Rules, Rules and More Rules! [Deut 14]

Tuesday, September 7, 2010

Deuteronomy 14

¹"You are the sons of the LORD your God; you shall not cut yourselves nor shave your forehead for the sake of the dead.

²"For you are a holy people to the LORD your God, and the LORD has chosen you to be a people for His own possession out of all the peoples who are on the face of the earth.

³"You shall not eat any detestable thing.

Every aspect of life in the Israelite camp was hemmed in by rules. There was a lot of you can't do this, but you have to do that when it came to eating, mourning a death, legal issues, medical issues, where their families could camp, how to worship, how to wash and on and on. In some ways it made life easier because they didn't have to think very hard about how to do the daily stuff of life. They just had to know and follow the rules. God made the rules very clear as you can see in this chapter and throughout the Old Testament.

There was a radical change from the Old Testament to the New Testament concerning rules. They were transferred from the pages of a book onto the hearts of God's people. Instead of being regulated from the outside book of rules, God's people are now to be regulated by the Spirit inside them. Many of the rules that kept the Israelites separate from other people groups were discarded in the changeover. God wanted the Jews to be separate because it was through them He gave His Word and to whom He revealed Himself until He brought Jesus into the world. They protected His Word and provided the means by which He carried out his plan of salvation.

Now, God's people with their new hearts are not to live separate any more. They are to live among all the people of the earth to spread the good news of Jesus who saves and will guide their lives, not by rules, but by the Spirit in them. However, because people still like rules, it is easy for believers to forget about the Spirit and to revert back to rules. It is a daily challenge for God's people to put off the old ways of living by rules and to put on God's Spirit to lead and empower.

God, we praise You that You are the Perfect Provider. You provided the rules that protected Your Word and created a people who would be privileged to be Your chosen vessel for our Savior. And we thank You that You fulfilled Your rules in the person of Jesus and through Him we have a new heart that always and only wants to follow Jesus. Cause us to daily turn away from the rules and to turn towards You and Your Spirit to guide, protect and provide for us.

Beth Warlick, 9/7/2010

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God Is Holy [Deut. 13]

Monday, September 6, 2010

Deuteronomy 13

⁶"If your brother, your mother's son, or your son or daughter, or the wife you cherish, or your friend who is as your own soul, entice you secretly, saying, 'Let us go and serve other gods' (whom neither you nor your fathers have known,

⁷of the gods of the peoples who are around you, near you or far from you, from one end of the earth to the other end),

⁸you shall not yield to him or listen to him; and your eye shall not pity him, nor shall you spare or conceal him.

⁹"But you shall surely kill him; your hand shall be first against him to put him to death, and afterwards the hand of all the people.

¹⁰"So you shall stone him to death because he has sought to seduce you from the LORD your God who brought you out from the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.

Oh my!!! Once again, I am startled by God's standard for His people. It was bad enough that He directed them to kill men, women and children of the enemy to clear out the land. However, telling them to kill their own family members because he or she made a suggestion to check out the other god's seems way over the top! What kind of God would do that? The answer to that question is a Holy God, a God who knew they couldn't live up to this holy standard, a God who was preparing them to hunger for a Savior to take the burden of holiness off of them and put the holiness in them.

We praise You that You are Holy and that You extended Your holiness into our lives through Jesus and His Holy Spirit. Thank you that you removed the burden of killing those who oppose You in our midst to keep ourselves holy. Thank you that because of the death of Jesus, now our job is to fill with Your love and grace and let it overflow on this broken world. Cause us to remember Your holiness and impossible standard and be grateful that You gave us Your Son to do what we could never do.

