The Bible Recap - Day 074 (Deuteronomy 11-13) - Year 4

Starting point is 00:00:00 Hey Bible readers, I'm Tara Lee Cobble, and I'm your host for the Bible recap. Today we drop back in on Moses parting words to the Israelites before his death. And he starts with a command we've heard often, but we've never really drilled down on it. God has commanded us to love Him. The word love here indicates emotion. It's action adjacent, but it's emotion-specific. How do you command a feeling? Jen Wilkins says, the heart cannot love what the mind does not know. And I'm guessing that by fixing your eyes on his word daily, by looking for him in Scripture instead of for yourself, that you love him more now than you did 75 days ago.

Starting point is 00:00:49 The more we take our eyes off ourselves and get to know this infinitely lovable God, the more we will love him. Moses speaks specifically to the adults among the crowd who were alive even when the Exodus happened, and he reminds them again to remember who God is and what he has done for them. In 1116 he tells them to pay attention to their hearts. There are things around them that will entice them to worship them,

Starting point is 00:01:14 and they have to be vigilant to not be led astray by these new shiny things. If they stay faithful to God, no nation will overtake them. God has already proven that he can defeat bigger armies. There's an interesting image at the end of chapter 11. He tells them to choose between blessing and cursing, represented by two different mountains, Mount Gerazeem, the Mount of blessing, and Mount Ebel, the Mount of cursing. The Israelites will perform the ceremony he commands for this later in Deuteronomy, so we'll just put a pit in it for now, but know that we're coming back to it. Moses continues to warn against idolatry, and if it's starting to feel like he's repeating himself, it's because he is. First of all, he's old, and old men tend to repeat themselves a lot, but second and most of all,

Starting point is 00:01:58 that's what we all do when something is important. This is the theme of Deuteronomy. Moses is very concerned about their faithfulness to God. And it's good for us to read these things as well because we all need daily reminders of who God is. God called them to remember His Word when they sit and when they walk, when they lie down and when they stand, which happens lots of times a day. So surely, we can read it once a day. He tells them again to destroy all the paraphernalia of worship to other gods, and he includes a word we've seen a few times, but haven't talked about yet. The word is a sharam. A sharam was a fertility goddess, and the Canaanites worshipped fertility.

Starting point is 00:02:38 Let's be honest, the Israelites kind of seem to as well, but in their own way. The a sharam are wooden poles with a figure of Ashera on them. God commanded them to destroy these when they entered Canaan. Another phrase you may see referenced sometimes when we're talking about idolatry is the term high places. Most of the pagan worship sites were set up on hills and on mountain tops, or under especially distinct trees. So anytime you see God telling them to destroy the high places or the trees, he's talking

Starting point is 00:03:08 about destroying the places of Canaanite worship. Moses also reveals that there will be a major shift in how some of the laws and sacrifices work once they get into the Promised Land. First, in 125, he says there will be one specific place in the Promised Land where God will make his dwelling place. This is nothing new, really. The manifest presence of the Lord dwells above the Ark of the Covenant in the Tabernacle, but the Tabernacle will no longer be in the midst of the encampment. It will be in the midst of a whole new land, and they're going to be spread out over that land,

Starting point is 00:03:40 which is the size of the state of New Jersey. There will be Levites allotted to live among each tribe, but the tabernacle, wherever it goes, is the only place where they can offer burnt offerings. Moses says that all the Israelites will travel to that one place, even if their allotment of land is far away. And when they go, that's where they will worship God and make their sacrifices to him. I don't know how you felt reading this, but I kind of panicked. If I had been in Israel light and I wasn't in the tribe that got the tabernacle, I would be scrambling to marry into whichever tribe did. Not because I don't like to travel, but because I would want to be as close as possible to wherever that mercy seat was going to be. I cannot imagine having to move away from the presence of God.

Starting point is 00:04:27 But one thing they all get to start doing once they enter Canaan is eating meat whenever they want, and even the people who are unclean can eat meat too. What this likely implies is that up to this point, the only meat anyone could eat was meat that had been offered to God. And since having that offering come in contact with an unclean person would make it unclean, then unclean people had to be vegetarians by default. So now with this new situation unfolding where they'll all be spread out instead of living in one encampment, they'd have to travel a long way to make sacrifices, which would mean they'd only get to eat meat when they made that trip.

Starting point is 00:05:04 With this new addendum, God is basically saying, you can eat meat in your own land anytime you want. It doesn't have to be sacrifice to me first. Moses warns them not to add or subtract from anything God has commanded, and he gives them a heads up that there could be people who will mingle the truth with lies as a means of enticing them in little by little. For instance, in 131-2, he gives the example of a false prophet or a diviner who provides some correct insights, but who uses that wow factor to lure people away from Yahweh.

Starting point is 00:05:37 Just because someone speaks truth, that doesn't make them a prophet of Yahweh. Even a false prophet can be right, but it doesn't mean we should follow them or seek truth from them. Moses said God may sometimes use this kind of thing to reveal their hearts to them. And then God commands that the false prophet or diviner get the death penalty. Not only because that's what is required of the covenant when someone breaks the first commandment, but also as a means of protecting their covenant community from further spread of the lies. God demands this kind of allegiance to Himself over strangers and even over friends and family members who try to lure them into apostasy.

Starting point is 00:06:15 These are intense preventative measures, but these laws are supposed to deter people from rebelling or enticing others into rebellion, and they're a necessary step in God's plan to restore humanity in relationship with Himself. This is a protective measure for everyone. Where did you see God's character on display today? What was your God shot? There was a subtle thing that showed up three times in chapter 12, verses 7, 12, and 18, that really sets Yahweh apart from all the other false gods.

Starting point is 00:06:46 In each of those verses, He says something like, you shall bring your burnt offerings and sacrifices, and there you shall rejoice. When people made their sacrifices to false gods, it was to appease them or entice them to give them what they wanted. It was an attempted initiating some kind of response, either, hey, please stop punishing me or, hey, please give me what I'm asking for. But with our God, none of that is how we approach Him. Our offerings to Him are a response to His initiation. And it's not about appeasing Him, it's about rejoicing in His provision

Starting point is 00:07:20 and relationship with us. What a great contrast to every other God. All those worshipers of false gods are missing out on the rejoicing, because Yahweh, he's where the joy is. You guys are the very best at spreading the word about TBR. Thanks to you, so many people who never would have read through the Bible have joined us and are loving it. So here's a pro tip for all of you who love to share the joy.

Starting point is 00:07:49 When you're inviting your friends to join us, have them start at the start, as opposed to jumping in where we currently are. That's the whole point of doing this chronologically, so we can follow the whole storyline. The plot is important. So whether they plan on reading through the entire Bible or the New Testament, encourage them to start at the beginning of that section. We've lined up all the details for them on the Start page of our website, so the best way to make sure they get off to a good start is to send them to thebibelrecap.com-boredslash-start. The End. you

The Bible Recap - Day 074 (Deuteronomy 11-13) - Year 4

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