How has your church dealt with the "consecration" of your pastor or pastoral team?

God’s Details, Not Moses’, and certainly Not Ours Today

Leviticus 8:1-30

The first thirty verses of this chapter refer to a “consecration” that God commanded Moses to carry out (verses 1-5). It involved cleansing the Priests with water (verse 6), donning them with special garments (verses 7-9), anointing them with oil (verses 10-13), and consecrating them with blood (verses 14-30).

Thoughts on the Passage

Now that the tabernacle had been completed, it was time to consecrate those that would work in it and serve the people as priests. 

First, we note that God commanded this consecration of the priests.  And secondly, that it was to be done in the presence of the “full congregation” which was to be assembled at the doorway of the tent of meeting.

Second, this involved all the priests, from father Aaron down to his last son.

Third, the priests were to have special clothing which included a place for the Urim and the Thummin, which were to help them determine God’s will for a particular issue or question posed. Today, as believers and all part of the Royal priesthood, each of us is clothed in Jesus Christ and His righteousness (Revelation 3:5). David Guzik says these ‘clothes’ are given freely by Jesus but received and ‘worn’ by us in faith.

Clearly, this was a ceremony which demonstrated that the priests were being “set apart” and part of that was the need for the atonement of their sins, as well as a committing of their entire lives to the ministry and service God was calling them to.

Finally, of noteworthiness here is the fact that this whole ceremony was not done “à la Moses” but rather according to God in every detail.  Sometimes we do things in our churches attempting to replicate a ceremony we note in the Bible, but we often choose to add our own touches. We need to be mindful that whatever we do – we do not add or subtract from what the Bible teaches us was done by God in the O.T. or Christ in the N.T.  I suppose the whole way our churches observe the Communion meal will come to mind for many of us. And perhaps it should.

How has your church dealt with the "consecration" of your pastor or pastoral team?

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