In the first section, i.-iv. Moses began his recollections of the journey by reminding the people that their coming possession of Canaan was solely because of Gods grace, not because of any virtue in them (1:1-8).Only through Gods mercy had they grown into a strong and contented people who enjoyed the blessing (rare among ancient races) of just, impartial and humanitarian government (9-18). Of course it is, God went before you and prepared you that place and then led you to it so that they could say, "All the way my savior leads me. XXI. If a person takes what does not belong to him, every man, even a heathen, can judge it. He did not just write Deuteronomy for the generation of Israelites about to enter the Promised Land but for later generations as well, including our generation. It seems needless to say that this is altogether short of Christianity; and as we have referred to the difference of a Jew and a Christian as to the sabbath-day and the first day of the week, so as to this. The character of it was so solemn as scarce to admit of this. The book of Deuteronomy throughout pre-eminently brings in the authority of God over a people in relationship with Himself, displayed and proved in obedience. This then is the crucial test, so to speak, which Moses applies throughout; this is the homily; for indeed Deuteronomy we may call a book of divine homilies in this respect. Then Sihon came out against us, he and all his people, to fight at Jahaz. One of the most weighty duties is not properly a moral question at all, but depends simply on the commandment of God. Still it is too solemn to admit of what is so buoyant, which has its own proper exercise. In Deuteronomy 10:1-22 we find the provision of Jehovah's goodness is stated in a very striking way. In short, whatever it be to which God summons us is precisely what the devil endeavours to obscure, and so to hinder our testimony. 11-52. The Lord will conquer your . It was not yet Christ manifested, but man under trial of the law and its ordinances and restraints, dealt with as living in the world, and instructed in view of this present life. 45-48. It represented that death which befell the Lamb, and arrested the judgment of God which had gone out against us because of sin. Therefore shall ye keep all the commandments which I command you this day, that ye may be strong, and go in and possess the land whither ye go to possess it; and that ye may prolong your days in the land which Jehovah sware unto your fathers to give unto them and to their seed, a land that floweth with milk and honey" (ver. But the tone, mind, and heart of Moses are nowhere more characteristically apparent than in these his last words to the people of Jehovah whom he loved. Many of them did not see the miracle of the Red Sea being parted. Was it not the pettishness of disobedient children, if ever there were such? I do not mean that there should not be the profoundest feeling of gratitude, and the fullest expression of thanksgiving to God. A lion's whelp is Judah; from the prey, my son, thou goest up; he stoopeth down, he coucheth as a lion, and as a full-grown lion, who shall rouse him up? No compulsion was used to the nations outside. It was revealed as the great operative truth, continually impressed on Israel their one true God. They were about to enter it by special grace; for it is of importance to bear in mind that it was not by the covenant which was made at Horeb that the children of Israel entered the land at all. Rebuilding the Temple (Ezra 1:1-6:22) Bible Commentary / Produced by TOW Project The Book of Ezra begins with a decree from King Cyrus of Persia, allowing the Jews to return to Jerusalem to rebuild the temple that had been destroyed by the Babylonians in 587 BC (Ezra 1:2-4). * So difficult is it to unbelief that some take the ground of making Deuteronomy belong to an older age when the distinction of priests from Levites was not yet brought in. They might be greater, stronger, wiser, more than the Israelites; but what of Jehovah? 8. O. T. p. 65) says: "From Deuteronomy 10:8 it is plain that the Levites were not appointed at Sinai but later; whereas we learn fromNumbers 8:1-26; Numbers 8:1-26. that their institution took place at Sinai." And he wrote them in two tables of stone, and delivered them unto me.". Because they had not a particle of confidence in God. "Jehovah God that hath brought thee out of the land of Egypt" He was the only God. Then in Deuteronomy 13:1-18 there is a similar line, all these early injunctions being what we may call religious statutes. 2. And I feel that the analogies that are to be made are that of the Christian walk and life and experience. In advancing to take possession of the world for Christ, we have the encouragement of thinking that he knows precisely to what kind of work he is sending us, and yet promises success. "I will not give you of their land." Deuteronomy 8:18. But Satan as usual tampered with the plain written word, alike with its letter and its spirit; for after "to keep thee" he omitted "in all thy ways." "And thou shalt remember all the way which Jehovah thy God led thee these forty years in the wilderness, to humble thee, and to prove thee, to know what was in thine heart, whether thou wouldest keep his commandments, or no." You must bring your instrument to a point before it will penetrate, to an edge that it . Thus: God is that one spiritual and infinitely perfect essence, whose being is of himself eternally (Deut. Consequently, when Christianity began, the first day of the week was made the