Deuteronomy 8-10

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Deuteronomy 8:7-20

“For the LORD thy God bringeth thee into a good land, a land of brooks of water, of fountains and depths that spring out of valleys and hills; 8 a land of wheat, and barley, and vines, and fig trees, and pomegranates; a land of oil olive, and honey; 9 a land wherein thou shalt eat bread without scarceness, thou shalt not lack any thing in it; a land whose stones are iron, and out of whose hills thou mayest dig brass. 10 When thou hast eaten and art full, then thou shalt bless the LORD thy God for the good land which he hath given thee. 11 Beware that thou forget not the LORD thy God, in not keeping his commandments, and his judgments, and his statutes, which I command thee this day: 12 lest when thou hast eaten and art full, and hast built goodly houses, and dwelt therein; 13 and when thy herds and thy flocks multiply, and thy silver and thy gold is multiplied, and all that thou hast is multiplied; 14 then thine heart be lifted up, and thou forget the LORD thy God, which brought thee forth out of the land of Egypt, from the house of bondage; 15 who led thee through that great and terrible wilderness, wherein were fiery serpents, and scorpions, and drought, where there was no water; who brought thee forth water out of the rock of flint; 16 who fed thee in the wilderness with manna, which thy fathers knew not, that he might humble thee, and that he might prove thee, to do thee good at thy latter end; 17 and thou say in thine heart, My power and the might of mine hand hath gotten me this wealth. 18 But thou shalt remember the LORD thy God: for it is he that giveth thee power to get wealth, that he may establish his covenant which he sware unto thy fathers, as it is this day. 19 And it shall be, if thou do at all forget the LORD thy God, and walk after other gods, and serve them, and worship them, I testify against you this day that ye shall surely perish. 20 As the nations which the LORD destroyeth before your face, so shall ye perish; because ye would not be obedient unto the voice of the LORD your God.”

Introduction: It’s God’s Word That Sustains Us

[Audio version: https://resources.ccphilly.org/detail.asp?TopicID=&Teaching=WED600]

“Deuteronomy chapter 8, let’s read down from the first verse, we’re really at about the 6^th verse here. “All the commandments which I command thee this day shall ye observe to do, that ye may live, and multiply, and go in and possess the land which the LORD sware unto your fathers. And thou shalt remember all the way which the LORD thy God led thee” I have a hard time doing that the older I get, I’m 57. I know I’m supposed to remember, it’s just the remembering that seems to be getting tougher, “these forty years in the wilderness, to humble thee, and to prove thee, to know what was in thine heart,” not for him to know, for us to know, “whether thou wouldest keep his commandments, or no. And he humbled thee, and suffered thee to hunger, and fed thee with manna, which thou knewest not, neither did thy fathers know; that he might make thee to know that man doth not live by bread only, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of the LORD doth man live.” (verses 1-4) You remember when Jesus answered Satan’s first temptation with this verse, Man does not live by bread alone. Man lives by bread, but not bread alone, the physical being of man certainly, God has designed us to be sustained with food, with the things of the natural. But man is more than that, and man does not live by bread alone. How many times have we seen someone in the church go through an extremely difficult time, going through cancer, going through loss, going through some unimaginable circumstance, and yet they’re sustained in the Spirit, not just during those times living because of the physical food they’re partaking of, but some inner strength, some greater thing of God’s Word working in their lives, and faith coming by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God. Moses certainly is going to demonstrate that, you and I, the Scripture tells us, are not born of corruptible seed but of incorruptible, of the Word of God, and it was effective in our lives, that the Word of God now keeps us. Jesus in John 17 said ‘Father, sanctify them through thy truth, thy Word is truth,’ and it’s the Word of God that sets us aside, that it’s the Word of God that works in our lives, that brings forth fruit. The Church [greater Body of Christ] that surrounds us has lost track of the Word of God, we never want to do that. We never want to do that. They have lost track of the Word of God, of its power, of its inerrancy, of its purpose, of the fact that heaven and earth are going to pass away, and nothing of God’s Word is going to pass away. And the Church has lost track of that. To me it’s the center of everything, of faith and practice, and it’s beautiful, it sustains me, it encourages me, it speaks to me, it keeps me alive, it helps me to see beyond the physical. And here he says that he had led them in a particular way, he had let difficult things come into their lives, he wanted them to learn that their life does not just consist of the physical sustenance that they partook of, but that the Word of God was what sustained the life of man. “Thy raiment waxed not old upon thee, neither did thy foot swell, these forty years. Thou shalt also consider in thine heart, that, as man chasteneth his son, so the LORD thy God chasteneth thee. Therefore thou shalt keep the commandments of the LORD thy God, to walk in his ways, and to fear him.” (verses 5-6) And again, it’s not just to, it’s not punitive, chastening there, it’s discipline, but it’s everything that’s necessary for proper education. So as a man chasteneth his son, not as a drill instructor. Some of us have grown up in church and we perceive God as the great drill instructor in the sky. Not as the cop that’s out to bust us, not as the arresting officer. I mean, think of the ideas that people get in their mind towards God. It says here “as a father chasteneth his son, so the LORD thy God chasteneth thee.” There was parental care and love and sustenance in all of that. Therefore, with all of that in mind now, he’s going to start to give them exhortation in regards to the Promised Land. He’s going to say, ‘You’re going to enter the land this day.’ It doesn’t mean a 24-hour period, he’s saying ‘This is the time, this is the Day of the LORD which will come.’ Often in the Scripture the word “day” means 24 hours, sometimes it speaks of ‘At this time,’ and he’s going to say to them ‘This is the day, you’re going to enter into the land.’ The land is going to be given to them because God promised it to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and he says ‘I’m going to take you in to fulfill my word.’ And he’s going to be very specific, it’s not because you’re a great people, it’s not because you’re a righteous people, it’s not because you deserve it. He says ‘I’m taking you in because of the promise that I made, I loved your forefathers,’ and he said ‘you’ve been a stiffnecked people all along the way.’ So, going into the land, entering into the land is God’s gift, is God fulfilling his word, but he’s going to enumerate for them, these are the principles, these are the things I want you to take hold of, because the enjoyment of the land, once you enter in, it’s a cooperative situation, he’s going to ask for their obedience. Everything’s handed to you, is given to you, and as you and I sit here this evening in the fulness of Christ, we have all kinds of blessings in Jesus Christ, that are ours. And as we grow, as the years go on, we learn to appropriate, we learn to see them, we learn to appreciate them. But he’s saying here to them, ‘You have all of these riches handed to you, now the appropriating of those things is relative to your obedience, once you get into the land, to cooperate with the things that I’ll put before you.’ And I think the favourite Book of Jesus Christ, he quotes more from Deuteronomy than any other Book in the Old Testament.

