Holiness and God's justice
English: The Sin of Nadab and Abihu, as in Leviticus 10, illustration from a Bible card published 1907 by the Providence Lithograph Company (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) “Among those who approach Me I will show Myself holy; in the sight of all the people I will be honored” ( Leviticus 10:3b). God moved into the tabernacle after it had been set up by Moses and Aaron in the wilderness (Exodus 40). God lit the fire on the altar in front of the tabernacle as a sign of His presence and of His holiness. The judgments rendered on the altar were God’s judgments, and so the fire was His fire (Leviticus 9:24). God consecrated Nadab and Abihu as priests to assist their father Aaron, but at the time God lit the fire on His hearth-altar, these two young men brought “strange fire” before Him. We don’t know for certain what this meant, but we do know that “fire came out from the presence of LORD and consumed them, and they died before the LORD” (Leviticus 10:2). Aaron was very upset, and Moses