Beth Warlick, 9/6/2010

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He Chooses the Place for Worship [Deut 12]

^{Saturday, September 4, 2010}

⁴"You shall not act like this toward the LORD your God. ⁵"But you shall seek the LORD at the place which the LORD your God will choose from all your tribes, to establish His name there for His dwelling, and there you shall come. ⁶"There you shall bring your burnt offerings, your sacrifices, your tithes, the contribution of your hand, your votive offerings, your freewill offerings, and the firstborn of your herd and of your flock. ⁷"There also you and your households shall eat before the LORD your God, and rejoice in all your undertakings in which the LORD your God has blessed you. ⁸"You shall not do at all what we are doing here today, every man doing whatever is right in his own eyes; ⁹for you have not as yet come to the resting place and the inheritance which the LORD your God is giving you. ¹⁰"When you cross the Jordan and live in the land which the LORD your God is giving you to inherit, and He gives you rest from all your enemies around you so that you live in security, ¹¹then it shall come about that the place in which the LORD your God will choose for His name to dwell, there you shall bring all that I command you: your burnt offerings and your sacrifices, your tithes and the contribution of your hand, and all your choice votive offerings which you will vow to the LORD.

As the people were hearing these instructions they did not know that God would choose the city of Jerusalem as the place His name would dwell, the place to come to seek Him and to worship Him. But He wanted them to know that He was preparing that city and that it was to deter them from falling into the patterns and religious activities of the former residents. To be separate, to be set apart from all others was God's mandate. To seek Him in a place that is set apart from what the world offers, a place that is holy, not to be confused with that that is other than God.

Father, we praise You that You have that place for us in Jesus. You have made us holy and set apart. You have chosen to send Your Spirit to indwell us. It is from there that You desire for us to seek You and worship You. Corporate worship happens where two or three are gathered in Your name, because You promise to be there. We are the place Your name dwells because of Jesus. Thank You for this privilege of worshiping You from our heart.

Verna McCrillis, 9/4/2010

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You Have Seen the Lord's Great Work [Deut. 11]

Friday, September 3, 2010

¹"You shall therefore love the LORD your God, and always keep His charge, His statutes, His ordinances, and His commandments. ²"Know this day that I am not speaking with your sons who have not known and who have not seen the discipline of the LORD your God--His greatness, His mighty hand and His outstretched arm, ³and His signs and His works which He did in the midst of Egypt to Pharaoh the king of Egypt and to all his land; ⁴and what He did to Egypt's army, to its horses and its chariots, when He made the water of the Red Sea to engulf them while they were pursuing you, and the LORD completely destroyed them; ⁵and what He did to you in the wilderness until you came to this place; ⁶and what He did to Dathan and Abiram, the sons of Eliab, the son of Reuben, when the earth opened its mouth and swallowed them, their households, their tents, and every living thing that followed them, among all Israel-- ⁷but your own eyes have seen all the great work of the LORD which He did. ⁸"You shall therefore keep every commandment which I am commanding you today, so that you may be strong and go in and possess the land into which you are about to cross to possess it; ⁹so that you may prolong your days on the land which the LORD swore to your fathers to give to them and to their descendants, a land flowing with milk and honey.

Moses was really preaching to them. He wanted to make sure that they did not make the choice they made last time. Because it was a choice - a choice to give into fear. Fear loomed so large that they forgot all the God had done and who He was. They wondered for 40 years because at the brink of entering, they "were not willing to go up, but rebelled against the command of the LORD your God; and you grumbled in your tents and said, 'Because the LORD hates us, He has brought us out of the land of Egypt to deliver us into the hand of the Amorites to destroy us." (Deut. 1:26-27).

This time, Moses did not want them to forget God. I wonder how many days he preached this message to them? Don't forget! "Your own eyes have seen all the great work of the LORD which He did."

We praise You God that we have Your Holy Spirit who is there to keep in our minds the truth about You. Cause us to not let fear keep us from hearing and remembering what we have seen with our own eyes - Your greatness, Your mighty hand and Your outstretched arm. Thank You that You are fighting for us.

Verna McCrillis, 9/3/2010

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He Chose You to Love [Deut. 10]

September 2, 2010

¹²"Now, Israel, what does the LORD your God require from you, but to fear the LORD your God, to walk in all His ways and love Him, and to serve the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul, ¹³and to keep the LORD'S commandments and His statutes which I am commanding you today for your good? ¹⁴"Behold, to the LORD your God belong heaven and the highest heavens, the earth and all that is in it. ¹⁵"Yet on your fathers did the LORD set His affection to love them, and He chose their descendants after them, even you above all peoples, as it is this day. ¹⁶"So circumcise your heart, and stiffen your neck no longer.

