|
|
Keep His Decrees and Commands
Keep His Decrees and Commands Deuteronomy 4:1-49 Key Verse: 4:40 “Keep his decrees and commands, which I am giving you today, so that it may go well with you and your children after you and that you may live long in the land the Lord your God gives you for all time.” In last week’s passage, Moses concluded the review of the history of the Israelites from the time they left Mt. Horeb (or Sinai) until their present situation. They were just East of the Jordan River and were ready to cross it and take possession of the Promised Land. In today’s passage we will learn why it is so critical to have good, clear sense of history. For the Israelites, this clear sense of history was an issue of life and death. It was an issue that would enable them to live a blessed life as God’s chosen people or, if they didn’t keep this sense of history, they would live a cursed life as His disobedient servants scattered among the nations. Having a clear sense of history, enables us to remember who God is, what He has done for us and why we should absolutely obey His decrees and commands. May God open our hearts and our spiritual eyes and ears so that we can hear His words today and keep His decrees and commands. First, God commands obedience (1-14). Look at verse 1. “Now, Israel, hear the decrees and laws I am about to teach you. Follow them so that you may live and may go in and take possession of the land the Lord, the God of your ancestors, is giving you.” Moses has finished his review of history, and now he is about to begin a review of the words of God as they were given to him and all the Israelites at Mt. Horeb. Before he begins this review, he begins by telling them that they should not only hear these decrees and laws, but they should follow them. It is very important to know why they should follow these decrees and laws. Moses gives two reasons in this verse – he will give others later on in this passage. The first reason Moses give is, “…So that you may live.” This is a reason that most of us as Christians do not associate with the law. Instead we tend to think that the law only makes us aware of our sins and how much we deserve death and eternal condemnation. However, Moses first reason for obeying the law is that by doing so we (or the Israelites in this case) may live. How can the law, which makes us aware that we are sinners deserving the wages of sin which is death, actually give us life? Well, for both the Israelites of that time and for us today, these were the very words of God. By keeping them, we can learn who God is, and Jesus says in John 17:3 “Now this is eternal life: that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent.” The words of God always lead us to Jesus and in Jesus is found eternal life. Therefore the words of the law that Moses is about to review for the people would indeed lead them to life if they obeyed. The second reason Moses gave in this verse was that they “may go in and take possession of the land the Lord, the God of your ancestors, is giving you.” Why did they need the words of law to take possession of the land? We must remember, that the Israelites were not able to take the land all by themselves. The people living there were more numerous and powerful than them. It was God who was going to fight for them and drive those people out of the land. In order for God to fight for them and dwell among them, they needed to set themselves apart as holy, a people belonging to God. This means they needed to keep his commands and decrees. The same is true for us today. If we are to obey God’s world mission command, we can’t just live any way we choose. We must live in obedience to His word. Otherwise God cannot dwell among us and do His work through us. Obedience to God’s word is absolutely essential in doing God’s work. These are not the only two reason that we should obey all of God’s commands and decrees however. Look at verses 6 & 7. “Observe them carefully, for this will show your wisdom and understanding to the nations, who will hear about all these decrees and say, ‘Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people.’ 7 What other nation is so great as to have their gods near them the way the Lord our God is near us whenever we pray to him?” Obeying God’s command not only gives us wisdom and understanding that will make other people take notice, but it will also bring us near to God so that He hears us whenever we pray to Him. Many people today laugh at the idea that studying the Bible gives us wisdom or understanding, but it does. I could talk about this for hours, but I want to show you just one example that illustrates this point. Stephen Hawking is a brilliant physicist. He has spent his entire life trying to figure out how this universe actually works. The problem is, he has been doing this without looking into the word of God. This has led him to conclude the following, “Because there is a law such as gravity, the universe can and will create itself from nothing.” This statement is a direct quote from his book The Grand Design and it makes absolutely no sense at all. It doesn’t even make sense at all logically. First of all, how can gravity exist if there is