Deuteronomy 18-19

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Deuteronomy 18:1-22

“The priests the Levites, and all the tribe of Levi, shall have no part nor inheritance with Israel: they shall eat the offerings of the LORD made by fire, and his inheritance. 2 Therefore shall they have no inheritance among their brethren: the LORD is their inheritance, as he hath said unto them. 3 And this shall be the priest’s due from the people, from them that offer a sacrifice, whether it be ox or sheep; and they shall give unto the priest the shoulder, and the two cheeks, and the maw. 4 The firstfruit also of thy corn, of thy wine, and of thine oil, and the first of the fleece of thy sheep, shalt thou give him. 5 For the LORD the God hath chosen him out of all thy tribes, to stand to minister in the name of the LORD, him and his sons for ever. 6 And if a Levite come from any of thy gates out of all Israel, where he sojourned, and come with all the desire of his mind unto the place which the LORD shall choose; 7 then he shall minister in the name of the LORD his God, as all his brethren the Levites do, which stand there before the LORD. 8 They shall have like portions to eat, beside that which cometh of the sale of his patrimony. 9 When thou art come into the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee, thou shalt not learn to do after the abominations of those nations. 10 There shall not be found among you any one that maketh his son or his daughter to pass through the fire, or that useth divination, or an observer of times, or an enchanter, or a witch, 11 or a charmer, or a consulter with familiar spirits, or a wizard, or a necromancer. 12 For all that do these things are an abomination unto the LORD: and because of these abominations the LORD thy God doth drive them out from before thee. 13 Thou shalt be perfect with the LORD thy God. 14 For these nations, which thou shalt possess, hearkened unto observers of times, and unto diviners: but as for thee, the LORD thy God hath not suffered thee so to do. 15 The LORD thy God will raise up unto thee a Prophet from the midst of thee, of thy brethren, like unto me; unto him ye shall hearken; 16 according to all that thou desirest of the LORD thy God in Horeb in the day of the assembly, saying, Let me not hear again the voice of the LORD my God, neither let me see this great fire any more, that I die not. 17 And the LORD said unto me, They have well spoken that which they have spoken. 18 I will raise them up a Prophet from among their brethren, like unto thee, and will put my words in his mouth; and he shall speak unto them all that I shall command him. 19 And it shall come to pass, that whosoever will not hearken unto my words which he shall speak in my name, I will require it of him. 20 But the prophet, which shall presume to speak a word in my name, which I have not commanded him to speak, or that shall speak in the name of other gods, even that prophet shall die. 21 And if thou say in thine heart, How shall we know the word which the LORD hath not spoken? 22 When a prophet speaketh in the name of the LORD, if the thing follow not, nor come to pass, that is the thing which the LORD hath not spoken, but the prophet hath spoken it presumptuously: thou shalt not be afraid of him.”

Introduction

[Audio version: https://resources.ccphilly.org/detail.asp?TopicID=&Teaching=WED605]

“Deuteronomy, chapter 18, we’re journeying through Moses reiterating certain responsibilities to the children of Israel on the border of the Promised Land. The responsibility of judges, the responsibility of kings, we looked at that last week. This evening we’ll look at the responsibility of priests and Levites, and then of Prophets, and then if we have time we’ll look at the Cities of Refuge, for those who might have to flee there.

More About The Priests & Levites

Chapter 18 begins “The priests the Levites, and all the tribe of Levi,” because even the priests were of the tribe of Levi, to be a priest you had to be specifically of Aaron’s line, but the tribe of Levi was set aside to minister to the LORD, and the Levites specifically to the priests, they “shall have no part nor inheritance with Israel: they shall eat the offerings of the LORD made by fire, and his inheritance.” (verse 1) What is to be given to the priests and Levites is rightly the LORD’s, it is rightly God’s. So there is an exhortation to the people that when they come into the land, that they had a particular responsibility towards the tribe of Levi, because the tribe of Levi was not given an inheritance in the land. Joshua chapter 21, Numbers chapter 35 delineate the fact that there were 48 cities given to the Levites that were spread through the tribes, and of course there were pasturelands around their cities and so forth. But the Levites who lived there did not have a parcel of ground that was a family inheritance. There were cities of the Levites, and God here will delineate the responsibility the people have with their offerings and so forth to care for the needs of the priests and the Levites. And he begins by saying, the portion that will be given to them is “his inheritance.” It isn’t the nation’s, it rightly belongs to God, and he says that it should be given to them. “Therefore shall they have no inheritance among their brethren: the LORD is their inheritance, as he hath said unto them. And this shall be the priest’s due from the people, from them that offer a sacrifice, whether it be ox or sheep; and they shall give unto the priest the shoulder, and the two cheeks, and the maw.” (verses 2-3) Ah, [in your fellowship offerings] give to the priests the shoulder, certainly a picture of strength, the shoulder, given to the priests, the cheeks, very interesting, the muscles, we’re told to meditate on the LORD’s Word day and night, it’s actually to ruminate, to chew the cud, interestingly, dedicated to the LORD. And look, the maw is just the stomach, sorry maw, it’s the Hebrew word that means the stomach, where digestion would take place, just interesting pictures, these parts are to be given to the priests. [I wonder if that’s where the Scots got the idea of eating haggis, made up of a sheeps stomach, filled with all kinds of yummy things and cooked, yum, yum.] “The firstfruit also of thy corn, of thy wine, and of thine oil, and the first of the fleece of thy sheep, shalt thou give him. For the LORD thy God hath chosen him out of all thy tribes, to stand to minister in the name of the LORD, him and his sons for ever.” (verses 4-5) This is all of grace. Now certainly the tribe of Levi stood with the LORD as Moses came down with the Ten Commandments, called over to the LORD’s side and took that position, though it seems they had been involved in the idolatry that was taking place [we don’t know that], and remember Aaron himself, who was the high priest, Moses’ brother, is the one who made the golden calf and came up with that cockamamy story about the calf jumping out of the fire. And yet here it says “God hath chosen him” We’ll read in the Book of Hebrews that it was necessary even for the priest to first offer for himself, that he was a sinner like the rest of the tribes. So it strictly says here ”For the LORD thy God hath chosen him out of all thy tribes, to stand to minister in the name of the LORD, him and his sons for ever.” Of course Aaron’s place had been challenged, there were some interesting tests in the wilderness that they should remember, and Moses. But it was by God’s choice, no one takes this office to himself, it says in the Book of Hebrews. “And if a Levite come from any of thy gates out of all Israel, where he sojourned, and come with all the desire of his mind unto the place which the LORD shall choose;” (verse 6) Now if a Levite, living in one of the Levitical cities, if he decides ‘I just want to serve the Temple in Jerusalem, or at the Tabernacle,’ if he decides he wants to come there and serve the priests there, and be there, and it’s in his heart to do that, he says “then he shall minister in the name of the LORD his God, as all his brethren the Levites do, which stand there before the LORD. They shall have like portions to eat, beside that which cometh of the sale of his patrimony.” (verses 7-8) What it says here is, there is a Levite who desires, not just to come up by lot to minister, but it would be his hearts’ desire to be there, continually at the Tabernacle or the Temple, at the presence of the LORD, to minister to the priests and so forth. That then he can come, and that he should receive then the portion that would be given to the Levites that were ministering, and the fact of the sale of any personal possessions that had when he moved there, should not be taken into consideration, that’s the sale of his patrimony. So he was allowed to sell his personal possession and come there, and expect to be cared for, God recognizing that it would be in the heart of some to be there, and asking the nation then to care for that particular man equally. Now 1^st Corinthians chapter 9, verses 13 and 14, 1^st Timothy chapter 5, verses 17 and 18 pointing to similar situations in the New Testament with those that serve. But we have this picture here about those who would come, stand before the LORD, serve the LORD. 1^st Corinthians 9:13-14, “Do ye not know that they which minister about holy things live of the things of the temple? and they which wait at the altar are partakers with the altar? Even so hath the Lord ordained that they which preach the gospel should live of the gospel.”

