Deuteronomy 29-30

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Deuteronomy 29:1-29

“These are the words of the covenant, which the LORD commanded Moses to make with the children of Israel in the land of Moab, beside the covenant which he made with them at Horeb. 2 And Moses called unto all Israel, and said unto them, Ye have seen all that the LORD did before your eyes in the land of Egypt unto Pharaoh, and unto all his servants, and unto all his land; 3 the great temptations which thine eyes have seen, the signs, and those great miracles: 4 Yet the LORD hath not given you an heart to perceive, and eyes to see, and ears to hear, unto this day [cf. Romans 11:1-8, 9-15, esp. vs 8] 5 And I have led you forty years in the wilderness: your clothes are not waxen old upon you, and thy shoe is not waxen old upon thy foot. 6 Ye have not eaten bread, neither have ye drunk wine or strong drink: that ye might know that I am the LORD your God. 7 And when ye came upon this place, Sihon the king of Heshbon, and Og the king of Bashan, came out against us unto the battle, and we smote them: 8 and we took their land, and gave it for an inheritance unto the Reubenites, and to the Gadites, and to the half tribe of Manasseh. 9 Keep therefore the words of this covenant, and do them, that ye may prosper in all that ye do. 10 Ye stand this day all of you before the LORD your God; your captains of your tribes, your elders, and your officers, with all the men of Israel, 11 your little ones, your wives, and thy stranger that is in thy camp, from the hewer of thy wood unto the drawer of thy water: 12 that thou shouldest enter into covenant with the LORD thy God, and into his oath, which the LORD maketh with thee this day: 13 that he may establish thee to day for a people unto himself, and that he may be unto thee a God, as he hath said unto thee, and as he hath sworn unto thy fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob. 14 Neither with you only do I make this covenant and this oath; 15 but with him that standeth here with us this day before the LORD our God, and also with him that is not here with us this day: 16 (for ye know how we have dwelt in the land of Egypt; and how we came through the nations which ye passed by; 17 and ye have seen their abominations, and their idols, wood and stone, silver and gold, which were among them:) 18 lest there should be among you man, or woman, or family, or tribe, whose heart turneth away this day from the LORD our God, to go and serve the gods of these nations; lest there should be among you a root that beareth gall and wormwood; 19 and it come to pass, when he heareth the words of this curse, that he bless himself in his heart, saying, I shall have peace, though I walk in the imagination of mine heart, to add drunkenness to thirst: 20 the LORD will not spare him, but then the anger of the LORD and his jealousy shall smoke against that man, and all the curses that are written in this book shall lie upon him, and the LORD shall blot out his name from under heaven. 21 And the LORD shall separate him unto evil out of all the tribes of Israel, according to all the curses of the covenant that are written in this book of the law: [cf. Leviticus 26 & Deuteronomy 28] 22 so that the generation to come of your children that shall rise up after you, and the stranger that shall come from a far land, shall say, when they see the plagues of that land, and the sicknesses which the LORD hath laid upon it; 23 and that whole land thereof is brimstone, and salt, and burning, that it is not sown, nor beareth, nor any grass groweth therein, like the overthrow of Sodom, and Gomorrah, Admah, and Zeboim, which the LORD overthrew in his anger, and in his wrath: 24 even all nations shall say, Wherefore hath the LORD done thus unto this land? what meaneth the heat of this great anger? 25 Then men shall say, Because they have forsaken the covenant of the LORD God of their fathers, which he made with them when he brought them forth out of the land of Egypt: 26 for they went and served other gods, and worshipped them, gods whom they knew not, and whom he had not given unto them: 27 and the anger of the LORD was kindled against this land, to bring upon it all the curses that are written in this book: 28 and the LORD rooted them out of their land in anger, and in wrath, and in great indignation, and cast them into another land, as it is this day. 29 The secret things belong unto the LORD our God: but those things which are revealed belong unto us and to our children for ever, that we may do all the words of this law.”

Introduction

[Audio version: https://resources.ccphilly.org/detail.asp?TopicID=&Teaching=WED610]

“Deuteronomy chapter 29 and 30 kind of give us the Book of Deuteronomy again in miniature, there is a reaffirming as it were of the entire covenant in much fewer verses here, it’s a microcosm in some ways of the entire book. It begins by saying “These are the words of the covenant,” we’re going to have that word “covenant” seven times in this chapter, from verses 1 through 8, Moses will revisit their history. He never gets tired of reminding them, of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, Egypt, of the Exodus, what God had done for them. That was their history. Paul, John, Peter in the New Testament, bringing things to remembrance, not giving you a new commandment, but putting you in remembrance of these things, nothing wrong with always being reminded of our origins, you and I, to ask God continually to restore to us the joy of our salvation, to remember our first love, as it says in the Book of Revelation chapter 2, the first 7 verses. Here Moses reminding Israel of her origins, of her history. And then from verses 9 through 15, Moses then speaking to them about a call to obedience. Which we have the next major section in the Book of Deuteronomy, and then from 16 to 29 there is a warning of judgment, and it follows the pattern of the entire Book. So, let’s jump in and look at these things together.

Yet the LORD hath not given you an heart to perceive, and eyes to see, and ears to hear, unto this day

