No Heart: Deuteronomy 29

In Summary:

Deuteronomy 29 turns from a general retelling of the covenant (note the similarity of Deuteronomy 29:1 and Deuteronomy 1:1) to the last words of Moses before his death. Prior to this point, Moses has presented the covenant between Israel and God according to the typical treaties between sovereigns and subjects of the time.

These next chapters take more of a personal turn, as Moses reminds the people what has happened under his leadership. We see, as final words should be, reminders of critical moments and very direct warnings about the future.

For example, Deuteronomy 29:5 reminds us of Deuteronomy 8:4, that the shoes and clothes of the Israelites did not wear out during their wanderings. The next verse, 29:6, highlights that the Israelites have not eaten bread for the last 40 years. This connects back to chapter 8 as well, and we see again the importance of context. “Man does not live by bread alone” was not merely a thought. It was the life of the Israelites. They lived by the Word of God, given in as manna in the desert.

In Focus:

Moses gives us a tragic statement in Deuteronomy 29:4, and it pairs with Deuteronomy 29:19 as a warning about the hearts of the people. As you read through this section, recognize the problem at stake. The people have not developed their own love for God or His ways at this point.

All of God’s work in their lives, and yet their hearts are closed. Their eyes do not see, their ears do not hear the truth of who God is. Now, there are a couple of ways to read this. Some will see this as the fact that without the Holy Spirit quickening the hearts of people, they have no hope of understanding and worshiping the One True God. Others will see it as evidence of the hardness of the people, that even with every action of God around them, they chose not to see.

I’ll not resolve that here, except that I think this is a both/and, not an either/or. The power of God is necessary to see the work of God, yet people still choose to ignore what should be clear. That comes out plainly in Romans 1. How, exactly, the sovereignty of God is true while human free responsibility is also true is the work of books, not a blog post.

What we see here is the Israelites as responsible for their failure to worship, even while acknowledging that it takes a heart from God to develop a heart for God.

In Practice:

We should, then, lay back and do nothing, hoping God fixes us?

Nonsense!

We should: 1. Look at the world around us. Start with the explanation that an all-powerful, all-loving God is involved in life.

2: Center our worship on Him for who He is. We see who He is by His actions, just like our actions reveal our character, but we need to put our focus on the right place. We love God for who He is. We see that by what He does. Don’t worship God that God feeds you. Worship God for His compassion that He shows by feeding you.

3. Pass on the covenant. This chapter resounds with the concern that future generations will abandon the Lord God, thinking that they had it all together. Pass on the covenant by demonstrating, daily, your own dependence on God. Too many of us want the veneer of self-sufficiency to show more than the framework of faith—peel it back, let your needs and the One who supplies them be evident.

In Nerdiness:

Let’s get nerdy: 1: Take a look at the parallel passages, including how Deuteronomy 29:2 parallels with Deuteronomy 5:1. Oh, and note that the Hebrew texts tend to put our 29:1 as the last verse in 28, and start this chapter at 29:2. And call it 29:1.

Moses gives another rehash of history here, including the recent defeats of Sihon and Og.

No bread, no wine, no “fermented drink” (possibly the fortified beer of the labor forces of Ancient Egypt). Does this mean that the Israelites had no yeast? If you look at the Passover, they were to get all of the leaven out of the house to celebrate it. Now we see that, for nearly 4 decades, they have had no yeast-based products. Since yeast is a living thing, is it possible that the conditions of the Exodus and Wanderings kept them from having any useful yeast?

And then the symbolism of yeast/leaven for impurity makes this theologically curious…

Book: Ashes to Ashes

It's time to return to Bampton for the further adventures of Master Hugh de Singleton, Surgeon and Bailiff to Lord Gilbert Talbot. The "medieval medical murder mystery" section in the library isn't particularly big, but as long as Mel Starr's series is there, it's big enough.

Ashes to Ashes is the eighth entry in this series. Once again, we find a mysterious body and Master Hugh is called upon to determine who, what, when, where, and how the evil deed took place. His travels take him to the nearby village of Kencott and the local politics there. 

As always, Starr takes his readers into a medieval world that requires a glossary at the beginning, a map after that, and an historical note at the end. The book is written in a first-person style, so whatever Master Hugh does not know, we readers do not know.

Since this is the eighth novel in a series, the reader would be better served to start earlier in the series. Once you know a bit of the background of Hugh, his marriage to Katie, and his standing in the medieval world, this story flows well. We are given a glimpse into the life of an English village and the difficulties that life brings.

