharisees, is found in Mark 8:15: "the leaven of Herod." Though Jesus does not elaborate, he may be calling attention to and warning against the sin of worldliness, power, or political compromise. "Love not the world, neither the things in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him" (1 John 2:15; John 15:18). The Jude text cited earlier (Jude 16) seems to indicate that some of the destructive forces in the church would demonstrate partiality and distort truth "because of advantage." This is the worldly spirit, which puts short-term personal gain ahead of principles such as justice, love, and impartial brotherly affection. The sins of Balaam and Cain (Jude 11) seem to be similar manifestations of the leaven of Herod.

The third kind of leaven Jesus warns us of is "the leaven of the Sadducees and Pharisees" (Matt. 16:11,12). Here, our Lord focused not on their hypocrisy but on their doctrine—their teachings. In one sense, any false teaching is sin; but because the Pharisees and Sadducees shared very few doctrines, we think the "leaven" Jesus spoke of had more to do with the thought processes they used in arriving at their false conclusions. Jesus identified at least five such perversions in the Pharisees’ and Sadducees’ teaching: (1) They put their traditions ahead of the Word of God (Mark 7:3-13). (2) They emphasized the outward rather than the inward (Matt. 23:23, 25; 15:11). This is legalism: "the letter kills; the spirit gives life" (2 Cor. 3:6). (3) They limited the grace of God, which had the effect of discouraging the humble whom God cared about most, while elevating the outwardly acceptable and proud (Luke 18:9-14). (4) They placed burdens upon their hearers that they themselves did not bear (Matt. 23:4). (5) They strained out gnats and swallowed camels: they were inconsistent in their reasoning and application of principle (Matt. 23:24, 14-22).

Examining Ourselves

The most important part of spiritual leaven-removal for the Christian is that which we do in our own heart (1 Cor. 11: 23-31). Paul warns us not to be self-deceived. (Note the three kinds of self-deception Paul warns of in 1Cor. 6:9, 15:33, and in Gal. 6:7.) Let us not focus on the long list of outward actions commited which do not quite pass inspection. Also, we are in danger of settling into years of spiritual mediocrity if we habitually compare ourselves with those around us (2 Cor. 10:12). Instead, the holy Scriptures are our standard. Let us compare ourselves to that perfect mirror (James 1:15-27) and examine the root causes of the horrifying sins revealed—serious defects in our fundamental attitudes, habits of thought, values, and character.

We will need to allow God to remake us, purging the root causes of sin (Rom. 12:1). Principles of love and justice must, by active submission and active obedience, be allowed to replace the weeds of fleshly thinking that make up our lower nature. (Note the series of replacement activities called for in Eph. 4:17-32, and the positive thought and action suggestions in Phil. 4:4-9.)

The task is daunting, but not hopeless. We are not attempting to make ourselves worthy of God’s love and eternal life. Rather, we are attempting to do our part of the sanctification process. God works in us, both to will and to do his good pleasure. Like the saw, we only need to rest in the carpenter’s hands and allow the cutting to proceed. The workmanship is the Lord’s, and the glory belongs to him.

A Joyous Feast

Passover, and the ceremony surrounding it, is a feast. God meant it to be a joyous celebration. It still is for the Jews to this day. Though it is appropriately mixed with self-examination and conscious effort to remember painful experiences of ourselves and others, the bottom line should be a joyous celebration of past blessings and future hopes—high hopes, representative of the only real human story ending with, "and they all lived happily ever after."

We rejoice that though we have leaven in our houses it can be removed; and if we are having trouble removing it, we have our heavenly Father who will "search us with candles"1 (Zeph. 1:12) until we see the leaven in our hearts. We rejoice that God pictured the imperfection of our little offering in the fact that the "wave loaves" offered in Leviticus 23 demonstrate that both the church and great company contain the leaven of sin—and yet by God’s grace (through Christ) they are acceptable sacrifices to him! (See Lev. 23:9-22, esp. vs. 17.)

We rejoice that there is a willing sacrificial lamb provided for us; and we have the privilege of feasting upon that lamb. We rejoice that even now, though troubles surround us and Satan’s minions are pursuing us, we have escaped the dark night of Egyptian slavery. We are headed for the Promised Land. Our leader, Jesus, is at the head of the column. All our provisions are in place—the food, the raiment, the shoes, and the animals we will need to sacrifice in worship to the Lord. All we need to do is put one foot in front of the other and keep moving forward in the Lord’s way!

May each of us give thanks and praise to God for the glorious deliverance he has provided. Have a blessed Memorial!

1. This is a reference to the ancient Jewish tradition of having the father of the household ceremonially inspect the household after the mother did the cleaning in preparation for Passover.