Deuteronomy Devotionals
Deuteronomy 4:2 - Precisely
Deuteronomy 8:4 - Our God
***Deuteronomy 8:17 - A Sound Cannon
Deuteronomy 9:6 - Erasers and Righteousness
Deuteronomy 9:6 - Good Gifts
Deuteronomy 16:17 - According to the Blessing
Deuteronomy 20:4 - Victory - through our Lord Jesus Christ!
Deuteronomy 23:23 - Keep Your Vows
Deuteronomy 28:47 - Joy and Gladness
Deuteronomy 29:29 - Cell Phones and Secret Things
**Deuteronomy 30:14 - So You Can Do It (Holy Day Lesson - Unleavened Bread/Wave Sheaf/Counting to Pentecost)
Deuteronomy 32:4 - A God of Faithfulness
**Deuteronomy 32:13 - Honey From the Rock
***Deuteronomy 33:25 - Bars of Iron and Bronze
**Deuteronomy 33:27a - Thankfulness and Reverence
Deuteronomy 8:4 - Our God
***Deuteronomy 8:17 - A Sound Cannon
Deuteronomy 9:6 - Erasers and Righteousness
Deuteronomy 9:6 - Good Gifts
Deuteronomy 16:17 - According to the Blessing
Deuteronomy 20:4 - Victory - through our Lord Jesus Christ!
Deuteronomy 23:23 - Keep Your Vows
Deuteronomy 28:47 - Joy and Gladness
Deuteronomy 29:29 - Cell Phones and Secret Things
**Deuteronomy 30:14 - So You Can Do It (Holy Day Lesson - Unleavened Bread/Wave Sheaf/Counting to Pentecost)
Deuteronomy 32:4 - A God of Faithfulness
**Deuteronomy 32:13 - Honey From the Rock
***Deuteronomy 33:25 - Bars of Iron and Bronze
**Deuteronomy 33:27a - Thankfulness and Reverence
Precisely
You shall not add to the word that I command you, nor take from it, that you may keep the commandments of the LORD your God that I command you. Deuteronomy 4:2
There’s a family joke about my cooking that if you like something that’s too bad because I just make up the recipe as I go, I don’t measure ingredients, and therefore, I can’t duplicate the results. To some extent that’s true, but I have learned there are times when you have to be very precise if you want the recipe to turn out at all. When I’m making candy, I’m very careful to measure the ingredients according to the recipe and I use the candy thermometer. When I’m making a cake, I’ve learned that you have to follow all of the directions!
Similarly, when we were building the house, and I was cutting the trim. If I hadn’t cut the trim boards at exactly the right length or at exactly the right angle, it would look bad, sloppy, haphazard. We wouldn’t have wanted our house to look like that!
My mom worked for Martin Marietta in Denver as a bookkeeper. She had to be precise down to the penny. If you’re off a penny, it’s likely an indication that you’re actually off more than that. Mom also likes to be very precise! Even if she’s making up a recipe, she writes down the amounts that she’s measured and thrown in - so she can adjust them the next time or duplicate her results whenever she wants to.
The importance of being precise is seen all around us in our world. We are precisely the right distance from the sun. If we were any closer, the sun’s gravitational pull would eventually pull us in. If we were any farther out, the sun’s gravitational pull would not be able to keep us in orbit.
Our earth is tilted at precisely the right angle to create seasons.
Water freezes precisely at 32º, but it is also the most dense at 39º. That’s very important. That means ice is less dense than water so that a pond doesn’t freeze all the way to the bottom and kill all the fish!
We also find that God is very precise. Think of the detailed instructions for the construction of the tabernacle and all its furnishings. Think of the detailed directions for offering sacrifices. Think of the precision of how to deal with skin infections, mold in houses, or having touched a dead body. God was also very specific on the day to celebrate His holy days. On the 14th day of the first month was the Passover. The 15th day was the start of the Days of Unleavened Bread. God told them, “You shall eat unleavened bread for seven days.” God was very precise with how many days to eat it! Similarly, each one of the holy days, when to keep it, is delineated!
So then we read this verse in Deuteronomy 4:2: You shall not add to the word that I command you, nor take from it, that you may keep the commandments of the LORD your God that I command you.
Moses is adjuring the people to keep God’s laws precisely! Keep them exactly as God has specified! Do you see the implication here? If you add anything to God’s commandments, or take anything away from God’s commandments, it’s no longer God’s commandment! It’s like me making candy or Mom balancing the books; if it’s not precise, it’s not right. It’s the same thing with God’s law. If you vary it a little bit, it’s no longer exactly what God said; it’s no longer God’s law.
It’s important for us all to wrap our minds around the fact that we can’t take a little bit off here, add a little bit there, throw in - so to speak - some of our own ideas of what is right and wrong. God is very precise about His commands. We need to realize that we can’t improve on what He has said. And if we don’t keep God’s law exactly as He specified, then we’re not really keeping God’s law! We must follow God’s laws precisely!
