David Bahn – Reflections

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In 1968 Jerry Snell opened a door in the hallway outside our first hour chemistry class. He invited me into what I discovered was a darkroom. Soon I was on the school newspaper and annual staff as a photographer. Later I learned that Jerry was a Lutheran who was planning to become a pastor. A few years later I was not only a Lutheran, but I was heading off to seminary to become a Lutheran pastor, too. Jerry followed a year later and served as a pastor in Missouri until his untimely heart attack and death. I thank God for Jerry and enjoy photography still today – not to mention rejoicing in having served as a Lutheran pastor in congregations in Utah, Colorado, Arkansas and Texas. I’ve retired now and serve part time as a Congregational Support Specialist for the Texas District of the LCMS. I also provide coaching and leadership training through various PLI cohorts and with individual congregations and organizations. David Bahn is a follower of Jesus Christ, husband to Diane, father and grandfather. He is an avid amateur photographer. His photo website is “Flowers by God Photos by David” He also publishes a devotional blog DavidBahn-Reflections.com. He and Diane live in Cypress Texas and enjoy visiting their grandchildren who live in the United States and Germany. He graduated from Concordia Theological Seminary in 1979, and earned a Doctor of Ministry degree from Fuller Theological Seminary in 1991. Diane, his wife, is now retired from PLI (PLIleadership.org). They have offered presentations on Marriage and Ministry Partnership, Leadership, Changing Your Congregation’s Culture, and Missional Living. They look are working with PLI International training pastors and wives of the ELVD Diocese of the Lutheran Church of Tanzania. David’s personal mission statement is “Leading people to realize Jesus’ calling and plans for their lives.”
Follow the Word: What Jesus Found in Leviticus

Follow the Word: What Jesus Found in Leviticus

Click here for an audio version of this blog post.

These devotions are part of the Follow the Word Bible reading program at St. John Lutheran Church in Cypress, Texas. This year we are reading through the Scriptures together, listening for how God speaks through his Word day by day. I hope you will join me on this journey.

Today’s readings are Leviticus 19-21, Psalm 63.

Leviticus 19:1-4

And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, 2 “Speak to all the congregation of the people of Israel and say to them, You shall be holy, for I the Lord your God am holy. 3 Every one of you shall revere his mother and his father, and you shall keep my Sabbaths: I am the Lord your God. 4 Do not turn to idols or make for yourselves any gods of cast metal: I am the Lord your God.

Flower | Gumbalimba Nature Preserve, Honduras | February 2026

Leviticus 19–21 reads like a catalog of everyday faithfulness: honor your parents, care for the poor, deal honestly with others, and respect the elderly. Even the priests were held to careful standards because they served near the presence of God. Through it all runs one clear theme — God’s people are called to reflect His holiness in every part of life.

I noticed reading these chapters that in the context of all these Old Testament requirements and laws, the command to “love your neighbor as yourself.” That really struck me because when Jesus is asked which is the greatest commandment in the Law, he answered with the expected, “You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, soul, and might.” He’s quoting the “John 3:16 of the Old Testament” (I call it that because it was so well known by the Jews of his day) we hear the Shema: “Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. And you shall love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might.”

But Jesus doesn’t stop there. He reaches into these chapters of Leviticus, picking his way through the maze of ritual, and sexual prohibitions and pulls out this gem. “And the second one is like it, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’” He says on these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets. They summarize the whole law of God.

Keep that in mind as you consider the opening verses of Leviticus 19: And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, 2 “Speak to all the congregation of the people of Israel and say to them, You shall be holy, for I the Lord your God am holy. 3 Every one of you shall revere his mother and his father, and you shall keep my Sabbaths: I am the Lord your God. 4 Do not turn to idols or make for yourselves any gods of cast metal: I am the Lord your God.

God commands his people to be different. And Jesus realizes that the key to being different is not mere outward obedience or religious observance. The key to God-pleasing difference is love: love for God, and love for neighbor.

As God’s people we are not constantly to test the limits or bristle against his commands. We are not to see how far we can go, or give in to the ways of the world. We are not to let the world set our moral compass with regard to sexual morality, integrity, or how we treat our neighbor. We are to love God first and most, and love our neighbors as ourselves.

The ways of the world are a slippery slope for God’s people. From the beginning the temptation has been the same: to decide for ourselves what is good and what is evil. But the Lord alone is God. He alone determines what is good, and he alone is worthy of our love above all.

He alone is worthy of all this because he is a loving God — the author of love — who loved us so much that he sent his Son into the world so that whoever believes in him will not perish but have eternal life.

Click on this image to watch the Bible Project Video for Leviticus

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