As we learned earlier in Exodus, a fellowship offering could be brought for a variety of reasons. Today we'll look at the regulations for handling each type of fellowship offering that is brought.
"These are the regulations for the fellowship offering anyone may present to the Lord: If they offer it as an expression of thankfulness, then along with this thank offering they are to offer thick loaves made without yeast and with olive oil mixed in, thin loaves made without yeast and brushed with oil, and thick loaves of the finest flour well-kneaded and with oil mixed in. Along with their fellowship offering of thanksgiving they are to present an offering with thick loaves of bread made with yeast. They are to bring one of each kind as an offering, a contribution to the Lord; it belongs to the priest who splashes the blood of the fellowship offering against the altar. The meat of their fellowship offering or thanksgiving offering must be eaten on the day it is offered; they must leave none of it til morning." (Leviticus 7:11-15) A meat offering and several varieties of bread were brought to the tabernacle as a fellowship offering. The parts not offered to the Lord, and the parts the bringer of the offering wasn't allowed to retain, belonged to the priest who officiated over the offering. When the fellowship offering was brought out of thankfulness, the entire meal had to be eaten all in one day. Anything left over would have to be discarded. It is easiest to be thankful for food when it is fresh and hot and delicious, not when it is served as cold or stale leftovers.
"If, however, their offering is the result of a vow or is a freewill offering, the sacrifice shall be eaten on the day they offer it, but anything left over may be eaten on the next day. Any meat of the sacrifice left over til the third day must be burned up. If any meat of the fellowship offering is eaten on the third day, the one who offered it will not be accepted. It will not be reckoned to their credit, for it has become impure; the person who eats any of it will be held responsible." (Leviticus 7:16-18) A person might make a vow to God and, upon fulfilling that vow, he would bring a fellowship offering to the Lord to commemorate its fulfillment. Or a person might bright a freewill offering to the Lord; in other words, he brings it "just because". He brings it just because he feels like showing his love to the Lord.
In the cases of these two occasions, the meat can be eaten on the day it is brought and again on the next day but not on the third day. It was difficult to keep meat fresh for that long in a time when there were no refrigerators. Salting meat down would delay decomposition but to prevent eating anything that has spoiled or is on the verge of spoiling the Lord commands them to burn up what's left of the meat on the third day. If they eat the leftovers on the third day it will be as if they didn't bring the offering at all. It dishonors the Lord for them to allow an offering made to Him to start going bad and to eat it after it starts going bad. On top of that it puts the person in danger of contracting food poisoning which could be deadly. It still can be deadly even in our own times with our advanced medical knowledge.
If you've ever had a pretty intense case of food poisoning you either felt like you were going to die or else you wished you would go ahead and die so you could at least stop suffering. You may recall some years back when a major manufacturer of peanut butter had an issue with a certain batch of jars being contaminated with salmonella. Before the story broke in the news I opened a new jar of peanut butter one afternoon and made myself several peanut butter crackers for lunch. By evening I had one of the worst headaches of my life and by the middle of the night I was vomiting uncontrollably until I couldn't throw up any more and yet I was still painfully dry heaving. My husband had to take me to the ER where I was giving a whole bag of IV fluids for dehydration along with some pretty strong medications injected into my IV line. I spent all night there and was sent home with prescriptions for more anti-vomiting medicines and antibiotics and strict instructions to drink all the clear fluids I could. I lay in bed for almost an entire week barely able to even talk, I was so sick. It wasn't until I recovered enough to watch a little TV that I heard the story on the news about the peanut butter. When I checked the code on the bottom of my jar it matched the code of the bad batch. I survived my ordeal but some of my fellow citizens didn't.
Now I've told you this icky story to make the point that is being made in regard to not keeping the meat from the offering to eat on the third day. The Lord didn't want anyone to get sick and die. The Lord also wasn't honored by an offering that caused a person to lie near death for a week with vomiting and diarrhea and dehydration. He wasn't honored by meat that was beginning to smell or change color or be blown by flies. So He strictly forbids keeping the meat for that long and this commandment is so important that He states their offering and the reason for bringing it will be negated if they eat the meat on the third day.
If the meat brought for the offering somehow comes in contact with anything unclean it is rendered impure. "Meat that touches anything ceremonially unclean must not be eaten; it must be burned up." (Leviticus 7:19a) Again we see that the best must be offered to God. If the offering somehow becomes defiled it is not longer acceptable to God and it is no longer safe for human consumption.
A person who was ceremonially unclean could not take part in the eating of the offering. "As for other meat, anyone ceremonially clean may eat it. But it anyone who is unclean eats any meat from the fellowship offering belonging to the Lord, they must be cut off from their people. Anyone who touches something unclean---whether human uncleanness or an unclean animal or any unclean creature that moves along the ground---and then eats any of the meat of the fellowship offering belonging to the Lord must be cut off from their people." (Leviticus 7:19b-21) We saw earlier in Leviticus what a person was to do when he realized he'd become ceremonially unclean. He had to wash himself and his clothes and self-isolate himself until evening. If a person did not follow these instructions, but instead attended a fellowship offering meal and ate it while ceremonially unclean, he was to be excommunicated from the congregation.
If a person partook of a fellowship offering meal while ceremonially unclean he was endangering himself by putting food into his mouth with hands that were contaminated. He was endangering those who ate with him because in those times people would sit around the pots and the platters and reach into them together. He might touch food that someone else would end up putting into their mouth. And lastly he was dishonoring the Lord by not bothering to wash his hands or put on clean clothes while observing a meal that symbolizes the fellowship (the peace) he has with God. No one can have peace with God who is spiritually unclean, and a person who thought nothing of eating the fellowship meal in a ceremonially unclean state was almost certainly not spiritually clean---not right with the Lord in his heart. Because this person is such a bad influence on those around him, his penalty was excommunication. He was like the bad apple that has the potential to spoil the whole barrel of apples. To protect the other members of the congregation he could not be allowed to fellowship with them while continuing to maintain his unrighteous ways.
Thanks be to the Lord Jesus Christ who cleaned us up when we put our faith in Him! We don't have to worry about being found unclean in the eyes of God if we are in Christ Jesus.
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