“These are the words of the covenant, which the LORD commanded Moses to make with the children of Israel in the land of Moab, beside the covenant which he made with them at Horeb.” (verse 1) Now they are sitting in view of Jericho, they can see across the Jordan River, they can see the walls of Jericho before them, they are gathered there, it is a short time before they move into the Promised Land. “And Moses called unto all Israel, and said unto them, Ye have seen all that the LORD did before your eyes in the land of Egypt unto Pharaoh, and unto all his servants, and unto all his land;” (verse 2) Now look, most of them he’s speaking to were children when those things took place. Remember, an entire generation of adults has perished in the wilderness. But those he’s speaking to were children, were under 18, under 20 years old, many of these no doubt were the firstborn males that were spared by the blood of the lamb on the doorposts and lentils, and they have become adults now. And Moses is speaking to them, and about the things that they had seen, ‘what the LORD did before their eyes in the land of Egypt, unto Pharaoh and unto all his servants, and unto all the land,’ “the great temptations which thine eyes have seen, the signs, and those great miracles:” the things that God did in his power, and notice “Yet the LORD hath not given you an heart to perceive, and eyes to see, and ears to hear, unto this day.” (verses 3-4) [cf. Romans 11:1-8, 9-15, esp. verses 8 & 15] He’s saying, God did all of these things, but spiritual things are only perceived through the Spirit, the flesh is at enmity with God. And the natural man, the Israelite in the natural, couldn’t apprehend fully the things that God had done for them, nor the spiritual significance of those things. [Comment: Pastor Joe is coming close to admitting what the Sabbath-keeping Churches of God have known all along, that as Moses pointed out in Numbers chapter 11, God has not bestowed on the “natural Israelite” of those times, i.e. the entire Old Testament, his Holy Spirit. They were called to a physical knowledge of God, Yahweh had revealed himself and his Torah to them, but they were not “called” as it were, they didn’t have spiritual salvation offered to them as we know of it, by being offered the indwelling Holy Spirit. Paul alludes to when all of Israel will receive their opportunity for salvation in Romans 11:15, “For if the casting away of them be the reconciling of the world, what shall the receiving of them be, but life from the dead?” which is a very quiet reference to Ezekiel 37:1-14 (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).] You know, God didn’t just want to blow their minds, he wanted to change their hearts, and that was through his written Word. Over and over he’s reaffirming this in the Book of Deuteronomy, because they had seen the miracles in Egypt, they had seen the things that took place in the desert, and they’re wandering through the desert griping ‘yea, you brought us out here to die, you brought us out here not to feed us, you brought us out here to die of thirst.’ Who would you think would say that after you were eyewitness of the most powerful miracles that the world had seen to date. And yet those things have an influence on us externally, but they don’t get to the heart of the matter. Peter will say that when he says ‘We were eyewitnesses of the Lord and his coming and his power,’ he says ‘And that we might make known unto you the power of the coming of the Lord, we didn’t use cunningly devised fables, we were there, we heard the Lord speak from the holy mountain, but we have now a more sure word of prophecy unto which you do need to take heed, unto a light that shines more and more…’ He says there that the written Word shall take precedent over spiritual phenomenon. And the world that we’re living in is scheduled to be deceived by spiritual phenomenon, and it will not come from Washington, or from Moscow, it will come out of Europe and out of the Middle East. The world with all of its logic and all of its wisdom and all of its mocking of spiritual things, is going to have spiritual things rammed right down its throat when the anti-christ comes to power, and follow, wondering after the Beast [see https://unityinchrist.com/prophecies/2ndcoming_4.htm ]. So here the LORD says, you know, you saw those things, they’re part of your history, but he says, “Yet the LORD hath not given you an heart to perceive, and eyes to see, and ears to hear, unto this day.” (verse 4) “And I have led you forty years in the wilderness: your clothes are not waxen old upon you, and thy shoe is not waxen old upon thy foot.” (verse 5) That would make a believer out of me, imagine you not having to buy your kids clothes for 40 years. Your shoes not waxing old upon thy foot. When I was in high school you could get Chuck Taylor Converse for 8 bucks. My kids when they were 13, that wanted $100 sneakers, and I’d just have to break the bad news to them. Imagine. What he’s saying here is, ‘Your clothes spoke to you of my faithfulness, your shoes spoke to you of my faithfulness.’ “Ye have not eaten bread, neither have ye drunk wine or strong drink: that ye might know that I am the LORD your God.” (verse 6) ‘You haven’t planted a field, you haven’t gathered grapes from your vineyard, all of these years I brought you out with a mighty and outstretched arm, I led you, your clothes didn’t wear out, your shoes didn’t wear out, you never needed to plant a field or gather in a vineyard, I gave you Manna from heaven, I gave you water from the Rock,’ all of these things should have spoken to them, and testified to them of God’s faithfulness. “And when ye came upon this place, Sihon the king of Heshbon, and Og the king of Bashan, came out against us unto the battle, and we smote them:” the giants “and we took their land, and gave it for an inheritance unto the Reubenites, and to the Gadites, and to the half tribe of Manasseh.” (verses 7-8) Remember how those tribes loved the land, they decided to stay, ‘Moses, can we take this side? we have cattle, it’s great grazing land,’ Moses said ‘Fine, but you will go with your brethren across Jordan into battle, and when you have subdued the land, and they have received their inheritance, then you can return and take this land.’ And personally I feel like they settled for less [I don’t].

Moses Begins To Challenge Them About Obedience

Beginning in verse 9 now he begins to challenge them in regards to obedience. Because of God having done all of these things, he says “Keep therefore the words of this covenant, and do them,” here’s God’s reason, “that ye may prosper in all that ye do.” (verse 9) This is what God desires for his children. “Ye stand this day all of you before the LORD your God;” notice he starts with the leaders, “your captains of your tribes, your elders, and your officers, with all the men of Israel, your little ones, your wives, and thy stranger that is in thy camp, from the hewer of thy wood unto the drawer of thy water: that thou shouldest enter into covenant with the LORD thy God, and into his oath, which the LORD maketh with thee this day:” (verses 10-12) Interesting, that you should literally “pass into it,” it doesn’t just give the idea of just entering, it’s the idea of leaving something behind, and passing, not the same word as ‘pass over,’ but “passing into this covenant,” that you should “enter into covenant with the LORD thy God, and into his oath, which the LORD maketh with thee this day:” again, God’s purpose, “that he may establish thee to day for a people unto himself, and that he may be unto thee a God, as he hath said unto thee, and as he hath sworn unto thy fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob.” (verse 13) You know, God asks for our obedience, God gives us his Word, he lays out a plan for our lives, he’s the one that is and was and is to come, he’s the one who knows what’s happening next week and next month. God’s the one that knows what’s going to happen in the world that we’re living in now, he knows whose going to win the election, he knows what the economy is going to be like, he knows all of these things. Relative to all of that stuff, he doesn’t ask us to figure all of that out, what he asks us for is today, do we love him? Will we obey him? He’s laid down his life for us. Will you obey him today? Because we may not know what the future holds, but we know he holds the future, and that has to be good enough for us. Here he says, he wants their hearts, he wants their obedience, he says ‘Look at my track record, here’s my resume’, remember, look at everything I’ve done, how I’ve delivered you, through mighty and powerful deeds, and you still haven’t even perceived what I’ve done, your clothes didn’t wear out, your clothes are screaming to you, what a great and faithful LORD I am, and how I can preserve. Your shoes should be talking to you. The fact that you had food falling from heaven and water coming from the Rock in the desert, you never had to plant grain or harvest your vineyard.’ And he said ‘And here you are, so I want you to yield, I love you, I want you to do these things, that,’ it says “that he may establish thee to day for a people unto himself, and that he may be unto thee a God, as he hath said unto thee, and as he hath sworn unto thy fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob. Neither with you only do I make this covenant and this oath; but with him that standeth here with us this day before the LORD our God, and also with him that is not here with us this day:” (verse 13-15)

