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What's
up with the interest rates on home loans this
past year? The last time they were this low my
Zayde was driving a DeSoto. And why is it a big
deal, anyway? Well, lands and houses represent
real, tangible, valuable holdings. That's why
it's called "Real Estate". Of course, though Alexandra
and I do have a mortgage and are aiming to have
paid the full balance on our home by the time
Ari is in college; we know that this world is
not our home, and that we have a better country
and a better inheritance in heaven. As a preacher
of the Good News, you could think of me as a "Surreal
Estate" agent, but heaven is not surreal; it is
a very real place.
Yet, if
you think about it, for the believer in Yeshua,
Jesus, the whole idea of real estate is a little
humorous. If we believe that God created and owns
the entire earth and the sum total of its contents,
then the boundaries we set up and call our "property"
are completely arbitrary. For that matter, the
very fabric of the Hebrew language presupposes
God's ownership of all that is. For example, you
cannot in Hebrew literally say "This is my house".
You can only say, "Yesh lee bayit" "There is to
me a house". Still, God allows us to have houses
and sometimes land, and we are free to think of
it as ours, but the bottom line is this: the planet
belongs to God. There are no heavenly real estate
brokers or city planning commissioners with whom
He must deal. God owns the whole thing. He's the
cosmic Landlord. And if the earth is real estate,
then Eretz Yisrael is the choicest property of
all.
The parsha
for this Shabbat opens for us the fifth and last
book of the Torah: D'varim, better known as Deuteronomy.
D'varim is the Jewish designation for the book,
and as with the other books of the Torah, is named
after the key word in the first verse. In this
case, verse 1 begins, "These are the words which
Moses spoke to all Israel…" D'varim means "words".
Background
Material to Deuteronomy
So how did it get the name Deuteronomy? Deuteronomy
is from the Latin words deutero ("second") and
nomos ("law" - nomos actually comes down directly
from Greek). According to God's command in chapter
17, verse 18, Israel's kings were each to begin
their administration by making a copy of this
law for themselves. It wasn't to be a "second
law" but rather a "copy of the law", so the name
Deuteronomy is based on a misinterpretation of
17:18. This book is also referred to in Jewish
tradition as Mishnah HaTorah, or, "The Law, a
second time" and Sefer Takahot, or, Book of Admonitions".
At the
risk of sounding odd, I'd like to introduce us
to Deuteronomy by reading a passage in Genesis.
You see, Deuteronomy, D'varim, is a book about
a covenant - namely, the reaffirmation of the
covenant Adonai had already made with Abraham
and confirmed with Isaac and Jacob. So, to remind
us of the particulars of that covenant, let's
start by reading Genesis, chapter 15, verses 7-18.
And He
(Adonai) said to him (Avram), "I am the Lord who
brought you out of Ur of the Chaldeans, to give
you this land to possess it." And he (Avram) said,
"O Lord God, how may I know that I shall possess
it? So He said to him, "Bring me a three year
old heifer, and a three year old female goat,
and a three year old ram, and a turtledove, and
a young pigeon." Then he brought all these to
Him and cut them in two, and laid each half opposite
the other; but he did not cut the birds.
This is
a covenant being made. This was precisely how
covenants were ratified in the ancient Middle
East. We'll talk more about that process in a
few minutes, but let's pick up at verse 12:
Now
when the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell
upon Avram; and behold, terror and great darkness
fell upon him. And God said to Avram, "Know
for certain that your descendants will be strangers
in a land that is not theirs, where they will
be enslaved and oppressed four hundred years.
But I will also judge the nation whom they will
serve; and afterward they will come out with
many possessions. And as for you, you shall
go to your fathers in peace; you shall be buried
at a good old age. Then in the fourth generation
they shall return here, for the iniquity of
the Amorite is not yet complete." And it came
about when the sun had set, that it was very
dark, and behold, there appeared a smoking oven
and a flaming torch which passed between these
pieces. On that day Adonai made a covenant with
Avram, saying, "To your descendants I have given
this land, from the river of Egypt as far as
the great river, the river Euphrates;"
And He
goes on to name some of the people groups living
in those lands at the time.