False prophets, the occult, drugs, back then and now

We come now to the prophets, and there’s a preface from verses 9 down to verse 14, before God delineates the office of a special Prophet. He’s going to tell why he does that. It tells us in the Old Testament the Prophets were first called a Seer, S E E R, because he could see. God does not condemn the desire of his people to know about the future [cf. Amos 3:7, “Surely the Lord God will do nothing, but he revealeth his secret unto his servants the prophets.” see https://unityinchrist.com/Prophets_Prophecy.html ], to know about God’s will, certainly that’s a God-given desire of his people today. Jesus said ‘the Holy Spirit, John 16:13, when he comes, will show you things to come.’ And we’re told to be wise and discerning, and watch, in regards to the days that we live in. There is something innate in the human being that realizes, ‘Hey, we’re more than just a beast of the field, what is eternity about? what is after this? what is the bigger picture in regards to these things?’ And certainly the Jew in ancient Israel understood things of Abraham’s bosom, that there were those that went to be with their fathers, that had an idea of sheol, which is more than the physical grave that was down, and pleasures at the right hand of God, they had certainly a hunger to understand that God’s will superintended the experiences of human beings, and then to know, to be in cooperation with that. Certainly they’re given his Word. [Comment: Ezekiel 37:1-14 is the only Bible promise given to the Jews being held in Babylonian captivity of a hope that they would be resurrected back to life at some unspecified time in the future, and verses 13-14 of Ezekiel 37 actually shows God giving his Holy Spirit to those resurrected in this resurrection. Now connecting the dots with the New Testament, we find that Revelation 20:11-13 shows this is the time of the Great White Throne Judgment, the 2^nd resurrection, when all of unsaved mankind will be resurrected back to life. In Ezekiel 37:13-14, it shows that at this time, God will give everyone resurrected in this resurrection his Holy Spirit, offering them salvation, which for most coming up in this resurrection, will be the first time that has been offered to them. See https://unityinchrist.com/ezek/Ezekiel%20pt3-2.htm and scroll to Ezekiel 37:1-14 and read that section about what those verses mean. So is God being unfair to the Canaanites, or mankind in general? No way, man. That’s not the God I worship. He is both just and merciful at the same time, all in due time.] But God now acknowledges the fact that they had asked, when they were at Horeb, if you remember, God speaking from the mountain, gave the Ten Commandments, and the children of Israel were terrified at that point in time. And they said ‘We don’t want to hear 11 Commandments, we don’t want to hear one more thing. Moses, you go talk to him, and then whatever he says to you, you come tell us and we’ll listen, but just tell him not to talk to us out loud again.’ And in that, there is the office of the Prophet, the office of a Mediator established. And God will address that here. But the first thing he’ll do is he will warn about the counterfeits. And Satan knows the pentient of human beings to probe the spiritual. God’s blessing in the Book of Deuteronomy is directly related to their obedience. All throughout they’re told, If you will obey, if you will listen to the Word of God, then your future will look like this, God will bless you, he will lead you, he will increase your flocks and your herds and so forth, that was the Law, that was the Old Testament. And it is an offense to the Living God, it is an abomination for his people to come into the land of Canaan and there get involved with wizards and astrology and witchcraft and all of these things, trying to discern or manage their own life, or trying to get some spiritual edge, when God said, no, sorcery will never be the way for people to take hold of their spiritual wellbeing, to secure their future. ‘It is directly related to their relationship to Me, I’m the LORD of lords, I’m the King of kings, I’m the Sovereign God, the Creator of the heavens and the earth, the One who called and chose the tribe of Levi and Aaron, I’m the One who will raise up another Prophet like unto Moses.’ So their spiritual wellbeing and their spiritual hunger was to be satisfied in their God, and it was an affront to him, and he knew a danger to them, that they would turn to other things. Now look, this is not an Old Testament story. The fact that the Psychic Hotline could exist today is proof that we’re still as gullible as we were then. Again, the big one, psychic whatever it went out of business in Florida, the newspaper headline said “They never saw it coming.” [laughter] How many periodicals and magazines right inside the cover, right at the back, is the horoscope, and you can find out how you’re going to do in July by what Toros is doing, whether Jupiter’s rising, cut me a break, that was 35 years ago with LSD we were interested in that. Didn’t that all fade away with the Hippies? Why’s that still alive, and why is it so, it’s everywhere. And again, Oprah now with the course of miracles and Maryann Williamson, I thought that was something that went out with the Hippies. Human beings are searching, you and I know the Truth, you and I have the Truth, and the Truth is unrelenting, it is intolerable, it is powerful, it is lifechanging, it is light and darkness, and we have it to communicate to a lost world. But that lost world out there has some hunger, and Satan will satisfy that with a thousand other things, and it isn’t any different now than it was back in ancient Canaan. So, here is gathered together and delineated probably all of the spiritual counterfeits they would encounter as they came into the land, and they’re warned of those things first. It says here “When thou art come into the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee, thou shalt not learn to do after the abominations of those nations. There shall not be found among you any one that maketh his son or his daughter to pass through the fire, or that useth divination, or an observer of times, or an enchanter, or a witch or a charmer, or a consulter with familiar spirits, or a wizard, or a necromancer. For all that do these things are an abomination unto the LORD: and because of these abominations the LORD thy God doth drive them out from before thee.” (verses 9-12) And Moses had grown up with all of these things in Egypt. He had grown up in the most idolatrous, wealthy, remarkable and educated nation, in regards to math and geometry and architecture and so forth. It says in the Book of Acts chapter 7, he was learned in all the ways in the science of the Egyptians, among all of this. The generation that had come out with him had basically perished in the wilderness. Now there’s a new generation that had not seen those days, that are going to face very similar things as they would come into the land of Canaan. I guess the picture for you and I, as again, Canaan is not a picture of heaven, there’s too many wars, too many giants, too much weirdness there, I’m hoping heaven is not like any of that at all. [Comment: Calvary Chapels, and most Sunday-keepers have this concept of going to heaven when you die, when in reality (and they know this, they’re just trying not to ruffle the feathers of the older Sunday-keeping denominations) they know that the only time the ‘just resurrected to immortality believers (1^st Corinthians 15:49-54)’ will go to heaven is depicted in Revelation 19:7-9, when we go up to the New Jerusalem for the Wedding Feast of the Lamb. Then we return back down to earth with Jesus to fight the enemies of Israel in the battle of Armageddon, and bring peace to the world as the Millennial reign of Jesus and all of us begins in Jerusalem, spreading out to the world. This Millennial Kingdom of God on earth lasts for 1,000 years, and then after the 2^nd resurrection period of time, the earth and universe are melted down, and then the creation of the new heavens and earth takes place, and the New Jerusalem comes down to earth, heaven will end up on the new earth, forever, and we’ll be living in that New Jerusalem, the real heaven on earth (cf Revelation 20:14-15; 21:1-23). Sorry to bust your bubble, but that’s what the Bible teaches.] Certainly Canaan is a picture of the promises God has made to us, it’s a picture of the spiritual life that we can live, and there are wars there, there are battles there [in our present lives on earth as we live our lives as believers], things that we will encounter there. We have God’s promises, God’s Word he’s set before us, and we can partake of his presence, of his Spirit, of the resources that he’s given to us, so that we can walk with him, remarkably. The first thing it mentions here is those who would make their son or their daughter pass through the fire, certainly the worship of Molech [Baal by another name] in the land, but often the worship of Molech [Baal] in placing a baby in the hot arms of a brazen statue where that baby would scream and die, and the crowds would all scream so they wouldn’t hear the baby scream, all this done to placate that god. There was another process relative to sacrificing their sons and daughters to try to figure out the future, try to have favour, to have that put in front of them. And God always considers that the ultimate blasphemous abomination, sacrificing of the children, it’s amazing that Israel would stoop to that. In Isaiah he says, “And when they shall say unto you, Seek unto them that have familiar spirits, and unto wizards that peep, and that mutter: should not a people seek unto their God? for the living instead to [of the] dead?” (Isaiah 8:19) “To the Law and to the Testimony: if they speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them.” (verse 20) In John’s Gospel, Jesus had said this to the Pharisees and Sadducees, but he gives us some spiritual insight, ‘You’re of your father the devil, and the lust of your father you will do, he was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaketh the lie, he speaketh of his own, for he is a liar and the father of it.’ So spiritual influence outside of the Scripture and outside of the Living God is based on deception. We should know that all the way back from Genesis chapter 3 and the serpent there, with Eve.