Our God
Your clothing did not wear out on you and your foot did not swell these forty years. Deuteronomy 8:4
As you think back over the incredible miracles and ways that God provided for the Israelites, do you think about this verse? Do you think about clothes not wearing out on you or your foot not swelling in forty years of wandering in the wilderness?
It reminds me of a couple of things: first, God didn’t overlook little details. He provided for what they needed. But think about it. If you’d been traveling with the Israelites and your clothing wore out, it would have been a big deal, not a little detail! There’s no local Wal-mart. You have to plant the flax, turn it into linen (with all that entails) and then make your clothes. Or you have to plant cotton and harvest it. Or you have to shear your sheep, wash and card the wood, spin it, weave it, make it into cloth, and then make your clothes. Clothes wearing out was a big deal. Now imagine clothing not wearing out for forty years! Do you realize what a miracle that would have been?! Similarly, not having trouble with your feet swelling when you’re traveling?
There’s another aspect to this provision from God: you don’t see your clothing wearing out. You don’t see the initial swelling of your feet. All of a sudden, a seam gives out and you realize the whole piece of material is rotten. Or you wake up one morning and think, my feet hurt. The absence of the problem sometimes causes you to overlook the fact that it’s not normal! God has done a miracle and you didn’t even notice!
Another thing to notice from this verse is God’s almighty hand. God could completely eliminate all trouble and pain from our lives. But He doesn’t. The verse right before this one talks about God letting the people hunger and then providing manna for them to eat so they might know that man does not live by bread alone but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God. This section goes on to talk about how God humbled the Israelites and tested them that He would know what was in their hearts. Then Moses continues by telling the people that God is disciplining them.
So, even though God could make our path straight, level, and smooth, sometimes He chooses not to. Why? Because He knows what we need in order to form us into the image of His Son. He knows how to mold us to guide us so that we will follow His leading. He does what is best for us in the long-term because He loves us. Sometimes that means keeping our clothing from wearing out. Sometimes it means leading us in the wilderness.
Next time you’re on your knees, you might thank God for the many things He has provided for you, and then thank Him for the provisions that you just took for granted - that you didn’t even notice, and then thank Him for loving you so much, for continuing the sanctification process in you, even when you’re not grateful for the discipline.
And maybe the next time you pull out an old, favorite shirt, thank God that it hasn’t worn out yet.
***A Sound Cannon
Beware lest you say in your heart, ‘My power and the might of my hand have gotten me this wealth.’ Deuteronomy 8:17
Materials: candle, candle holder, matches, cardboard tube, plastic wrap, tape
Have you ever made a sound cannon? You tape plastic wrap tightly over both ends of a plastic tube. Then you make a tiny hole in the middle of one piece of the plastic wrap. When you hit the other end, it creates a drum effect. A tiny puff of air will come out the other end, just strong enough to blow out a candle. Just a little tiny puff of air is enough.
But what would happen if you had a big flame, a campfire, or a forest fire? The tiny puff of air wouldn’t affect a raging fire in the least.
So think about how we produce words: We breathe in air and when we speak, we push air out of our lungs through our vocal cords which vibrate because of the moving air, causing our voice. We can see the effect of our words on the people around us. We can make them smile or we can make them really angry - with just a little word or two. That’s kind of like the cannon putting out the candle. We have just a little power in comparison to the power of God.
But we’re told in Psalm 33:9 that God spoke the world into existence. He said, “Let there be light” and there was! He said, “Let there be lights in the firmament of the heavens” and we had the sun, the moon, and all the stars! That’s the kind of power that God has with His words!
We may think that our power and the might of our hands has gotten for us the things that we have. But we need to realize that what we have is a blessing from God. We could do nothing without God’s blessing. We have so very little power, really, compared with our great God.
Some day, however, we [God’s people - the ones who love Him and who are called by His name] are going to be given a great deal of power as we rule in God’s kingdom with Him. (Revelation 20:6) We’d better learn how to control our words now when we have just a little power - like enough to blow out a candle. Someday God may give us a great deal of power and we’d better know how to use it for good.
God, in His mercy, allows us to start small. We learn to say nice things to people. We learn to build up, instead of tearing down. We learn to compliment and constructively criticize. We don’t denigrate and demoralize. We learn the incredible power of words - giving us just a glimpse of the power God may grant to us in the future.
Erasers and Righteousness
“Know, therefore, that the Lord your God is not giving you this good land to possess because of your righteousness, for you are a stubborn people. - Deuteronomy 9:6
I have a whole collection of erasers. I don’t know why people think that teachers need erasers, but somehow I don’t ever need to buy erasers; people just keep giving them to me. I have little ladybug and bee erasers. I have the end of pencil erasers. I have pen and pencil erasers. I also have a huge eraser that a penpal from Australia sent me. I don’t know if I’ll ever use all of that eraser.
Erasers are for erasing mistakes. But the weird thing about mistakes is that sometimes people are not truly sorry that they’ve made the mistake. They are just sorry they got caught. My black labs are like that. I don’t know how many times I’ve told them not to get the used kleenexes out of the trash can and chew them up! The dogs know they’re not supposed to be in the trash. They always act so sorry and guilty when they’re caught, but I’m pretty certain they’ll do it whenever they next get the chance.