Think
of this in terms of real estate.
Here in
Genesis, God, the Landlord of all the earth, promises
Abraham, centuries in advance, that his descendants,
after four hundred years of slavery, will inherit
a particular parcel of land - a real prime property,
but that there are currently "tenants" living
there (the Amorites). God is particularly unhappy
with these tenants, and as soon as their lease
is up, they're getting the boot (eviction) but
not just yet… for the iniquity of the Amorite
is not yet complete.
It was
promised to Abraham by way of a covenant, a contract.
And that covenant included the following provisions:
- Land (Eretz Yisrael)
- Seed (generations of
descendants)
- Provision (abundant
crops, supply)
- Protection (from enemies)
- Extended blessing (cf.
Genesis 12:3 - to all the families of the earth)
The entire
book of Deuteronomy is remarkably similar in structure
to the ancient Middle Eastern treaties between
kingdoms. A great debt is owed to a scholar, Dr.
G.E. Mendenhall. In 1955 Mendenhall called the
academic community's attention to the remarkable
parallels between Deuteronomy and 2nd Millennium
BC Near Eastern (Hittite) treaties and covenants.
It caused a whole generation of biblical scholars
to re-evaluate their previously held arguments
against Moses' authorship of the book.
These
ancient covenants, or treaties, came to be known
as Suzerainty Treaties. Typically when one king
or kingdom would conquer another, a treaty would
be made to solidify what their respective positions
were, and to establish normative relations. The
victorious king was the Suzerain and the vanquished
king was the Vassal. These covenants were typically
unilateral in nature, the Suzerain alone setting
the terms of the covenant. Those who are defeated
don't negotiate terms, they simply agree to abide
by terms set by the Victor, and hope that the
terms are just.
One theological
dictionary defined covenant this way: "a compact
or agreement between two parties, binding them
mutually to undertakings on each other's behalf."
Examples of covenants may include marriage, real
estate contracts, treaties or commercial agreements.
In the Tanakh, the Jewish Scriptures, as well
as throughout that part of the world at that time,
covenants were understood to be unalterable and
permanent. You did not enter into a covenant lightly.
Commitments of this kind require deep and sober
consideration.
The Hebrew
word for covenant is tyrB (B'rit). And though
we speak of "making" a covenant, the actual Hebrew
term was not hcu (Asah - to make) but rather trK
(karat) which means to "cut". You spoke of "cutting"
a covenant, because that's precisely what happened
to the animals involved in the ceremony. The making
of a covenant involved the sacrifice of animals.
Typically, the vassal and suzerain would sacrifice
one or more animals, subsequently bisecting each
animal, and placing the halves opposite each other
to form an aisle. Having done that, the two parties
in the covenant/treaty would form a solemn processional
down that aisle, the implications being "should
either of us violate the terms of this covenant,
let that one meet with the same fate as these
animals!"
Many copies
of Hittite treaties have survived through the
years, and were discovered in archaeological digs
of the previous century, to give us an idea of
the format of these covenants.
Format:
-
Preamble
-
Historical Prologue
-
Laws/Stipulations
-
Ratification
-
Witnesses
The Preamble:
"here we are, gathered, king so-and-so and his
country, the victors, and king so-and-so and his
country, the vanquished, meeting at such-and-such
a place to make a covenant"). The preamble simply
names the respective parties to the covenant.
Deuteronomy 1:1-5 is essentially the Preamble
to the book. It identifies God as the first party,
Moses and Israel as the second, and establishes
the location and time. The place? Across the Jordan.
The phrase /Dry rbuB (beyond the Jordan) is very
important in all of biblical literature, and those
who have been coming to our Bible Study on Wednesday
evenings already know why. The Canaanites, seeing
the Israelis coming from afar referred to them
as those from "across the Jordan", since the Jordan
was the natural eastern boundary to their territory.
That was their perspective.
