Article for November 3, 2024
Deuteronomy 6:1 1“Now this is the commandment, the statutes and the just decrees that the Lord your God commanded me to teach you, that you may do them in the land to which you are going over, to possess it,
In Deuteronomy 5, we are taught again the Ten Commandments. These are the same as we have already learned them in Exodus 20. God must know how easy it is to forget what we’ve been taught. So, God, through Moses, repeats these laws as they are the laws that are most meaningful in our daily lives.
But not just the Ten Commandments but all 613 laws that have been decreed by our Lord to set His people apart from the people of the world. God’s first chosen were to be set apart from the rest of the world to be an example of God in all holiness. However things were supposed to be, the truth is, the Jewish people were and are a crosscut of all people in the world.
We as Christians should also be an example of God in all holiness. However, we too, are a crosscut of the worldly people as we continue to enslave ourselves to the world. Not that we think of ourselves as being a slave to anything, yet this is something that should be realized in our daily living. We are a slave to the world, and we are a slave to sin. Once our sinfulness is realized, is a good first step towards the freedom imposed by Christ’s death and resurrection for salvation.
Deuteronomy 6:3 3Hear therefore, O Israel, and be careful to do them, that it may go well with you, and that you may multiply greatly, as the Lord, the God of your fathers, has promised you, in a land flowing with milk and honey.
This is God being your conscience, that we obey His laws and statutes. God did not write the best-selling book for His prosperity, rather, God wrote the Holy Bible for our prosperity. Each law has meaning and purpose for each and everyone in this world. We are “a” people who need structure as we truly cannot survive in chaos.
Though there are some who want chaos, we should realize they seek to lord it over others in hopes of empowering themselves. Chaos truly leads to sin and death. Structure truly leads us to God, especially when that structure comes from God. There is no purpose in chaos and there is much purpose in structure, again when that structure comes from God.
Deuteronomy 6:4–6 4“Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. 5You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. 6And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart.
Why the world does not like God is really no surprise. Evil rules the world and the world has learned to live and embrace the evil that destroys people, families, and the fabric of righteousness. Jesus repeats these words from Deuteronomy 4-6 in Mark 12:29-31. Jesus says Himself that God is one. The Scribe that came to question Jesus even commends Jesus for saying God is one. We know we have one God though we talk about His three persons as the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
The scribe also says Jesus is correct, we should love God with everything we have. But what does loving God look like? If we love God with all of our heart, do we make God first in our lives? If we love God with all of our mind, would we think of God’s ways and make them our ways?
If we love God with all of our soul, would we live more in the spirit and less in the flesh? If we love God with all our might/strength, would we be afraid to spread the good news of the salvation that Jesus gave us from the cross and His resurrection? Would we be afraid to standup for God?
Deuteronomy 6:7 7You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise.
If we love God, should we teach our children or should we let it go and let them make their own choice as to whether they go to church or not? Many people are not teaching their children about God and making it another choice that might lead their children to death.
Of course, the death I am talking about here is the eternal death. The world lives for today and they do not recognize their tomorrow. Many have already grownup with out God and therefore do not know how to love God. If they think loving God is a command, then they rebel and ask who does God think He is? Why should we love a God that doesn’t come around behind us and clean up the mess we made?
I tell you the truth, loving God has changed my life, opened my eyes, and enlightened my understanding of everything God does for us. I can no longer contain my love for God in just words because I see and reflect on everything God has gotten me through. I see, believe, and have great faith in God and that He saved us through His Son our Lord Jesus Christ. Because God loved us first!
Deuteronomy 6:8–9 8You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. 9You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.”
The Jews wear these little boxes on their forehead, or around their wrist that contain the verses of Deuteronomy 6:4-9 and 11:13-21. These vessels they wear are called “Mezuzah” meaning doorpost. The verses talk about loving God and what love we receive from God when we love Him.
The Jews can wear the “Mezuzah” and put them on their doors to remember God’s command is for us to love Him. For what we give to God, God returns to us in each season to bless our lives in this life on earth. So, think; what God gives us here on this earth will pale to what He will give us on the new earth.
Hebrews 9:13–14 13For if the sprinkling of defiled persons with the blood of goats and bulls and with the ashes of a heifer sanctifies for the purification of the flesh, 14how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without blemish to God, purify our conscience from dead works to serve the living God.
The law sprinkled the blood of sacrifices on the sinner. Imagine the stains their clothing were covered with. Imagine the stain our clothing would show if the practices of the Tabernacle were still practiced today. But the ultimate sacrifice was made through the blood of Jesus Christ.
Instead of blood stains of sin, we are washed white as new fallen snow. We are clothed in the righteousness of our Lord and Savior. We are forgiven and rewarded with God’s grace and mercy. We are marked as God’s and will live on the new earth with our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ forever and ever.
Amen.
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