The Categories Of False Prophets

This first picture, of those who would make their sons and daughters passing through the fire, using divination. You remember, and there’s kind of three categories here. Divination, observer of times, enchanters seem to be relative to foretellers. The etymology of these words is very difficult, but it seems to be looking towards those who would try to discern the future [why not rely on God’s Prophets and what they prophecy instead of those ungodly idiots? is my question]. Then we have the witch, which is masculine there, and the charmer, which seems to be those who would manipulate or control others through spells and so forth [that is quite common in African nations, and it really works, in very dark ways]. And then the last group, the necromancer, familiar spirits and all, has to do with communicating with the dead, because they had such a fear of death and such an awe of the dead, they thought if they could communicate with the dead, they could get insight into what’s going on, they would have wisdom above others and so forth [again, the Bible gives us wisdom in the Book of Proverbs and Ecclesiastes, why look elsewhere?]. So those three are clearly in the use of these words. So the first is, making their sons and daughters pass through the fire, in using divination. Now you remember Joseph and his brothers, they put the “cup” in Benjamin’s sack, in the grain. That cup was a cup they [the Egyptians] used for divination. They put water in it, put different things in it, they looked. People do that with teacups. Ever know anybody that went and got their tea leaves read? What a bummer man, you know you got the Living God the maker of heaven and earth who gave his Son for you, and somebody thinks their future is determined by how some old tea leaves that are stuck on the side of a cup. I don’t know, I think we got a better deal. Or it’s palm readers, you ride down the street sometimes, you see the palms, the sign, somebody’s going to tell you what’s going to happen in your life by looking at your palm. Our God knows the future, he looks at our palm, he looks at our feet, he looks at our head, he looks at our height, and he looks at our next week, next month, he knows our whole life, he sees us washed in the blood of his Son, we don’t need palm-readers, ok. Ah, observers of times, soothsayer, the Hebrew uses that sense, it can be relative to astrology, don’t let somebody ask what sign you are, cut me a break sign, stop sign, leave me alone sign, sign your own dotted line, leave me alone. Astrology can be in that, soothsaying, again, using enchantments and so forth. Enchanter here, interesting word, it’s masculine, it’s warlock in some of the ancient translations, and it has sometimes the idea of muttering and using potions, using drugs. Look, the ancients used mescaline, the ancients used the drugs that we’re using today, they used hallucinogens, they did all of those things. [The Native Americans used peyote, mescaline, very strong forms of marijuana in their peace pipe, boy no making war after smokin a bowl of that stuff.] Are we any different today? We are just as sick today, again. It’s remiss of me not to mention, they had this conference in California back in the ‘90s on hallucinogens, and one of the things they covered was “toad-licking” that they discovered, this is our generation, they discovered that if you frighten certain toads, don’t say you can’t be talking about toads, I’m talking about toads, the things that look like frogs but they live on the land, that if you frighten them they emit an oil and certain of those oils are hallucinogens. And if you licked that toad, you’d have, I’m assuming, a bad trip, you know [laughter]. This is our culture today! And you’re laughing, but if you hadn’t got saved you’d probably be licking toads by now. And I did think about, I thought ‘Well, you have to love them, they’re lost.’ The guy that bothers me is the guy who didn’t know about the hallucinogens and licked the first toad. What was up with that guy, why’d he do that? So you have this first crew that seems to be those who are trying to get hold of the future to find out information. Then it says again, a witch here, which is also masculine, we would think today of a shaman, a sorcerer, again, and using spells to control other lives, putting hexes on people, that kind of thing. A charmer, specifically it seems to be pointing to spells, drugs. Look, again, Paul in the New Testament when he talks about the acts of the flesh, he mentions sorcery, which is pharmekia, pharmakos, we get pharmacy from it. It’s the buying, selling and using of drugs. And the average American doesn’t tap into sorcery or witchcraft by sacrificing a chicken on the kitchen floor, it’s by smoking dope or snorting coke or ice or heroine, it opens up the spiritual realms that are real, that we’re not to be open to. And there’s enough of it, and it’s destroying homes, it’s the power of darkness, it’s destroying lives, it’s destroying marriages, it’s destroying the next generation. It’s destructive. No one has ever been made better by it. And I am not opposed to prescription medication, when someone’s in the hospital suffering in pain, I am not talking about that, though there’s enough of that abused. There’s a proper use for a doctors care, relative to pain, I believe that. Here then it moves on to a consulter of familiar spirits, it’s talking to the dead, you go to séances , anybody here, please, they’re forbidden in Scripture, to just sit there and have the voice of your grandma. There’s a great gulf fixed we’re told in Luke 16, they’re not coming back. First of all, any of us who have loved ones who have gone on to be with the Lord, they are not interested in coming back here to talk with us. No offense. I know there’s a lot of emotion and heart-wrenching in loosing someone, and sometimes I hear someone say they’re looking down on the memorial service today, I don’t think they are. When you try to imagine their options up there, looking at a memorial service is at the bottom of their list. Because in front of their eyes, is the Glory of the Lord, the King of kings, in front of their eyes is that scene, with the rainbow, Sea of Glass, the fire and the throne of God, of the Lamb, the cherubim and the angels, David, and Abraham, Noah, and Spurgeon, and Whitfield, Moody, so much going on up there to look back here. [Comment: Calvary Chapels (and most Sunday-keeping Christians) believe when you die, your spirit goes to heaven, remaining conscious, while your physical body decays down here. Then at the time of the first resurrection your spirit up there re-unites back into your new glorious body. But all the time before that, your spirit’s alive, conscious up in heaven. The Sabbath-keeping Churches of God, following what Ecclesiastes and Psalms teaches, believe all the human spirits in man go upward upon death, unconscious, until it is reunited with the resurrection body at the point in time of whichever resurrection it is to be part of, the 1^st resurrection to immortality (1^st Corinthians 15:49-54) or the 2^nd resurrection back to mortal life (Ezekiel 37:1-14 and Revelation 20:11-13). Whose right? We’ll