Beware, Lest You Forget God

So, here the LORD says in verse 6, “Therefore,” he led them, he fed them, cared for them as a father, “Therefore thou shalt keep the commandments of the LORD thy God, to walk in his ways, and to fear him. For the LORD thy God bringeth thee into a good land, a land of brooks of water, of fountains and depths that spring out of valleys and hills;” (verses 6-7) Water if you understand what a precious commodity water is in that part of the world, it’s one of the first things he says, he says there are brooks, there are streams, there are aquifers, I’m bringing you into a land like that. He’s going to tell them in chapter 11 ‘and the rains of heaven will also feed this land, it’s not going to be like the land of Egypt where your foot watered,’ they had these machines they used to bring up the irrigation water from the Nile into their troughs. He said not in this land, the water is going to fall from heaven, I’m going to bless you. So the first thing he tells them is the fact that this land is a land that is fertile, it’s watered, “a land of wheat, and barley, and vines, and fig trees, and pomegranates; a land of oil olive, and honey;” (verse 8) because there’s people drilling all over Israel for oil because of some of these verses, and I hope they hit it, and there’s probably lots there, and it’ll happen in God’s timing I guess. [No oil under the modern Israeli nation, but a huge oil and natural gas field has been discovered within their 200-mile Economic Exclusion Zone that stretches to off the coast of Cyprus, so the Israelis can sink down oil and natural gas rigs to the bottom of that section of the Mediterranean Sea.] But this is talking about olive oil right here, not the one from Pop-Eye, this is the one, you go to Israel today, just some of the best olive oil you ever tasted, and honey. “a land wherein thou shalt eat bread without scarceness, thou shalt not lack any thing in it; a land whose stones are iron, and out of whose hills thou mayest dig brass.” (verse 9) it’s rich in minerals. “When thou hast eaten and art full, then thou shalt bless the LORD thy God for the good land which he hath given thee.” (verse 10) Now here’s the warning. And as we watch this nation and we observe their history, we realize God’s warnings came with good purpose [log onto and read through this survey of Old Testament History at: https://unityinchrist.com/kings/1.html ] “Beware that thou forget not the LORD thy God, in not keeping his commandments, and his judgments, and his statutes, which I command thee this day: lest when thou hast eaten and art full, and hast built goodly houses, and dwelt therein; and when thy herds and thy flocks multiply, and thy silver and thy gold is multiplied, and all that thou hast is multiplied; then thine heart be lifted up, and thou forget the LORD thy God, which brought thee forth out of the land of Egypt, from the house of bondage;” (verses 11-14) he wants them, “when” verse 10, when you come in, verse 11, “beware,” then verse 12, “lest when thou hast eaten and are full…” He says, look, I’ve blessed you, I’ve led you through the wilderness, I’ve taught you things, I’ve done that as a father, and now I’m bringing you into this land, and I want you to keep my commandments. It is a good land, it is flowing with water, the crops and the increase of the orchards and the fields will be wonderful, there will be no lack, it’s a good land, it’s a land of blessings. And even the mineral rights, it’s a good land all the way across the board. And when you’ve eaten to the full, when you’re blessed, when you’re in fat-city, no longer got Egyptians chasing you through the Red Sea, you’re no longer fighting the Amalekites, you’re no longer going through some of the things you’ve gone through. When you settle in, then he says, “Beware that thou forget not the LORD thy God,” And again, all through the Book of Deuteronomy the word “forget” doesn’t mean to get amnesia, you can’t forget God. It means “to set to the side.” And what he’s saying is this, ‘I’ve taken you through the wilderness, I cared for you, and I fed you with Manna which your fathers knew not, there was supernatural provision in your lives. It was coming out of Egypt with the miracles and the signs and wonders that came on Egypt, it was passing through the Red Sea. These things forged you into a nation, I made you a people. And I sustained you in the wilderness all these years, with bread falling out of heaven,’ it would take at least 40 tons of Manna a day, daily to feed them, and then 80 tons on Fridays, miraculous provision every week, water coming out of the desert, God’s provision for them. And he says ‘But I’m bringing you now to that place of blessing, it is a place filled with prosperity and goodness. But my concern is, once you get in there, then beware, take heed, lest you forget.’ When you start to partake of natural blessings, no longer a supernatural supply, no longer bread falling out of heaven, it’s no longer the Pillar of Cloud and Pillar of Fire. God’s saying ‘When you’re in there and actually start to eat from vineyards and from flocks and the natural is so abundant, look out then that you don’t forget that even in those things, I’m the one that’s supplying. Because your tendency is going to be to take for granted that you’ve worked hard, or you deserve something, and you start to forget about the LORD.’ There’s the same challenge for you and I, we get saved, at least for my generation, getting saved out of the world, I feel like I got delivered from Egypt, I got delivered from that bondage and from drugs and everything that was out there, and there was kind of a line of demarcation, you get saved. And the new life in Christ is vastly different from that old life. But it’s the same thing for all of us, we get older, we have kids, we start to settle in. And then he says somewhere along the way you start to cop this attitude that you deserve what you have now. That you have this because of something in you, and you start to rest on your lees, and you think ‘I’ve got the minivan, the place down the shore, I’ve got this, I got money in CDs and money market funds, and everything’s nice and fat,’ and he says, what happens is when you start to receive my blessings through the natural instead of the supernatural, you get a blindness, there’s a myopathy, there’s something where you stop seeing as clearly, and then you set the Lord to the side. You don’t forget him, but he’s not central anymore because he doesn’t seem central. If you’ve noticed in your life, and if you haven’t you can notice in mine, desperate times produce desperate prayers. I pray desperate prayers when I’m desperate. I don’t pray desperate prayers when I’m not desperate. And how often do we get in a situation when we’re desperate, we go ‘Oh Lord, oh Lord!’ and he goes ‘oh, nice to hear from you, haven’t seen you for awhile.’

Revival, It Happened In 1968, Can It Happen Again?

