The prophet Jeremiah was told to stand in the gate of the temple and to urge the people to “Amend your ways…” (Jeremiah 7:3).  What ways did they need to amend?  According to Jeremiah 7:31, they had built high places upon which to burn their sons and daughters.  But note the principle or rationale by which God condemned their action.  God said they were guilty of doing that “which I did not command, nor did it come into My heart.”  Their condemnation was not based upon the explicit prohibition of idolatry, but rather was based on the equivalent practice of doing that which the Lord had not commanded.

In Leviticus 10:1-2, Nadab and Abihu sinned by ignoring this principle of silence.  They offered strange fire before the Lord “which He had not commanded them.”  By doing that which the Lord had not commanded them, they were found guilty.  Nowhere did God say, “You cannot use this fire.”  However what God did do is tell them what fire they were supposed to use, and there was no permission to be found in God’s silence about other fires.

–Beth Johnson

​”…Remember me, O my God, for good” ​ ​(Neh. 13:31b).
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