Leviticus 5:2 “Or if a soul touch any unclean thing, whether it be a carcase of an unclean beast, or a carcase of unclean cattle, or the carcase of unclean creeping things, and if it be hidden from him; he also shall be unclean, and guilty.”

This verse introduces an important principle taught in the Bible which should be particularly relevant to any Christian.

This verse establishes that when “clean” touches “unclean”, the “clean” does not make the unclean “clean”, but rather, the “unclean” makes the clean “unclean”.

Maybe that sounds like a bit of a tongue twister, but this concept in Leviticus is one we all know and practice without necessarily realizing it.

For example, recently we’ve had a “pandemic” where people didn’t want to go anywhere near people that had “the virus”.

People that didn’t have the virus were afraid of “catching it” from people that did, and thus we had/have a situation where “clean” people were separating from “unclean” people.

Why were they doing that? Well, because people know that healthy people cannot spread their healthiness to sick people, but that sick people can spread their sickness to healthy people.

If you didn’t have the virus and you were around someone that did, your health didn’t make them better, but their sickness quite likely made you sick.

How about another example? Well, say you pick up dog poo with your clean hands… does the fact your hands are clean make the dog poo clean? Or does the dog poo make your hands unclean?

Interested or not, this principle matters because there are many professing Christians who think that they can “rub off on” and “influence” people in sin by being complicit in their sin with them.

An example of this is Lot living in the city of Sodom. The Bible says he was a “righteous man” and that they were “wicked”.

If you read about Lot, you’ll find he did try to “influence” the people of Sodom by becoming a judge. But no one there ever “caught” salvation and righteousness off him, but they sure affected him.

Lot had his reasons for being there, but none of those reasons were obedience to God’s word. And in his own method of influence, he lost all power of influence even within his own family.

And so many Christians today think they’re influencing this world and bad to good, when in reality, they’re being influenced by the world and the world hasn’t changed a bit.

If you’re saved, it is your responsibility to have a clean life and walk before God, not to be better than others, but because it’s right, and because your cleanness is what makes you useful to God and others.

If and when you get yourself involved in the putrid carcase of someone else’s sin and uncleanness, whatever it is, whatever your reasons, yet the only thing you will have achieved is your own guilt and uncleanness.

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