Caller: Okay, my first question here is about clean and unclean meats. I’ve enjoyed your Bible study on that and I choose to eat what the Bible stated is clean meats, for the health purposes mainly. I’ve heard many different people’s opinions about it and I know there’s a lot of people that feel that biblically there is proof that we should be continuing, but I’m still confused because oftentimes when you’re addressing the Sabbath issue and people feel that when Christ, when the Bible says that the Old Covenant was done away with that you refer and say that was the Mosaic Law, Moses’ Laws, of everything, you know, keeping clean.
But in those Laws were the clean and the unclean meats, and so there is no question the body is the temple of God and that we should take care of it, I understand that, but my question is ‘Is there anything biblical to stand behind that’? Does the Bible really tell us in this day that we should or should not eat clean or unclean meats?
Pastor Doug: Well, first of all you have to—there are certain laws in the Bible that predate Moses and we know that these are eternal principles. Our listeners know that we think that the Sabbath is still part of the Ten Commandments, and one reason for that is the Sabbath predates Moses, it predates the Ten Commandments, it goes to Genesis Chapter 2—He blessed the seventh day and rested. Okay?
The same thing with the distinction between clean and unclean foods. Noah was not a Jew. Everybody listening to my voice right now is related to Noah. God told Noah to make a distinction between the clean and unclean animals when they were brought onto the ark. So this was not a Mosaic Law. It predates Moses by hundreds of years and so that’s why I say it’s safe to put that in a different category.
Because Moses, in his law, talks about these things does not mean it’s part of the Mosaic Law. Moses talks about everything. He talks about the civil law. He talks about moral law. He talks about health law. He talks about ceremonial law. I mean Moses covered everything, but the clean and unclean distinction was not original with Moses. He simply commented on it. Okay?
Caller: Was that addressed in—I don’t recall—when the Lord spoke with Noah—did He tell them when they came out of the ark that they couldn’t eat unclean?
Pastor Doug: Well, the very fact that they’re called unclean…
Caller: Oh, okay, sure.
Pastor Doug: It wasn’t that they were unclean for riding you understand, they were unclean for sacrificing and for eating, and, of course, our bodies are the temple of the Holy Spirit. Then in the New Testament, you asked for some evidence—if you go to Acts chapter 10, you know, Peter’s vision about the sheet? Three times the sheet comes down from heaven filled with unclean animals and this takes place about 35 AD, I’m guessingJesus ascended to heaven in 31 ADPeter three times says “I have never eaten anything common or unclean.”
So after following Jesus three and a half years Peter was outraged and shocked that God would ask him to eat something unclean and then he was saying “What could this mean? Surely the Lord doesn’t want me to eat unclean animals.” Then God shows Peter not to call any man common or unclean. That’s in Acts 10:28. The vision had nothing to do with food. But that vision actually proves—this is the New Testament proving that the distinction between clean and unclean was still there for the apostles.
Caller: Right.
Pastor Doug: Okay?
Caller: You’ve answered that question very well. Thank you.