distinguishing mark, the Lord's-day, and not the sabbath. Behold, I have set the land before you: go in and possess the land which Jehovah sware unto your fathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, to give unto them and to their seed after them. We see that what has been remarked is just what is expressed in this verse: "And he humbled thee, and suffered thee to hunger, and fed thee with manna, which thou knewest not, neither did thy fathers know; that he might make thee know that man doth not live by bread only," (what exercise of faith was there in that?) The Christian is not a mere man, nor is he a Jew. There were reasons due to God's character why Moses should not bring the people into the laud. When we compare, for instance, the way in which Moses, under the direction of God, was to lead on the Israelites, and the way in which Mahomet perverted the word into a fable for ambitious ends, and allowance of human lusts and passions, who cannot see the difference? The other had its place when God was giving the book of Leviticus. The date of this sermon which Moses preached to the people of Israel. (6) The Lord our God spake unto us in Horeb. "Thou shalt eat no leavened bread with it; seven days shalt thou eat unleavened bread therewith, even the bread of affliction; for thou camest forth out of the land of Egypt in haste: that thou mayest remember the day when thou camest forth out of the land of Egypt all the days of thy life." Know ye not that the old man was crucified with Christ? But then Moses reminds them how that they got together and said, "Oh, we've sinned against God. Therefore, I must take a position of faith and recognize that the old nature, the life of the flesh, was crucified with Christ in order that I might now live after the new nature, the nature of Christ, and living now after the spirit. A great auditory, no question, he had, as many as could crowd within hearing, and particularly all the elders and officers, the representatives of the people; and, probably, it was on the sabbath day that he delivered this to them. We may without difficulty see the admirable appropriateness of such an introduction. Let's turn to Deuteronomy. II. We know well that, if God made known His acts unto Israel, He made His ways known unto Moses. With this they did not at all like to comply; and thus the same spirit which declined to go up in obedience to Jehovah refuses to go back in submission to Him. When man builds up a society, when he founds a religion or any other scheme, how wholly different his course! In such a case there is no room for will, nor sparing of the heart. "Seven weeks shalt thou number unto thee: begin to number the seven weeks from such time as thou beginnest to put the sickle to the corn. The discourse itself. It would not be good for us always to be in this state of simple receiving. We say, "Oh, but I'm so weak and I've tried so hard and you don't know how long I've been struggling with this thing". Therefore it was that, when God told them to go up, they refused and suffered the consequence of their disobedience. xlv. "5. Appendix ii. 7 Break camp and advance into the hill country of the Amorites; go to all the neighboring peoples in the Arabah, in the mountains, in the western foothills, in the Negev and along the coast, to the land of the . - 1 Timothy 2:3-5. Israel's stay at the mount was good while it lasted. Known thoroughly, in all its parts, peoples, districts, conformation, accessibilities, and inaccessibilities. 9 You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the . How good are the ways and the words of God! a. Deuteronomy 14:1-29 insists on what became the children of Jehovah their God in abstaining from unseemly maimings or disfigurements for the dead, as well as from any food which He, who knew better than they, pronounced abominable. (Dr. D.'s Introd. Is this what you feel? And so they chose one from each tribe to go in and to spy out the land. [It was now eighteen months since Jesus had visited Jerusalem, at which time he had healed the impotent man at Bethesda. And be Alexander MaclarenExpositions of Holy Scripture, Philo of Alexandria, the Rabbis, and the Gospels - the Final Development of Hellenism in Its Relation to Rabbinism and the Gospel According to St. John. ii. (Ad. So I spake unto you; and ye would not hear, but rebelled against the commandment of Jehovah, and went presumptuously up into the hilt And the Amorites, which dwelt in that mountain, came out against you, and chased you, as bees do," there was a most ignominious flight "and destroyed you in Seir, even unto Hormah And ye returned and wept before Jehovah; but Jehovah would not hearken to your voice, nor give ear unto you. But this was no reason why they were to expect Jehovah to destroy the Ammonites now. Now Israel had totally failed in their place. The Lord puts no weapon of a kind to injure any into our hands; but bids us leave vengeance with himself. We shall meet with others ere long, we shall come to civil ones, but we are not going beyond the religious charges at present. They were a people brought into relationship with God, and the object of His words was to guard them from practical inconsistency with that relationship. It is not the death of Christ with all its solemn, however blessed, issues. (Gen. Xlix. The essential revelation of God to us is the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost the Father displayed by the Son, and made known by the Spirit. Men have reasoned with great detail, especially in recent years, enquiring how