And he’s challenging them, he’s challenging us, because look, we can sit on our lees, 1969, 1970, 1971 there was a revival, the JESUS Movement [see https://unityinchrist.com/prophets/Zephaniah/REVIVAL.html and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8vmHFvnjPDw and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a64YADx_Ymk and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nN-tj5Rn0Qo ], and there was a great moving and a great deliverance [and be sure to log onto that first link, because that Revival was far larger than just the JESUS Movement that started the Calvary Chapels, it was also the start of the Messianic Jewish movement under Martin Chernoff (now numbering close to a million Jewish believers in Jesus), and even the Sabbath-keeping Churches of God, then the Worldwide Church of God, where we had the numbers of new-believers coming into their doors virtually exploding (topping out at 150,000 believers), just as was happening with Pastor Chuck Smith and the JESUS Movement. God was not discriminating between the Sunday or Sabbath-keeping Churches of God, or Messianic Jewish believers, he was blessing all three groups liberally and equally], and I wonder now, all of these years, how much I personally, or we’ve cooled, not having the same zeal that we had then, the same urgency to get up and seek him, and the same love for his presence and for his Word. [I was there too, back in 1970, seeing new members, new believers flooding into our churches, I along with Pastor Joe, experienced that revival, being a part of it.] And I look at what’s going on across the nation in the Church [greater Body of Christ] turning away from the Word, turning towards feelings and all of this contemplative prayer and all these kinds of things, which is just a form of self-righteousness. We draw close to him because the blood of his Son has opened the door, and there’s nothing else. It’s because of his grace, that he’s supplied abundantly and supernaturally for us, and in that are all the things that we need. And as I look at the Church [greater Body of Christ] today, I’m convinced, it was never called post-modernism through Church history, but it’s always these lulls where people kind of got lulled to sleep, and then they need feelings, they need something, they need incense, they need this and that to draw close, and it’s always, it sets the stage for Revival. One of these times it’s going to slide right into Laodicea and into the Great Whore, we know that. [see https://unityinchrist.com/revelation/revelation3-1-22.html and https://unityinchrist.com/prophecies/2ndcoming_4.htm ]. So as I look into the world today, with all of, you know it’s the best of times and worst of times, and I look at what’s going on, I’m convinced we’re either right on the verge of a Revival or the Rapture, and both of those seem pretty exciting, either way. [Pastor Joe is giving this sermon on Wednesday, June 11, 2008. Now in the Fall of 2024, with wars raging in the Middle East and between the Russian Federation and Ukraine, and down in the Sudan, threatening the starvation of over 13 million people in southern Sudan, and China arming itself to the teeth, like Japan of the 1930s, and America getting tired of it’s role as World Policeman, we’re really due for a Revival, before WWIII explodes on the world scene.]

Don’t Get Too Comfortable In God’s Blessings

But his challenge to you and I is, not to get so comfortable in his blessings, as they surround us, that we miss seeing his hand in the provision, in the natural in our lives. We’re ready to see it in the supernatural, but in the most common things of daily life he’s there. A piece of toast in the morning and a cup of coffee, he’s there, he’ll meet with you, he provides, giving you a day, you’ll wake up, our next breath is in his hands. So there’s a challenge here, and he knows what we’re like. So he says, verse 14, “then thine heart be lifted up, and thou forget the LORD thy God, which brought thee forth out of the land of Egypt, from the house of bondage; who led thee through that great and terrible wilderness, wherein were fiery serpents, and scorpions, and drought, where there was no water; who brought thee forth water out of the rock of flint; who fed thee in the wilderness with manna, which thy fathers knew not, that he might humble thee, and that he might prove thee, to do thee good at thy latter end;” (verses 14-16) All of those things happening, for God to do something good in our life. Listen, and I assume that you’re like me in many ways. We get into a difficult situation, we get into something where we find ourselves desperate, we’re crying out, we’re somewhere we’ve never been before, all of a sudden we’re somewhere without water, we’re without bread, somewhere without sustenance, and we begin to cry out, begin to seek him. And then he provides, and he leads us through. Isn’t it always in hindsight we stand there and say ‘Oh Lord, forgive me for griping and complaining, now as I look back I can see what you were doing.’ And he said ‘I led you through all of those things to do thee good at the latter end.’ He was taking them somewhere the whole time. And he’s taking us somewhere, and he’s raising us, we’re his sons, we’re his daughters, he directs us, he teaches us, he instructs us, he disciplines us, he cares for us, he causes us to pray when we’re not inclined to pray. He causes us to seek him sometimes when we’re not inclined to seek him. And when we stand around his presence, no flesh will glory there, it will all be his. Here he says “and thou say in thine heart, My power and the might of mine hand hath gotten me this wealth.” (verse 17) How could anybody who saw the plagues that came on Egypt, the Red Sea part, the Manna falling from the sky everyday say ‘My hand and my power has done this’? “But thou shalt remember the LORD thy God: for it is he that giveth thee power to get wealth, that he may establish his covenant which he sware unto thy fathers, as it is this day. And it shall be, if thou do at all forget the LORD thy God, and walk after other gods, and serve them, and worship them, I testify against you this day that ye shall surely perish. As the nations which the LORD destroyeth before your face, so shall ye perish; because ye would not be obedient unto the voice of the LORD your God.” (verses 18-20) Now this is under the Law, of course. Their righteousness was dependent on their performing the Commandments. In the New Testament our righteousness is based upon the righteousness imputed to us by the completed work of Jesus Christ on the cross. But the moral and ethical change that takes place in our life, if we are filled with the Holy Spirit, the things that were put in front of Israel under the Law are still incumbent upon us today, as everything I can see, except specifically for keeping the Sabbath on Saturday [and there is a real question as to whether he’s right in his assumption or not, discussed in this article: https://unityinchrist.com/wwcofg/Has%20the%20Sabbath%20Been%20Abrogated.htm ]. But my point is, adultery is still wrong, murder is still wrong, worshipping any other god is still wrong, bearing false witness is still wrong, covetousness is still wrong, those things are still there. So God would still talk to you and I about obedience. But it says the commandments of the LORD are not burdensome. I’m so thankful we have a way to live. I’m so thankful that we have a lens to see the world that we live in. Imagine watching the news [esp. now in 2024] without the Bible. Imagine watching the news without the Bible. At least we have a sense of where we are and what’s going on. We follow through the chapter, prosperity, ingratitude, idolatry, always three steps downward. God wants to bless, prosperity. Prosperity is there, when we get used to it we loose the sense of gratitude, ingratitude comes, ‘Well it’s because of me, it’s because I work hard, it’s because of my gifts, it’s because I do this, it’s because I do that,’ and we lose this tremendous sense of ‘Lord, thank you, you give us this day our daily bread, thank you for your blessings.’ You wake up in the morning ‘Lord, I’m alive, another day, my eyes are open, I can breathe, I can hear my bones creak when I get out of bed, Lord, thank you so much, another day.’ But we should live with a sense of gratitude, because if we go from prosperity to ingratitude, the next step is always to idolatry. And look, we’re not talking about your getting on your knees and worshipping Astarte, or Baal, or Molech, or Mammon, though all of those gods are worshipped around us, in pornography, abortion, in pleasure. Certainly all of that is worshipped around us, we just don’t make little statues and get on our knees in front of them anymore. But it will go from prosperity, and if it slides to ingratitude, it always goes to idolatry, when we start to set our own rules. We don’t forget God, he’s just pushed to the side, we start to do things our own way. Once we start to do that, he’s no longer Lord, he’s no longer the Center, we’re doing the things the way we want to do them, and that’s idolatry. And he says “As the nations which the LORD destroyeth before your face, so shall ye perish; because ye would not be obedient unto the voice of the LORD your God.” (verse 20) Now by the way, Israel in the days of Jeremiah and Ezekiel [and those were no longer the days of Israel, the 10 northern tribes, called The House of Israel, had already been taken captive and deported to the region of the Caspian Sea, never to permanently return. The Days of Jeremiah and Ezekiel were during the days of the House of Judah, right during and after their Babylonian captivity] that’s exactly what he’s saying, ‘You’ve become worse than the nations that I drove out before you,’ and because he was jealous, he would deal with them.”