Master Hugh generally describes the cultural and economic situations as they were. He provides some commentary on the injustice of life, generally as discontent without solution. He also establishes some distaste for the religious practices of the day without knowing how to separate those from his devotion to the "Lord Christ." On a personal note, I miss the inclusion of John Wycliffe, who has been absent since the earlier books--apparently, he's just still in London. This doesn't harm Ashes to Ashes, I'd just like to see him back.

The writing style is challenging at times, as Starr uses words from the medieval era seamlessly. One would be wise to thumb through that glossary, especially for dates and festivals, every now and then before progressing to the next chapter.

(Free book in exchange for the review)

History Repeats: Matthew 5

In Summary:

The Sermon on the Mount begins with Matthew 5. That tells us we have a lot of ground to cover, and one post may not be enough for it. For that matter, I have a couple of complete books on the shelf about the Sermon on the Mount. There is so much here that is worth considering, and we’re going to hit it in one blog post. In doing so, let us look at the Sermon on the Mount as just that: a sermon. What are some keys to understanding a sermon?

First, consider the audience. The audience, according to verse 1, are those who are disciples of Jesus. In this case, we are likely looking at a larger group than the Twelve Apostles. That opening verse gives us enough of a context for the audience: they are people from the area that have been in the “crowd” which watched and listened to Jesus, and they wanted to know more. They wanted to know more enough to separate from the crowd and go up on the mountain to hear from Jesus.

Second, consider the preacher. In this case, the Preacher is Jesus Himself. We see the Lord of the Universe, the Author of all Scripture, teaching the principles of living in His Kingdom. This is not like listening to me preach, where mistakes are possible (or even likely). There will be no errors in this sermon. There will be no suppositions or estimations, no doubts about authorial intent. It will be preached right. It may not be listened to right, but it will be preached right.

Third, consider the text. This is where the Author of Scripture gets to do what you should never allow any other preacher to do. He does not have one particular Biblical text to preach from. Although He does end up using some Old Testament quotations (like Matthew 5:21 quotes Exodus 20:13,) overall it is new material. Jesus gets a pass on this—and on quoting Himself—because HE’S JESUS.

Fourth, consider the theme. The theme of the Sermon on the Mount, from Matthew 5 through Matthew 7, is living in the Kingdom of God. Take it apart however you would like to, and you will find the Kingdom of God underneath it all. Who is blessed in the Kingdom? What does it take to enter the Kingdom? How do subjects of the Kingdom relate to the world around them? How do they relate to each other?

Fifth, consider the application. For this, we will put the first imperative into focus. As you read the rest of the sermon, see what Jesus is commanding, and see what Jesus is stating as factual. For example, the Beatitudes are not commands to be anything, but statements of fact about those who face those challenges or embrace those character traits. We can see that as a gentle way of commanding, but there is a difference between that and the clear command to “Let your light shine” in Matthew 5:16.

In Focus:

In focus, I want to look at the command in Matthew 5:12. Jesus commands His disciples to “Rejoice and be glad” when they are persecuted. After all, if you are persecuted for righteousness, your reward in heaven is great. And the prophets were treated that way, so it is a long-standing reality. The world, even the religious world, does not have much patience with those who live out righteousness and proclaim it plainly.

Note, especially, that Jesus connects the persecution of His disciples to the history of persecution suffered by the prophets. If we had the Old Testament only, we might think that the prophets had a pretty good life, except for Jeremiah and Elijah. (Jonah’s problems are his own fault!) Yet when we reach into the wider book of history, we find that the prophets did not fare so well with the people at large. The details take on legendary status, but it is enough to note that Jesus validates the historical reality that the prophets faced oppression.

In Practice:

Then, He points out to us that oppression and persecution should be no surprise to His followers. After all, history reveals not only the work of God but the patterns of human behavior. And human behavior is not friendly to those who speak unpopular truths. The reality is that the church should be so different from the world that the world sees us as intruders, invaders, or threats. The only positive way this does not happen is if we win the world to Christ. Which we have not done.

Unfortunately, we have fallen into the negative side: we are too mushy to be a threat. We are not intruders or invaders, but consumers and cohabitators. Rather than embracing truth and then rejoicing in rejection, we embrace the world and then wonder why we have no joy.

