August 27, 2017
Please use the comment section on this page to share insights from today’s reading OR your own personal Bible reading.
Reading along with us in Deuteronomy? Here’s today’s reading:
Deuteronomy 4 (ESV)
“And now, O Israel, listen to the statutes and the rules that I am teaching you, and do them, that you may live, and go in and take possession of the land that the Lord, the God of your fathers, is giving you. 2 You shall not add to the word that I command you, nor take from it, that you may keep the commandments of the Lord your God that I command you. 3 Your eyes have seen what the Lord did at Baal-peor, for the Lord your God destroyed from among you all the men who followed the Baal of Peor. 4 But you who held fast to the Lord your God are all alive today. 5 See, I have taught you statutes and rules, as the Lord my God commanded me, that you should do them in the land that you are entering to take possession of it. 6 Keep them and do them, for that will be your wisdom and your understanding in the sight of the peoples, who, when they hear all these statutes, will say, ‘Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people.’ 7 For what great nation is there that has a god so near to it as the Lord our God is to us, whenever we call upon him? 8 And what great nation is there, that has statutes and rules so righteous as all this law that I set before you today?… Continue Reading
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We need laws
2You shall not add to the word that I command you, nor take from it, that you may keep the commandments of the Lord your God that I command you.
15″Therefore watch yourselves very carefully. Since you saw no form on the day that the Lord spoke to you at Horeb out of the midst of the fire, 16beware lest you act corruptly by making a carved image for yourselves
I really noticed the context here of the command about not making carved images. Moses is implying the question, “What does God look like?” He points out that they (the Israelites) have heard His voice but never seen Him. Don’t then create “images” of God in the form of anything (man or beast) and worship them, thinking you’re worshiping God. You’re not! And don’t look to nature or the heavens and worship God using what He has created for ALL the world, either, “lest you be drawn away and bow down to them and serve them.”
The consequences God spells out in Deuteronomy 4:25-28 are frightening!!
What Moses is describing are the religious practices of age-old paganism, which still exists today in many forms, including Wicca, and also of the contemporary New Age religions. Today, we hear many “praying to the Universe,” and even thanking the Universe for its blessings. In today’s New Age religion, the heavens have become god.
“The LORD your God is a consuming fire, a jealous God.” Deuteronomy 4:24,29
Thankfully, God is merciful, and promises that when tribulation comes and those “gods” they worship don’t deliver them, “But from there you will seek the LORD your God and you will find him, if you search after him with all your heart and with all your soul.” Deuteronomy 4:29
I’m so glad God not only loves me but is jealous for me, and won’t allow my falling away from Him to lead to a blessed life. I want to suffer terribly if I ever begin to fall away and worship anything or anyone but Him, if I’m ever deceived or led astray, so I will come running back quickly.
There are two things Moses points to in this chapter that are true privileges the Israelites should recognize. How privileged they are to have God’s laws, to know His standards! And secondly to be called His people. What other nation can claim they have a God like their God? What other nation has their God following along with them protecting, guiding and providing?
Isn’t this in some ways even more true of us? How privileged we are to have His word written on our hearts? How blessed we are to have God inside us? What a great reminder reinforced in this chapter which leads to great praise to our God! It is what makes His desire and expectation for obedience make sense. It is what makes making idols a frivolous and foolish endeavor.
And isn’t verse 29 awesome? If you have lost your way and followed a wrong path, if you turn and seek God, you will find Him. And you will find God to merciful without being a push over.