A Challenge In Regards To Disobedience & Judgment

Now speaking it seems to future generations in Israel. Now from verse 16 to 19 there is a challenge in regards to disobedience and judgment then that will come. “(for ye know how we have dwelt in the land of Egypt; and how we came through the nations which ye passed by; and ye have seen their abominations, and their idols, wood and stone, silver and gold, which were among them:) lest there should be among you man, or woman, or family, or tribe, whose heart turneth away this day from the LORD our God, to go and serve the gods of these nations; lest there should be among you a root that beareth gall and wormwood; and it come to pass, when he heareth the words of this curse, that he bless himself in his heart, saying, I shall have peace, though I walk in the imagination of mine heart, to add drunkenness to thirst:” (verses 16-19) He says, look, ‘this should be a warning, you’ve come, you’ve been delivered, Egypt was the land of idols and a pantheon of gods, you saw none of them did anything.’ In fact, again, if you read Barnhouse’s book Invisible War, he outlines each one of the plagues on Egypt, and how each plague judged a specific Egyptian deity. It wasn’t just random, and he says ‘You’ve seen all of that, and then the nations that you have had victory over along the way, you’ve seen the gods they worship, stone, wood and iron and so forth,’ and he says ‘These things happened, lest there should be a man or woman among you that would turn his heart,’ that’s where it begins, ‘away from the LORD our God, to go and serve these gods of other nations,’ “lest there should be among you a root that beareth gall and wormwood;” Idolatry never bears anything but bitterness and poison. And the writer to the Book of Hebrews picks up with this and says ‘Look out, lest there is a root of bitterness among any of you, that many be defiled by that.’ Bitterness is something that is poisonous, and certainly it comes from idolatry. You know, we know something, it doesn’t work out the way we want it, so then what we do, is we become bitter, we become offended, and we act in a way that is relative to the thing we wanted, which has now become an idol, instead of acting relative to the Scripture and the things the Lord wants to do with us. So often a Christian is disappointed or disillusioned, and then their behavior is in response to their disappointment, their hurt, their bitterness, their disillusionment, instead of still responding to who has the right to us, we are blood-bought, our life is not our own. He’s given us clear instruction in his Word, and if we will respond that way, and we respond to him, we are safe. If we respond strictly to our disappointments, we respond to these other idols that we’ve set up, we bow down before them, they haven’t delivered, and they’ve left us disillusioned, and we behave then the wrong way. Certainly we would never bow down in front of wooden statues or of gold or silver, but we bow down in front of mammon, don’t we? we bow down, in Rome they worshipped Baccus the god of wine, they all got loaded all the time. So many people in America today are stoned and drunk all the time. We would never worship Ashtoreth, with all the little pornographic statues, but how many worship in front of their computer screens or their television? We live in an idolatrous culture and society. And the Lord is saying, ‘look, you should have seen, you’re eyewitness to all of the destruction, all of the vanity of all of that,’ and God said ‘I let you see it so that you would know, lest any man or woman would turn after those things, and go after them, and there’d be some root that would bear gall and wormwood,’ “and it come to pass, when he heareth the words of this curse, that he bless himself in his heart, saying, I shall have peace, though I walk in the imagination of mine heart, to add drunkenness to thirst:” (verse 19) This is what God says, he says ‘I don’t want it to go this way, because people then become self-deceived,’ and somebody’s going to on and say ‘Hey, I can live this way, and all of the warnings God has made, none of them are going to come on me.’ And I guarantee you that happens, we talk to people sometimes in the church, and they say ‘Well ya, I’m living in sin, yes I’m doing this, but God is blessing my business, and God is blessing this, and he understands my heart,’ and they are right here, and Moses describes their heart, they are self-deceived, they think everything’s just hunky-dory with God, and they can live any way they want to, because the hammer hasn’t come down yet. They don’t understand it’s over their head. And God is merciful and longsuffering, and Paul tells us people misinterpret his longsuffering as his approval. And the truth is, they’re running out of room. Because God loves us, he will move, he will chasten us. It says if we’re not chastened, then we’re as children without a parent. But God chastens a son or daughter that he loves, in the final analysis, which is unpleasant at the present, but yields the peaceable fruit of righteousness. So God is saying here, look, ‘I don’t want that person then to bless himself in his own heart, saying, ‘Hey, I’m going to have peace, I’m going to walk in the imagination of my heart, there’s no problem,’ he says that’s like adding “drunkenness to thirst.” Verse 20, “the LORD will not spare him, but then the anger of the LORD and his jealousy shall smoke against that man, and all the curses that are written in this book shall lie upon him, and the LORD shall blot out his name from under heaven.” That can’t be good, I’m just convinced. There’s no secret sin, the LORD sees everything, there’s no one saying ‘Hey, I’m going to do this, it doesn’t matter what people think.’ Listen to what the LORD’s saying here, you can decide, he’s making an appeal to them, you can decide whether you’re going to obey the LORD or not, but you can’t decide what the consequences will be, they are in his hands. God will not blot out our name, we’re blood-bought, we’re his children, but he will spank us, he chastens us, because he loves us. Disobedience, even for the Christian, never yields anything good, no Christian has ever been better for sinning, or ever will. And God loves us, and God will deal with us, God will not cut us off, but we will be rewarded, you know Paul says, our labours when we come into heaven, one man’s work, his labour, his walk with the Lord will endure the fire, it’s gold and silver and precious stones. Another man, his works will be like wood, hey, stubble, it will be burnt up, but the soul itself shall be saved, he’d be getting into heaven with his robes smokin’ (cf. 1^st Corinthians 3), instead of having a crown to throw at his feet he’s going to have one of those little beanie hats that spin around, and is going to have to wait forever saying to the guy next to you ‘Can’t I just throw your crown just one time?’ There’s a warning that God would be severe with these things. And again, the truth of it today is, we can decide, he wants us to choose. He wants our hearts, he wants our willing obedience, he wants us to do it because we love him. You can choose to disobey, you just can’t choose what the consequences will be. They are in his hands. “And the LORD shall separate him unto evil out of all the tribes of Israel, according to all the curses of the covenant that are written in this book of the law:” (verse 21) [cf. Leviticus 26 & Deuteronomy 28] I’m so glad we’re under grace now and not under the law. “so that the generation to come of your children that shall rise up after you, and the stranger that shall come from a far land, shall say, when they see the plagues of that land, and the sicknesses which the LORD hath laid upon it; and that whole land thereof is brimstone, and salt, and burning, that it is not sown, nor beareth, nor any grass groweth therein, like the overthrow of Sodom, and Gomorrah, Admah, and Zeboim, which the LORD overthrew in his anger, and in his wrath: even all nations shall say, Wherefore hath the LORD done thus unto this land? what meaneth the heat of this great anger?” (verses 22-24) You know you read of Sodom and Gomorrah in Genesis chapter 14, verse 10, it said Lot chose Sodom and Gomorrah because they looked like the Garden of the LORD. Sodom and Gomorrah looked like Eden, and as Egypt as thou goest down unto Zoar. But Sodom and Gomorrah were beautiful, they were more lush than any place on the earth, and to the natural eye, but their sin was exceeding before the LORD, but it says to look at them, it was like the Garden of Eden. Look at the Dead Sea today, that is just the way this is described here. And for centuries the nation of Israel, after they were put out of their land, it was barren. Mark Twain went to Israel, he said the land, he mocked it, he said “This is the land of Israel? it’s dead, it’s barren, there’s nothing here but a wasteland.” “all nations shall say, Wherefore hath the LORD done thus unto this land? what meaneth the heat of this great anger? Then men shall say, Because they have forsaken the covenant of the LORD God of their fathers, which he made with them when he brought them forth out of the land of Egypt: for they went and served other gods, and worshipped them, gods whom they knew not, and whom he had not given unto them: and the anger of the LORD was kindled against this land, to bring upon it all the curses that are written in this book: and the LORD rooted them out of their land in anger, and in wrath, and in great indignation, and cast them into another land, as it is this day.” (verses 24-28) We have some very remarkable verses coming here, we look into the Diaspora of the nation of Israel. And yet to an unconditional covenant that God has made with his own people. Notice verse 29, it says “The secret things belong unto the LORD our God: but those things which are revealed belong unto us and to our children for ever, that we may do all the words of this law.” Now it actually says “What is kept secret to Yahweh,” it says it that simple, it says, “What is kept secret to Yahweh our God, but what is revealed to us and to our children forever, God has revealed.” We hear through the history of man, the bright mind, the brilliant quick mind of the Jew, whatever country he was in, he was noted for his ability to succeed. Very interesting, when the Jews were driven out of Israel, and we talk about it, the Romans changed the name of that land to Palestine, it was never Palestine, it was called Israel. The Romans named it Palestine because the perennial enemy of Israel was the Philistines, and they called it Palestine to be an insult to the Jew. Of course the interesting thing is, if you go to Israel today, you have a Jew giving you a tour of Roman ruins, and they are still there, as God is still there. Ah, the things that are secret belong to the LORD, God is going to say to them, you don’t have to grind them out, you don’t have to find those things, they are the things that are revealed, to Israel, to his children, that they might serve the LORD. Look, you think there’s big conspiracies, secrets out there, it says the things that are hidden are revealed, they’re revealed to Israel (cf. Amos 3:7), not to the Illuminati, not to the Masons, not to the Knights Templar, not to the Club of Rome, not to the Bilderbergers, not to the Trilateral Commission, not to every conspiratorial group you’ve ever heard of, the Israelis hold the key to the future of this planet. Jerusalem, the Bible says, will become a cup of trembling, a stumblingblock to all the nations of the world (Zechariah 12:2-3). Now, God acknowledges that, there was no chapter break, look what he says here…”

