Leviticus 27:14

Leviticus 27:14 says, And when a man shall sanctify his house to be holy unto the LORD, then the priest shall estimate it, whether it be good or bad: as the priest shall estimate it, so shall it stand.  A man could sanctify his house to the LORD.  This was the house itself and not the people, and the priest would estimate the value for the man to pay to redeem it.  Verse fifteen adds, And if he that sanctified it will redeem his house, then he shall add the fifth part of the money of thy estimation unto it, and it shall be his.  To redeem the house, the man who sanctified it had to add twenty percent to the estimated value.  Of course, everything is really God's to start with, but when we sanctify, or set aside, something that is ours in the view of the world for God's use, if we later decide to use it for our own purpose, we should expect it to cost us more than what it is valued at.  Verse sixteen continues, And if a man shall sanctify unto the LORD some part of a field of his possession, then thy estimation shall be according to the seed thereof: an homer of barley seed shall be valued at fifty shekels of silver.  Matthew Henry says this is land that was inherited.  This had to do with set a value on a part of a field sanctified to God.  The value would be based on the yield of the field.  Verse seventeen states, If he sanctify his field from the year of jubile, according to thy estimation it shall stand.  Verse eighteen continues, But if he sanctify his field after the jubile, then the priest shall reckon unto him the money according to the years that remain, even unto the year of the jubile, and it shall be abated from thy estimation.  Once more, the year of the jubilee would come onto play.  If the land was dedicated in the year of jubilee, it would be redeemed for the price, but if after the year of jubilee, it would be reduced by a percentage based on the years left to the next jubilee.  Verse nineteen says, And if he that sanctified the field will in any wise redeem it, then he shall add the fifth part of the money of thy estimation unto it, and it shall be assured to him.  Again, the redemption price was a fifth more than the valuation price.  Verse twenty adds, And if he will not redeem the field, or if he have sold the field to another man, it shall not be redeemed any more.  If the man would not redeem the land or had sold it to another then it could no longer be redeemed.  Verse twenty-one continues, But the field, when it goeth out in the jubile, shall be holy unto the LORD, as a field devoted; the possession thereof shall be the priest’s.  A field unredeemed at jubilee would be God's forever, just as when we are redeemed by Christ we are God's forever.  There is no reduction in the value of our redemption, no matter how long we may have lived, but the redemption of any individual cost the same, and that is the death of Christ on the cross.  Verse twenty-two states, And if a man sanctify unto the LORD a field which he hath bought, which is not of the fields of his possession;   This had to do with land the man had purchased and not with inherited land.  Verse twenty-three adds, Then the priest shall reckon unto him the worth of thy estimation, even unto the year of the jubile: and he shall give thine estimation in that day, as a holy thing unto the LORD.  The man giving the land would pay the estimated value of the land to the priest and it would be considered a holy thing.  Verse twenty-four continues, In the year of the jubile the field shall return unto him of whom it was bought, even to him to whom the possession of the land did belong.  In the year of jubilee the land would be returned to the one who had originally owned it.  This I believe would prevent the one who purchased the land from simply claiming to give the land to God knowing that revert to the original owner in jubilee.  The one donating it would still be out the cost of the estimation.  We should be wary of trying to claim to give something to God because we figure that it is going to be lost to us anyway.  Verse twenty-five concludes, And all thy estimations shall be according to the shekel of the sanctuary: twenty gerahs shall be the shekel.  This once again was just assigning a monetary value to the land.