Deuteronomy 24-27

Daily Reading

Deuteronomy 24-27

Daily Thought

The Israelites presented their first fruit offerings with these words, "A wandering Aramean was my father. And he went down into Egypt and sojourned there, few in number, and there he became a nation, great, mighty, and populous. And the Egyptians treated us harshly and humiliated us and laid on us hard labor. Then we cried to the Lord, the God of our fathers, and the Lord heard our voice and saw our affliction, our toil, and our oppression. And the Lord brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm, with great deeds of terror, with signs and wonders. And he brought us into this place and gave us this land, a land flowing with milk and honey. And behold, now I bring the first of the fruit of the ground, which you, O Lord, have given me" (Deuteronomy 26:5-10).

This is the story of the Israelites, the story of God's leading, of faith and of following.  The first fruits are a celebration of God's blessing, and the hardship, the toil, the wandering is part of the story and must be remembered.  It is our story as well.  We were wandering lost, found by Christ.  "Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God?  And such were some of you. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God" (1Corinthians 6:9, 11).  

This is our story: "My father was a wandering Aramean."  It is the first-fruit offering, the celebration.  We are each wanderers, born of wanderers.  And the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost (Luke 19:10).

Daily Prayer

Loving Father, You are my Savior and my Deliverer, my Rock and my Fortress, my Rescuer and my Redeemer. You made a covenant, a promise, a vow with me. You are my God. I, with all who believe in You and place our lives in Yours, all of us, we are Your people. The bride of Christ.

I am created in Your image, fearfully and wonderfully made. The image is clouded by sin, but You are restoring it. God, fill me with Your Spirit, so Your glory is evident, so that I resemble Your Son, so that all who see me see a reflection of You.  

Amen

Deuteronomy 21-23

Daily Reading

Deuteronomy 21-23

Daily Thought

"So you shall purge the evil from your midst."
~Deuteronomy 13:5; 17:7, 12; 19:19, 21; 22:21, 22, 24; 24:7

Question:  The God of the Old Testament is a brutal God.  Why can't he be more tolerant?  Like Jesus. 

For example, in today's passage, Deuteronomy 22:22, "If a man is found lying with the wife of another man, both of them shall die, the man who lay with the woman, and the woman. So you shall purge the evil from Israel."  The Pharisees used this passage when approaching Jesus with a woman (Where'd the man go?) caught in adultery.  Moses said to stone such a woman.  "What do you say Jesus?"

Everyone loves his answer, "Let him who is without sin among you be the first to throw a stone at her."  Jesus is so tolerant, "Neither do I condemn you," so loving.  We don't catch that Jesus has exposed the motive behind our own infatuation with tolerance.  We excuse the sins of others because we want our own sins excused.  Thus, the most (mis)quoted verse in the Bible, "Judge not, that you be not judged."  

Our definition of tolerance is "live and let live."  By that definition, God is, in fact, tolerant, but do we want him to be?  God's tolerance of rebellious people is displayed in Romans 1.  He gave them up (let live) in their lusts (v 24), their dishonorable passions (v 26), their debased mind (v 28), and the result?  They are filled with all manner of unrighteousness, inventors of evil (vv 29-30).  It turns out God's tolerance is a tool of his wrath and judgment.  It turns out an eternity of tolerance would be hell.  

Israel was the one nation in history where God joined together Church and State.  "I will be your God and you will be my people."  In that close relationship, when God's holiness is a daily display, Israel is to bless the world as an example of God's presence.  You cannot have God in your midst and evil, too.  Evil must be purged.  

Rather than tolerance, I am grateful for God's patience.  When asked about a coming Day of Judgment, the apostle Peter answered, "The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance." 

Rather than tolerance, I am grateful for God's salvation.  The wages of sin is death and God is not tolerant.  Death was paid.  As a result, "there is therefore no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus (Romans 8:1).  And Jesus said to the woman, "Neither do I condemn you" (John 8:11).

Daily Prayer

My God, at the Name of Jesus every knee will bow, above the earth, on the earth, under the earth.  Every tongue will confess Jesus Christ is Lord. You reign and Your Kingdom is good.  I desire nothing less, nothing else.  

You are sovereign, You are Creator, You are King, You are God.  You are wonderful.  Teach me what it means, what it looks like to love You with all my heart and soul and mind and strength.  Increase my love, my faith, my devotion, my delight in righteousness.  