From the
Jewish people's perspective, the Jordan represented
either side of redemption history. Those references
to the time we were beyond the Jordan are references
to the time before we enjoyed life in Israel,
before we entered into God's promise. It sometimes
has a negative connotation. We had been slaves
in Egypt, and after that we wandered forty years
in the desert. In any case, we were still outside
the promise and the blessings. To be beyond the
Jordan is to be on the outside looking in. Keep
that in mind whenever you come across that phrase
in the Bible.
Let's
look again at verses 1-5:
These
are the words which Moses spoke to all Israel
across the Jordan in the wilderness, in the
Arabah opposite Suph, between Paran and Tophel
and Laban and Hazeroth and Dizahab.
There
is some debate about the significance of the mention
of these five cities. Those who hold to a mystical
approach to the word of God look at these cities
as representing, in some fashion, the occasions
when Israel rebelled against God. There is a little
mystery about it, but the most likely explanation
(the one that requires the least amount of spiritual
gymnastics) is that Moses gave this discourse,
not all at once, but over a period of time, and
in these particular locations. In any case, these
five verses form the Preamble to this book.
The Arabah
is the desert plain (i.e., Arabian Desert). Suph
was a Moabite region east of the Dead Sea. After
that we have the specific mention of the five
cities. Paran was part of the wilderness region
in the Sinai Peninsula, and the place from which
Moses sent the spies into the land. Tophel is
translated "lime" or "cement". Hazeroth is simply
translated "villages" and is the site where Aaron
and Miriam challenged Moses' leadership. Dizahab
is translated "abounding in gold". Let's continue
in verses 2 and 3:
It is
eleven days' journey from Horeb by the way of
Mount Seir to Kadesh Barnea. And it came about
in the fortieth year …
"Whoa!
Wait a minute, Moses! You're telling me that we
could have made this shlep in a week and a half?!!
And forty years later we're back where we started?
What's up with that?" Well, let me ask you: Are
Jewish people uniquely possessed of directional
dysfunctionality? Do you think we might have done
better had we been equipped with a GPS (Global
Positioning Satellite) system?
Dear friends,
please don't miss the significance of this: Here
we are, at the threshold of the land of Israel,
the land of promise! But it turns out we'd been
here before - forty years earlier! As a matter
of fact, we were THIS close! So what happened?
What went wrong?
Maybe
it's just me, but I'd really be interested to
know if the following scenario has ever happened
to any of you: You get up nice and early and get
yourself ready for the work day; You leave your
house, make the commute, you shlep across town,
you get to your place of employment, unload your
vehicle, get to your office door… only to discover
that you'd forgotten your keys? It is one of the
more frustrating, unnerving experiences I have
had (at least twice… in the past five years…).
Don't
miss this! Forty years earlier we had been at
the very threshold of the Land. We'd been delivered
by God's hand out of slavery in Egypt, crossed
the Sinai, arrived at the doorway to the Land,
and guess what, we'd forgotten the key. Key? What
are you talking about, Rabbi Glenn? What key?
Oh… the one marked "Faith"! "Trust"! Trust in
Adonai was what we had forgotten, and that trust
was the only way we were going to complete the
journey!
That was
the previous generation. D'varim was given to
the New Generation. That unbelieving generation
was refused entry into the Land on account of
their faithlessness. Having personally witnessed
the mighty power of God in Egypt, and the parting
of the Red Sea, and the pillar of cloud by day,
and the pillar of fire by night; miracle after
miracle; and yet they were too frightened to enter
the land - which Rabbi Loren related to us in
Numbers chapters 13 and 14. We wouldn't trust
God to complete what He had started, and we were
thus decreed by God to wander through the wilderness
for forty years until every adult male had died.
Did God
abandon His people? No way! Was He with them during
the years of their wandering? Absolutely! Did
He provide for our needs those forty years? Abundantly!
Would that generation live to see the Promised
Land? No. Their children would, but not the unbelievers.