¹⁷"For the LORD your God is the God of gods and the Lord of lords, the great, the mighty, and the awesome God who does not show partiality nor take a bribe. ¹⁸"He executes justice for the orphan and the widow, and shows His love for the alien by giving him food and clothing. ¹⁹"So show your love for the alien, for you were aliens in the land of Egypt. ²⁰"You shall fear the LORD your God; you shall serve Him and cling to Him, and you shall swear by His name. ²¹"He is your praise and He is your God, who has done these great and awesome things for you which your eyes have seen. ²²"Your fathers went down to Egypt seventy persons in all, and now the LORD your God has made you as numerous as the stars of heaven.

What a moving address Moses gave the people inspiring them to go into the land really knowing their God and knowing their place in God's heart. "The God of gods and the Lord of lords, the great, the mighty, and the awesome God who does not show partiality nor take a bribe," this is who chose you out of all the people. If you know this to be true, how can your response be anything but to "fear the LORD your God, to walk in all His ways and love Him, and to serve the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul?"

I love the progression in this verse. First because you know God to be great, mighty and awesome, the initial response is awe (fear). Next you begin to walk in all His ways - really experience all of His character and as you do, your response is to love Him. As you love Him you find yourself serving Him, and as you serve Him out of love it becomes whole-hearted. Your entire heart and soul becomes consumed with God in all of His glory (correct estimation of who He is).

Father, we praise You for initiating. You loved us and You chose us before we even knew You. You, the mighty, great and awesome God chose to love us! Cause us to respond in awe as this truth sinks into our hearts. Turn that awe to love. Cause us to know Your love so deeply that serving You comes out of that love. We are sorry that we have tried to serve You out of our own strength instead. We repent and ask You to do a great and awesome change in our heart as we walk in Your love instead.

Verna McCrillis, 9/2/2010

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Not Because of Your Righteousness [Deut. 9]

^{September 1, 2010}

¹"Hear, O Israel! You are crossing over the Jordan today to go in to dispossess nations greater and mightier than you, great cities fortified to heaven, ²a people great and tall, the sons of the Anakim, whom you know and of whom you have heard it said, 'Who can stand before the sons of Anak?' ³"Know therefore today that it is the LORD your God who is crossing over before you as a consuming fire He will destroy them and He will subdue them before you, so that you may drive them out and destroy them quickly, just as the LORD has spoken to you. ⁴"Do not say in your heart when the LORD your God has driven them out before you, 'Because of my righteousness the LORD has brought me in to possess this land,' but it is because of the wickedness of these nations that the LORD is dispossessing them before you. ⁵"It is not for your righteousness or for the uprightness of your heart that you are going to possess their land, but it is because of the wickedness of these nations that the LORD your God is driving them out before you, in order to confirm the oath which the LORD swore to your fathers, to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. ⁶"Know, then, it is not because of your righteousness that the LORD your God is giving you this good land to possess, for you are a stubborn people.

Have you ever been offered a second chance? The children of Israel were on the brink of entering the promised land for the second time. These men had been children the first time they were supposed to enter and I am sure they remembered the story. Did their fathers sit around the camp fire and discuss their mistakes? Or did they pass on to their children their own rationalizations? "The people were great, the men were tall. We aren't used to fighting and we could never have defeated them."

God through Moses wanted to dispel their fear. What they needed to remember was that they had been and still were a very stubborn people. Moses painstakingly spoke of each major event, where they as a nation rebelled against God's goodness and righteousness. He did that because to live by the law required one to remember their sin in order to learn to not repeat it. But even to this nation trying to live by the law God offered His grace. He offered His strength, power and forgiveness in order for them to enter the new land. God was not giving them this land (a gift, totally undeserved) because of their righteousness, He was giving it because of His own character. What they needed to know, so that fear would be dispelled and replaced by faith, was the God loved them and was going to go before them as a consuming fire, even when they were dirt bags (self absorbed and stubborn).

We praise You God that Your character never changes. Your love is never based on our actions. You love us because we are flawed. You offer forgiveness and power to live in a new place. You offer for us to live by Your strength not by our righteousness (or attempts to be right). Thank You for Jesus. His death and resurrection are the fulfillment of Your forgiveness and power toward us. (Even while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. Romans 5:8) Today, by grace, cause us to enter the land of rest You are offering to enable us to go in to.