Now I know that dogs just do that. It’s their nature. But is it also our nature to do things that don’t please God, even when we know better? Think about Joshua and Jericho. God gave the Israelites that victory. There’s absolutely no doubt about that! So when Achan took some of the devoted things, what could he have been thinking? When God said He was not giving the people the good land because of their righteousness, He wasn’t kidding!! Over and over again, God’s people showed their stubbornness to do things their way and not God’s way.
Unfortunately, we are very much the same today. We often do the things that displease God, things which are not righteous, things which display our stubbornness. Thankfully we don’t depend upon God to give us good things because of our righteousness. We depend upon God to give us good things because of Jesus’ righteousness. If we belong to God, then our carnal nature is crucified with Christ. We no longer live to ourselves, but we live to God. We still don’t always do things that please God, but Jesus Christ is in the process of changing us, making us perfect. In Christ, we don’t depend upon erasers to undo our mistakes. We trust in the shed blood of Jesus Christ to atone for our sins. That blots them out so much better than an eraser ever could.
Good Gifts
“Know, therefore, that the Lord your God is not giving you this good land to possess because of your righteousness, for you are a stubborn people. Deuteronomy 9:6
What is good? Good food, a good night’s sleep, a good grade, a good answer. Yes. Those all can be good. In Deuteronomy 9:6, Moses told the people that God was giving them “this good land.” Now most of the pictures that I’ve seen of Israel does not make it look like a good land. That word “good” is the word “tov”. It means good, pleasant, beautiful, excellent, lovely, delightful, fruitful. We know this is true because when the 12 men spied out the land, they told the Israelites that the land was flowing with milk and honey. The grapes were huge! It was a bountiful land. That shouldn’t surprise us because James 1:17 tells us that every good and perfect gift is from God. It makes sense that God, the only One who is truly good (Matthew 19:17), would give good gifts.
It is very interesting that Moses contrasts the good land and righteousness with the word stubborn. There’s no doubt in the reader’s mind that “stubborn” is not a compliment. So then, why did God give them the good land?
Deuteronomy 4:35-39 says, “To you it was shown, that you might know that the Lord is God; there is no other besides him. Out of heaven he let you hear his voice, that he might discipline you. And on earth he let you see his great fire, and you heard his words out of the midst of the fire. And because he loved your fathers and chose their offspring after them and brought you out of Egypt with his own presence, by his great power, driving out before you nations greater and mightier than you, to bring you in, to give you their land for an inheritance, as it is this day, know therefore today, and lay it to your heart, that the Lord is God in heaven above and on the earth beneath; there is no other.” God gave them that land that they would know He is God and because He loved them.
It’s very much the same for us today. God gives us good things so that we will know that He alone is God and because He loves us. Does that mean everything will always be smooth? No. Hebrews 12:5-6 says that sometimes God disciplines us - for our good and because He loves us. Discipline is not easy or comfortable, but it should encourage us that we are God’s treasured possession, His people. Because this is so, because God loves us and gives us good things, we are exhorted “to walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God” (Colossians 1:10).
Are you concerned that you are stubborn and won’t be able to walk in a manner worthy of the Lord? Take heart! Philippians 4:13 says, “I can do all things through him who strengthens me.” And you can walk in a Godly manner through the help of the Holy Spirit. Where can you get the Holy Spirit? It’s another of God’s good gifts.
You just have to ask.
According to the Blessing
Every man shall give as he is able, according to the blessing of the Lord your God that he has given you. Deuteronomy 16:17
There’s a great old hymn - “Count Your Many Blessings” - whose exhortation we would be wise to heed! When we’re down, when we’re overwhelmed, when we’re stricken by the green-eyed monster of envy, or when we’re involved in battle, that’s the time to remember what God has done for us. God has given us so much! He has blessed us so richly! He has directed our steps! He has redeemed us from our sins! He has given us His Son! And then there’s the little things like air to breathe, colors to enjoy, music which inspires us, children who delight, and food to savor! The list goes on and on! Really! When you stop to think about the goodness of our God and the many blessings you could scribe on a piece of paper, the list would be enormous.
So once you’ve written your list, what do you do with it? Hmm.
The author of “Count Your Many Blessings” intended that list to be an encouragement: “help and comfort give you to your journey’s end.” And it is! The list of blessings does strengthen our hands and exhort us to continue on regardless of our struggles and difficulties.
But the list can do more! Obviously, the first step is to recognize that we have received numerous blessings, but then what? It can, and should, motivate us to thank God for those many blessings! It’s hard to grumble and complain when you are expressing gratitude from a grateful heart! I can’t help but think of 1 Corinthians 10:10 - “nor grumble, as some of them did and were destroyed by the Destroyer.” Thanksgiving is a life-saving antidote to grumbling!