see when we get there. Only real way to find out is to die 😊] So don’t go to a séance and try to communicate. First of all, as a Christian you should never be there. And if you know people that go there, look, you’re just messing with demonic spirits, that’s all it is. They can do impersonations. There’s guys in TV that make their living doing impersonations, some of them are even funny. A demonic spirit can impersonate your mom or your dad or you aunt or you uncle or somebody. The last one is the wizard, is literally a channeler, the Hebrew, of course we hear of that today, channeling. Wasn’t it one of those movie stars that was channeling, Shirely McLaine, she was channeling for awhile, wasn’t she, 4,000 year old Irishman or something I don’t know. [She died mysteriously too, drowned, no one knows how, mystery never solved.] I remember they had a convention out there, New Age thing where they all, they lit their candles, they were all chanting, trying to communicate with the other world, and there were so many candles lit, it set off the fire extinguishers and everybody got soaked and all the candles went out, got rained on their parade, it was really a wonderful thing. The last one here, necromancer is again, communicating with dead. These last three, strictly forbidden in Scripture, strictly forbidden in Scripture. You want to communicate with the dead, go to Jesus Christ, he was dead, he’s alive forevermore. You want to communicate with somebody that went on, we can go to him. We can have all of his attention, all of his care.

The Occult In Our Day & Age

All of this is just a counterfeit, a Satanic counterfeit. And it would distract us. Look, it’s something you and I need to think about, I have this article on Evangelical Wickens, if you can believe that, that think they can be Christian, ‘Hey, I’m a white witch,’ I’ve had people in church say that to me, ‘I’m a white witch,’ and I’m thinking ‘Well is that preferable to a purple witch, or a green witch, what do you mean you’re a white witch!?’ Cut me a break, I feel great about that, cut me a break. Here’s one article, it says “Fort Hood, America’s largest military base, sprawls over 340 acres, sunbaked limestone in the brush of Texas hill country near Austin, home of 42,000 soldiers, 1^st Armored Calvary Division, 4^th Mechanized Infantry Division, one of America’s greatest fighting forces. It turned up that they had this Wicken coven there. The outset of the story was surprisingly low to attract widespread attention, on May 11, 1999, the Austin-Texas American Statesman published an article by reporter Kim Perks, about the officially sanctioned Wicken ceremonies that had been going on for nearly three years at Fort Hood. It said they were worshipping through the Spring Equinox, they were jumping naked through fires.’ and then it says ‘Finally it got to the London Telegraph, which blew it up, and America then started to respond, and finally Bill O’Riley got ahold of it,’ and of course once he gets ahold of it then everybody. So this is at Fort Hood. There’s another one here, interesting, to me at least, forgive me. This one guy protested, got the A.C.L.U. involved because some of the gravestones of some of our soldiers, this one guy whose a Navy veteran, he’s a Wicken, and he wanted pentagrams on the gravestones, in military cemeteries. They fought him off and fought him off, there were crosses, there were Jewish stars of David, the Crescent Moon for Muslims, so they went and fought this thing and fought this thing, and finally, reluctantly they bowed the knee and agreed to allow them to put pentagrams on gravestones in American Forces Cemeteries, pentagrams. This is the country that we live in. Wickens meet on an Air Force base, this is at, this guy saying that they should be able to do it, this is at Lakeland Air Force Base. They don’t officially consider services, but they said all faiths could worship there, but the services are drawing between 25 and 50 people every time they meet at Lakeland Airforce Base. And these are Wickens, these are Wicken Covens. Look, this is not an old thing, this is something our country is swinging back towards this. The more impotent the Church is, because it is surrendering the inerrancy of God’s Word, making the mistake we saw in the last century, people are not on their knees fasting and praying for our government, the Church is not seeking the Lord for the filling of the Holy Spirit, we’re building churches with coffee shops and rear-screen projection and coloured lights and smoke machines and Las Vegas worship. We’re loaded for bear on the horizontal and we’re lacking on the vertical. And whatever Moody and Spurgeon and Whitfield and these men and women through the centuries had that changed nations, changed metropolitan areas [like Charles Finney in Rochester, New York], that’s what we need, that’s what we need. And God says these are the kind of things that are destructive to people, and destructive to a nation, he forbid them to his ancient people. He says “For all that do these things are an abomination unto the LORD: and because of these abominations the LORD thy God doth drive them out from before thee.” (verse 12) Now look, the best thing for our nation, it would be for the Church, you and I, for our nation to repent and seek the One True Living God, to seek the One True Living God. You noticed after 9/11 you saw all the Congress standing on the steps of the Capitol Building singing God Bless America, while they were still shaking in their boots, they were very serious about God. Isn’t it funny? That’s what our nation lacks, there’s no more fear of God. And as a people we need to come back, and the Revival needs to start there, in the Church [greater Body of Christ, i.e. all the Christian churches], so that we’re infectious, the Church needs to be revived, and one of the side benefits of that is evangelism, touching the nation that we live in [see https://unityinchrist.com/prophets/Zephaniah/REVIVAL.html ]. “Thou shalt be perfect with the LORD thy God. For these nations, which thou shalt possess, hearkened unto observers of times, and unto diviners: but as for thee, the LORD thy God hath not suffered thee so to do.” (verses 13-14) Because all of it’s an indication of the burden and the blindness of people. People want to know the future, they want to know what’s going on. There’s a way to know that. Again, the Scripture, over half the Scripture is prophetic, it’s not the Bhagavata, not the Upanishads, not the Koran, the Scripture, over half of it speaks of the future, there is a way for us to know [one third of the Bible is actual prophecy (see https://unityinchrist.com/Prophets_Prophecy.html ], there is a way for us to know, and the LORD wants us to know, and the LORD says ‘test me and see, who else can do this?’ The fact that we think about the dead, what’s happened, that fact, that that’s something that plagues the human mind. There’s an answer for that, in Jesus Christ, and the resurrection from the dead, and the hope that we all have. And the fact that people dabble in all of those things is just an evidence of their blindness, and their emptiness. And you have the answer, you have the answer.