Verna McCrillis, 9/1/2010

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He Gives the Power [Deut. 8]

Tuesday, August 31, 2010

⁷"For the LORD your God is bringing you into a good land, a land of brooks of water, of fountains and springs, flowing forth in valleys and hills; ⁸a land of wheat and barley, of vines and fig trees and pomegranates, a land of olive oil and honey; ⁹a land where you will eat food without scarcity, in which you will not lack anything; a land whose stones are iron, and out of whose hills you can dig copper.

¹⁰"When you have eaten and are satisfied, you shall bless the LORD your God for the good land which He has given you. ¹¹"Beware that you do not forget the LORD your God by not keeping His commandments and His ordinances and His statutes which I am commanding you today; ¹²otherwise, when you have eaten and are satisfied, and have built good houses and lived in them, ¹³and when your herds and your flocks multiply, and your silver and gold multiply, and all that you have multiplies, ¹⁴then your heart will become proud and you will forget the LORD your God who brought you out from the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. ¹⁵"He led you through the great and terrible wilderness, with its fiery serpents and scorpions and thirsty ground where there was no water; He brought water for you out of the rock of flint. ¹⁶"In the wilderness He fed you manna which your fathers did not know, that He might humble you and that He might test you, to do good for you in the end. ¹⁷"Otherwise, you may say in your heart, 'My power and the strength of my hand made me this wealth.'

¹⁸"But you shall remember the LORD your God, for it is He who is giving you power to make wealth, that He may confirm His covenant which He swore to your fathers, as it is this day.

God had led them, fed them, humbled them and disciplined them, all in preparation for taking them to the good land He had promised. He wanted them to be satisfied and to in turn bless Him for what He had provided. But God knew how quickly they would forget the truth and live out of pride.

I know how true this is in my own life. Even as God has done tremendous change and healing in me, I very quickly take the credit for what has happened. How quickly my flesh turns to self-provision (pride). He is calling me to be careful. To not forget Him. How, Lord?

What does it mean to turn and bless Him in response to His provision? I looked up the Hebrew word "bless" and it means to bow in adoration, praise, salute. As I turn my focus on who He is and what He has done, as I proclaim my adoration, my focus will be on Him instead of on me. He gives the power to go into this place of blessing Him.

Lord, I thank You that You know us so well. You know how we need Your power to remember You. You are a God who takes exquisite care of us. By Your power cause us not to forget that it is You that has provided us with "everything pertaining to life and godliness" (1 Peter 1:3).

Verna McCrillis, 8/31/2010

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Remember What He Did in Egypt [Deut. 7]

Monday, August 30, 2010

¹⁶"You shall consume all the peoples whom the LORD your God will deliver to you; your eye shall not pity them, nor shall you serve their gods, for that would be a snare to you. ¹⁷"If you should say in your heart, 'These nations are greater than I; how can I dispossess them?' ¹⁸you shall not be afraid of them; you shall well remember what the LORD your God did to Pharaoh and to all Egypt: ¹⁹the great trials which your eyes saw and the signs and the wonders and the mighty hand and the outstretched arm by which the LORD your God brought you out. So shall the LORD your God do to all the peoples of whom you are afraid. ²⁰"Moreover, the LORD your God will send the hornet against them, until those who are left and hide themselves from you perish. ²¹"You shall not dread them, for the LORD your God is in your midst, a great and awesome God. ²²"The LORD your God will clear away these nations before you little by little; you will not be able to put an end to them quickly, for the wild beasts would grow too numerous for you. ²³"But the LORD your God will deliver them before you, and will throw them into great confusion until they are destroyed.

What are you facing today? Are you dealing with things that are overwhelming? Are you saying in your heart that these things "are greater than I; how can I dispossess them?" Have you forgotten who God is and what He has done in the psst? The only way to go forward without fear is to remember the Lord your God. Remember that He "is in your midst, a great and awesome God."