Moses knew that the generation of Israelis that
came out of Egypt would not enter the Land. It
was a new generation standing on the plains of
Moab to whom this address was given. And we'll
take that theme up again shortly, but I just want
you to bear in mind that the same principle applies
to the World-to-Come. Heaven is for those who
will put their trust in Adonai and in His Messiah.
This earth is our wilderness wandering and the
question is put to us:
Will
we have learned the costly mistake of that generation?
Let's
go on (vs. 3):
And
it came about in the fortieth year, on the first
day of the eleventh month, that Moses spoke
to the children of Israel, according to all
that the Lord had commanded him to give to them,
after he had defeated Sihon the king of the
Amorites, who lived in Heshbon, and Og the king
of Bashan, who lived in Ashtaroth and Edrei.
Across the Jordan in the land of Moab, Moses
undertook to expound this law, saying …
And that
completes the Preamble. We now know who the respective
parties to the Covenant are: Israel and God. We
now know who's involved and where we are, and
why.
That brings
us to the second part of the Covenant: The Historical
Prologue.
Our parsha
for this Shabbat, Deuteronomy chapters 1 -3 is,
for the most part, the Historical Prologue to
the Covenant. The Preamble gave us the setting;
we have the main characters, and the place and
time. We've been told who's involved and where
we are and why. Now comes the second part, the
Historical Prologue (again, typical of ancient
Middle Eastern treaties). The Historical Prologue
is the part of an ancient covenant that tells
us how we got here; the events leading up to the
present treaty ratification. In the context of
the book of D'varim, it is the necessary background
information if we're to understand the "big picture".
Again,
what you will find fascinating, as we make our
way through Deuteronomy, is that the entire document
seems to be one long covenant document, following
almost precisely the format of the ancient Near
Eastern Treaty documents.
I can't
stress enough the importance of knowing this book.
Familiarizing yourself with Deuteronomy is essential
if you hope to have an understanding the relationship
between the God of Israel and the people of Israel.
Do you want to understand the message of the Prophets?
You need to know this book. Do you want to know
why things are the way they are for the Jewish
people today? You need to know this book. Do you
want to understand Messiah Yeshua's teachings
better? You need to know this book.
So prevalent
in first-century Jewish religious thinking was
the book of Deuteronomy that it is quoted more
than 80 times in the New Covenant Scriptures!
Did you know that when Yeshua was tempted in the
wilderness by the devil, He responded to each
of the three challenges with quotations directly
from Deuteronomy. I'm sharing these facts with
you in the hope that those of you who are visiting,
or those who attend Shema only sporadically, will
make it a point to continue with us in the weeks
ahead through this very important book.
Verses
6-8
The Lord our God spoke to us at Horeb …
(Horeb
is a reference to Mt. Sinai - don't forget, this
is now the Historical Prologue. This is a recounting
of the things that happened the first time around,
right after we had come out of Egypt), saying,
'You have stayed long enough at this mountain.
Turn and set your journey, and go to the hill
country of the Amorites, and to all their neighbors
in the Arabah, in the hill country and in the
lowland and in the Negev and by the seacoast,
the land of the Canaanites, and Lebanon, as far
as the great river, the river Euphrates. See,
I have placed the land before you; go in and possess
the land which the Lord swore to give to your
fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac and to Jacob, to
them and their descendants after them.'
That's
a lot of land! Those borders exceed by far the
present borders of Israel, and even the little
we have now is forever being contested by those
bent on our demise. What we need to understand
here is that this was the very land God promised
by covenant to give to Abraham and his descendants.
And now, according to the word of God, four centuries
of slavery and one decimated Egypt later, we were
free, and poised to enter that land.
Verses
9-10
And I spoke to you at that time, saying, I am
not able to bear the burden of you alone. The
Lord your God has multiplied you, and behold,
you are this day as the stars of heaven for multitude.
(intentional hyperbole)
Wasn't
that exactly what God had promised to childless
Abraham? Didn't God take Avraham for an evening
stroll and point out the star-studded night sky
to him, and promise him "So shall your descendants
be!" And here was Abraham, nearly 100 years old
and childless, and yet he trusted God to fulfill
His promise, and on that basis, the basis of simple
trust, God deemed Abraham righteous. Abraham hadn't
kept Torah - the Torah didn't exist at that time.