But there’s more that listing your blessings does for you. It’s highlighted in this verse in Deuteronomy 16:17: Every man shall give as he is able, according to the blessing of the Lord your God that he has given you. The recognition of our many blessings should motivate us to give an offering to God. How much of an offering? What should I give to God? Well, how much has He blessed you? That’s what this verse says! You give according to how God has blessed you.
So look at your list of blessings again. What monetary value, what offering equivalent can you ascribe to the blessings from God?
When it comes right down to it, we owe God everything: our homes, our families, our possessions, our lives, the very air we breathe and the food we eat. It is not lightly that Paul exhorts the Romans to “present their bodies as living sacrifices”! That truly is our “reasonable worship” (Romans 12:1)! If you (and I) would begin to view our possessions as God’s possessions that we are merely stewards of; if we would begin to view our lives as gifts from God and our entire being as no longer slaves to sin, but bought by the precious blood of Christ; if we would truly view Jesus as our Lord, our Master, our Adoni in every area of our lives, we would live very much differently.
Well, I don’t know about you. I know that I would live very differently. In counting my blessings and giving a gift to God according to how He has blessed me, I would give all that I am. That’s my goal. In scriptural terms, it’s a restatement of 2 Corinthians 10:5: We destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God, and take every thought captive to obey Christ. My gift to God according to how He has blessed me would be everything, my possessions, my life, my very being, including my thoughts!
How has God blessed you?
Victory - Through Our Lord Jesus Christ
“for the Lord your God is he who goes with you to fight for you against your enemies, to give you the victory.”~ Deuteronomy 20:4 (ESV)
I REALLY like Facing the Giants! I think there are some wonderful quotes and vivid images that can be applied in my life, in my Christian walk. The idea of God helping us to win the war against the giants in our lives is veryattractive. But the movie also makes the point that even if God doesn’t give the victory, we praise Him anyway. He has given us so much! The individual victories against a single giant here or there shouldn’t make any difference in our devotion to Him.
That’s the attitude of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. Do you remember? When they were faced with the choice of a horrible death or bowing down to Nebuchadnezzar’s idol, they chose death. They were not willing to compromise on God’s commands, even if it meant they would die. But more than that, they told the king, respectfully, that they knew God could save them from the fiery furnace. Yet even if He didn’t save them, they still would not disobey Him.
That’s the attitude which gives real meaning to today’s verse. “For the Lord your God” means that He truly is your God, not just when you’re in trouble, not just when you want something. God is your God all the time. You seek Him, you serve Him, and you put Him first in your time, in your thoughts, in your conversations, and in your actions. Then, when He is your God, you rest in the knowledge that He goes with you to fight for you against your enemies.
Does that mean you always win every battle? No. Not necessarily. You see, God’s perspective is that He wants you in His kingdom with Him for eternity. And He knows what it’s going to take to get you there. Losing some battles might mean that you turn to Him more completely. More importantly, the attitude you have when you lose some battles shows God your heart. Is your heart committed to Him, committed to praising Him when you win and when you lose?
The KJV gives another perspective on the last phrase of this verse. In the ESV it says, “to give you the victory.” In the KJV, it says “to save you.” That word “save” is Strongs #3467 (yasha) and means “to be open, wide, or free; not cramped.” You have plenty of room to move. According to Zodiates, therefore, it means to be delivered, saved; to get help, to deliver, give victory, to help, to take vengeance, to preserve. The RSV translates this word “savior.” It is from this word that the personal name of our Savior, Jesus, is derived. Whenthe crowds cried Hosanna (Matt 21:9), that word can be traced to this word. Originally, yasha meant being saved from physical enemies or catastrophies. Zodiates says,“Later ‘save’ developed a theological meaning. God is concerned with our physical well-being, our emotional status, and the salvation of our souls. God has the ability to save us from anything which would harm us. Salvation is God’s love in action. There is none outside of Him.”
When you read that, you can’t help but think of 1 Corinthians 15:57, “But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ!”
Amen!
Word study source: Zodiates’ Hebrew-Greek Key Word Study Bible, KJV, pg. 1621.
Keep Your Vows
You shall be careful to do what has passed your lips, for you have voluntarily vowed to the LORD your God what you have promised with your mouth. Deuteronomy 23:23
In the movie Black Beauty, Joe promised the horse that he would find him and buy him back some day. How important was it for Joe to keep that promise?
When two people get married, they recite marriage vows - before God and all those assembled. How important is it to keep those marriage vows?
Ecclesiastes 5:4 says, “When you vow a vow to God, do not delay paying it, for he has no pleasure in fools.” Do you get this? Solomon says if you make a vow and don’t fulfill it, you’re a fool.
This command in Deuteronomy to keep your vows isn’t the only occurrence of this admonition. This is serious stuff to God. So why would anyone make a vow in the first place? Can you think of specific examples in the Bible of people who made a vow and the reason they did so?