Amen

Deuteronomy 17-20

Daily Reading

Deuteronomy 17-20

Daily Thought

This is how you know whether a prophet is true or false:

When a prophet speaks in the name of the Lord, if the word does not come to pass or come true, that is a word that the Lord has not spoken; the prophet has spoken it presumptuously. You need not be afraid of him (Deuteronomy 18:22).

The prophet Isaiah: "Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel" (7:14).

The prophet Micah: "But you, O Bethlehem Ephrathah,
    who are too little to be among the clans of Judah,
from you shall come forth for me
    one who is to be ruler in Israel,
whose coming forth is from of old,
    from ancient days" (5:2).

The prophet Daniel: "Know therefore and understand that from the going out of the word to restore and build Jerusalem to the coming of an anointed one, a prince, there shall be seven weeks. Then for sixty-two weeks it shall be built again with squares and moat, but in a troubled time" (9:25).

The prophet Isaiah again: "But he was pierced for our transgressions;
    he was crushed for our iniquities;
upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace,
     and with his wounds we are healed" (53:5).

For unto you is born this day in the city of David

a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.
~Luke 2:11

Daily Prayer

Father God, Your Kingdom come, Your will be done. Thank You for sending Your Son, King of kings and Lord of lords. May I and my whole household serve You all our days in this present life, and all eternity in the age to come.

Thank You for coming close, for Your Son becoming flesh and blood, displaying Your glory in our midst. Thank You that I am a citizen of Your Kingdom through the righteousness of Your Son. May my entire household love You and serve You with all our heart and soul and strength.

Amen

Deuteronomy 14-16

 Daily Reading

Deuteronomy 14-16
 

Daily Thought

Deuteronomy 15:4 says, "But there will be no poor among you."  Seven verses later, "For there will never cease to be poor in the land" (verse 11).  Which is it?  

It's the latter.  Verse 11 is an admission of reality.  Jesus repeats it years later, "For the poor you always have with you" (John 12:8), and it is still reality today.  Verse 4 is conditional.  It is not true, but it would be true if the second half of the sentence was true.  I left off the second half: "if only you will strictly obey the voice of the Lord your God, being careful to do all this commandment that I command you today."  

God would turn our world upside-down (which means the right side would be up) if we would obey him, but we don't.  We don't even understand what he is asking of us, because we don't understand the heart of God.  For example, the eighth commandment, "You shall not steal" (Deuteronomy 5:19).  We think stealing happens when someone who does not have sees someone who has and takes it from him.  God says stealing is much more than that.  He says that stealing happens when someone who has sees someone who does not have and does not share it with him.  (This may require several re-readings.)  

"If among you, one of your brothers should become poor, in any of your towns within your land that the Lord your God is giving you, you shall not harden your heart or shut your hand against your poor brother, but you shall open your hand to him and lend him sufficient for his need, whatever it may be." ~Deuteronomy 15:7-8

Does God have rules?  You bet he does, and he expects us to keep them.  If you love me, you will keep my commandments (John 14:15).  But following God is not about following rules.  It is about love, "love your neighbor as yourself" (Matthew 22:39).  And it is about life, "I came that they may have life and have it abundantly" (John 10:10).   If we truly desire what life has to offer, if we truly desire to love others, if we truly desire that there will be no poor among us, there is a way.  Desire God and do what God says. 

Daily Prayer 

Lord God, You have come to bring Your justice into the land, to give Your grace to the repentant, to bless the meek and the poor, to comfort those who mourn, to bring righteousness and goodness to those who seek Your face. May Your Kingdom come and Your will be done.

Father, I pray that my heart would be free of darkness, full of light. That I would see others, love others, and serve others the way You do. God, that I would look at others as more important than myself, that I would be sensitive to needs, that I would have open hands, and feet ready to go wherever You lead. That people would praise Your name because of the faithfulness of Your followers.

Amen

Deuteronomy 11-13

Daily Reading

Deuteronomy 11-13

Daily Thought

"Remember today that your children were not the ones who saw and experienced the discipline of the LORD your God: his majesty, his mighty hand, his outstretched arm" (Deuteronomy 11:2 NIV).

In the fifth grade, Mrs. O'Donnell tried to teach the class a song. She got it all wrong. I told her that. In fact, I sang it for her, so she'd know how it was supposed to sound.  Except Mrs. O'Donnell had a record by the original artist, and she played it, and she was right, and the class laughed.

In the fifth grade, I learned that my dad had his own way of singing songs.  When you haven't heard the original artist, you depend on your dad to get the song right.