Deuteronomy 9:1-29

“Hear, O Israel: Thou art to pass over Jordan this day, to go in to possess nations greater and mightier than thyself, cities great and fenced up to heaven, 2 a people great and tall, the children of the Anakims, whom thou knowest, and of whom thou hast heard say, Who can stand before the children of Anak! 3 Understand therefore this day, that the LORD thy God is he which goeth over before thee; as a consuming fire he shall destroy them, and he shall bring them down before thy face: so shalt thou drive them out, and destroy them quickly, as the LORD hath said unto thee. 4 Speak not thou in thine heart, after that the LORD thy God hath cast them out from before thee, saying, For my righteousness the LORD hath brought me in to possess this land: but for the wickedness of these nations the LORD doth drive them out from before thee. 5 Not for thy righteousness, or for the uprightness of thine heart, dost thou go to possess their land: but for the wickedness of these nations the LORD thy God doth drive them out from before thee, and that he may perform the word which the LORD sware unto thy fathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. 6 Understand, that the LORD thy God giveth thee not this good land to possess it for thy righteousness; for thou art a stiffnecked people. 7 Remember. and forget not, how thou provokedst the LORD thy God to wrath in the wilderness: from the day that thou didst depart out of the land of Egypt, until ye came unto this place, ye have been rebellious against the LORD. 8 Also in Horeb ye provoked the LORD to wrath, so that the LORD was angry with you to have destroyed you. 9 When I was gone up into the mount to receive the tables of stone, even the tables of the covenant which the LORD made with you, then I abode in the mount forty days and forty nights, I neither did eat bread nor drink water: 10 and the LORD delivered unto me two tables of stone written with the finger of God; and on them was written according to all the words, which the LORD spake with you in the mount out of the midst of the fire in the day of the assembly. 11 And it came to pass at the end of forty days and forty nights, that the LORD gave me the two tables of stone, even the tables of the covenant. 12 And the LORD said unto me, Arise, get thee down quickly from hence; for thy people which thou hast brought forth out of Egypt have corrupted themselves; they are quickly turned aside out of the way which I commanded them; they have made them a molten image. 13 Furthermore the LORD spake unto me, saying, I have seen this people, and, behold, it is a stiffnecked people: 14 let me alone, that I may destroy them, and blot out their name from under heaven: and I will make of thee a nation mightier and greater than they. 15 So I turned and came down from the mount, and the mount burned with fire: and the two tables of the covenant were in my hands. 16 And I looked, and, behold, ye had sinned against the LORD your God, and had made you a molten calf: ye had turned aside quickly out of the way which the LORD had commanded you. 17 And I took the two tables, and cast them out of my two hands, and brake them before your eyes. 18 And I fell down before the LORD, as at the first, forty days and forty nights: I did neither eat bread, nor drink water, because of all your sins which ye sinned, in doing wickedly in the sight of the LORD, to provoke him to anger. 19 For I was afraid of the anger and hot displeasure, wherewith the LORD was wroth against you to destroy you. But the LORD hearkened unto me at that time also. 20 And the LORD was very angry with Aaron to have destroyed him: and I prayed for Aaron also the same time. 21 And I took your sin, the calf which ye had made, and burnt it with fire, and stamped it, and ground it very small, even until it was as small as dust: and I cast the dust thereof into the brook that descended out of the mount. 22 And at Taberah, and at Massah, and at Kibroth-hattaavah, ye provoked the LORD to wrath. 23 Likewise when the LORD sent you from Kadesh-barnea, saying, Go up and possess the land which I have given you; then ye rebelled against the commandment of the LORD your God, and ye believed him not, nor hearkened to his voice. 24 Ye have been rebellious against the LORD from the day that I knew you. 25 Thus I fell down before the LORD forty days and forty nights, as I fell down at the first; because the LORD had said he would destroy you. 26 I prayed therefore unto the LORD, and said, O Lord GOD, destroy not thy people and thine inheritance, which thou hast redeemed through thy greatness, which thou hast brought forth out of Egypt with a mighty hand. 27 Remember thy servants, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; look not unto the stubbornness of this people, nor to their wickedness, nor to their sin: 28 lest the land whence thou broughtest us out say, Because the LORD was not able to bring them into the land which he promised them, and because he hated them, he hath brought them out to slay them in the wilderness. 29 Yet they are thy people and thine inheritance, which thou broughtest out by thy mighty power and by thy stretched out arm.”

‘When I Drive Out The Inhabitants, Don’t Say ‘We Did It Because We Were So Righteous’