Deuteronomy 30:1-20

“And it shall come to pass, when all these things are come upon thee, the blessing and the curse, which I have set before thee, and thou shalt call them to mind among all the nations, whither the LORD thy God hath driven thee, 2 and shalt return unto the LORD thy God, and shalt obey his voice according to all that I command thee this day, thou and thy children, with all thine heart, and with all thy soul; 3 that the LORD thy God will turn thy captivity, and have compassion upon thee, and will return and gather thee from all the nations, wither the LORD hath scattered thee [i.e. 2^nd coming of Jesus Christ]. 4 If any of thine be driven out unto the outmost parts of heaven, from thence will the LORD thy God gather thee, and from thence will he fetch thee: 5 and the LORD thy God will bring thee into the land which thy fathers possessed, and thou shalt possess it; and he will do thee good, and multiply thee above thy fathers. 6 And the LORD thy God will circumcised thine heart, and the heart of thy seed, to love the LORD thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, that thou mayest live. 7 And the LORD thy God will put all these curses upon thine enemies, and on them that hate thee, which persecuted thee. 8 And thou shalt return and obey the voice of the LORD, and do all his commandments which I command thee this day. 9 And the LORD thy God will make thee plenteous in every work of thine hand, in the fruit of thy body, and in the fruit of thy cattle, and in the fruit of thy land, for good: for the LORD will again rejoice over thee for good, as he rejoiced over thy fathers: 10 if [Hebrew: “because”] thou shalt hearken unto the voice of the LORD thy God, to keep his commandments and his statutes which are written in this book of the law, and if [Hebrew: “because”] thou turn unto the LORD thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul. 11 For this commandment which I command thee this day, it is not hidden from thee, neither is it far off. 12 It is not in heaven, that thou shouldest say, Who shall go up for us to heaven, and bring it unto us, that we may hear it, and do it? 13 Neither is it beyond the sea, that thou shouldest say, Who shall go over the sea for us, and bring it unto us, that we may hear it, and do it? 14 But the word is very nigh unto thee, in thy mouth, and in thy heart, that thou mayest do it. 15 See, I have set before thee this day life and good, and death and evil; 16 in that I command thee this day to love the LORD thy God, to walk in his ways, and to keep his commandments and his statutes and his judgments, that thou mayest live and multiply: and the LORD thy God shall bless thee in the land whither thou goest to possess it. 17 But if thine heart turn away, so that thou wilt not hear, but shalt be drawn away, and worship other gods, and serve them; 18 I denounce unto you this day, that ye shall surely perish, and that ye shall not prolong your days upon the land, whither thou passest over Jordan to go to possess it. 19 I call heaven and earth to record this day against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing: therefore choose life, that both thou and thy seed may live: 20 that thou mayest love the LORD thy God, and that thou mayest obey his voice, and that thou mayest cleave unto him: for he is thy life, and the length of thy days: that thou mayest dwell in the land which the LORD sware unto thy fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give them.”

Israel To Be Regathered To The Land

“And it shall come to pass, when” just let me read down, let me read down to verse 9, you have to let me, I have the microphone, but let me read down to verse 9, and just get a sense here. God doesn’t say “If” he says it will come to pass “When,” there’s something unconditional about all of this, listen to these phrases and the power of them. “And it shall come to pass, when all these things are come upon thee, the blessing and the curse, which I have set before thee, and thou shalt call them to mind among all the nations,” plural, not just Babylon, not just Assyria, all of the nations “whither the LORD thy God hath driven thee, and shalt return unto the LORD thy God, and shalt obey his voice according to all that I command thee this day, thou and thy children, with all thine heart, and with all thy soul;” now there’s no mention of Temple or sacrifice or blood here, God is looking for a day that those who are genuine amongst the Jews will come with all of their hearts, “that the LORD thy God” notice, “will, will, will, will,” this is unconditional “will turn thy captivity, and have compassion upon thee, and [he] will return and gather thee from all the nations, wither the LORD hath scattered thee [i.e. 2^nd coming of Jesus Christ]. If any of thine be driven out unto the outmost parts of heaven,” that’s the four points of the compass, the four corners of the earth, it’s called an idiom, the four points of the compass, across the world, “from thence will the LORD thy God gather thee, and from thence will he fetch thee: and the LORD thy God will bring thee into the land which thy fathers possessed, and thou shalt possess it; and he will do thee good, and multiply thee above thy fathers. And the LORD thy God will circumcise thine heart, and the heart of thy seed, to love the LORD thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, that thou mayest live. And the LORD thy God will put all these curses upon thine enemies, and on them that hate thee, which persecuted thee. And thou shalt return” there’s no doubt here, “and obey the voice of the LORD, and do all his commandments which I command thee this day. And the LORD thy God will make thee plenteous in every work of thine hand, in the fruit of thy body, and in the fruit of thy cattle, and in the fruit of thy land, for good: for the LORD will again rejoice over thee for good, as he rejoiced over thy fathers:” (verses 1-9) Verse 10 begins with the word “If,” it’s not in the Hebrew, the word is “Because,” “BECAUSE thou shalt hearken unto the voice of the LORD thy God, to keep his commandments and his statutes which are written in this book of the law, and” not “if” BECAUSE thou turn unto the LORD thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul.” Not “if thou turn,” that’s not a proper translation, it says “Because thou wilt return unto the LORD thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul.” This is a remarkable, remarkable passage [it’s prophetic!]. I can’t find anywhere in the Bible where the passage in Genesis 12, verse 3, “I will bless them that bless thee, and curse them that curse thee” has been revoked. The word “Israel” is mentioned over 2300 in the Old Testament, I’m not a computer guy, I counted those, in Strong Concordance, you just count how many are in a column, I counted a column, and then I figured out how many columns there were, over 2300 times you have the word “Israel” in the Bible, that’s twice as many times as you have Christ and Messiah. 203 times God calls himself the God of Israel.