‘I will raise them up a Prophet, like unto thee, Moses’

God challenges them about the deception first, and then he says this in verse 15, “The LORD thy God will raise up unto thee a Prophet from the midst of thee, of thy brethren, like unto me; unto him ye shall hearken; according to all that thou desirest of the LORD thy God in Horeb in the day of the assembly, saying, Let me not hear again the voice of the LORD my God, neither let me see this great fire any more, that I die not.” (verses 15-16) Now listen, this Prophet is going to be raised up, he’s going to be like unto Moses, according to all that they desired of the LORD thy God “in Horeb in the day of the assembly, saying, Let me not hear again the voice of the LORD my God, neither let me see this great fire any more, that I die not.” So there is a Prophet, Moses said, that’s going to come. It isn’t wrong to want one, there’s one that’s going to come, he’s going to be like unto me, Moses is saying, in the sense he would be the Mediator of a Covenant. Moses becomes the Mediator of the Covenant, because the people say ‘Tell God not to talk to us anymore. You go and stand in the gap between us, you listen to him, whatever he says, then you come and you tell us.’ And Moses says there’s going to be a Prophet raised up, in that sense, like unto me, according to the request you made. Not just a Prophet, there were many prophets, Samuel was a great Prophet, one of my favourites, there were amazing men and women in the Old Testament that had prophetic gifts. But this one specifically was [will be] like unto him, in regards to the request made at Horeb, and that is in regards to a mediating function. And that Jesus Christ would come and be the Mediator of a better Covenant, a more effective and proper covenant (cf. Jeremiah 31:31-34 & Hebrews 8:6-13). Here, certainly, a Prophet would come, it’s spoken of there. Acts chapter 3, verses 22 and 23 tell us certainly about that. Here he says it would be relative to a mediating ministry, ‘because you didn’t want to hear from God, you wanted to hear from an individual.’ “And the LORD said unto me, They have well spoken that which they have spoken. I will raise them up a Prophet from among their brethren, like unto thee, and will put my words in his mouth; and he shall speak unto them all that I shall command him. And it shall come to pass, that whosoever will not hearken unto my words which he shall speak in my name, I will require it of him.” (verses 17-19) Look, the problem between man and God is sin, what’s broken down the communication between man and God is sin. Jesus came to remedy that, he is the Mediator of another Covenant. God says ‘I’m going to put my words in his mouth,’ Jesus said ‘The words that I speak are not mine, they’re the Father’s who dwelleth in me.’ Over and over in John’s Gospel, as we’re studying, that’s what Jesus says. ‘If you don’t believe me because of what I say, believe me for the works sake,’ but he said ‘that which I speak, I speak not of myself, but the Father which sent me, he gave me the words to speak.’ John chapter 1 tells us the Law came by Moses, but grace and truth come by Jesus Christ. No man at any time has seen God, but the only begotten of the Father, he hath declared him, or demonstrated him, or displayed him. And it’s very interesting, look what it says here, verse 19, “And it shall come to pass, that whosoever will not hearken unto my words which he shall speak in my name, I will require it of him.” Remember, Peter, James and John, when they were on the mount of transfiguration, and Moses is there, and Elijah, and of course Peter didn’t know what to say, he said ‘It’s a good thing we’re here,’ and then it says they were overshadowed by the Shekinah, God’s glory, and a voice said ‘This is my Son, hear ye him.’ and nobody was left on the scene but Jesus Christ. We’re told in the Book of Hebrew 1:1-2, “God, who at sundry times and in divers manners spake in time past unto the fathers by the prophets, hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son, whom he hath appointed heir of all things, by whom also he made the worlds;” So it says that God has spoken again, in these last days, once and for all, in Son, in Jesus Christ, God in Christ, reconciling the world to himself. There isn’t a problem with that, except for the will of man. He says here “it shall come to pass, that whosoever will not hearken” it doesn’t say they cannot hearken, it’s a matter of the will, it’s a matter of choice, “whosoever will not hearken” that’s what it’s saying here. Whoever decides they don’t want to listen to the voice of God in the person of Jesus Christ, he will deal with them. It’s not that they can’t hear, it’s their unwillingness to hear, and Amos again addresses the same thing in his days when he said ‘there is a famine, not of water or of bread, and so forth, but a famine of the hearing of the Word of the LORD.’ Again, not of the Word of the Lord, Bibles are all over our country, Bibles in our Lost & Found, Bibles are on bumper-stickers, Bibles on television, there’s not a famine of the written Word, but there’s a famine “of the hearing of the Word of God.” And God says here, “whosoever will not hearken” lean into and listen with the intent of obeying my words, it’s a matter of choice, he says it right here. It’s a matter of choice, they will not do it, their will is involved, “which he shall speak in my name, I will require it of him.” You know, I pray, if you’re here tonight and you don’t know Christ, you make a decision. This world is filled with deception, this world’s filled with insanity on every level. Our perspectives are skewed, there’s hatred and there’s bigotry and there’s war and drugs and there’s families just disintegrating, and as it says about the last days, we’ve lost natural affection, there’s truce-breaking, there’s all kinds of things going on. But in the midst of all of that God’s still speaking, in the midst of all of that he still loves you. If you don’t know him tonight, he sent his Son to die for you. And he says the problem isn’t that you can’t hear, the problem is ‘We don’t want to hear,’ sometimes. You can hear people say ‘I kind of know what you’re saying is true, but I’m gonna sow my wild oats and then right in the end then I’ll turn.’ That’s a bad gamble. That is a bad gamble. If someone told you that you had an aneurism that could burst at any time, you wouldn’t think ‘Well, let me just run wild, live how I want to and then when I really feel it’s bad I’ll get it fixed,’ that’s insane. The Bible says ‘Today is the acceptable day of salvation’ [no, actually the accurate quote of that Scripture is ‘Today is a, an, acceptable day of salvation.’ Many pastors change the “a” to the word “the,” scratching their heads over why is says “a” day of salvation in the actual Greek text]. Maybe you’re here tonight and you don’t know him, he’s reaching out to you in his love, and a portion of this is for you. He says “whosoever will not hearken unto my words which he shall speak in my name, I will require it of him.”