“Chapter 9 begins by saying, “Hear, O Israel: Thou art to pass over Jordan this day,” not that 24-hour period, but that’s where they were in their journeys “to go in to possess nations greater and mightier than thyself, cities great and fenced up to heaven,” (verse 1) Now look, this is the 5^th time in the Book of Deuteronomy where he begins an exhortation saying “Hear, O Israel.” And by the way that word means “to lean towards,” “to hearken,” it’s not just physical hearing, it’s an attitude of heart. And here’s the thing with Israel, Israel had God’s Word, Israel could hear their God, but they couldn’t see their God. In contrast to them, the pagans that were around them could see their gods, but couldn’t hear their gods. Israel could hear their God, like you and I can hear our God, but not see him. We love him with joy unspeakable, full of glory, though we have not yet seen him, but we can hear him, through his Word, through his Spirit. Israel could hear their God, they couldn’t see him. The pagans around them could see their gods, but not hear them, because it tells us in Psalm 115, ‘you make idols of gold and silver and brass and so forth, they have mouths, but they speak not, they have eyes, but they see not, they have ears but they hear not, and those who worship them have become like them.’ People who just want the physical, and they just want to worship something physical, the problem is, you become like those idols, they can’t speak and neither can you if that’s what you worship. They can’t hear, and neither can you if that’s what you worship. They can’t see and neither can you, if that’s what you worship. But our God, though we have not seen him, he speaks, and we can hear him. Look, driving home from work, there’s the packy, ‘Ah, should I get a sixpack?’ our God speaks, just sit still and listen, ok. “Lord, this guy really drives me crazy, I think I’m just going to punch him in the nose tomorrow. Should I do that?’ just listen, our God speaks. Charles Swindoll said “Our problem is not in the knowing, it’s in the doing.” And we have a God who speaks, who has spoken, whose Word is speaking today. When I sit alone with it, this Book still talks to me, out loud (at least loud enough for me to hear it, and take away all my excuses). “Hear, O Israel:” he says “Thou art to pass over Jordan this day, to go in to possess nations greater and mightier than thyself, cities great and fenced up to heaven,” of course they’re looking across and they can see Rahab’s house on the wall and Jericho right in front of them and these huge walls, “a people great and tall, the children of the Anakims, whom thou knowest, and of whom thou hast heard say, Who can stand before the children of Anak!” (verses 1-2) And what the LORD is doing here, is he’s rehearsing everything that happened at Kadesh-barnea, all of their arguments, ‘the cities are great, they’re walled up to heaven, and the sons of Anak are there, the giants, and we’re like grasshoppers in their sight, they eat up the inhabitants of the land.’ And God now with a new generation, before he’s taking them in, he rehearses these things to take away their excuses. He says “Understand therefore this day, that the LORD thy God is he which goeth over before thee; as a consuming fire he shall destroy them, and he shall bring them down before thy face: so shalt thou drive them out, and destroy them quickly, as the LORD hath said unto thee.” not because of their strength, because of his, “Speak not thou in thine heart, after that the LORD thy God hath cast them out from before thee, saying,” he knows us, doesn’t he? “For my righteousness the LORD hath brought me in to possess this land: but for the wickedness of these nations the LORD doth drive them out from before thee.” (verses 3-4) He says, I know what you’re going to do, your fathers died in the wilderness because they were afraid of the giants, afraid to face those cities, I’m going to take you guys in, go before you, we’re going to slaughter the giants, pull down their walls, and you’re going to stand around and say ‘How could God not love me, it’s because of my righteousness he’s done this.’ Now when we first got saved, you remember having any of those thoughts? ‘Lord, you made a wise choice, you got a good deal, I mean, there’s troubled people in this world, but when you saved me, good plan,’ and then he pulls back and lets us see a little bit more of what we are and we go ‘Whoa, I didn’t know that was still there, I need to go forward in another altar-call, reconsecrate my consecration,’ and he slowly lets us see ourselves so that we would grow in grace and the knowledge of who he is. But here he says ‘I’m going to take you in, when I get you in there, and we have miraculous victories over these unimaginable foes, I don’t want you to start with this,’ “For my righteousness the LORD hath brought me in to possess this land:” he said that’s not the reason, “but for the wickedness of these nations the LORD doth drive them out from before thee.” (verse 4) Chapter 15, verse 16 in Genesis said “the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet come to a full.” God measuring time again morally. And he said the day is going to come when I’m going to use the children of Israel as my rod of judgment and drive them out. But there was still 400 years of mercy towards these people. He says but it was for the wickedness of these nations the LORD doth drive them out from before thee. “Not for thy righteousness, or for the uprightness of thine heart, dost thou go to possess their land: but for the wickedness of these nations the LORD thy God doth drive them out from before thee, and that he may perform the word which the LORD sware unto thy fathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.” (verse 5) Look, there’s the danger, he’s warning them about misinterpreting his grace. His grace is always the same. You know, you and I, if we’re struggling with something, God is teaching us, he’s wanting us to grow, and we pray and we seek him, and he reveals and he gives strength, and we feel like we have victory over something. The thing you have to realize is, the second after that victory you’re just as dependent on him for the next victory as you were the second before you got that victory. That will be the lesson with Joshua and the children of Israel, when they come into the land, every victory they have is a secondary victory. The primary victory was won when they sought the LORD and got on their knees. Every failure they experienced was a secondary failure, because they moved ahead without seeking him or without praying and then they fail. And here, he’s just reiterating ‘It didn’t have anything to do with your righteousness of heart,’ he said ‘it’s because the LORD desired to drive them out from before thee,’ “that he may perform the word” notice it, I love that, it’s circled in my Bible, “which the LORD sware unto thy fathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.” (verse 5b) his Word is going to stand. “Understand, that the LORD thy God giveth thee not this good land to possess it for thy righteousness; for thou art a stiffnecked people.” (verse 6) you’re all in your terrible-two’s.