For that matter, Abraham hadn't even been circumcised
yet! Righteousness comes through faith, and all
the nice charitable things you could possibly
do will not make you righteous in God's sight
if you don't believe.
May Adonai,
the God of your fathers, increase you a thousand-fold
more than you are, and bless you, just as He has
promised you!
Wow! It
was over 600,000 Jewish men of fighting age that
came out of Egypt. Add to that the hundreds of
thousands of women and hundreds of thousands of
children and the thousands of foreigners who had
attached themselves to Israel and you have in
the vicinity of 2 million people in the assembly
of Israel. And Moses says, "May God increase you
a thousand-fold more than you are!" Be careful
what you pray for, Moses!
Look at
the next verse …
How can
I alone bear the load and burden of you and your
strife?
Ask any
pastor, or ask Rabbi Loren sometime about the
difficulties and trials and contentions of even
a congregation of a few hundred people. We human
beings are a contentious lot, given to petty bickering
and often frivolous disputes, and Moses had a
lot of human beings to deal with. Did you know
that how you conduct yourself will either make
your spiritual leader's ministry a joy, or a grievous
burden? Foolish and selfish disputes are a sign
that one's eyes off the Lord and on themselves.
Rabbi Paul wrote to the believers in Thessalonika
"But we request of you, brethren, that you appreciate
those who diligently labor among you, and have
charge over you in the Lord and give you instruction,
and that you esteem them very highly in love because
of their work. Live in peace with one another."
(1 Thessalonians 5:12-13)
Let's
look at verse 13:
Choose
wise and discerning and experienced men from
your tribes, and I will appoint them as your
heads.
What a
great idea, Moses - Delegate! And where do you
think he got that good idea? It was the advice
of his Father-in-Law, Jethro (cf. Exodus 18).
How many of us are willing to take advice from
our In-Laws, I wonder? And Moses went on to commission
these other men as judges to handle disputes,
and exhorts them in the following verses to judge
righteously, as acting in the stead of God. They
were not to show favoritism, they were not to
fear the repercussions of their decisions, and
any cases that were just too difficult, they were
to bring to Moses.
Verses
19-24
Then we set out from Horeb, and went through all
that great and terrible wilderness which you saw,
on the way to the hill country of the Amorites,
just as the Lord our God had commanded us; and
we came to Kadesh-barnea. And I said to you, 'You
have come to the hill country of the Amorites
which the Lord our God is about to give us. See,
the Lord your God has placed the land before you;
go up, take possession, as the Lord, the God of
your fathers, has spoken to you. Do not fear or
be dismayed.'
So we
left Mt. Sinai and traveled those eleven days
and came to Kadesh-barnea, the doorway to the
Promised Land. And Adonai had commanded us to
take possession of it and not to be afraid. And
what did we have to fear? We saw what God did
to the Egyptian army. But look at verses 22-24:
Then
all of you approached me and said, 'Let us send
men before us, that they may search out the
land for us, and bring back to us word of the
way by which we should go up, and the cities
which we shall enter.' And the thing pleased
me and I took twelve of your men, one man for
each tribe. And they turned and went up into
the hill country, and came to the valley of
Eshcol, and spied it out.
Leave
it to us human beings to get a clear, simple set
of directions from God and find a way to make
it more complicated. The fact is, we were given
a directive, and we went ahead and reinterpreted
that directive to suit ourselves. God said, "Go
up and take possession of the Land." and we said,
"I've got a better idea - let's send spies in
to check it out first." God wanted our simple
trust, and we wanted to play Secret Agent Man.
("Ooh, I get to use the secret decoder ring first!"
"No, me!"). Now in all fairness, in Numbers ch.
13 God said they should send spies. But here in
Deuteronomy, looking on the event in retrospect,
Moses takes the blame along with the people. I
think we're meant to understand it, not as having
been a bad strategy, per se, but rather as evidencing
a lack of faith.