Now We’re Back To False Prophets Again

“But the prophet, which shall presume to speak a word in my name, which I have not commanded him to speak, or that shall speak in the name of other gods, even that prophet shall die.” (verse 20) Now it’s severe enough what he says here, when the true Word is spoken, he’ll require it, when a false prophet speaks that he hasn’t commanded to speak, and they know that, that false prophet was to be put to death. We can’t do that anymore, but it was in those days it happened. “And if thou say in thine heart, How shall we know the word which the LORD hath not spoken?” he says this, “When a prophet speaketh in the name of the LORD, if the thing follow not, nor come to pass, that is the thing which the LORD hath not spoken, but the prophet hath spoken it presumptuously: thou shalt not be afraid of him.” (verses 21-22) Now any of you guys who have been around the Church awhile, especially the Pentecostal side, I grew up on that side, when a prophet comes running and everyone’s kind of afraid, his favourite other line is ‘Don’t touch the Lord’s anointed, don’t touch the Lord’s anointed.’ But when they come in and they’re prophesying, you kind of don’t know what to think. He says, ‘Look,’ Edgar Case, Nostradamus, all of these supermarket tabloid prophets and prophetesses, by the way, it’s been estimated that they only get 20 to 30 percent accuracy. That if they would flip a coin and decide they’d get closer to 50 percent right, just God’s humour, that’s all. The way you tell a false prophet, ‘If I send somebody, and I tell them to say something, everything they say will happen EXACTLY the way they say it, because they heard if from me.’ [see https://www.unityinchrist.com/ProofOfTheBible-FulfilledProphecy.htm] The way to tell if somebody is not a true prophet, is there’s no margin for error. God’s saying “I’m not grading prophets on a curve here, because he got 90 percent this week and 85 percent last week, he’s not a prophet. It has to be 100 percent accuracy,’ if it’s from the Living God. And he says, if not, you don’t have to be afraid of him. You don’t have to cow-tow in front of him, you don’t have to be afraid of him.”

Deuteronomy 19:1-21

“When the LORD thy God hath cut off the nations, whose land the LORD thy God giveth thee, and thou succeedest them, and dwellest in their cities, and in their houses; 2 thou shalt separate three cities for thee in the midst of thy land, which the LORD thy God giveth thee to possess it. 3 Thou shalt prepare thee a way, and divide the coasts of thy land, which the LORD giveth thee to inherit, into three parts, that every slayer may flee thither. 4 And this is the case of the slayer, which shall flee thither, that he may live: Whoso killeth his neighbour ignorantly, whom he hated not in time past; 5 as when a man goeth into the wood with his neighbour to hew wood, and his hand fetcheth a stroke with the ax to cut down the tree, and the head slippeth from the helve, and lighteth upon his neighbour, that he die; he shall flee unto one of those cities, and live: 6 lest the avenger of the blood pursue the slayer, while his heart is hot, and overtake him, because the way is too long, and slay him; whereas he was not worthy of death inasmuch as he hated him not in time past. 7 Wherefore I command thee, saying, Thou shalt separate three cities for thee. 8 And if the LORD thy God enlarge thy coast, as he hath sworn unto thy fathers, and give thee all the land which he promised to give unto thy fathers; 9 if thou shalt keep all these commandments to do them, which I command thee this day, to love the LORD thy God, and to walk ever in his ways; then shalt thou add three cities more for thee, beside these three: 10 that innocent blood be not shed in thy land, which the LORD thy God giveth thee for an inheritance, and so blood be upon thee. 11 But if any man hate his neighbour, and lie in wait for him, and rise up against him, and smite him mortally that he die, and fleeth into one of these cities: 12 then the elders of his city shall send and fetch him thence, and deliver him into the hand of the avenger of blood, that he may die. 13 Thine eye shall not pity him, but thou shalt put away the guilt of innocent blood from Israel, that it may go well with thee. 14 Thou shalt not remove thy neighbour’s landmark, which they of old time have set in thine inheritance, which thou shalt inherit in the land that the LORD thy God giveth thee to possess it. 15 One witness shall not rise up against a man for any iniquity, or for any sin, in any sin that he sinneth: at the mouth of two witnesses, or at the mouth of three witnesses, shall the matter be established. 16 If a false witness rise up against any man to testify against him that which is wrong; 17 then both the men, between whom the controversy is, shall stand before the LORD, before the priests and the judges, which shall be in those days; 18 and the judges shall make diligent inquisition: and, behold, if the witness be a false witness, and hath testified falsely against his brother; 19 then shall ye do unto him, as he had thought to have done unto his brother: so shalt thou put the evil away from among you. 20 And those which remain shall hear, and fear, and shall henceforth commit no more any such evil among you. 21 And thine eye shall not pity; but life shall go for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot.”