Remember What You Guys Were Really Like--How You Constantly Provoked Me

“Remember” he says, let’s take a trip down memory lane now, just so you don’t think it’s because of your own righteousness, “Remember. and forget not, how thou provokedst the LORD thy God to wrath in the wilderness: from the day that thou didst depart out of the land of Egypt, until ye came unto this place, ye have been rebellious against the LORD. Also in Horeb ye provoked the LORD to wrath, so that the LORD was angry with you to have destroyed you.” (verses 7-8) Now look, he’s going to rehearse the two central issues that were rehearsed here, is Horeb, the making of the Golden Calf and the idolatry there, and Kadesh-barnea. He’s going to hit, incidentally, a few other places where they complained and so forth, Kibroth-hataavah and these places. But he’s mainly going to center on idolatry and unbelief in their journey. So he says here, ‘Let’s head down memory lane, here, I wonder if you guys remember this, you moved me to wrath, almost to have destroyed you,’ “When I was gone up into the mount to receive the tables of stone, even the tables of the covenant which the LORD made with you, then I abode in the mount forty days and forty nights,” please notice this “I neither did eat bread nor drink water:” (verse 9) Forty days and forty nights without bread and without water, learning that man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God. Jesus when he fasted, it said when he finished fasting, he hungered, because he drank water during his forty day fast [now it doesn’t say in the Scripture whether he drank water or not]. You can’t live forty days in the natural without water. You can go forty days without eating, try it sometime [a friend of mine did, we talked him out of it just before he reached the 40 day mark because he looked like he’d stepped out of Auschwitz]. Not without water, and, I’m thinking about someone my son was telling me that he had talked to somebody and he said “You really can’t go three days without drinking water,” and he said “one of the girls in senior high said ‘I’ve gone three days without any water,’ and he said ‘What are you talking about,’ she said ‘all I drank was soda and juice, and I didn’t have any water for three days,’ and I said ‘Never mind,’ [laughter] Forty days and forty nights, sustained by the presence of God, what we really are to be and will be in his presence [as spirit-beings, because John said in 1^st John 3:1-2, that we will be like Jesus is now, and in Revelation 1:13-18, we see Jesus, like the Father is, is a flaming spirit-being, not composed of physical flesh], sustained there by the very presence of God. “and the LORD delivered unto me two tables of stone written with the finger of God;” I’d love to have a handwriting analysist go over that, wouldn’t you? “and on them was written according to all the words, which the LORD spake with you in the mount out of the midst of the fire in the day of the assembly. And it came to pass at the end of forty days and forty nights, that the LORD gave me the two tables of stone, even the tables of the covenant. And the LORD said unto me, Arise, get thee down quickly from hence; for thy people” now Moses should have known there was trouble right away when he heard they were “his” people, because all along he said God brought you out of Egypt, God did this, God parted the Red Sea, when God says “your people,” you know, if you come home from work and your wife says “your son,” if he’s mine, there’s trouble. So the LORD says ‘for thy people’ “which thou hast brought forth out of Egypt have corrupted themselves; they are” notice “quickly turned aside out of the way which I commanded them; they have made them a molten image.” (verses 10-12) Moses must be thinking, ‘Wait a minute, all I did was lift a stick, you did everything else.’ Now look, there are several things, you would think, because you hear Christians says this, ‘Man, if I could see a miracle, if I could experience this, that would strengthen my faith, like if I saw all of the judgments, the Nile River turning to blood, the frogs, the lice, all this stuff, when blackness came on the land of Egypt,’ Josephus says the darkness was so thick they gnawed their tongues, it could be felt, and in Goshen they’re having picnics, the sun was out, ‘the Passover lambs, and the night of the deliverance, the Red Sea and the Pillar of Fire and the Pillar of Cloud, the Manna falling,’ you think if you saw all of that it would straighten you out a little bit. And God says ‘Remember, how quickly you turned away, how quickly you turned away.’ Look, Paul says this in Galatians chapter 1, verse 6, he says, ‘I’m amazed that you’re so soon removed from the Gospel of Christ to another gospel,’ and he said ‘but it’s not another gospel, it’s a perverted gospel,’ and he said ‘anybody who preaches another gospel to you, whether it be man or angel, let them be anathema, eternally condemned.’ But Paul’s called the Galatians into grace, God’s calling the children of Israel to the Law, but he demonstrated his power with wonders and signs, and he says ‘I can’t believe how quickly you turned back to worship a golden calf, after I brought you out of Egypt.’ Paul says ‘I can’t believe how quickly these Galatians, who were Gentiles, now they’re circumcising themselves,’ he says ‘I can’t believe how fast you’re going under the Law, I called you to God’s grace, and how soon you’re turned away from the Gospel of grace that you’ve heard.’ There’s just something in us, isn’t there. [Comment: Galatians 6 is referring to them putting themselves back into the ceremonial law of God, which circumcision was a part of, which Paul said in Hebrews 10:5, the sacrificial laws had been abrogated because they were just shadows of Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross.] It bends one way and then it bends the other way. To you and I, balance is, going down the road, driving from one side of it to the other, and most of the road stays in the middle, we’re balanced, we go back and forth between grace and law and grace and law, we’re learning where that balance is. [Comment: and different parts of the Body of Christ are in different locations on that road of Law & Grace, some legalistic, some super-grace oriented, tending to deny that any law-keeping is required, whereas neither of these positions are correct. Calvary Chapels tend to understand where the balance is, except maybe not understanding that the Sabbath command, the 4^th Commandment, hasn’t been abrogated, as they think it has. But they understand the grace of God, in the context that at least 9 of the 10 Commandments are still in force, required of Christians (see https://unityinchrist.com/whatisgrace/whatisgrace.htm and https://unityinchrist.com/whatisgrace/whatisgraceintro.htm and https://unityinchrist.com/newcovenant/whichcovenant.htm and https://www.unityinchrist.com/newcovenant/TheNEWCOVENANT.htm for a full treatment of the subject that doesn’t take sides).] And here he says ‘I was amazed how quickly you turned away, and made a molten image.’ “Furthermore the LORD spake unto me, saying, I have seen this people, and, behold, it is a stiffnecked people: let me alone, that I may destroy them, and blot out their name from under heaven: and I will make of thee a nation mightier and greater than they.” you can just picture the LORD and Charlton Heston having this conversation, “So” Moses said “I turned and came down from the mount, and the mount burned with fire: and the two tables of the covenant were in my hands. And I looked, and, behold, ye had sinned against the LORD your God, and had made you a molten calf: ye had turned aside quickly out of the way which the LORD had commanded you. And I took the two tables, and cast them out of my two hands, and brake them before your eyes.” the only guy to break all Ten Commandments at one time, that’s Moses, “And I fell down before the LORD, as at the first, forty days and forty nights: I did neither eat bread, nor drink water, because of all your sins which ye sinned, in doing wickedly in the sight of the LORD, to provoke him to anger.” (verses 13-18) Now he makes quick mention, and then he’ll go back, of the fact he went and sought the LORD for forty more days and nights without bread and water, so altogether it was 80 days and 80 nights without bread or water. When he comes down the second time, he’d been in the presence of the LORD for so long, his batteries are all charged up, his face is glowing, he’s shining from being sustained by the very presence of God. And look, realize, that the children of Israel never saw a neon light, they never saw a flashlight [for you Brits, a hand-held torch], for you and I, you look at something like that, we have a context to put it in. For them to see this human being come and emanating a divine light, of course it shook the entire camp. But Moses quickly tells them how he spent 40 more days praying for them. “For I was afraid of the anger and hot displeasure, wherewith the LORD was wroth against you to destroy you. But the LORD hearkened unto me at that time also. And the LORD was very angry with Aaron to have destroyed him: and I prayed for Aaron also the same time.” (verses 19-20) because Moses said ‘Aaron, what in the world did you do? I left you in charge when I was up there, you’re supposed to be watching the children of Israel on the LORD’s behalf, they came to you and wanted you to do this. Why didn’t you stand up and say ‘No, we’re not going to worship any other god, you saw God’s work.’ Instead, Aaron capitulates, he decides to cooperate, and then when Moses says ‘What did you do?’ he gives him this cockamamy, this is like #1 cockamamy story, he said ‘You’ll never believe what happened, they made me do it, they gave me their gold earrings, gold rings, and I just threw it in the fire, and this calf came out. You’ve never seen anything like it before.’ And God said ‘Let me kill him,’ and Moses said ‘No, no.’ And he will enter the priesthood as the first high priest strictly on the basis of God’s grace. And the writer to Hebrews will tell us that it is necessary for the priest first to offer sacrifice for himself, for his own sins, before he ministers to the people.