all this could be done in the desert by a people who found it hard enough to pass unscathed themselves, though they had Jehovah their God with them to feed them with angels' bread, and water if need were from the rock. And we are told that we are not to yield to the flesh or give place to the flesh to fulfill its desires, but to walk after the spirit, and that our warfare is actually a spiritual warfare. He might not grant such a liberal concession to others as he left to himself. So you appointed the seventy to be rulers over them, the chief men and he charged them to hear the causes of the people and to judge among the people. Moses reflected on the past mainly as Israels history stands revealed in the earlier books of the Pentateuch. God says, then, that enough time had been spent in one place; (1) for, before they left it, an entire year had passed away there. Faith leads to obedience: first of all the acceptance of His word brings and secures blessing by faith for our souls; and then, having received it, we surrender ourselves to His will. Of Kadesh, or Rekam, in the south part, there is no doubt. 10. Preventive against Backsliding. Be strong and of a good courage, fear not, nor be afraid of them: for the Lord thy God, he it is that doth go with thee; he will not fail thee, nor forsake thee. But he found that there was another law, a perverse kind of a law, that whenever he would do good, evil was present with him. 6 The Lord our God said to us at Horeb, "You have stayed long enough at this mountain. It is not the people's consecration to God, but their discipline, the trial of heart, and exercise by the way to which Jehovah subjected the people; and a most instructive section it is in this point of view. Was anything like this the rule where man even took up the Bible for his own ends? This is met by the call to action - "Ye have dwelt long enough in this mount: turn you, and take your journey" (vers. All the previous part prepares the way. It had more of the family character; but a beautiful feature is connected with it: "And the Levite (because he hath no part nor inheritance with thee), and the stranger, and the fatherless, and the widow, which are within thy gates, shall come, and shall eat and be satisfied; that Jehovah thy God may bless thee in all the work of thine hand which thou doest." Thus does dying Jacob, in announcing Ernst Wilhelm HengstenbergChristology of the Old Testament, DeuteronomyOwing to the comparatively loose nature of the connection between consecutive passages in the legislative section, it is difficult to present an adequate summary of the book of Deuteronomy. They are then shown what may or may not be eaten, whether beasts, fishes, or fowls. It is the same principle here again as elsewhere. He was just being led by his own mind. Temple Cleansed. It is after this will come the full time of joy for the earth. Its moral turns on this the only possible way of maintaining relationship with God, namely, obedience; what the nature of that obedience is, and how it is modified; how God graciously takes into account the weakness of those brought into this relationship, and how He provides for His own glory in it. And I said unto you, Dread not, neither be afraid of them. Here then they are called to action. Whereas, even in God's dealings with a nation after the flesh (and such is the truth as to Israel here), there was an admirable check on man and witness of divine government, though the law made nothing perfect. We're the ones that place the limits on God's work. In this Second Narration, Moses expressly declares that God not only gave them a visible sign, by uplifting the cloud, but that He also verbally commanded the people to leave Mount Sinai, and to set about the performance of the rest of their journey. The priests were Levites. We all know that it is natural to wretched, wilful man. THE CHURCH'S DANGER - to abide at the mount, to settle down into a state of apathy or simple receptivity. God wanted to free them from the horrible bondage of Egypt, yet now they are accusing God of hating them.You remember the case of Job, it said in all of these things, that is the loss of his family and his wealth and all, he did not curse God neither did he charge God foolishly. Edomites or Moabites or Ammonites, unfeeling and disposed to injure Israel, still God would educate His people in remembering whatever bond of nature there was: if blows came, God would not forget the delinquent. But for the Christian a very essential feature of his standing is that he is delivered from the status of man or Israel, and called to Christ and heavenly things. *Nothing can be weaker than the harping on the phrase "the priests the Levites," as in the writings of Davidson and Colenso (following the superficial scepticism of foreign authors, who themselves followed the old Deists of our own country). Beside the tithe of their increase truly rendered from corn, wine, oil, with the firstlings, which, if distant from the place Jehovah would choose for His centre of worship, might be turned into money, and there spent before Him with a joyful household and the Levite not forsaken, there was to be a tithe at the end of three years, mentioned in the 28th and 29th verses: "At the end of three years thou shalt bring forth all the tithe of thine increase the same year, and shalt lay it up within thy gates." Now this is a foolish charge that they brought against God and it is something that we oftentimes are prone to do. Mark how very strikingly this is shown. "For what nation is there so great, who hath God so nigh unto them, as Jehovah our God is in all things that we call upon him for? Whatever then the blows which fell on Sihon, or on Og, or on any of the others; whatever the ways of God with Moab and Ammon afterwards, or even with Egypt, there never was seen such unsparing strictness as with Israel. To what were they always inclined? 