History Of The Jews--1500s to 1930s

The problem was, the Jews were driven out of their land, and for all intent purposes, had disappeared. And we had men like John Calvin and Martin Luther bringing the Bible back to the people, again Martin Luther helped, ended up translating the New Testament in ten weeks, and had to pull together 18 dialects of German to basically create a modern German, there were 18 different dialects of German, some attempted translations into some of those dialects, so he pulled together all of the dialects in Germany, and as he translated each Greek word, he looked through all of the dialects and found the most common word to all of the dialects, and he created in ten weeks, basically modern German. And within a number of weeks after that he translated the Hebrew Old Testament. Because the problem is, the wonderful thing, they didn’t have cell phones or computers, nothing to distract him, but just the mind, the capacity that it has. But Israel was gone, for all intent purposes, it had disappeared. And it was a mystery to those men in those decades. Martin Luther, by the time he died, there were over a million of his translations in circulation, because the printing press was getting started right about the same time. And of course they had no idea what to do with Israel, because Israel was gone. So what they did, is they said, ‘Well all of the promises made to Israel, they must go to the Church,’ and you had the Reformers, with Replacement Theology borne out of that, there was a genuine attempt to see what was happening, they just couldn’t understand. The wonderful thing for me, is some of those scholars through those ages, I have some of them on the shelves of my library, even in the 1860s, 1870s, they’re saying ‘You know, the way we see the Bible, Israel has to be reborn as a nation, or all of these things can’t be fulfilled.’ The others stood back and said ‘There is no Israel, therefore the promises made to Israel must go to the Church, and because real circumcision is the circumcision of the heart, therefore it must all belong to the Church and not to Israel,’ which should have all gone away in 1948, and anybody who has a television can go home and turn it on tonight and understand that Israel, and the great parable is in her name, is-real, and it’s Dah, Israel is real, I’ve been there many times, many times. This is a prophecy [right in Deuteronomy] of the regathering of the nation from all of the nations of the world, after she’s been driven out among them. Quickly, I’ll give you a quick history, I jotted down some of these things, you don’t have to believe me, in fact don’t believe me. I never did good in history, of course I did good in math, geometry, German, physics and gym, that’s the only things I was really interested in for some reason. But Israel, the antisemitism, the hatred through the ages, 1897 when the first Zionist counsel began to meet, and 1917 the end of World War I the Balfour Declaration was given through Great Britain, Palestine was under British control from World War I, all of that area, including modern Jordan they captured during World War I [General Allenby] from the Ottomans, the Turks, not from the Palestinians, there weren’t Palestinians then [there sort of were, as Ottoman Turkish occupying armies had mixed with the local Arab population, which sort of made a mixt race (see https://unityinchrist.com/prophets/edom/Edom%20in%20Prophecy%201.html )]. The Turks (Ottomans) had taken that land from the Mamelukes, the Mamelukes had taken it from the Crusaders, the Crusaders had taken it from the Muslims, the Muslims [These Muslims were: The Seljuqs, who brought the Turkic race back into the Middle East, and control of it, from modern day Turkey down the coast all the way through Syria, Lebanon and Israel, all of Iran and half of Iraq. The Seljuq empire lasted from 1071AD to about 1325AD, until it was supplanted by the Ghazhi’s under Osman I, starting the Ottoman Empire…] had taken it from Rome, and the Romans had taken it from Israel, Israel had it from the time of David. They had a bill of sale, David had bought Ornan’s threshingfloor in Jerusalem, it had been under their control since David took Jebus from the Jebusites and those who lived there. The Jews have resided in Israel since the time of David. Great Britain then formed this alliance with Jordan, about 80 percent of what was called Palestine was given to Jordan as a reward for the Arab leaders who fought with the British army against Germany in World War I. So they rewarded them. In 1922 the League of Nations, the forerunner of the U.N. takes up the British Mandate, to establish a homeland in what they called Palestine, for the Jews. But it was never realized. From 1933 to 1935 Hitler starts to come to power, he ascends, then from 1935 to 1937 Jews began to flee Germany and Europe, tried to go to Australia, Canada, the United States, all were refused entry, it was insanity, because quotas were set, and so many then began to flee to Israel, and at the peak of that, the Brits wrote the White Papers and they restricted immigration to Palestine to 1,500 a month, it was cruel, it was unimaginable, and it sent people back to the Death Camps. Britain saw the prospects of World War II and set these quotas to please the Arab and Muslim nations who they knew they would need when the Second World War would begin. It drove multitudes back to Europe, and we know the sad story of Judaism and Jewish families being shredded in the Holocaust. Britain though, through the press and through pressure and sympathy at the end of the war, when the Holocaust was realized, handed the problem back to the U.N., who divided the remaining 20 percent. This whole area was to be divided in half. 80 percent was given to Jordan, the 20 percent that remained, half was given to the Jews and half was given to the Palestinians.