The Other Times They Provoked God

“And the LORD was very angry with Aaron to have destroyed him: and I prayed for Aaron also the same time. And I took your sin, the calf which ye had made, and burnt it with fire, and stamped it, and ground it very small, even until it was as small as dust: and I cast the dust thereof into the brook that descended out of the mount. And at Taberah,” which means “burning” there in Numbers 11, verses 1 to 3, where they complained and God sent a fire among them, “and at Massah,” which is “strife” or “complaining” there where there was no water, “and at Kibroth-hattaavah,” “the graves of lust,” you remember where they wanted, they were tired of Manna and they wanted flesh, and God sent the quails and so forth, “ye provoked the LORD to wrath. Likewise when the LORD sent you from Kadesh-barnea, saying, Go up and possess the land which I have given you; then ye rebelled against the commandment of the LORD your God, and ye believed him not, nor hearkened to his voice. Ye have been rebellious against the LORD from the day that I knew you. Thus I fell down before the LORD forty days and forty nights, as I fell down at the first;” so this is the second 40 days “because the LORD had said he would destroy you. I prayed therefore unto the LORD, and said, O Lord GOD, destroy not thy people” Moses is giving them back “and thine inheritance, which thou hast redeemed through thy greatness, which thou hast brought forth” ‘I didn’t do it’ “out of Egypt with a mighty hand. Remember thy servants, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; look not unto the stubbornness of this people, nor to their wickedness, nor to their sin: lest the land whence thou broughtest us out say, Because the LORD was not able to bring them into the land which he promised them, and because he hated them, he hath brought them out to slay them in the wilderness. Yet they are thy people and thine inheritance, which thou broughtest out by thy mighty power and by thy stretched out arm.” (verses 20-29) Moses is genuinely jealous for the glory of God, and his prayer is ‘LORD, if you do that, and you let them perish in the wilderness, the heathen in Canaan land, the pagan tribes around here are all going to say ‘Ya, he might have had enough strength to bring them out of Egypt, but you did not have enough strength to bring them in, and therefore they perished in the wilderness, LORD it is your reputation at stake here, it’s your glory that’s at stake here.’ And I think for you and I as his children, I had a good dad, I’m sorry for those of you who had not been through that experience, but you have one now if you’re saved. And even as a young kid, I would get bugged if someone, somebody said something about my dad. And I feared my dad, and love him, a good dad gets both of those. It was a bad day when I heard my mom telling my father, and I knew that I was going to get the hickory switch from him instead of her. I didn’t mind her as I got older, she couldn’t hit hard enough to hurt me, just act a little bit and it was over. But he was always scary. So it was a healthy reverence and fear, but I knew that he loved me with all of his heart and I loved him. And here Moses is saying, ‘This is what they’re going to say about you, this is how the unbelieving nations are going to perceive you if you do this, you’re glory is at stake here, your reputation.’ “Yet they are thy people and thine inheritance, which thou broughtest out by thy mighty power and by thy stretched out arm.” (verse 29) we can do 12 verses here, we can’t do the whole chapter. Let’s go, hold on, ready, buckle your seatbelts.”

Deuteronomy 10:1-13

“At that time the LORD said unto me, Hew thee two tables of stone like unto the first, and come up unto me into the mount, and make thee an ark of wood. 2 And I will write on the tables the words that were in the first tables which thou brakest, and thou shalt put them in the ark. 3 And I made an ark of shittim wood, and hewed two tables of stone like unto the first, and went up into the mount, having the two tables in mine hand. 4 And he wrote on the tables, according to the first writing, the ten commandments, which the LORD spake unto you in the mount out of the midst of the fire in the day of the assembly: and the LORD gave them unto me. 5 And I turned myself and came down from the mount, and put the tables in the ark which I had made; and there they be, as the LORD commanded me. 6 And the children of Israel took their journey from Beeroth of the children of Jaakan to Mosera: there Aaron died, and there he was buried, and Eleazar his son ministered in the priest’s office in his stead. 7 From thence they journeyed unto Gudgodah; and from Gudgodah to Jotbath, a land of rivers of waters. 8 At that time the LORD separated the tribe of Levi, to bear the ark of the covenant of the LORD, to stand before the LORD to minister unto him, and to bless in his name, unto this day. 9 Wherefore Levi hath no part nor inheritance with his brethren; the LORD is his inheritance, according as the LORD thy God promised him. 10 And I stayed in the mount, according to the first time, forty days and forty nights; and the LORD hearkened unto me at that time also, and the LORD would not destroy thee. 11 And the LORD said unto me, take thy journey before the people, that they may go in and possess the land, which I sware unto their fathers to give unto them. 12 And now, Israel, what doth the LORD thy God require of thee, but to fear the LORD thy God, to walk in all his ways, and to love him, and to serve the LORD thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul, 13 to keep the commandments of the LORD, and his statutes, which I command thee this day for thy good?”

“And now, Israel, what doth the LORD thy God require of thee?”