no universe? And if there is no gravity, how then can it be the cause of the creation of the universe? With all his learning and his great mind, in this one statement, he has shown his complete lack of wisdom and understanding. A Christian, however, doesn’t need to go past the first verse of the Bible to show our wisdom and understanding. “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.” Just imagine the wisdom and understanding you will have if you really set your heart on studying and obeying the rest of this book. In verses 9-14, Moses reviews how God had given the ten commandments to the Israelites at Mt. Horeb. They had all stood at the foot of the mountain as it “blazed with fire,” and had heard the voice of God come out of that fire. They heard the words of God, but they saw no form of God. Not only that, but God had written His words on two stone tablets so they could always have them with them. Moses tells them that God directed him to teach those decrees to the people, who in turn would teach them to their children and grandchildren, so that the Israelites would follow them down through the generations. As we will see later, Moses already knew that Israelites would not remain faithful to these decrees and commands, but he faithfully obeyed God’s command and taught the people. Second, idolatry must be avoided (15-31). When God appeared to the Israelites at Mt. Horeb, they heard His voice very clearly, but they saw no form. This should have led them to learn a very serious lesson. Look at verses 15–19. “You saw no form of any kind the day the Lord spoke to you at Horeb out of the fire. Therefore watch yourselves very carefully, 16 so that you do not become corrupt and make for yourselves an idol, an image of any shape, whether formed like a man or a woman, 17 or like any animal on earth or any bird that flies in the air, 18 or like any creature that moves along the ground or any fish in the waters below. 19 And when you look up to the sky and see the sun, the moon and the stars—all the heavenly array—do not be enticed into bowing down to them and worshiping things the Lord your God has apportioned to all the nations under heaven.” Idolatry is a very serious sin and it is one that we humans are very susceptible to. First of all, we need to know what idolatry is. Idolatry is worshiping anything other than God Himself. In Moses’ time, it was very common for people to make statues of men or women or animals and worship them as their God. The Israelites did this while they were still at Mt. Horeb, just days after God had spoken to them out of the fire when they made the golden calf. But idolatry is not just limited to man-made statues or paintings. We can set up the sun, moon and stars as idols and many people do that today whenever they look at their horoscope to see what may happen to them today. We can also set up people as an idol and this is far more common than most people think. In fact, the Roman Catholic church actually teaches idolatry when they teach that praying to Mary and other saints on their particular holy day is the right thing to do. It is never right to pray to anything or anyone other than God. God alone is our creator. God alone sustains us in this life. And it is God alone who can save us from our sins and give us eternal life. Only God is deserving of our worship. Nothing else should ever be prayed to or set in our minds to be worshipped. In verses 25-28, Moses indicates that he knows the Israelites will not remember everything that God had done for them when He rescued them from the “iron-smelting furnace” of Egypt and would fall into idolatry. According to verse 26, most of them would end up perishing from the land they were crossing the Jordan to possess. According to Moses, they would not live their long because of their idolatry, and the survivors would be scattered among the nations. In those foreign nations, they would end up worshipping man-made gods who could not see or hear or eat or smell. In other words, they would be worshipping and serving created things that could do nothing for them one way or the other. Yet Moses also knew the heart of God. Look at verses 29-31. “But if from there you seek the Lord your God, you will find him if you seek him with all your heart and with all your soul. 30 When you are in distress and all these things have happened to you, then in later days you will return to the Lord your God and obey him. 31 For the Lord your God is a merciful God; he will not abandon or destroy you or forget the covenant with your ancestors, which he confirmed to them by oath.” God is a merciful God and a faithful God. I believe He has called each of us, and just like the Israelites, he will never abandon us. However, it is our duty to seek Him with all our heart and soul. If we seek Him with less than that, we will not find Him, but He promises us that if we seek Him with all our heart and soul we will find Him. Remember this, God’s promise never fails Third, remember that the Lord is God (32-40). In verses 32-40, Moses urges the Israelites to remember what God has done for them. First of all, Moses urges the people to think about who God is. He wants them to think all the way