History Of The Jews--From 1948 to 1982

And in May 14^th, 1948 David Ben Gurion calls the land Israel, because of Ezekiel’s prophecies, that they would come back to the land of Israel. Arabs in droves left that small parcel of ground, because they were told by the Jordanians and the Egyptians and Syrians and Iraqis ‘We’re going to slaughter the Jews and drive them into the sea, you leave your land, we’ll come, we’ll destroy everything, and you’re going to have more property than you ever would have had in the first place,’ of course God had a different plan, that was the problem. A hundred and fifty Jews in the Sinai held off 2,500 Egyptians for 6 months, 150 Jewish untrained soldiers with hardly any weapons held off 2,500 Egyptians for 6 months, till Moshe Dayan received jeeps and mounted machineguns and so forth from other countries, some from the United States. In the southern end of the Sea of Galilee, you can go there today, there’s this small kibbutz where a 14 and a 15 year old brother and sister held off, with Molotov Cocktails Syrian and Iraqi tanks, and it freaked them out, they thought there was a whole Israeli secret service operating, it was a 14 and 15 old, and it turned them back. 1967, Israel, when that war started, she captured the West Bank, Sinai and the Golan Heights, I remember 1967 I was standing in a food store on Cotman Avenue and Busselton Avenue, a largely Jewish neighbourhood at that point in time, and across the speakers in that store, and I was way far from being a Christian, I wasn’t saved, I remember the announcement “The Jews are in possession of Jerusalem and the Wailing Wall,” the place, I wasn’t a believer, I could sense the place stood still, tears were running down peoples faces, it was a phenomenon, I never experienced anything like that in my life, 1967 when they took the Golan Heights, the Sinai and the West Bank. From 1948 to 1967 the Russians were involved, put more than 3 million mines, planted them in the ground, and rows of barbed wire, all through the Golan Heights, for 19 years they were shelling, the Syrians’ weapons, shelling the kibbutz’s down around the Sea of Galilee. In 1973 the Yom Kippur War begins, Israel, because it’s the Holy Day, Chuck Smith was staying in Jerusalem when the war started, and his wife was up early in the morning, he was saying ‘oh go back to bed,’ ‘Oh Chuck, you need to see what’s going on here, there’s tanks going down the street,’ ‘There are not tanks going down the street, just go back to bed,’ and he finally gets up, and tanks were going down the street, you know, so they had to gather their tour together and get out of there, of course, and get back to the States. But Egypt comes from the south in the Yom Kippur War with 2,200 tanks, the Syrians come from the north with 1,800 tanks, there were under 600 Israeli soldiers on the Golan Heights, under 600 soldiers facing 1,800 Syrian-Russian tanks. And the Israeli officers that made it to the Golan Heights in the first few days, over 90 percent of those officers gave their lives and died in that conflict. The Syrians made such quick progress that they thought it was a trap. They roared over the Golan Heights, they knew how smart the Jews were, they came to the top looking down to the Sea of Galilee, they said ‘This is too simple, this has got to be a trap, this has got to be a trap,’ and they didn’t know what to do, so what they did, the Israelis were trying to fight to get up, the Syrians all of a sudden realized ‘We’d better take what we got, let’s start this terrible rumour that the Israelis have driven us back, they’re within 3 miles of Damascus, when the U.N. hears that they’ll make everybody stop, and it’ll bring this to a screeching halt, and we’ll have the Golan Heights.’ So the Syrians start to announce with their radio, ‘The Jews are within 3 miles of Damascus,’ the problem was their soldiers in the Golan Heights didn’t know they were doing that, heard the broadcast, thought it was real and started running out of their bunkers, the Jews were watching, and the Syrian soldiers are running, because they think the Jews are within 3 miles of Damascus and none of it was real. That’s called “discomfited” in the Old Testament, by the way. The things got so bad in the first few days that Moshe Dayan, who was the Chief of Staff, it was 1973, I don’t know where you were in 1973, I was out of high school, I was just saved, struggling, things got so bad Moshe Dayan, Chief of Staff, went to Golda Meir who was the Prime Minister, and said “the Third Temple is about to be destroyed,” [which must have been Israeli code for “Israel is about to fall”] and then requested permission to pull out what they called The Doomsday Weapon, their atomic weapons, and they were taken out of the silos and their storage places, at least 13 nuclear bombs were armed and loaded onto jets at 5 different air fields in Israel. The Russians with their surveillance saw that happening, Russia began loading paratroopers on their planes, and they began to rush nuclear devices to Syria. The United States surveillance saw that taking place, and through espionage and their satellites, former President Nixon called a Red Alert to our Armed Forces worldwide, and told the Russians “We are ready, we have Special Forces on the ground in Israel, all of our ICBMs are locked and loaded,” and we were wondering around somewhere doing something crazy, while the world’s teetering on the edge. That caused everything to come to a screeching halt, and Arial Sharon then cut off the Egyptian 3^rd Army, cut off 40,000 Egyptian troops, surrounded them so they got no supplies, they destroyed all the Russian Sam-6 and Sam-7 missiles down in the Sinai, and Israel was 48 hours from destroying Cairo and that broadcast was taking place on the Golan Heights, and finally Kissinger started going back and forth between the United States and Russia, the U.N. calls for a cease-fire. It’s insanity, it was insanity. That cease-fire is what stopped Russia from invading Israel and Ezekiel 38 and 39 getting rolling all the way back in 1973, and prevented that invasion. After that, of course 1982 was another buildup, it was remarkable what took place at that point in time, interdicted because the Israelis invaded Lebanon, they found 40-foot tunnels, a 40-foot bore through the mountains in Lebanon, only the Russians had the technology to do that, they found 13 division’s worth of armament and weapons, and they trucked them out of there for over 6 months, and they took them and sold them to the Afghanis to fight the Russians in Afghanistan [see Charlie Wilson’s War, which makes a small connection and reference to this massive arms deal], it was a gold mine. [The Israelis selling Russian weapons to the Afghans so they can fight the Russians in Afghanistan, now that’s God’s sense of humour 😊]

Where Are We Now?