Jepthah wanted God to act on his behalf; he wanted victory over the Ammonites. He vowed that if he arrived home in peace (got the victory over Ammon) the first thing to greet him, coming out of the door of his house, he would sacrifice as a burnt offering to God. Judges 11:30-40
Hannah wanted God to act on her behalf; she wanted a son. She vowed that if God gave her a son, she would dedicate him to the LORD. 1 Samuel 1
Saul wanted victory over the Philistines. He vowed that anyone among the people (those fighting the Philistines) who ate anything that day would be cursed. 1 Samuel 14:24-46
Herod wanted to show his pleasure to the daughter of Herodias for her dancing. He vowed up to half of his kingdom to her. Mark 6:22-23
Certain Jews wanted to show their hatred and determination. They vowed to neither eat nor drink until they had killed Paul. Acts 23
How well did these vows turn out for the people who made them?
In Jepthah’s case, what came out of the door of his house was his only child, his daughter. Jepthah was beside himself at his vow, but he knew that he had to fulfill it.
In Hannah’s case, the dedication of that son was a huge benefit to Israel! They had Samuel leading them for years!
Saul’s rash vow was a disaster from the start. The people are fighting the Philistines! How well can you fight when you’re hungry, faint from hunger? To complicate matters, Jonathan (Saul’s son) didn’t hear the curse. He ate some honey. So then, when Saul went to inquire of the LORD to determine their next move, God wouldn’t answer. Saul knew someone had sinned. So he set the people against himself and Jonathan, saying that whoever had sinned would surely die. When it came out that it was Jonathan who had eaten the honey, Saul was ready to fulfill that vow. But the people intervened! Because God had worked mightily through Jonathan that day, and because the people knew that, they wouldn’t let Saul kill him. The way the event is recorded is: “So the people ransomed Jonathan, so that he did not die.”
Herod’s vow was just thoughtless. Proverbs 20:25 says, “It is a snare to say rashly, “It is holy,” and to reflect only after making vows. In other words, you can find yourself in trouble when you vow something before you know what it is that you’ve promised. That’s what Herod did. He didn’t have any idea that it would mean the head of John the Baptist!
Similarly, the Jews who vowed they would neither eat nor drink until they killed Paul were destined to break that vow or to die a premature death - because we know they didn’t kill Paul!
But really, how serious is it to make, and keep, a vow? There’s a passage in Jeremiah 44 where God told the people of Judah who were living in Egypt that they would keep their vows to the queen of heaven to burn incense to her and to pour our drink offerings to her. And subsequently, God would “watch over them for evil, and not for good” and that all those people would “be consumed by the sword and by the famine” until they were all gone! God took their vows very seriously!
And then there’s Psalm 15. It starts out: “O LORD, who shall sojourn in your tent? Who shall dwell on your holy hill.” Then there’s a list of 11 items, including doing what is right, speaking the truth, not slandering your neighbor, not taking a bribe against the innocent. The ninth in the list is this one: “ who swears to his own hurt and does not change.”
How important are your vows, your promises? Let’s review: First, God expects you to keep your vows. Secondly, you’re a fool if you make a vow and then break it. And thirdly, if you want to dwell with God, you have to keep your vows!! In this society, where integrity and vows are not given the weight they require, we need to be extremely careful what we say. We need to seriously consider the words which are about to pass our lips! I don’t know about you, but I want to dwell on God’s holy hill.
Joy and Gladness
Because you did not serve the LORD your God with joyfulness and gladness of heart, because of the abundance of all things, Deuteronomy 28:47
Ebony and Velvet, our two black labs, are about as close as we get to having servants. They exist to serve us, to wake up the children in the morning, to keep a watch out for intruders (especially at night), and to offer us comfort through companionship whenever we need it. They are our servants. (Now, if only someone would tell the dogs that!) But seriously, when I walk up to get the mail, and I tell the dog that she can’t come with me, that she has to stay home, I expect to be obeyed. Neither Velvet nor Ebony like that order. If I’m going for a walk, they want to go along. But, amazingly enough, they both obey me.
One day, several weeks ago, I walked up to get the mail when Ebony was out. She greeted me at the front door with leaps and bounds and huge tail propellers. (Greeting your master joyfully is another mandatory job of a servant.) Those tail propellers stopped abruptly when I told her she had to stay home. But when I walked back down the hill from getting the mail, and I called Ebony to come, she raced to me. When she got close, she ran circles around me to show me how happy she was to see me and how happy she was to be back in my good graces - because I wanted her with me again. But as she raced around me, it wasn’t enough to her; it didn’t express her joy as completely as she wished. Out of the corner of her eye, she caught sight of a leaf on the ground. So she grabbed it in her mouth and tossed it up into the air. Then she grabbed another leaf . . . and another. I was delighted to discover that I have a leaf-throwing dog - because it was how she was expressing her joy.
How important is it to God that we are happy and joyful? On a scale of one to ten, I’d say it’s about a 1. You see, God is not in the business of making us happy - not anymore than a parent’s sole job is to make sure that his or her child is always smiling. That’s not the primary focus.