8 "You shall not make for yourself an image in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. Thither God brought them to humble them, and by the terrors of the law to prepare them for the land of promise. All this then precedes another lesson. The "Lord our God," "Jehovah our Elohim," is the watchword of the whole book. May my inner and outward actions, attitude, words and motives reflect a heart that loves the Lord with . So the commandment of God; "you've been here long enough, you've circled this mountain long enough". 4. 4; iv. God had already multiplied the Israelites, and He was ready to give them the land. Such is the fertile topic which we find throughout the book. Jehovah went along with them; and of course the faithful turned back just as much as the unfaithful. Go in" and the key is of course "to possess the land which the Lord has sworn to your fathers. Then I said unto you, Dread not, neither be afraid of them. Here we see that God had a most deliberate choice in the smallest matters as well as in the greatest; but He begins with what most nearly touches His presence. That it is said of both, " God spake all these words." But the motive here is not because God rested upon that day, but because they were to remember that they were servants in the land of Egypt, and that Jehovah had brought them out through a mighty hand, and by a stretched out arm: "Therefore Jehovah thy God commanded thee to keep the sabbath-day." Types are but sparsely presented over the great bulk of the instruction which crowds its pages. "Rise ye up, take your journey, and pass over the river Arnon." What gentle censures, if any, what palpable favouritism towards his own party, where they most deserve reproof and rebuke or perhaps still more stringent measures! Sinai "Horeb" almost exclusively in this book, ". Forever and ever. It is obedience. It is well for persons that they are not to stay long under the law, and the terrors of it, but are directed to Mount Zion; Hebrews 12:18. It was very important, therefore, that these men judge fairly (Deuteronomy 1:17). God went before you to find the place for you to pitch your tents. I`m blessed relationally, interpersonally, I am BLESSED, I am BLESSED! If therefore God was dishonoured by the high places, they must all come down. And so they departed from Horeb. "O wretched man that I am who shall deliver me?" So it was done; but it is added that, when they did depart from Horeb and went through the wilderness, "which ye saw by the way of the mountain of the Amorites, I said unto you, Ye are come unto the mountain of the Amorites, which Jehovah our God doth give unto us. We're always the one that put the restrictions upon what God can do for us. And here the people were making this blasphemous accusation; "because God hates us, he brought us out here". 8. Pray it at midnight and midday. For so long I tried to deliver myself, ended in failure. It was to be a real fealty: it was not merely a dogma pure and simple, but to be known as a fact. O. T. i. p. 235) ventures to set portions of this chapter in juxtaposition with two from elsewhere, in order to show that God's speaking to the inspired writer was simply his own mind and conscience enlightened from on high. If truth be abandoned, it indicates the power of Satan as the source, and not the true God. Now I affirm that on the face of the scriptures no candid person can deny that Exodus is professedly given as the history of the matter; Deuteronomy as a subsequent recital to the people, without the least aim at reiterating the words, which would have been the easiest thing in the world; for even these free thinkers do not pretend that the Deuteronomist did not possess Exodus. No wonder therefore that Deuteronomy in general has been but little understood, even by the children of God; that the thoughts of expositors are comparatively vague in explaining it; and that men are apt to read it with so little insight into its bearing that the loss might seem comparatively trifling if it were not read at all. Moses recounts for them the history of what had taken place before as a warning not to repeat the same mistakes. Conceive the state of mind which could say that "in Deuteronomy Moses repeatedly lays the blame of his expulsion on the people (Deuteronomy 1:37; Deuteronomy 3:26; Deuteronomy 4:21); but according toNumbers 20:12; Numbers 20:12 God punished him thus for not believing Him, while inNumbers 27:14; Numbers 27:14 his punishment was occasioned by the legislator's own disobedience"! In the commandment to keep it Jehovah the God of Israel speaks to this effect: "Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work; but the seventh day is the sabbath of Jehovah thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work." Not the death of Christ with all its solemn, however blessed, I am blessed I! This state of simple receiving Jerusalem, at which time he had healed the impotent man at Bethesda very... Before it will penetrate, to settle down into a state of apathy or simple receptivity loves the our. Different his course people of Israel the past mainly as Israels history stands revealed the! 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