But look, this whole part of the world is rumbling, tonight, as we sit here [but it wasn’t God’s timing, but now in the fall of 2024, we’re getting really close, with a major war going on between the Israelis and HAMAS in Gaza, and Hezbollah in Lebanon, China going through an armament phase not seen in the Pacific since Japan did that in the 1930s, and a Russian-Ukrainian war that has robbed Germany and Europe of their cheap oil and natural gas supplies coming from Russia, making Middle East Oil and Natural Gas for Europe more important than ever before, so the Euros don’t need instability in the Middle East right now. The whole world has been prepared for the rise of the Beast power, a United States of Europe (see https://unityinchrist.com/prophecies/2ndcoming_4.htm )]. The Israelis, just on the way to the West Coast, I sit next to this guy whose a defense department contractor, selling stuff to the Pentagon, I don’t ask for this stuff. And look, I don’t want everybody to be freaked out, it just means Jesus is coming, that’s what it means. ok? I’m not freaked out, I know whose in charge of everything. I am convinced there can’t be a full-scale nuclear exchange until the Church is gone, won’t the God of all the earth do right? if God wouldn’t destroy Sodom and Gomorrah if there were ten righteous people there, how’s he going let nukes fly all over and hundreds, literally hundreds of millions of people die, until he takes his Church home. And I don’t believe that’s going to happen while we’re here. There’s a purpose for us being here right now, and we’d better take it seriously. This Harvest Crusade may be the last great outreach in the city of Philadelphia, I don’t know. Again, beside the crowds that gathered for Whitfield and Billy Graham, these are the largest crowds that have gathered in the spiritual history of this city, strictly for evangelism, and in heaven these things are being recorded. What a wonderful thing that we can be a part of that [Pastor Joe is off in his timing estimates, showing we can’t always rely on current events, but have to watch and wait for the real end-time prophetic pieces of the puzzle to fall into place. It would appear right now at the end of 2024 we might be getting close. And Iran is just as big a threat and problem now as when Pastor Joe said this in 2008.] The Israelis are telling our Intelligence right now, Ahmadinejad [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mahmoud_Ahmadinejad ], whose not a mental case, he’s a very serious Shiite Muslim, who believes, and there’s this small sect of Shia Islam, who believes that Allah has raised him up to begin a world war, conflagration, and he believes that will bring the Madi, the 12^th Imman. He’s serious about that, this is serious, and he believes that. And the Israelis are telling us, he’s within 9 months of having a nuclear weapon. Our Intelligence is saying to the Israelis, we have until 2012 to 2013, the Israelis are saying back to us ‘Well, in 1998 both Pakistan and India set off nukes, that you said are ten years away, and they were your friends. Why should we listen to you, this is our neighbourhood, please let us do intelligence here and trust us.’ The Israelis weighed, that if we go into Iran, not to take out population centers, but nuclear facilities, that oil will slow down, in the spring oil [gasoline] will be $7 to $10 a gallon, the U.N. will be screaming, the rest of the world will be hating Israel, anti-Semitism may go off the charts [the Israeli-HAMAS-Hezbollah wars have already caused this anti-Semitism to go off the charts, and for an entirely different reason]. And they said “it’s either that, or our annihilation, and that’s not an option.” And our government [2008] now taking over Freddie Mack and Fanny Mae, some of you know, that’s just not good, that’s just not good [that threw us into a recession, but we weathered that]. Our economy is teetering, get your credit cards paid off, they’re debt cards, not credit cards. It’s going to be an interesting world, an interesting world. It may be a challenge to many of us, pray for peace in Jerusalem, the nation of Israel. Don’t ever get me wrong, God, God, the God, not Allah, loves the Iraqis, he loves the Saudis, he loves the Jordanians, he loves the Iranians, he loves the Egyptians, his Son died for them, he loves them. There is a harvest taking place in those countries right now the likes of which the world has never seen since Mohammed walked the earth. There are so many turning to the love of God, to Jesus Christ right now, it’s wonderful [through the JESUS Film Project]. And we’re living in a very tenuous, difficult days.

Israel Really Regathered After Jesus’ 2^nd Coming

The LORD says some interesting things here, he says “And is shall come to pass, when all these things are come upon thee, the blessing and the curse, which I have set before thee, and thou shalt call them to mind among all the nations,” notice “whither the LORD thy God hath driven thee,” (verse 1) You know, we’ve seen what happened in 1948. If anti-Semitism around the world begins to mount, we’re going to see more Jews immigrating back to Israel. We’re going to see a greater ingathering. “and shalt return unto the LORD thy God, and shalt obey his voice according to all that I command thee this day, thou and thy children, with all thine heart, and with all thy soul;” (verse 2) You can’t return without obeying. Verse 3 is extremely interesting, notice, “that the LORD thy God” Yahweh Elohim, “will turn thy captivity, and have compassion upon thee,” please notice, “and [he] will return and gather thee from all the nations, wither the LORD hath scattered thee [i.e. 2^nd coming of Jesus Christ].” When did he leave? When did Yahweh, the God of Israel leave that he could be returning? (Acts chapter 1 anyone?) He will return, it’s the first prophecy of the return of Jesus Christ, the Messiah! Enoch saw the Lord coming with ten thousands of his saints, but this is the first time it says “return,” how interesting. It says “That he will return and gather thee from all the nations, wither the LORD thy God hath scattered thee.” “If any of thine be driven out unto the outmost parts of heaven, from thence will the LORD thy God gather thee, and from thence will he fetch thee:” (verse 4) Look, Isaiah is the one who says this, for those who just think it’s the Babylonian Captivity “And it shall come to pass in that day, that the LORD shall set his hand again the second time to recover the remnant of his people which shall be left from Assyria [Germany], from Egypt, from Pathros, from Cush, from Elam [Iran], from Shinar [Iraq], from Hamath, and from the islands of the seas,” (Isaiah 11:11) a second time, there’s another regathering. Jesus said, that the angels would go and gather the elect from the four winds. It says a worldwide regathering. I remember the first time we went, El Al Airlines, the stewards and stewardesses on the plane, the El Al flight we were on, were British, the cab driver and bus drivers that picked us up were Russian, the maids in the hotel were French, and I couldn’t get anywhere, we were there for a few days, and your eyes, ‘Lord, you’ve gathered them from all over the world.’ In fact, my kids were little then, and on the plane on the way over, was a little kid sitting near me, in those like Oscar the Grouch pajamas with the furry things, and they kept saying ‘I hope they don’t bother you,’ and I said, ‘No, no, I got a bunch of these at home, same kind of Oscar, same kind of pajamas,’ no problem at all, they were jumping and carrying on, and we’re messing with them. I started talking to him, and he said ‘Well, we’re Jewish,’ ‘Where you coming from?’ he said ‘We’re back in Israel,’ I said ‘What do you mean?’ He said, ‘I don’t know, the strangest things, it’s been on my heart for about six months, he said one day I looked at my wife and said, ‘Honey, I have something to ask you,’ and she said, ‘Yes,’ I said ‘What?’ She said ‘Yes, we can move back to Israel,’ he said ‘I don’t know why, I don’t have a job there, I left a great job here,’ and they weren’t religious, I said ‘It’s the Lord,’ ‘Some things are on our heart, moving us back here,’ very interesting, it’s very, very interesting. Just consider what a sociological miracle it is. How many Babylonians do you hang out with? How many Assyrians here? How many Roman legions do you eat lunch with? Again, just put it in the context of the Seneca Indians coming back and saying ‘Here are your beads, we want Manhattan back, it’s only been 300 years. It was a bad deal, we’re changed our mind, by the way we want to join the United Nations.’ That’s ludicrous, that’s why we laugh. And these people have been out of the land for 2,000 years, and they have kept their identity, they have kept their language, and they have kept their religion, God has brought them from the four corners of the earth. I wouldn’t say we’re seeing the conclusion of it, but we’re seeing the beginning of it, and it is beyond me how anyone could say, because of their theological disposition, that this is not a reality, it’s in front of us, and it’s happening. You see, I didn’t come to the Scripture with a theological disposition, I came to the Scripture with a blown mind, having taken acid for a number of years, and got saved. I didn’t know the difference between an epistle and an apostle, so I was never afraid to read the Bible and believe exactly what it says. I didn’t come from anybody’s camp. In fact in my library I have guys on the shelf together you’d never see sitting together on the shelf in anybody else’s library, I didn’t even know they didn’t get along when I bought them and put them on my shelf. They do fine in my library and I never hear them yelling at each other. But he will do this, he will do this, let’s read verse 4, he says “If any of thine be driven out unto the outmost parts of heaven, from thence will the LORD thy God gather thee, and from thence will he fetch thee: and the LORD thy God will bring thee into the land which thy fathers possessed, and thou shalt possess it; and he will do thee good, and multiply thee above thy fathers. And the LORD thy God will circumcised thine heart, and the heart of thy seed, to love the LORD thy God will all thine heart, and with all thy soul, that thou mayest live. And the LORD thy God will put all these curses upon thine enemies, and on them that hate thee, which persecuted thee. And thou shalt return and obey the voice of the LORD, and do all his commandments which I command thee this day. And the LORD thy God will make thee plenteous in every work of thine hand, in the fruit of thy body, and in the fruit of thy cattle, and in the fruit of thy land, for good: for the LORD will again rejoice over thee for good, as he rejoiced over thy fathers:” again, “BECAUSE thou shalt hearken unto the voice of the LORD thy God, to keep his commandments and his statutes which are written in this book of the law, and BECAUSE thou turn unto the LORD thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul.” (verses 4-10) verse 11 is the first word “For” is the same word, “because” again, “BECAUSE this commandment which I command thee this day, it is not hidden from thee, neither is it far off.” God never asks anything of us that is complicated, beyond our intellect, he never asks anything of us that incomprehensible, that’s on the table. What he’s saying to these people, ‘Look, I love you, I brought you out of Egypt, I made you my children, I did all of these things for you, if you’ll do all these things in obedience, I’ll bless you, but if you turn around and act like the Egyptians who worship idols, you’ll be back in trouble. Look at the things that are hidden, they belong to me, but the things that are revealed, I’ve given them to you. But what is going to happen in the last days, when you’ve been driven to all of the nations, plural, I personally am going to bring you back, and I am going to have you, and I am going to bless you, and I am going to make this happen my way, because you’re going to listen to my voice, and because you are going to return to the LORD thy God with all your heart, because this commandment which I’m commanding, it’s not hidden, it’s not difficult, it’s not incomprehensible.’ Jesus said a child should be able to embrace the things of the Kingdom. God hasn’t made any of this difficult. It’s a no-brainer. Paul uses this in Romans 10. “It is not in heaven, that thou shouldest say, Who shall go up for us to heaven, and bring it unto us, that we may hear it, and do it?” (verse 12) Literally it says “he will cause us to hear, and we will do it” is what the Hebrew says. “Neither is it beyond the sea, that thou shouldest say, Who shall go over the sea for us, and bring it unto us, that we may hear it, and do it? But the word is very nigh unto thee, in thy mouth, and in thy heart, that thou mayest do it.” (verses 13-14) It’s not there so we can argue about it, it’s not there so you can intellectualize about it, that’s not bad, we should use our minds. It is there so that we may do it. “See, I have set before thee this day life and good, and death and evil;” (verse 15) Complicated, right? It’s not in heaven, you don’t have to go down to some depths to bring it up, the Word is nigh thee, it’s in thy mouth. Even for you and I, we don’t lack for knowing, we lack for doing, Charles Swindoll when he writes on his book on marriage, he says “We don’t lack for knowing, we lack for doing,” we know what Ephesians says, we know what 1^st Peter says, we know what the Book of Proverbs says, we know what the text says about marriage, we don’t lack for knowing, we lack for doing.

