After five straight articles in Leviticus 13 talking about leprosy and cleanliness laws and quarantine practices, I really thought it was going to be time to move on to Leviticus 14.
And then, my eyes caught the phrase “warp and woof” nestled in verse 48. At that, I had to dig a little deeper.
My first thought was that I had accidentally opened up a browser and inadvertently typed in some kind of URL for Star Trek fan fiction (which would be weird, since I’m not a Trekkie at all).
Then, I realized that “warp and woof” is actually a sewing term. The threads that are horizontal on a garment is called the warp, and the vertical threads are called the woof. In order to make a piece of clothing, you need to overlay the two. The interlocking threads give the outfit it’s strength.
In the context, Leviticus 13:48 describes what to do if you find a mark of leprosy on the garment itself, instead of on a person.
Interestingly enough, the procedure for “cleansing” the garment is almost exactly the same as with a human. The priest inspects it and quarantines the cloth for a week, if necessary. Then, if the leprous mark hasn’t faded, the garment is burned.
If the mark has faded, then the priest tears off the fabric that had the mark. The garment is monitored long-term to make sure that the mark doesn’t spread through the warp and the woof.
What an amazing depiction of the way sin spreads throughout a local church. In 1 Corinthians 5, Paul tells the church there to isolate a member that “has his father’s wife.” The purpose was to isolate the sin and keep it from spreading like “leaven” through the church.
Carrying that allusion further, the “warp” and the “woof” are the church members that the rest of the church would be tracking. Not to pass judgment, but to make sure that the sin hasn’t spread to everyone else.
In a sense, the warp and the woof are the branches of any group of people. They run horizontally and vertically through your life, and, just like fabric, are intertwined with each other. Your friends and family members’ actions can impact you—both positively and negatively.
But just as this analogy works with sin (like it did in 1 Corinthians 5), it can also work for other things. Think of how your Godly influence can spread up and down through relationships, or how evangelism flows through the people you know. All of that connectedness can be used for good—sometimes to great effect.
You have warps and woofs in your own life. How are you impacting them?
