Daily Devotion | Leviticus 25:18–34 | 2026 March 25

Title: Daily Devotion | Leviticus 25:18–34 | 2026 March 25

Scripture: Leviticus 25:18–34 (ESV, reference only)

Date: 2026 March 25

Speaker: Rev. John Chen

Transcribed, translated & edited by: Joseph Wang (Yufan)

Dear brothers and sisters, peace be with you. We begin a new day as we come before God to study the Daily Devotion. Today’s passage is Leviticus chapter 25, verses 18 to 34. Let us pray. Truly, we thank You for writing these statutes again upon our hearts, so that we may more deeply understand Your will, and keep Your statutes and observe Your rules. May You be with us. In Christ’s name, Amen.

Alright, let us look at Leviticus chapter 25. Now today’s passage, verses 18 to 22, is an explanation concerning the Sabbath year, and from verse 23 to the end of chapter 25, it speaks about the Year of Jubilee. So here in chapter 25, you can understand it as dealing with both the Sabbath year and the Jubilee. Yesterday we spoke about the introduction, a kind of general overview, and now the following sections give more detailed regulations and explanations.

First, let us look at the explanation concerning the Sabbath year. In verse 18, God says: you shall do my statutes and keep my rules, and then you shall dwell in the land securely. So brothers and sisters, here we need to understand that Israel’s dwelling in the land was actually conditional. Later, in chapters 26 and 27, this becomes even more evident, where blessings and curses are laid out. What were the conditions for Israel to live in the land of Canaan? It was that they must keep and obey God’s statutes and rules.

This is something we must pay attention to. God brought Israel out of Egypt, and at Mount Sinai He gave the law. Now we are still in Leviticus, still in the period of giving the law. What is the purpose? God has already told you: it is so that you may live in the land by obeying His statutes and keeping His rules, and only then can you dwell there securely. In other words, God called Israel out of Egypt and led them into Canaan in order to establish a kingdom that belongs to Him—a people who bear witness to His glory.

This guiding idea, whether in the Old Testament or the New Testament, is the same. In Acts chapter 1, verse 8, the Lord Jesus says that you will be His witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth. And at the end of Matthew 28, Jesus says, go and make disciples of all nations. So all of these things are actually a continuous theme from the Old Testament into the New Testament. It is just that we often fail to notice this theme. That is why I want to explain it carefully here: God calls us so that we may become a people who are different, a people set apart as holy.

Our conduct, our way of living, our way of thinking—everything must be different from the world, so that we may become a witness to the LORD. So brothers and sisters, I hope you have a clear understanding of this, and do not misunderstand it.

In fact, this has been taught consistently from the Old Testament to the New Testament. Many times we have this impression: why do we believe in Jesus? Why has He chosen us? Is it so that we may go to heaven? Of course, from one perspective that is not entirely wrong. But what is more important is that we become His witnesses. And by keeping His statutes and obeying His rules, we may dwell securely in the land. Otherwise, God will cause us to be cast out from it.

So this central theme, concerning both individuals and the mission of the church, is something that many people overlook. As a result, we do not know what we are supposed to do on this earth. What are we supposed to do? We are to become God’s witnesses.

What do we witness? That Jesus Christ has risen from the dead. That there truly is a God. That there will be a new heaven and a new earth. And how do we bear this witness? By living according to God’s law—by becoming a people who are different from the world, a people set apart from all nations. This is our task and our mission.

So this truth must be engraved in your heart. You must think about it repeatedly. Otherwise, you will drift, and you will not know what you are doing. You may even miss the focus. For example, you might say, “Anyway we cannot do it, Jesus has already done it, and we are saved by Him.” Yes, that is absolutely correct. But after you are saved by Jesus, what are you supposed to do? You are still to love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength, and the second is like it: to love your neighbor as yourself.

This is the summary of the law. So on this point, I hope that we, brothers and sisters, will not have any hesitation or compromise. If you do not understand this, you actually do not know what you are doing in this world. You will live as if just eating and waiting to die, waiting to go to heaven. That is not the case.

We have a very difficult task on this earth: to live according to God’s law. In reality, we will face great difficulties—it is not easy. But we must rely on the faith God has given us, and continually glorify Him and bear witness to Him, so that our community may become a people that glorifies His name.

Now, for example, keeping the Sabbath year is difficult, right? Then the land will yield its produce, and you will eat your fill and dwell there securely. In verse 19, God says that if you carefully obey His statutes and rules, He will give you abundant produce.

God knows that they are afraid of keeping the Sabbath year. They may say, “What shall we eat in the seventh year, if we may not sow or gather in our crop?” You see, God already knows our lack of faith. What does He do? He promises: “I will command my blessing on you in the sixth year, so that it will produce a crop sufficient for three years.”