“I call heaven and earth to witness, blessing and cursing, choose life”

“See, I have set before thee this day life and good, and death and evil; in that I command thee this day to love the LORD thy God, to walk in his ways, and to keep his commandments and his statutes and his judgments, that thou mayest live and multiply: and the LORD thy God shall bless thee in the land whither thou goest to possess it. But if thine heart turn away, so that thou wilt not hear, but shalt be drawn away, and worship other gods, and serve them;” (verses 15-17) Look, see the problem isn’t, you don’t need a hearing test, you need a heart test. The heart of the problem is always the problem of the heart. He says, “But if thine heart turn away,” remember, Amos chapter 8, verse 11, talks about the problem in Israel in his days, and he says ‘There’s not a famine of grain, it’s not a famine of this or that, he said it’s a famine of the hearing of the Word of God.’ America is in that place right now, we got Bibles in our glove compartments, Bibles in our bathrooms, Bibles at the Lost & Found in church, we got Bibles we carry with us, we got Bibles on our phone, Bibles on our iPods, Bibles on our Smartphones, my wife got one today, iPhones, which I’m not going to get, I’d be lost in it, Christian radio, Christian TV, we have Bibles everywhere. The problem isn’t there’s a famine of the Word of God, there is ‘a famine of the hearing of the Word of God.’ And God says that here, if your heart turns away, so that you will not hear, you know it’s a heart problem, “but shalt be drawn away, and worship other gods, and serve them; I denounce unto you this day, that ye shall surely perish, and that ye shall not prolong your days upon the land, whither thou passest over Jordan to go to possess it. I call heaven and earth to record this day against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing: therefore choose life, that both thou and thy seed may live:” (verses 17b-19) God’s saying ‘I’ve made it so clear, black and white, life and death, blessing and cursing,’ this is really complicated, isn’t it? You can get this in kindergarten, it’s like breaking the crackers along the line. Therefore, because I’ve made it so simple, my Word is available, it’s there, “therefore choose life,” look, anybody here this evening that doesn’t know Jesus Christ, God’s the same yesterday, today and forever. You can have alcohol as your master, you can have pornography as your master, you can have heroine as your master. This world is full of masters, people are saying ‘Hey, I want to be free,’ and they’re bound by one thing or another, they’re not in prison but they’re incarcerated by something, and I know it, because I was. And the pursuit of life is to find the right master, and drugs is a cruel master, money is a cruel master, alcohol is a cruel master. When you find the Master that hung on the cross and bled his life into the ground for you, that’s the Master you’re looking for, the One who died for you to make you a king, and make you a prince, and lay down his life for you. God says here, Choose, I call heaven and earth to witness, blessing and cursing, choose life, “that both thou and thy seed may live:” “that thou mayest love the LORD thy God, and that thou mayest obey his voice, and that thou mayest cleave unto him: for he is thy life, and the length of thy days: that thou mayest dwell in the land which the LORD sware unto thy fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give them.” (verse 20) he says the same thing to us tonight, choose life. I’m going to have the musicians come…[transcript of a connective expository sermon on Deuteronomy 29:1-29 and Deuteronomy 30:1-20, given by Pastor Joe Focht, Calvary Chapel of Philadelphia, 13500 Philmont Avenue, Philadelphia, PA 19116]