History, though, is a beast of a thing. It will repeat itself, not because we did not learn from it but because human nature does not change. We, as God’s people, are heirs to the legacy of the prophets. We are heirs to the truth-telling, weird-living responsibility of proclaiming the Living God. And we are heirs to the trouble that came upon them.

In this, we should rejoice. Because our reward is greater than anything this world can hold.

In Nerdiness:

I’ll be a brief nerd. 1: Luke 6 contains a parallel passage called the Sermon on the Plain. I think it’s a different event. Others, including many good scholars, hold otherwise.

2: Be aware of the intensity of using contrast in teaching. Every one of the “you have heard it said…but I say…”, Jesus is not just building on to the expectations of the Kingdom. He’s correcting the teachers of the time who always anchored their teaching in what others had said. Further, we see that the heart of the person is more relevant than the actions. That does not justify bad actions—a lust-free affair is still adultery; anger-less murder is still murder. It does show what is key to growing in Christ. The inside of us, our thoughts and motivations, matters because that drives our actions.

Sermon Recap for January 31

Here’s the sermon from yesterday morning!

January 31 AM: John 6

We’ll take a detour from John for February and start on 1 Samuel.

Blessed or Not: Deuteronomy 28

In Summary:

Deuteronomy 28 continues the storyline from Deuteronomy 27. Moses commands the people to gather at Shechem and recite both curses and blessings from Mount Ebal and Mount Gerizim. This is done with the Ark of the Covenant in the middle of the people, symbolizing the presence of God Almighty in the process.

These blessings and curses are given as the consequences for covenant-keeping. If the Israelites keep the covenant, then the blessings will apply. If they reject the covenant, then the people will face the curses. There are significant predictive concepts in the curses. Deuteronomy 28:36, for example, speaks of the king which Israel won’t have for another 400 years. Further difficulties are foreseen, including cannibalism and plagues like Egypt faced. The capstone of the curses is a forced return to Egypt (Deuteronomy 28:68) as slaves, but slaves without owners.

While these curses are comprehensive, let us dispense quickly with a few important facts. First, we should most likely see this as fulfilled in the life of Israel in the ancient world. Israel’s fall to Assyria in 722 BC and Judah’s fall in 586 BC are candidates for this, as is the Roman forced diaspora in 135-140 AD after the Second Jewish Revolt. There is no justification in these curses for willful anti-Semitism. Second, we should see this as predictive by the power of God, not as written retrospectively.

In Focus:

Draw your eyes back to the first portion of the chapter. In 68 verses, 14 relate to blessing and the rest to curses, but let us look closely at the blessings. Deuteronomy 28:2 speaks of blessings “overtaking” the people. This does parallel with the opening verses on curses, where the curses will “overtake” the people in 28:15. More importantly, though, this speaks of the inescapable truth that obeying God would bring blessing on the people.

The idea is that the blessing of God is comprehensive. It surrounds not only what you do, but where you go. It is not just for the people of Israel that day, but all of their offspring. And the end result?

The peoples of the earth will fear Israel and recognize YHWH as the Great God. (Deuteronomy 28:10).

In short, blessing comes through obedience for the purpose of the glory of God. The purpose is not the benefit of people. That is just the means to the greater end.

In Practice:

Let’s kill one practical step quickly: in reference to material prosperity, these verses relate to national Israel. Not to you. This passage does not endorse a personal wealth result from walking with Jesus. Not at all. Our results from walking with Jesus should be expected by His words: “you will have tribulation.” (John 16:33). Or perhaps the experience of the apostles in Acts 14:22, referring to hardships for entering the Kingdom.

Instead, substitute these practical expectations:

1. There is a natural structure of consequences from results. Disobedience will bring worse results, in time, than obedience brings. Looking through the lens of eternity, remember this in your personal life. There is more at stake than just right now.

2. When God’s people are gathered, the blessings of obedience multiply, but so do the curses of disobedience. When the church is gathered, though this passage is about Israel and not the church, the concept applies. One sinful person in a church may not bring great curse upon it, but a church which adopts of culture of sin will face God’s judgment, including its ultimate destruction.

3. Again, drawing from the principle, one can imagine that any nation which openly flaunts the righteousness of God should expect similar consequences. 

In Nerdiness:  

It’s hard to do justice to this passage. The totality of the destruction envisioned in the curses, compared to the blessings, reflects the holistic nature of the Law, the Covenant, and the People.