"You shall therefore lay up these words of mine in your heart and in your soul.  You shall teach them to your children, talking of them when you are sitting in your house, and when you are walking by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates, that your days and the days of your children may be multiplied in the land that the Lord swore to your fathers to give them, as long as the heavens are above the earth." ~Deuteronomy 11:18-21

Daily Prayer

Father God, Thank You for all You do. Thank You for Your Word which tells me Your story, about Your faithfulness from generation to generation. Thank You for Your church, the family of God, that surrounds me with Your love and grace.

You have given me Your Good News. May I share it well, may I share it accurately, may I share it in action and word. God, I pray that the picture I show of You by my life will be accurate and true, that I will sing it right and well, and compel others to love and follow You.

Amen

Deuteronomy 9-10

Daily Reading

Deuteronomy 9-10

Daily Thought

"And now, Israel, what does the Lord your God require of you, but to fear the Lord your God, to walk in all his ways, to love him, to serve the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul, and to keep the commandments and statutes of the Lord, which I am commanding you today for your good?" Deuteronomy 10:12-13

How does the Lord want me to live? Good question. What does God really want of me? Five things are expected of the Israelites.  Of me, too.  

A life of awe, fearing God not in a trembling terror, but rather in a respectful appreciation of his wonderfully terrifying awesome majesty. This is an overarching attitude toward God that saturates my being and shows through in my actions.  A life of trust, obeying God all-day, following his lead and direction.  A life of love, grateful and full of joy, exhibited not only toward God, but to all those he loves, as well.  That is, to each and every person I meet.  A life of service, using my God-given talents and abilities on behalf of and to better the lives of others.  And a life of obedience, reading, hearing, studying, living out His Word. The Lord's commands are not a burden, but the very best way to live.

God's will for my life?  Not that hard to know, is it.

Daily Prayer

Father, thank you for giving me instruction that is for my best. You put me together according to Your plans. You have numbered my days, and set a path in front of me. My prayer is that I would follow that path.

Sometimes I don't. Thank You for Your Son who paid the price for those times I stray. Thank You for Your Word which lights the path and leads me on the way to righteousness. God, as long as I stay on Your path, I get life and You get the glory!

Amen

Deuteronomy 7-8

Daily Reading

Deuteronomy 7-8
 

Daily Thought

The term 'Genocide' was coined in 1941 by combining the Greek word 'genos' (race) with the Latin word 'cide' (killing). Genocide, as defined by the United Nations, is the deliberate destruction, in whole or in part, of a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group.  

The Hittites, the Girgashites, the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites, seven nations more numerous and mightier than you, when the Lord your God gives them over to you, and you defeat them, then you must devote them to complete destruction (Deuteronomy 7:1-2).

Question:  How is this not genocide?   Short Answer: According to that definition, it is.  Skipping this topic is tempting.  I could find something safe to write about in chapter 8.  But if I am to follow God, I must not fear standing beside him, even when it is not safe.  Especially when it is not safe.  So, here I am, discussing Deuteronomy 7:1-2.  I will not say, "I wish God hadn't, but since he did," as if to say, if I was God I wouldn't have.  I'm not nicer than God.  I'm not God.  That's the point.  It is the first lesson of humanity, the one we failed in the Garden of Eden.  Genesis 3:4-5, the serpent said, "When you eat, you will be like God."  We ate, but we're not.  

I am not eternal.  God is.  He measures people through eternity, I measure them in the moment.  I am not, by nature, holy and righteous.  God is.  When I live in the midst of sinners, I am not merely accommodating their sin, I am also enjoying their sin.  I'm one with them because I am one of them.  God is not.  He endures sin because of grace and because of the Gospel.  He has a plan.  It is the holiness and justice of God that moves him to exact the price on sin.  In extreme cases, it appears genocidal.   It is also his holiness and justice that moves God to pay the price for sin.  This is grace, it is the Gospel.  

There is more to write on this.  Much more.  And there will be opportunities as we continue through Deuteronomy and into Joshua.  But this is where we stand, alongside a holy, just, good, gracious, eternal, wonderful God.  Even when it is not safe.  Especially when it is not safe.

Daily Prayer

Eternal God, You are the One who created me in the first place.  It is not my place to hold You accountable, but to account myself before You.  Before Your goodness and holiness and righteousness.  I am happy to say, I stand tall before You, but not because of anything I have accomplished.  I stand tall because I want You to see the work of Your Son in my life.  It is His righteousness I display, not my own, and I stand tall to let it shine.

God, may I stand before this world, so that all may see the grace and goodness of Your salvation.  I am not ashamed of Your gospel, because it is the power of salvation, saving me from my world of sin.  I now hunger and thirst for righteousness, to live in Your presence forever.

Amen