“At that time the LORD said unto me, Hew thee two tables of stone like unto the first, and come up unto me into the mount, and make thee an ark of wood.” (verse 1) because it’s still in the first movement. “And I will write on the tables the words that were in the first tables which thou brakest, and thou shalt put them in the ark.” (verse 2) “which you broke,” notice, God’s not cutting a second set, ‘I sent you down there to see what was going on, not to break the tablets, so I’ll write on them like I did on the tables which you broke, and thou shalt put them in the ark,’ “And I made an ark of shittim wood, and hewed two tables of stone like unto the first, and went up into the mount, having the two tables in mine hand. And he wrote on the tables, according to the first writing, the ten commandments, which the LORD spake unto you in the mount out of the midst of the fire in the day of the assembly: and the LORD gave them unto me.” (verses 3-4) Remember, he spoke audibly to the nation as he had given them. “And I turned myself and came down from the mount, and put the tables in the ark which I had made; and there they be, as the LORD commanded me.” (verse 5) Wouldn’t that be an interesting archeological discovery, the Ark of the Covenant? I’ll take my best shot at these names “And the children of Israel took their journey from Beeroth of the children of Jaakan to Mosera: there Aaron died, and there he was buried, and Eleazar his son ministered in the priest’s office in his stead. From thence they journeyed unto Gudgodah; and from Gudgodah to Jotbath, a land of rivers of waters. At that time the LORD separated the tribe of Levi, to bear the ark of the covenant of the LORD, to stand before the LORD to minister unto him, and to bless in his name, unto this day. Wherefore Levi hath no part nor inheritance with his brethren; the LORD is his inheritance, according as the LORD thy God promised him.” (verses 6-9) Now he backs up now, and he says “And I stayed in the mount, according to the first time, forty days and forty nights; and the LORD hearkened unto me at that time also, and the LORD would not destroy thee.” (verse 10) Moses said he was up there pleading on behalf of the children of Israel. And no doubt God had allowed all of this, because the Good Shepherd lays down his life for the sheep, and it’s such a reflection in Moses of Jesus Christ and that kind of sacrificial heart, he said ‘LORD, strike my name from thy book, LORD, rather than do this to thy people,’ and so forth. “And the LORD said unto me, take thy journey before the people, that they may go in and possess the land, which I sware unto their fathers to give unto them.” Now there’s five imperatives here, and I want you to take notice of them, very interesting, he says, ‘I led you through the wilderness, I treated you like a father, fed you with Manna from heaven, I want you to understand man doesn’t live by bread alone, I’m going to bring you to this land, I want you to take heed to me, I want you to obey, because the land is good, the land is filled with streams and rivers and so forth, and olive yards and wheat and barley and figs, it’s a good land, there’s iron, there’s brass. But when I get you in there, and you start to partake and start to be blessed, the thing I’m concerned about, I don’t want you to forget, that I have provided all of these things just as miraculously as I have provided Manna, when you start to partake of the natural, you might forget that it all comes from my hand, and you might think it’s something you deserve, and I don’t want you to think that way at all. Because if your mind goes there and you start to forget me, you’re going to finally turn to idolatry and then I’m going to have to deal with you.’ he says, ‘What I want you to remember, is when you come in, and all of those blessings are there, I don’t want you to say it’s because of my uprightness, we’re such a righteous people, because you ain’t! You’re a stiffnecked crew, and you’ve provoked the LORD to wrath enough times. He got you out there, out of Egypt miraculously and encamped you in Horeb, sent me up to get the Ten Commandments, and so quickly you turned away, you’re all worshipping a golden calf.’ and he said ‘You were the same way at Taberah, Kibroth-hataavah, and Marrah, and when we came to Kadesh-barnea, you didn’t have the faith to enter in, it doesn’t have anything to do with you.’ God is performing his Word. So what is it then, taking all of this into consideration, what does he require of you then? And he says it here in verses 12-13, “And now, Israel, what doth the LORD thy God require of thee,” #1, “but to fear the LORD thy God,” that is a good thing, the fear of God is clean, John tells us in his first Epistle that fear hath torment, that’s a different kind of fear. You and I are in are in relationship with a God not to be tormented in our fear of him, it says the fear of the LORD is clean, in Psalm 119, it’s healthy, it’s a good thing. There is a reverence, there is a fear of God that we’re to have. When he speaks to a nation, when he speaks to Israel in Jeremiah 2, verse 19, he said ‘You’ve turned away, and my fear is no longer in you,’ that’s one of the reasons a nation turns away. The greatest thing that’s lacking in our nation today, is not oil, it’s not fossil fuels, it’s not economy, it’s not all of the things we’re seeing, what lacks in this nation is a genuine fear of Almighty God. And if that was in place, like it was in the lives of our founders, God’s blessing would be much more apparent on this nation, we have forgotten God, we have misinterpreted our history, we have turned away from him. We have decided morally what we think is correct instead of what he says. And again, this nation founded on a Judeo-Christian ethic, not a Judeo-Christian theology, he didn’t say everybody in this country has to be a Christian or a Jew, the doors are open for all people to come here. But the morality, the ethic that it was founded on was a Biblical ethic. And we’ve turned away from that, we forgotten it. And we’re in a mess, aren’t we? Fear thy God, that’s the first thing. Secondly it says, “to walk in all his ways,” and the New Testament doesn’t remove that responsibility from us, we’re supposed to walk with him, we hear much of that in the New Testament, that’s our life of faith, walking speaks of progress, that’s supposed to be our walk, “and to love him,” there’s nowhere, the New Testament says we love him because he first loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins, “and to serve the LORD thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul, to keep” to guard, to garrison, to treasure “the commandments of the LORD, and his statutes, which I command thee this day for thy good?” All of those things are incumbent upon us today. Listen, this is what he’s saying. “And now, Israel, what doth the LORD thy God require of thee, but to fear the LORD thy God, to walk in all his ways, and to love him, and to serve the LORD thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul, to keep the commandments of the LORD, and his statutes, which I command thee this day for thy good?” (verses 12-13) Listen, this is what he’s saying ‘I brought you through this great howling and terrible wilderness for 40 years, all the way you griped and complained, Are we there yet? Are we there? as soon as you pull out of the driveway, ‘can we go to the bathroom? can we eat?’ he says ‘All the way, you were a stiffnecked people, you were an idolatrous people, you provoked me to wrath, right from the beginning, all of this. And yet I was there, I was faithful,’ then he says ‘I want you to do these things, I want you to fear me, I want you to walk with me, I want you to love me, I want you to serve me, and I want you to keep my commandments, so that I can do thee good.’ Listen, if God so led them for 40 years when they were rebellious, and they were stiffnecked, and he delivered them from slavery, and he fed them from heaven, angel’s food, and he cared for them and gave them water in the desert, if he did all of those things when they were rebellious, what might he do in showing them good, if they’ll fear him and walk with him, and love him, and serve him, and keep his Word? Just think, he says ‘I want you to do these things, that I might do thee good.’ Isn’t that what he had done for them for 40 years? Nothing compared to the measure of what he desired to do for them. God invented the word Oye Vey as he led them through the wilderness for 40 years, believe me. And all those 40 years he was gracious to them, he loved them, they were his covenant people, he saw Abraham, Isaac and Jacob when he looked at them, and the promises that he had made, and he said ‘you kicked against me, you rebelled, you were stiffnecked, and I fed thee, I led thee, I’m bringing thee into a good land. It’s not because of your righteousness.’ This is our story. Not because of some good thing in you, it’s not because of your superior military strength that you’re going to do this, it’s because I’m going to keep my word. ‘What do I require of you, I want some reverence, I want you to fear me, I want a relationship, I want you to walk with me, and love me, like any father, to serve me, to keep my Word.’ Because he’s insecure? No, ‘that I might do thee good, that I might do thee good.’ What a God we serve, what a gracious God, ever the same. Let’s stand, let’s pray, let’s have the musicians come. Now remember, your blessing is to read ahead, not your homework…[transcription of a connective expository sermon on Deuteronomy 8:7-20, Deuteronomy 9:1-29 and Deuteronomy 10:1-13, given by Pastor Joe Focht, Calvary Chapel of Philadelphia, 13500 Philmont Avenue, Philadelphia, PA 19116]