Moses
accepts his share of culpability in all this,
saying, "And the thing pleased me and I took twelve
of your men, one man for each tribe…" One of the
things that separates real, biblical history from
mythology is the genuineness of these accounts.
The candor with which our failures are related
gives Scripture the ring of authenticity. Nothing
is whitewashed or glossed over. Our sin is held
up for collective scrutiny.
We were
unwilling to trust God; we thought we knew better;
and Moses admits having bought into it. And I'm
pretty certain I would have done exactly the same
thing! You?
Then they
took some of the fruit of the land in their hands
and brought it down to us; and they brought us
back a report and said, 'It is a good land which
the Lord our God is about to give us.' Yet you
were not willing to go up, but rebelled against
the command of the Lord your God; 12 spies went
into the land, and the 12 came back. And they
all agreed that the land was choice and beautiful
and fruitful (we read about this in Numbers 13-14).
And then they gave the majority report and the
minority report.
The majority
(represented by 10 of the 12) said, "There's no
way we're going to pull this off. These cities
are walled and well-fortified, there are more
of them than us, and they're strong, and there
are giants in those cities (Nephilim) and we felt
like grasshoppers by comparison." And their bad
report caused the people's hearts to sink.
The minority
report (represented by just 2 - can you name them?)
The minority report, represented by Joshua and
Caleb, urged the people to trust God, saying,
"We should by all means go up and take possession
of it, for we shall surely overcome it… If the
Lord is pleased with us, then He will bring us
into this land and give it to us… Adonai is with
us; do not fear them!"
Verses
27 ff
And you grumbled in your tents and said, 'Because
the Lord hates us, He has brought us out of the
land of Egypt to deliver us into the hand of the
Amorites to destroy us. Where can we go up? Our
brethren have made our hearts melt, saying, "The
people are bigger and taller than we; the cities
are large and fortified to heaven. And besides,
we saw the sons of the Anakim there."
Isn't
it amazing how two people can look at exactly
the same circumstances and interpret them in completely
different ways? The unbeliever looks at them and
sees only obstacles. The believer looks at the
same set of circumstances and sees an opportunity.
Then I
said to you, 'Do not be shocked, nor fear them.
The Lord your God who goes before you will Himself
fight on your behalf, just as He did for you in
Egypt before your eyes, and in the wilderness
where you saw how the Lord your God carried you,
just as a man carries his son, in all the way
which you have walked, until you came to this
place.' But for all this, you did not trust the
Lord your God, who goes before you on your way,
to seek out a place for you to encamp, in fire
by night and cloud by day, to show you the way
in which you should go.
Unfortunately,
our people went along with the majority, and even
threatened to put Moses, Aaron, Joshua and Caleb
to death (so much for tolerance and diversity).
Did you
know that 3,500 years later we're still making
the same mistake? 3,500 years later we're still
throwing our vote with the majority and refusing
to believe. 10 out of 12 spies said it couldn't
happen. Those spies were respected leaders in
Israel. "Well, are we supposed to believe that
the overwhelming majority of our leaders were
wrong?" Yes. It is not only possible for the majority
to be wrong, it is usually the case.
The majority
of our rabbis have rejected Yeshua as the Messiah
for centuries now. They too are respected leaders
of the Jewish people. They, too, have been wrong,
and if we tell ourselves, "Well, they're our leaders
and I'm throwing my vote in with what the majority
says," - that's no excuse. We will be just as
guilty as that generation. Joshua and Caleb were
both young men, and were clearly a very small
minority. It would have been very easy to dismiss
them as a fringe element. Well guess what - Joshua
and Caleb were the only ones God allowed to live
to see the Land!
It's now
3,500 years later and we don't seem to have learned
our lesson. We Jews who believe in Jesus have
been dismissed as a fringe element. The majority
of the rabbis, speaking on behalf of the people,
have said "No. We don't believe in Him." With
a wave of their hand, the rabbis have dismissed
what we believe as naïve and foolish, pretending
there's not a real issue at hand, telling us that
the Scriptures which point to Yeshua don't really
matter, and that we're unqualified to read and
understand them ourselves anyway.
