As we conclude the book of Leviticus, we must remember that through the law God was their king and He was establishing a theocracy. Many of the blessings offered for being obedient are those that their king would bestow, many of the punishments promised for disobedience was because these seemingly harmless sins (such as idol worship, etc.) in our minds, were the equivalent of high treason to their king. Though we do not live in a theocracy any longer God's promises of covering still exist. Many in the prosperity gospel or "name it and claim it" movement have used these verses to promise many things which eventually disillusion people when they don't occur. The Bible must be interpreted as God has revealed His plan as the Biblical narrative evolved. First of all, based on Leviticus 26, we would all receive the curses not the blessings since we all sin and are disobedient. But due to His infinite mercy and grace, His blessings are never ending to us, a people undeserving of such gifts. To experience these blessings, we must get our eyes and our hearts off the materialistic things of this world and onto Jesus. We read in Matthew 6:33, "But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you."

We read in Leviticus 26:3,11-12, "If you walk in My statutes and keep My commandments, and perform them…I will set My tabernacle among you, and My soul shall not abhor you. I will walk among you and be your God, and you shall be My people." We know from the visions from Ezekiel 10-11, that though God indeed dwelt with the people in the tabernacle, then the temple, that His glory departed at the time of the Babylonian captivity (approximately 600 BC). We read a little over 600 years later in John 1:14, "And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth." In the Greek, "dwelt" means "tabernacled" among us. Though God initially made His presence in the Most Holy Place, He was now walking, in the person of Jesus, amongst the people. But now we have an even more amazing truth, He literally tabernacles within us, His children. They were promised this in Jeremiah 31:31-33, "Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah - not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt, My covenant which they broke, though I was a husband to them, says the Lord, But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I will put My law in their minds, and write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people." This New Covenant promised in the Old Testament was fulfilled in the New Testament through the life and death of Jesus Christ and now through the ministry of the Holy Spirit. As we read in 1 Corinthians 6:19, "Or do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own?"

Though filled with the Spirit we still struggle in this world, not because the Spirit is inadequate, but because we still struggle with our flesh. As we read in Galatians 5:16-17, "I say then: Walk in the Spirit, and you shall not fulfill the lusts of the flesh. For the flesh lusts against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; and these are contrary to one another, so that you do not do the things that you wish." Our lives should not be to seek after the things of this world which will not last, but those things which are eternal and which no man can ever take away. Setting our eyes on the material things of this world will frustrate, but the things of God will lead to the fruits of the Spirit in Galatians 5:22-23, among those items listed are joy and peace. All of this in anticipation of the future fulfillment revealed for us in Revelation 21:3, "And I heard a loud voice from heaven saying, "Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and He will dwell with them, and they shall be His people. God Himself will be with them and be their God." May we keep our eyes fixed on Jesus, knowing what He accomplished on our behalf, and live the life that is available to us due to the One, the Holy Spirit, who now tabernacles with us.