So what is important to God? You can answer this question by thinking of the things for which God punished His people. Let’s see. Disobedience was a big one. That included breaking any of the Ten Commandments - serving other gods, making idols to worship, taking His name in vain, collecting sticks on the Sabbath (breaking the Sabbath), dishonoring your parents, murdering, committing adultery, stealing, bearing false witness, coveting what is not yours. I can think of stories in the Bible where the people were punished for each one of these transgressions. But what else displeased God? Not treating God as holy kept Moses and Aaron out of the Promised Land. Not trusting God to guide and protect caused the Israelites 20 years old and upwards to lose out on the Promised Land - all except Caleb and Joshua. Grumbling caused God to send fiery serpents among the people.
The first example, obedience, is about what you do. We understand that we are supposed to serve God. We need to obey Him. There are too many examples of disobedience which highlight that error. But the last three examples listed above of what is important to God focus on the attitude towards God - which directly impacts your actions. So the original question of how important joy and gladness are to God is better asked this way: How important is it to God that you serve Him with joyfulness and gladness of heart? Does God care whether you are willingly, eagerly, zealously, joyfully serving Him? Wouldn’t it be enough that you just obey His rules?
No. It’s not enough.
Look at Deuteronomy 28:47-48: Because you did not serve the Lord your God with joyfulness and gladness of heart, because of the abundance of all things, therefore you shall serve your enemies whom the Lord will send against you, in hunger and thirst, in nakedness, and lacking everything. And he will put a yoke of iron on your neck until he has destroyed you.
Our God, who has graciously, incredibly, given us so much (the abundance of all things!!), He expects that we would serve Him with joyfulness and gladness of heart. We willingly serve Him. We eagerly serve Him. We zealously serve Him with our whole heart.
And those servants, those dogs which God has given to us, they show us the way.
Cell Phones and Secret Things
The secret things belong to the LORD our God, but the things that are revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may do all the words of this law. Deuteronomy 29:29
I have an old cell phone. I don’t remember the last time I upgraded, but it’s been years. Nevertheless, I have not yet begun to plumb the depths of what it can do. Oh, I know how to turn it on, make calls, retrieve messages. But that’s about the extent. I know there are games on it. I know I could send a text message. I know there are lots of features that I could access, but it’s enough to me that it just works to make phone calls when I need it to do that.
I learned how to turn it on, answer calls, and make calls when we first got it. Someone showed me how to do the basics. The rest of it, well, I could engage in some trial and error. I could go to the internet and google it. I could go to a phone store and ask. But it just isn’t that important to me to know how to access all of the features. At least, I don’t think I need to access any of the other features; I’m getting along just fine. But the reality is: I know there are probably functions that phone can perform that I haven’t even considered.
In a similar way, God gives us His word, the Bible. Many times whoever gives us our first Bible also gives us some basic instructions, like “don’t steal,” “don’t lie,” and “don’t covet.” We read a little bit here and there. We may go to church and hear what the preacher has to say. We keep adding to our knowledge base of what the Bible says, how it applies to our life, and how our observance of God’s laws impacts our relationship with Him.
As we learn more and more, and as our relationship with God deepens, we want to learn more and more. So we read the Bible. We pray. We fellowship with others who have a similar hunger for the things of God. And then we come across things we don’t understand.
What do you do when you read something you don’t understand? You can 1) stop searching altogether; you can 2) put it on the shelf and look at it later when you have gained more overall understanding; you can 3) gather opinions from other people you respect; you can 4) ask God to give you understanding; or you can 5) remember this verse in Deuteronomy 29:29:
The secret things belong to the LORD our God, but the things that are revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may do all the words of this law.
There are some things that we aren’t going to understand about God during this lifetime, who He is, and what He’s doing. That knowledge doesn’t impact our ability to obey Him. The truth is, the Bible contains enough information for us to obey God, to do what He has said.
But sometimes, we have to dig. There’s a fascinating verse in Proverbs 25:2: It is the glory of God to conceal things, but the glory of kings is to search things out. Sometimes when we come across things we don’t understand, we need to dig a little deeper. We need to show some perseverance in our curiosity. It demonstrates to God just how valuable His word is to us.
I started with a physical example of my cell phone. The analogy breaks down quickly because the cell phone is a tool. I use it to accomplish what I need. God’s way is more than a simple tool; it’s a way of life; it is our life. So while there are many things I don’t know about my cell phone, it doesn’t really matter. In contrast, there are many things I still don’t know about God, and I plan to keep seeking and searching. The things of God matter enormously, and what I need to know God will reveal to me.
***So You Can Do It
But the word is very near you. It is in your mouth and in your heart, so that you can do it. Deut. 30:14
Materials needed: unleavened bread, calendars, stickers
Have you ever looked at a task and been so overwhelmed that you just wanted to go back to bed, pull the covers over your head, and go to sleep? Or maybe you decide that it’s all still going to be there tomorrow, so you decide to do something else like going for a walk or going shopping? Sometimes that’s how people approach obedience to God as well: it’s too hard and they’ll do it later.
I love that God knew people would say this. So He gave us verses like Deuteronomy 30:14: But the word is very near you. It is in your mouth and in your heart, so that you can do it.