My friends,
take the road of courage, not of cowardice. The
majority doesn't determine the truth. Neither
is a minority status a barometer of the truth.
The Scriptures are the measure of the truth. Don't
ignore this book.
Let's
conclude chapter one this morning.
Verses
34 ff
Then the Lord heard the sound of your words, and
He was angry and took an oath, saying, 'Not one
of these men, this evil generation, shall see
the good land which I swore to give your fathers,
except Caleb the son of Jephunneh; he shall see
it, and to him and to his sons I will give the
land on which he has set foot, because he has
followed the Lord fully.' The Lord was angry with
me also on your account, saying, 'Not even you
shall enter there. Joshua the son of Nun, who
stands before you, he shall enter there; encourage
him, for he shall cause Israel to inherit it.
Moreover, your little ones who you said would
become a prey, and your sons, who this day have
no knowledge of good or evil, shall enter there,
and I will give it to them, and they shall possess
it. But as for you, turn around and set out for
the wilderness by the way to the Red Sea.
Joshua
and Caleb were the only two adults of that generation
who would be blessed to enter the Land of Promise.
Moses himself, as the leader, had to take responsibility
for his and the people's actions. He would not
enter the Land either.
The description
of the little ones having no knowledge of good
or evil simply affirms they were not to be held
responsible for the sin of their parents.
Moses
is told to encourage Joshua, for he would eventually
lead the people in. This is a significant mention,
because the book of Deuteronomy is also the farewell
address of Moses. Our people were being told in
advance that Joshua would be commissioned as Israel's
next leader. For now, however, God told us to
turn around. If we weren't going to trust Him
to bring us into the Land, we wouldn't enjoy the
benefit of His protection. So we were consigned
to return to the wilderness for one generation.
Verses
41 ff
Then you answered and said to me, 'We have sinned
against the Lord; we will indeed go up and fight,
just as the Lord our God commanded us.' And every
man of you girded on his weapons of war, and regarded
it as easy to go up into the hill country. And
the Lord said to me, 'Say to them, "Do not go
up, nor fight, for I am not among you; lest you
be defeated before your enemies."' So I spoke
to you, but you would not listen. Instead you
rebelled against the command of the Lord, and
acted presumptuously and went up into the hill
country. And the Amorites who lived in that hill
country came out against you, and chased you as
bees do, and crushed you from Seir to Hormah.
Then you returned and wept before the Lord; but
the Lord did not listen to your voice, nor give
ear to you. So you remained in Kadesh many days,
the days that you spent there.
What a
terrible failure! What a lamentable chapter in
our history. God spoke to us through Moses, and
we refused to listen. Twice! First He told us
to go up, and we said "No!" Then He said, "Very
well, turn around, then, and be consigned to the
wilderness" and we said, "Wait a minute - okay
we'll do it!" God said through Moses, "Don't do
it. You didn't want to go in, so I'm not going
to help you go in. If you do this, you're on your
own, and you'll never make it." But we went anyway,
and suffered terrible losses.
It was
not the first time, nor would it be the last time,
that our people refused to listen to God's servant.
We refused to hearken to Moses. Over the many
centuries that followed we refused to listen to
the voice of the prophets of Israel. Finally,
we refused the very Messiah Himself. My friends,
God has given us these words so that we may learn
from them, and not make the same mistake of refusing
ratification of this covenant, and our unworthiness
to receive God's blessings.
We read
earlier this morning about the New Covenant God
promised our people. That covenant has come. It
has come in the person of Messiah. Yeshua is the
mediator of that New Covenant. The only question
that remains is, "Will you enter in?" As the psalmist
wrote, "Today, if you hear His voice, do not harden
your heart." Omayn? I am indebted to Dr. Louis
Goldberg and to Jhan Moskowitz for much of the
content of this message.
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