Remember Egypt - that place where we lived without God. When we lived there, in slavery to sin, we had a Redeemer doing incredible things to free us. Remember "the signs and the wonders and the mighty hand and the outstretched arm by which the LORD your God brought you out." Consider Jesus, our Passover who rescued us from the kingdom of darkness and brought us into His marvelous light. Now in that light He is calling us to clear away the things that threaten to pull us back into darkness, Not in one fell swoop but "little by little," letting the LORD our God deliver us in a way that protects us at the same time.

Lord, You are great and awesome. You are able to send a hornet or anything You want to deal with the enemy thoughts that we are tempted to camp with. You are the One that will deliver us. Cause us to be willing to let You destroy them completely without hanging onto any part that can snare us. Thank You that You are in our midst, that Your Spirit lives in us and empowers us to remember You, what You did in our Egypt and how You fought for us. Thank You, Jesus.

Verna McCrillis, 8/30/2010

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Remember Our Powerful God [Deut 6]

Saturday, August 28, 2010

Numbers 6

²²'Moreover, the LORD showed great and distressing signs and wonders before our eyes against Egypt, Pharaoh and all his household;

²³He brought us out from there in order to bring us in, to give us the land which He had sworn to our fathers.'

²⁴"So the LORD commanded us to observe all these statutes, to fear the LORD our God for our good always and for our survival, as it is today.

²⁵"It will be righteousness for us if we are careful to observe all this commandment before the LORD our God, just as He commanded us.

This chapter is rich with God's provision for the people and a plea for the people to build God's Word into every aspect of their lives so that they may fear Him and observe the statutes and that it would go well with them. We have a powerful God who has shown His power and has provided abundantly for His people and always wanted their best. But He also wanted a people who would consistently want Him and keep Him at the center of all they did.

We praise you, God that You showed Yourself to be powerful with great signs and wonders. You also made clear that You and Your Word are to be remembered, obeyed, permeating our lives and our children's lives so that it will go well with us. God we can't make You and the Word the center of our lives, but Jesus died giving us the indwelling Spirit to do that work in us as we exchange our ability for Your ability through Him. Cause us to be in Your Word daily and for that Word to seep into all the aspects of our lives as You grow us in the desire and ability to be totally surrendered to You... to be like Jesus. We can't, but You can.

Beth Warlick, 8/28/2010

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Your God is a Jealous God [Deut. 5]

Friday, August 27, 2010

¹Then Moses summoned all Israel and said to them: "Hear, O Israel, the statutes and the ordinances which I am speaking today in your hearing, that you may learn them and observe them carefully. ²"The LORD our God made a covenant with us at Horeb. ³"The LORD did not make this covenant with our fathers, but with us, with all those of us alive here today.

⁴"The LORD spoke to you face to face at the mountain from the midst of the fire, ⁵while I was standing between the LORD and you at that time, to declare to you the word of the LORD; for you were afraid because of the fire and did not go up the mountain. He said, ⁶'I am the LORD your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. ⁷'You shall have no other gods before Me. ⁸'You shall not make for yourself an idol, or any likeness of what is in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the water under the earth. ⁹'You shall not worship them or serve them; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children, and on the third and the fourth generations of those who hate Me, ¹⁰but showing lovingkindness to thousands, to those who love Me and keep My commandments.

Why is God a jealous God? This passage explains this part of His character that I have not easily understood. The key is that He had a covenant with His people. He brought them out of slavery to be their God. As Jesus reminds us in the New Testament - you cannot serve two masters. If you are worshiping something other than God, you cannot worship Him at the same time. He lovingly desires to have that intimate relationship with us, where He is giving Himself fully to us and we are giving ourselves fully to Him.

What things are you giving yourself to? What things take priority in your life and keep you from giving yourself fully to God? Lets repent of those things and agree with God that we should not "worship them or serve them." Those idols can be "good" things like family, friends, dreams, jobs, clean houses, the computer, Facebook, nice cars or even ministry. We can actually take the very things that God has provided for us and give our full attention to those things, forgetting God in the midst of them. Ask Him to show you what they are.

Father, we praise You that You jealously guard our relationship with You. Thank You for being a loving God who keeps Your covenant with us. Thank You for the new covenant of grace that is ours through Jesus. Cause us to recognize the things that keep us from giving ourselves fully to You and lay them at the foot of the cross.

Verna McCrillis, 8/27/2010

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