Little speculation for the causes and roots of Nadab and Abihu’s disobedience will be offered in today’s reflection, except that the ‘unauthorised fire’ was in fact disobedience and did not glorify God.  This passage should challenge us that our intentions in our service and offerings of worship should always be to glorify God, and not to diminish His holiness.  Verses 6-7 may seem incredibly harsh as Aaron and his family are prohibited from grieving, but even in his grief Aaron was to learn to put service first.  He was to set an example to all of Israel that portrayed his acceptance that God had acted justly.  Aaron now understood that the example to be set could not be sloppy, but had to fully respect and honour a holy God.  This was a lesson taught by Jesus in Luke 12: 48 when we read “Everyone to whom much was given, of him much will be required, and from him to whom they entrusted much, they will demand the more”.  This chapter ends with conflicting interpretations between Moses and Aaron over how Nadab and Abihu’s offering should be dealt with.  Moses felt it should be consumed by the newly ordained priests to complete the offering, but Aaron was exercising caution fearing the events of the day may have made the offering unclean, his priority in his grief is still to honour God.  Perhaps our response in prayer should be in the words of Matt Redman:

                “Blessed be Your name, when the sun’s shining down on me, when the world’s ‘all as it should be’, blessed be your name.  Blessed be your name on the road marked with suffering, though there’s pain in the offering, blessed be your name”