I don’t think it’s a coincidence that God tells His people to eat unleavened bread for seven days. See, the spring feasts tell a story. Before we accepted Jesus as our Lord and Savior, we were sinners in need of the Savior. Recognizing your need is the starting point. It’s kind of like starting with a messy room - where do you start to get it all straightened up? You just start. First, acknowledge that you need Jesus. Then start obeying Him. When you see something in His Word, do it. For instance, in Leviticus 23:6, God tells us to eat unleavened bread for seven days. It’s not enough to not eat leavened bread; God specifically tells us to eat unleavened bread. In that way we are reminded that all of the leavening is out prior to the Feast, just as Jesus Christ dealt with our sin when He died. Once He has dealt with our sin, it’s time for us to let Him completely fill our lives. You know that old saying “You are what you eat”? Well, we want to be like Jesus, the unleavened Bread of Life, so we eat unleavened bread every day of the Feast to remind ourselves to let Jesus reign in our hearts and lives. That is, we choose to obey Him in everything. As we obey Him, we become more like Him, and we want to obey Him more and more. Those small steps add up!
This first feast of the year is called the Days of Unleavened Bread. In it we are commanded to eat unleavened bread every day. But this year, today is also the Wave Sheaf Day. It starts the countdown to Pentecost. In Leviticus 23:15-16 we are commanded to count the next 50 days. We may need a calendar to help us keep track of our counting. That will help us remember that it’s not too hard! After all, the desire to obey Jesus is in our hearts.
But the word is very near you. It is in your mouth and in your heart, so that you can do it.
A God of Faithfulness
The Rock, his work is perfect, for all his ways are justice.
A God of faithfulness and without iniquity, just and upright is he. Deuteronomy 32:4
Has anyone ever hurt you, intentionally or unintentionally? It’s almost a silly question to pose because we humans are so fallible that we hurt the people we love the best, unintentionally, quite frequently. Our ways are not always just. Our work is rarely, if ever, perfect.
This verse, found near the beginning of the Song of Moses, contains such a rich collection of descriptors for God. Why? Why did Moses emphasize this part of God’s character? It’s interesting: God’s people have a hard time trusting God because everyone else around them fails them at some time, to some degree. When that’s all we know, it’s hard to remember that God is not like us. We have the incredibly human failing of trying to make God in our image, even when we don’t intend to. So perhaps Moses, for our benefit and for the benefit of the people who would sing his song down through the ages, would write a very strong reminder that God is faithful, just and upright, that His work is perfect and His ways justice.
Perhaps, too, the structure of this verse is designed to help the people remember. There’s a chiasm here. “The Rock” (A) is mirrored by “is He” (A’). “His work is perfect” (B) is mirrored by “just and upright” (B’). “For all his ways are justice” (C) is the positive way to express “without iniquity” (C’). That leaves “A God of faithfulness” in the middle spot. In Western thinking, this doesn’t make sense. But in Hebrew writing, the main point is in the center. Everything else mirrors around that main point, setting it off.
Not only in the chiasm a wonderful literary device for driving home the important point, it also makes memorizing the verse easier. There’s a form, a recognizable structure to the words.
A. The Rock
B. His work is perfect
C. For all his ways are justice
D. A God of faithfulness
C.’ Without iniquity
B.’ Just and upright
A.’ is He
It’s a wonderful reminder for us. We can rest assured, have that confident assurance, that solid foundation, that our God is faithful. Amen!
**Honey From the Rock
He made him ride on the heights of the land and fed him with the fruit of the fields. He nourished him with honey from the rock, and with oil from the flinty crag, Deuteronomy 32:13
Materials needed: honey/honeycomb, plastic knife, spoons
Do you ever find yourself reading along in the Bible and suddenly realize you weren’t paying attention? Oh, you were reading the words; you just weren’t letting them soak in. You weren’t reading for comprehension. I was reading along the other day and saw this verse in Deuteronomy 32. It caught my attention - probably because I started singing “Honey In The Rock.” And once you have a song stuck in your head, good luck trying to think of anything else.
But look at this verse!! He made him ride on the heights of the land and fed him with the fruit of the fields. God brought His people out of captivity in Egypt and blessed them. They were prosperous. They were productive. They had plenty of food. I understand the first part. But this: He nourished him with honey from the rock, and with oil from the flinty crag, (There’s a similar verse in Psalm 81:16)
In the past, honey was a precious commodity: a nutritious food, a valuable gift, a medicine. In fact, Iowa and Missouri engaged in what was called the Honey War in 1839 over a 9.5 mile disputed strip along the top of Missouri. Before the issue was settled, militias from both sides faced each other at the border, a Missouri sheriff collecting taxes in Iowa was incarcerated, and three trees containing beehives were cut down.
And oil was used to soften skin, as a nutritious food, as a fuel for light, and for anointing.
To have God provide honey and oil for His people was a great blessing. But Deuteronomy 32 seems to take it a little further because I wouldn’t normally expect honey to come out of rock or oil out of a flinty crag. Bees make honey; honey doesn’t normally come from a rock. Oil comes from olive trees, not from a cliff or rock face. So what was Moses telling?