back to the creation of man and think of all the things God had done. Then he wants them to turn their thoughts to what God had done for them. God had chosen them from among all the nations on the face of the earth. Then He had personally delivered them from the most powerful nation on the earth at that time. He did not do this in any ordinary way. Look at verse 34. “Has any god ever tried to take for himself one nation out of another nation, by testings, by signs and wonders, by war, by a mighty hand and an outstretched arm, or by great and awesome deeds, like all the things the Lord your God did for you in Egypt before your very eyes?” God wanted them to remember what he had done for them. He wanted them to have a great sense of history. A sense of what God has done for us helps us to do two very important things. The first thing can be found in verse 35. “You were shown these things so that you might know that the Lord is God; besides him there is no other.” A sense of God’s history enables us to know that the Lord is God and there is no other beside Him. This is very important in the life of any believer. We all go through ups and downs in our life of faith, but if we remember what God has done for us we will always know that He is God, He loves us, and He wants to bless us and make our life a blessing for others. (Personal testimony here). The second thing is found in our key verse today. Look at verses 39 & 40 “Acknowledge and take to heart this day that the Lord is God in heaven above and on the earth below. There is no other. 40 Keep his decrees and commands, which I am giving you today, so that it may go well with you and your children after you and that you may live long in the land the Lord your God gives you for all time.” Having a good sense of history can enable us to keep God’s commands and decrees. Sometimes people might feel that it is too burdensome to keep God’s commands and decrees, but that is because they have a wrong idea about God. They think of God as a ruthless dictator who is simply trying to control their life, but that is not true at all. Look carefully at verse 40. God wants us to keep His commands and decrees so that he can bless us. God really wants our lives and our children’s life to go well. He wants us to have a long life and, in fact, he wants to give us an eternal home. This is something I think most Christians forget. Jesus tells us that if we love Him we will keep His commands and He will us eternal life with Him in the kingdom of heaven. We should not look at this as a burden. God is our creator. He loves us and He knows exactly what we need to live a happy life. Remember, Jesus said in John 15:10-12 “If you keep my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commands and remain in his love. 11 I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete. 12 My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you.” I added His command so that we might remember it. God’s commands and decrees aren’t meant to make us miserable, they are meant to give us a long happy life full of joy and then to enjoy all of eternity together with Him. How foolish we would be if we choose not to follow these decrees and commands. Fourth, set aside cities of refuge (41-49). At the end of this chapter Moses commands the people to set aside cities of refuge where people can flee to if they accidentally kill their neighbor. Apparently at that time an avenger of blood (probably a close family member) could legally kill a person who had killed someone dear to them. However, sometimes a person might accidentally kill another person without having any bad feelings for that person. Such a person did not deserve to be killed in return. They would suffer enough just from the knowledge that they had ended someone else’s life. Therefore, God provided cities of refuge where they could find safety from the avenger of blood. Moses provides three such cities here on the east side of the Jordan river. The really important thing here, I think, is not the cities of refuge, but where they were. They were in land that was formerly controlled by two kings of the Amorites. These kings had powerful armies and fortified cities, yet the Israelites had completely defeated them and taken over their land. This shows that God was working mightily among them. I think Moses wanted them to think about this as they were getting ready to cross the Jordan River and take possession of the Promised Land. In other words, Moses wanted to remind the people once again of what God had already done for them, to remind them that His promises are true and if they obeyed his decrees and commands He would never leave them or forsake them. In today’s passage we learned the importance of keeping God’s decrees and commands. He wants us to do this, not to burden us, but to bless us and give us a long joyful life and an eternal inheritance in the kingdom of God. In order to keep His commands and decrees we must have a good sense of history to remember what God has already accomplished in our lives and in history. May God help us keep His commands and decrees in this generation so that we can show his wisdom and understanding to the nations around us. |
| 
|