The Cities Of Refuge

“When the LORD thy God hath cut off the nations, whose land the LORD thy God giveth thee, and thou succeedest them, and dwellest in their cities, and in their houses; thou shalt separate three cities for thee in the midst of thy land, which the LORD thy God giveth thee to possess it.” (verses 1-2) Now back in Numbers 35 they set aside three cities on the other side of Jordan, where Reuben, Gad and half the tribe of Manasseh were going to stay. These will be three cities on the west side of Jordan, where the land of Canaan was. “Thou shalt prepare thee a way,” keep the roads clean “and divide the coasts of thy land, which the LORD giveth thee to inherit, into three parts, that every slayer may flee thither.” (verse 3) This is what he’s going to say, he’s going to say ‘Divide up the land of Canaan into three equal sections, and in each one of those sections you have a city of Refuge, I want you to keep the roads and the directions to it clear, because the city of Refuge is there, because if someone kills someone accidentally, there’s no premeditation, they hadn’t hated that person, they hadn’t been angry at them,’ like if you’re chopping wood, and the ax head flies off and hits somebody in the head and kills him, there has to be a place for them to go. So he said they can flee to the city of Refuge. Because if they don’t, it says the avenger of blood, and we’re going to read it, the Hebrew is one word, Goel, the kinsman, the closest male in the family. There’s no police force in Canaan. The closest adult male had the responsibility to avenge the unjust death of someone else in the family. Look, much of what happens in the Middle East today, I’m not condoning it, because a lot of it’s so crazy, but you have to understand there’s Hatfield’s and McCoy’s mentality attached to them in the Middle East, and it doesn’t matter if it it’s 600, 700, 1,000 years, there’s a mentality in the Middle East today that we don’t understand. And some of it is this, among the Bedouin today, I’ve been to Israel many times, they’ll still do this. If a Bedouin invites you into his tent, even if he hates you, you are safe in his tent. They will never betray hospitality. If he leaves his tent, no one else will touch it, that’s how sacred it is, it’s his. And it’s funny to drive by and see TV antennas and Honda generators sitting outside of them. If someone kills his wife or his son, and it’s murder, that Bedouin will tract that person down, because they still embrace this. They are the Goel, in other parts of the world were this still goes on. God wants to protect his people, and he knows there will be times where there is involuntary manslaughter, it is not premeditated, it’s a mistake, it’s terrible. And then that slayer was to flee to the city of Refuge, which is a beautiful picture of Christ, he was safe there. And he lived there until the death of the high priest. If he came out of the city (before the death of the high priest) and the avenger caught him, he’d kill him. As long as he stayed in the city he was safe. And when the high priest died, then he was free to go, nobody could touch him, and of course a beautiful picture of our High Priest, dying, for our failings, our sins. But it says here, “Thou shalt prepare thee a way, and divide the coasts of thy land, which the LORD giveth thee to inherit, into three parts, that every slayer may flee thither. And this is the case of the slayer, which shall flee thither, that he may live: Whoso killeth his neighbour ignorantly, whom he hated not in time past;” (verses 3-4) You know, it’s interesting in Acts chapter 3 as Peter’s preaching, he said ‘God winked at your sins, because you did it ignorantly.’ You know, that they had been ignorant. And that there was a place for those who had put Christ to death to flee to safety, and it was to the very one of course whom they had put to death, Acts chapter 3, verses 15 to 17, interesting. Now he gives an exampled, “as when a man goeth into the wood with his neighbour to hew wood, and his hand” I love the King James, ok “fetcheth a stroke with the ax to cut down the tree, and the head slippeth from the helve, and lighteth upon his neighbour, that he die; he shall flee unto one of those cities, and live:” (verse 5) He didn’t do it on purpose, he’s to flee there. Now how did he know that he was safe when he got there? When he fled there, how did he know he was safe? Was it by his feelings? Was it by his conscience? I’m sure his conscience accused him. Or was it by believing the Word of God? It’s the same today for you and I, when we flee to Christ. We’ve saved, the Bible tells us that, if we commit our salvation to him, we ask forgiveness in faith. It’s not based on feelings, it’s wonderful, isn’t it, when you wake up in the morning and you feel Christian, the sun’s out, you got a hot cup of coffee, nobody hassles you, you feel pretty Christian. You wake up with a headache and it’s raining, somebody bashes into you, you don’t feel very Christian then. Does it mean you’re not Christian? Your conscience, when you fail, do something stupid, you compromise, you fly off the handle. It’s because of God’s Word, we believe his Word, because he’s given us his Word, his Living Word, his written Word, and we have found refuge in Jesus Christ. When he died on the cross he said ‘It is finished, once and for all, it’s done.’ He says “he shall flee unto one of those cities, and live: lest the avenger of the blood pursue the slayer, while his heart is hot, and overtake him, because the way is too long, and slay him; whereas he was not worthy of death inasmuch as he hated him not in time past.” (verses 5c-6) God’s concern, then city has to be within reach, it has to be close enough, and the way to it has to be prepared, maintained, and kept, and even the signs that pointed toward it had to be maintained. Just such a wonderful picture. “Wherefore I command thee, saying, Thou shalt separate three cities for thee. And if the LORD thy God enlarge thy coast, as he hath sworn unto thy fathers, and give thee all the land which he promised to give unto thy fathers; if thou shalt keep all these commandments to do them, which I command thee this day, to love the LORD thy God, and to walk ever in his ways; then shalt thou add three cities more for thee, beside these three:” (verses 7-9) which were the other three enumerated in Numbers 35. [This is also a provision that if the land of Israel should expand to the borders promised to Abraham, to the Euphrates river, then there is a provision to map out other cities of Refuge.] “that innocent blood be not shed in thy land, which the LORD thy God giveth thee for an inheritance, and so blood be upon thee. But if any man hate his neighbour, and lie in wait for him, and rise up against him, and smite him mortally that he die, and fleeth into one of these cities: then the elders of his city shall send and fetch him thence, and deliver him into the hand of the avenger of blood, that he may die.” (verses 10-12) So it says here, if someone deliberately commits premeditated murder, they hate somebody, they plan it out, and for some reason they feel they have the right to ambush somebody and kill them in cold blood, then the elders of the city, the officials, the city officials know that’s true, the evidence is clear, they can go to that city of Refuge he fled to, they can take him and bring him back to their city, deliver him to the hand of the avenger of blood that he may die. Notice “Thine eye shall not pity him, but thou shalt put away the guilt of innocent blood from Israel,” please notice God’s motive, “that it may go well with thee.” (verse 13) God is saying ‘Justice is necessary for the preservation of society,’ not injustice, justice. There’s enough injustice in our land, but justice, necessary for the preservation of society.