You see, in the sixth year, God gives you produce for three years. Then in the eighth year, you will sow, but you will still be eating from the old crop until the harvest of the ninth year.

Even though I have not been a farmer, the meaning here in Scripture is very clear—you do not need to be a farmer to understand it. In the sixth year, you produce enough for three years. Then in the seventh year, since you are not allowed to work, you eat from the stored grain. In the eighth year, you still cannot rely on new produce, because you must sow and wait for harvest—spring sowing, autumn harvest—so you continue to eat the stored grain. Only in the ninth year do you begin to harvest what was sown in the eighth year.

But God’s point is this: in the sixth year, He gives you produce sufficient for years seven, eight, and nine. So the produce of the eighth year is essentially extra, and the produce of the ninth year is also extra.

And when it says that in the ninth year, when its produce comes in, you will still be eating the old crop, it means that the abundance is so great that even by the ninth year, you still have stored grain left. You do not even need to consume all the earlier provision.

And what does this show? It shows that if you truly obey the statutes and rules of the LORD, God will abundantly bless you. This is why He encourages them to keep the Sabbath year. Do not be afraid of observing it. Do not say, “If I do not sow or reap for a year, I will have nothing to eat.” No—He says, in the sixth year I will give you a harvest sufficient for three years.

Strictly speaking, if God only wanted to meet your needs, He could simply give you enough for two years, and that would already be sufficient. But He does not do that. He gives you an extra year. Why? Because He wants to express His blessing, to show His mercy. He does not just barely meet your needs—He gives in abundance. This is God’s compassion.

So I think verses 18 to 22 truly reveal God’s mercy and lovingkindness toward us. We are so lacking in faith, and God already knows that Israel would be unwilling to keep the Sabbath year. Therefore, He gives such a promise in advance, saying: you can keep it with peace of mind, there is no problem—I will provide for you.

So brothers and sisters, we really need to repent before God. We are often too cautious, too fearful. We are unwilling to keep the Sabbath day. Why are we unwilling? Because we are afraid we will lose business, we are afraid of loss, and many other similar concerns. We feel that there is too much work left undone, that we do not have enough time—this is all due to our lack of faith.

If we truly keep the Sabbath, God is able to give us the provision of several days within fewer days. He is able to bless us. Do not be afraid. This is God’s promise. As long as we faithfully keep the Sabbath, God will not treat us unfairly.

Now, can this command be applied one hundred percent directly today? We can say yes, and we can also say no. First, God’s promise is true. I believe that many people, through keeping the Sabbath, have indeed received blessings—even material blessings. They close their shops, they stop doing business for that day, and yet God still blesses them.

But will it always appear in exactly the same way every time? Not necessarily. If, for example, you find that your income decreases because you keep the Sabbath, that may also be part of God’s good will. In any case, God is blessing us—this is something we must remember. Do not be lacking in faith. And very often, God truly does bless us in visible ways.

Now let us move on to the matter of redeeming property. This is actually also part of the explanation of the Jubilee. From verse 23 to the end of the chapter, it all concerns the regulations of the Jubilee. Yesterday we mentioned that land must return to its original owner. Why is that? Here God gives further explanation.

“The land shall not be sold in perpetuity, for the land is mine. For you are strangers and sojourners with me.” Here God very clearly tells us our identity, our relationship with Him, and our relationship with the land.

Whose is the land? The land belongs to God. And all of us are merely sojourners, strangers. So brothers and sisters, we need to pause and think about this: do we truly regard ourselves as sojourners and strangers? Or do we live in this world as if we were its owners?

I think, especially for us Chinese, we are very easily trapped in this way of thinking. Buying houses, buying land, building property—when getting married, one must have one’s own house. These ways of thinking actually reveal a kind of misunderstanding. I am not saying that you must not buy a house—do not misunderstand me. What I am saying is that if you do not have the conditions to buy one, it is not necessary. It is not that important.

The problem lies in this illusion—that we think we are the owners. But verse 23 tells us clearly: we are sojourners, we are strangers. Whose is the land? The land is God’s. Therefore, it must not be sold permanently.

Many people accumulate land and property, thinking, “Now I am secure, now I can enjoy life permanently.” But this is actually foolishness. While the land still remains, we ourselves may already be gone. In this sense, human life is very empty—we live as if we could remain forever.

In fact, it does not take much wisdom for us to realize that we are sojourners and strangers. People around us are passing away one by one. Our lives are aging day by day. We should be able to sense that we are merely passing through. We ought to long for the heavenly homeland.

So may God have mercy on us, that we would not cling so tightly to this world. Our physical body will pass away—it is not permanent. All those properties with our names on them—while the buildings may still stand, our lives may already be gone. This is something we must seriously reflect on.