One thing that you should notice in study is the parallel structure of the first sections. The blessings will be exactly countered by the curses. Further, one can see how badly life will turn. If we take this passage and place it into 2 Kings, we see just how terrible the fall of Israel truly was.

Comparisons

If you missed it, there’s a new movie in first place on the United States box office chart. It’s Star Wars: The Force Awakens. As a life-long Star Wars fan, I’m excited by this. Even knowing the similarities between this one and the original Star Wars, I’m still excited by this.

Except, perhaps it’s not the first place movie. If you adjust for inflation or try to figure based on an estimate of ticket sale numbers, then The Force Awakens is closing on the top ten, but lags behind the original Star Wars, Avatar, Titanic, and the first: Gone with the Wind. (The source for all this info is BoxOfficeMojo.com.)

So, maybe Star Wars: The Force Awakens is the number one movie of all time. And maybe it isn’t.

Meanwhile, over at the University of Alabama, Coach Nick Saban has won another football National Championship. The discussions in sports media since then have centered on just how great of a coach he might be. Is he the greatest football coach of all time? Or just the greatest college coach of all time?

Then again, though, Bear Bryant coached in a time when practice and school requirements were different. Goodness, I think he coached before there was Gatorade. There have certainly been more coaches in the past that did amazing things, with far smaller budgets and far smaller players.

Perhaps Saban is the greatest, but then again, Vince Dooley or Bear Bryant or Knute Rockne might have something to say about that.

Where is this going?

These are examples of the mistake of trying to draw full comparisons across lines of history and generations. Consider this: Gone with the Wind came out in an era where you had to see movies in the theater, and if you wanted to see it again, you went to the theater. Again. For entertainment, you had live events, a few movies (and rarely more than 2 in one place,) and the radio. Is it fair, then, to compare the pull a movie of the 1930s had on people with a movie in the era of Netflix, DirecTV, and the multiplex? (Even admitting that 4 screens had Star Wars: The Force Awakens, it was 4 out of 20.)

Likewise, when we compare the present success of the University of Alabama to prior eras of football. True, just as good storytelling (except maybe Titanic) is the key to the great movies of any era, hard work is the key to any football team’s success. And Saban, Rockne, Dooley, Bryant, etc., all had teams that worked hard. Yet is a team with millions of dollars of specialized workout equipment better than a team with a broken down fieldhouse and standard free weights?

Into this, throw one more comparison. Look at the average of church attendance and involvement in American society. We spend a great deal of time, especially churchy-people, critiquing and lamenting that our numbers have not kept pace with the growth of population. Even now, we see churches that were once tremendous in size and cultural influence are fading in their connection.

Gone are the days when the words from one or two pulpits truly thundered across the nation and people listened. Gone are the days when Sunday morning found the vast majority of the population filling a pew in their Sunday finery. Gone are the days when a candidate had to do more than just claim a religious belief to get elected. Gone are the days when everyone knew the pastors, and everyone respected them.

Alongside this, though, we should see another reality. Gone are the days when one needed to join a church just to get a job in town. Coming are the days when one no longer gets elected by paying lip-service to Christianity. Gone should be the days where “church membership” helped one evade criminal prosecution or responsibility for your actions.

In short, the era of culture enhancing church statistics is drawing to a close. After all, there were days that attending church brought benefits that have almost nothing to do with Christianity. Can we truly compare how much people participate now, when the only benefit (only?) is honoring Christ by participating with the local body of believers?

Just as the eras of movies and football have shifted, the era of churches has shifted as well. There are many other ways people spend their time, and that results in a normal, cultural life that does not require, and barely encourages, worship participation.

Now, there has to be a valuable takeaway from this. What continues to make good movies? Storytelling, acting, and cameras. What makes great football teams? Hard work, good coaching, and sure hands. The externals have changed, but the core remains the same.

What, then, makes for strong churches? Jesus Christ is always Lord of the Church. The first requirement is that the church acknowledges Him as the Lord of all. The next two things are critical right behind that: commitment to the Word and relationships within the Body. Take away the smoke and mirrors, or the pews and organs, and you find this: A church that honors Jesus as Lord, knows His Word, and serves one another faithfully will be successful before God in any era.

Sermon Recap for January 17

Good morning! Here are the sermons from Sunday, January 17.

Morning Sermon: John 6 "Afraid of God" (audio)

Evening Sermon: Nehemiah 4 (audio)

Thanks!