Human reasoning would lead us to think that an enterprising bee found a cleft in a rock to make a hive. And a resilient olive tree not only was surviving, but thriving on a rocky crag. So a bee hive and an olive tree were found in unexpected places. We don’t know this from the verse, however.
What we do know is that God takes care of us when we don’t see where the provision could possibly come from! He’s the one who makes us prosperous and productive. He’s the one who provides. We need to thank Him and trust Him and serve Him with all of our hearts!
**Bars of Iron and Bronze
Your bars shall be iron and bronze, and as your days, so shall your strength be. Deuteronomy 33:25 (ESV)
Materials: box lid, string/yarn, spaghetti, popsicle sticks, straws, metal bolts
Let’s suppose we have a model of a country. The country has a border wall around it for protection from wild animals and enemies. But we need a gate so we can get in and out. We still want to visit other countries. We still want to trade with them. We can’t completely block ourselves in. So we need a gate. What are we going to secure our gate with? We could use a nice strong cord. But if our enemies have a strong knife or if there’s a wildfire, that cord won’t last long. What about spaghetti? Well, that’s silly, right? At the first sight of rain, that spaghetti “bar” will be worthless. What about wood? Well, like the strong cord, wood can be cut or burned. What about plastic? It’s strong. But probably not strong enough. What about metal? If we make our gate and dead bolt (bar) out of metal, will it be strong enough to repel the danger?
This verse is part of a blessing pronounced by Moses on the tribe of Asher. Interestingly, Asher was along the northern border of Israel. So if Asher’s gates, and specifically, the bars securing the gates, were strong, the whole country was protected from enemies. In a sense, then, this was a blessing for all of Israel. And we know that it was a blessing of strength because of the parallel structure of the verse. The second half of the verse says, “As your days, so shall your strength be.” In other words, as long as you live, may your have the strength you need. So we know that the first half of the verse is also dealing with strength.
So then what happened? Israel was invaded by the Assyrians from the north. Didn’t they make their bars and gates out of iron and bronze? We don’t really know. But we do know that they turned away from something that is stronger than iron and bronze, something that could have protected them from any enemy. They turned away from God and His ways. They chose to follow pagan customs. So God allowed their enemies to overcome them.
Sometimes we worry about being strong enough to be protected from anything harmful. So what are you securing your gate with? Are you using spaghetti or cords? Are you using wood or metal? Notice that God still expected them to build with a strong material; don’t be stupid. Use the metal to build your gate and your bar. But then you follow God with all of your heart. He is our protection, our strong tower, our protection, our shield. In reality, if we don’t find our security in God, putting our trust even in iron and booze would be similar to trying to secure our gate with spaghetti.
**Thankfulness and Reverence
The eternal God is your dwelling place, and underneath are the everlasting arms. Deuteronomy 33:27a
Materials needed: air-filled packing material
Pepper is terrified of air-filled packing material. Just one rustling noise when unpacking a box can make him head for some place safe. He’s quite sure it’s going to get him. I suspect it’s the loud pop it makes when we stomp on them. That’s scary to any respectable watchdog/head of home security. But in my view, the packing material is a great way to keep things from breaking in transit. Packing material: a beneficial, protective thing that can also be quite scary.
There are other things that that same category:
*Air: The earth’s atmosphere helps to keep the Sun’s harmful rays from reaching us. Good thing. This protective blanket also creates incredible light shows - the Northern Lights. Also a good thing. But the atmosphere also creates a blanket which traps pollution (smog - not the dragon in Lord of the Rings). Not a good thing - the smog is harmful to our respiratory health.
*Air. We need air to live. Good thing. Healthcare providers know that concentrated oxygen can be very beneficial to healing. Also a good thing. But too much moving air - wind shears, tornados, hurricanes - can cause a lot of damage and kill people. Not a good thing.
*Water. We need water to live. So much of our bodies are comprised of water. Having water to drink and to keep ourselves clean is a good thing. But too much water - floods - that’s not such a good thing. In recent years, we’ve experienced flooding in our region. The damage to property is one thing. But the number of snakes that the flooding drove into populated areas was unnerving! Not a good thing. (We could talk about several other aspects of water. but let’s move on.)
*Knives. A good, sharp knife is a very beneficial tool for a chef. A good thing. But a knife sharp enough to chop carrots and slice tomatoes is also sharp enough to do a lot of damage to your fingers. Not a good thing.
So what does this all have to do with our memory verse: The eternal God is your dwelling place, and underneath are the everlasting arms. Deuteronomy 33:27a?
Just this: Our God is incredibly good, awesome in power, mercy, and love. He guides and protects us. But we can never forget that He is the God of justice and righteousness. It’s a dreadful thing to fall into the hands of the living God. He’s not a genie - there to provide for all of our wants and desires. He’s our awesome God, who deserves our praise and worship in reverence. He will not turn a blind eye to our sins. Vengeance is God’s; He will judge each one of us. Keep that in perspective as you receive strength and protection from His everlasting arms.
Even air-filled packing material can remind you to walk humbly with your God.