Therefore, may God have mercy on us, that we may truly see ourselves as sojourners and strangers, and not be deceived by appearances or fall in love with this world.

Then it says: in all the land of your possession you shall allow a redemption of the land. That is, even if you have bought land, you cannot keep it permanently. The land originally belongs to the one to whom God gave it, and it must be returned.

If your brother becomes poor and sells part of his property, then his nearest redeemer shall come and redeem what his brother has sold. So the land must ultimately belong to each individual according to God’s original distribution. If no one redeems it for him, but he himself later prospers, then he may redeem it himself. The principle is very clear: the land must not be permanently sold—it belongs to its original owner.

You must not join house to house and field to field. This is something that the prophet Isaiah rebukes. Thinking about recent years, especially in China’s real estate market, there was a period of rapid expansion, but eventually it reached its limits. From a worldly economic perspective, you may explain it one way, but from a biblical perspective, we understand that these things are ultimately unstable and unreliable.

When land is sold, the value must be calculated based on the remaining years until the Jubilee, and the excess must be returned to the buyer, so that the land can go back to its original owner. Each person has his own inheritance, and it must return to him. Even if someone refuses, saying, “I bought this land, it is mine,” that is not allowed—you must return it. Because fundamentally, the land belongs to God.

If a man cannot redeem what he has sold, then what he sold shall remain in the hand of the buyer until the Year of Jubilee, and in the Jubilee it shall be released and returned to him. So even if he cannot redeem it now, and no relative redeems it for him, there is still hope—the Jubilee will come, and the land must be returned.

From this, you can see God’s view of land. In fact, God is restricting the accumulation and trading of land. As I mentioned yesterday, if you understand Chinese history even a little, you will see that every dynasty’s rise and fall is closely related to large-scale land accumulation and land transactions.

In an agricultural society, land is the most important productive resource. If land becomes excessively concentrated, it produces large numbers of landless people, who eventually become a destabilizing force. So from a historical perspective, preventing land concentration is necessary.

But from a biblical perspective, there are two reasons. First, to declare that the land belongs to God. Second, to show mercy to people. Because large-scale land accumulation leads to great suffering for those who lose their land—they lose their means of survival.

That is why God commands Israel not to permanently buy and sell land, but to return it, so that every person may have a place to live and a means of livelihood. This is God’s mercy.

Some may say that we are no longer in an agricultural society, so we do not need to follow these regulations. That is true—we do not need to follow them literally. But the principles behind them—the principle of mercy, the principle of caring for the poor, the principle of justice—these remain.

Returning land to the poor is itself an act of mercy. God’s justice and righteousness are displayed here: He does not allow land to be permanently concentrated in the hands of a few, but ensures that each person has a place to live before Him.

In this sense, these regulations benefit not only the poor, but also the strong. If you look at history, when land concentration becomes extreme, the resulting unrest often overturns those in power. So even the strong would benefit from such a system, though they may not be willing to follow it.

Next, we see that houses in walled cities are treated differently. These can be redeemed within one year. That is, after a house is sold, it may be redeemed within one year. But after one year, it permanently belongs to the buyer.

Here you can see that God distinguishes between houses in cities and land in the countryside. This distinction is important. Land, in an agricultural society, is a means of production, but houses are not—they are for living. So once a house is sold in the city, it may remain with the buyer.

However, houses in villages without walls are considered like the fields of the countryside—they may be redeemed and must return in the Jubilee. So you see, the location of the house matters. City houses are treated differently from rural land.

Then there is also a special regulation concerning the Levites. If a Levite sells a house, he may redeem it at any time. Why are the Levites treated differently? Because they have no land inheritance. When the land was divided, the Levites did not receive territory.

So their houses are their means of livelihood. They serve God, and ideally they are supported through offerings. But when Israel falls into spiritual decline, the Levites may have no support and must wander and work elsewhere. So being a Levite is actually a high-risk “profession,” in a sense—their livelihood depends on the spiritual condition of the people.

Therefore, if a Levite sells a house, it must be returned to him in the Jubilee. And the pasturelands around their cities must not be sold at all. These small portions of land are given to them so that they may have some means of survival.

So what do we see here? We see the principle of mercy. God shows mercy to the weak. He distinguishes between productive resources and living resources. He shows special grace to the Levites.

Through all these detailed statutes and rules, we see God’s faithfulness, His care, and His thoughtful provision. He is telling us how deeply He loves us, and how carefully He provides for us.

So we should not be anxious. We should entrust ourselves into God’s hands with confidence. His mercy and grace will surely be with us.

That is all for today’s sharing. Thank you, everyone.