The Importance Of Land-Inheritance, Private Ownership

“Thou shalt not remove thy neighbour’s landmark, which they of old time have set in thine inheritance, which thou shalt inherit in the land that the LORD thy God giveth thee to possess it.” (verse 14) There is the prohibition of moving landmarks, because the land didn’t belong to them, the land belonged to the LORD, they paid a tribute as it were, the tithe of the land and of the flocks and so forth, the land belonged to the LORD, and it was divided to the tribes by lot, and then by inheritance. And they didn’t have the right to steal it or take it from someone else. And of course what you do at night is, usually the landmark was a pile of rocks somewhere, at the border of your property, and your next-door neighbour if he was a scoundrel, he’d come out at night and move it a little closer to your house, and his property would be getting bigger all the time, you’d try to figure what’s going on. [Comment: God’s system was and will yet be the ultimate form of “land reform” this world has ever seen, explained in this short article: https://unityinchrist.com/IsraelAPeculiarPeople--ALightToTheGentiles.html ] And of course it’s a great spiritual lesson for us tonight, not to remove the ancient landmarks, some of them are just good, some of them are righteous, they are just good. Certainly as a people, we move forward, there’s technology and so forth, but there are some things that are absolutes. But here in this picture, is that one of taking advantage of someone’s land, not removing the ancient landmarks, God is upholding the right to private ownership here. Those of you that have teenagers should memorize this verse, God respects the right to private ownership. I know they “borrow,” things disappear, I’ve raised a bunch of them. Ah, the right to private ownership. Look, the folklore in Israel, when we go there, we always hear this story about Jerusalem, in ancient times, ancient, ancient times, way back, before Abraham. Two brothers, one of them was married, had a wife, he had children. The other brother never found a wife, was single. And the brother with the wife and the children, at night, thought “My brother’s over there alone, I have a wife, I have children, I have so much, and all he has is his land,’ so he went out at night and he moved the landmark towards his own house to enlarge his brother’s border. But his brother was thinking, ‘You know, I’m alone, I don’t have the responsibilities my brother has, I don’t have a wife, I don’t have kids, I’m happy as a lark, I don’t need anything, I’m going to enlarge his property,’ and he would sneak out at night and move the landmark back in his own direction. And they couldn’t figure out what was going on. And one night, the folklore in Israel says, they both met in the field, and they startled each other, and said ‘What are you doing here?’ the first brother said, ‘Well, God has blessed me, I have a wife, I have children, he’s given so much to me, and I think about you, we pray for you all the time, we know that you’re alone, and we thought that we would bless you by enlarging your borders, each night I’ve been coming, trying to move this pile of stones. What are you doing out here?’ and the single brother said, ‘Well you know, I’m so blessed, I don’t have the responsibilities that you do, you’ve got to take care of the kids, so every night I come out and I try to move the pile of stones closer to my house to make your property larger.’ And the folklore says they both began to weep, and they began to embrace, and the pile of stones that they stood over was the first foundation stones of the city of Jerusalem, that that’s how it had it’s beginning. Jeru-Salem, the City of Peace. Sure, someday. But when you go there it’s the folklore they tell, relative to this verse, moving the landmarks, and someday Jeru-Salem shall be, no doubt, the City of Peace.

The Laws Of Jurisprudence

“One witness shall not rise up against a man for any iniquity, or for any sin, in any sin that he sinneth: at the mouth of two witnesses, or at the mouth of three witnesses, shall the matter be established.” (verse 15) So God said ‘I don’t want one person being able to determine the outcome in the life of another individual, there should at least be two or three witnesses,’ we have a jurisprudence system based on much of this. Because God knows us so well, you might have a really bad day and be tired of somebody, make something up, they could be gone. Verse 16 says, “If a false witness rise up against any man to testify against him that which is wrong; then both the men, between whom the controversy is,” now it seems to say ‘a false witness, singular,’ if there is an accusation by one,’ shall stand before the LORD, before the priests and the judges, which shall be in those days; and the judges shall make diligent inquisition:” the judges were usually also priests, “and, behold, if the witness be a false witness, and hath testified falsely against his brother; then shall ye do unto him, as he had thought to have done unto his brother: so shalt thou put the evil away from among you.” (verses 16-19) Now sometimes, it seems early on, they found out the will of God with the Urim and Thummim, but it seems that they then after those days, they were to investigate, make an inquisition, it says “diligent,” find out, so if you were accusing somebody of murder, to try to have them put to death, and they found out you were lying, it says then you were put to death. What you thought to do to the other person, then was, the sentence you created was the one that then you paid, “so shalt thou put the evil away from among you.” Verse 20 says “And those which remain shall hear, and fear, and shall henceforth commit no more any such evil among you.” and the last verse says “And thine eye shall not pity; but life shall go for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot.” (verses 20-21) Seems hard here, justice, not vengeance. There’s no soft approach here. What God is saying is, that when a sentence is executed properly and completely, that it’s healthy for society. Those who would tell us that capital punishment doesn’t bear any fruit, have an opinion that flies in the face of God the Creator, who says he knows the nature of man better than they do. And when justice is executed the right way, justice, not vengeance, not anger, justice, when it’s executed the right way, that people will hear and they will fear, and it will put away evil from the land. Now look, am I saying that I think everybody who is guilty should die? It doesn’t matter what my opinion is. Jesus said this to us, as believers, how we should act, ‘You have heard that it hath been said, an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, but I say unto you that you resist not evil. Whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him also the left. If any man will sue thee at the law, and take away thy coat, let him have thy cloak also. And whosoever shall compel thee to go one mile, go with him twain.’ Now by the way, Jesus doesn’t ask us to do what he didn’t do, he turned his other cheek, they plucked out the beard, they took away his cloak, he carried the cross. ‘Give to him that asketh of thee, and from him that would borrow of thee, turn not away. You’ve heard that it hath been said of them of old, thou shalt love thy neighbour and hate thy enemy, I say unto you, love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you and persecute you, that ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and the unjust. For if ye love them which love you, what reward have ye? do not even the publicans the same? And if ye salute your brethren only, what do ye more than others? Do not even the publicans so? Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.’ (Matthew 5:38-48) [transcript of a connective expository sermon on Deuteronomy 18:1-22 and Deuteronomy 19:1-21, given by Pastor Joe Focht, Calvary Chapel of Philadelphia, 13500 Philmont Avenue, Philadelphia, PA 19116]