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All the men were circumcised before they entered into the Promised Land but there were also certain things they had to do immediately after they entered the land and that is what these two chapters explain.
Moses gave them these instructions because he knew that he was not going to be going over the Jordan with them.
Moses tells them that after they cross the Jordan, one of their first acts is to set up very large stones, prepare them with whitewash and to inscribe them with the commandments so they can easily be seen from a great distance.
They were to build an altar with uncut stones next to the commandments.
The book of Deuteronomy is fill of statutes, judgements and commandments Moses is telling the children of Israel that God was charging them to remember them all and to perform all these in their daily lives. They were also going to be warned about the consequences of rejecting these judgements, statutes and commandments.
They were told to take these whitewashed stones and place them on Mt. Ebal on the other side of the Jordan. Archaeologists have found this altar on Mt. Ebal, and it appears to have been in use for some time.
They were also instructed to split into two groups and travel to Mt. Ebal and Mt. Gerazim to perform a ritual of blessing and cursing. After every blessing and curses, they people were to say “Amen.” In our modern time, we use the word “amen” flippantly. It is a promise and a commitment. They have no idea what they are really saying. The word “amen” means, “So be it!” and a person who makes this comment flippantly may be setting themselves up for judgement.
Deut. 28:2 says, “All these blessings will come upon you and overtake you if you obey the LORD your God.” In other words, God will give them so much blessing, they won’t be able to count it or contain it, but there were significant conditions to these blessings and if the people did not keep these laws, all these blessings would boomerang and be changed into a curse. They were not to “turn from the left or the right.” They were to have a single-minded focus on performing God’s laws in their lives.
The narrow road is not shared with anyone else.
God told them to destroy certain things when they went into the land. God warned them that if they did not destroy these places that they would want to use those places to worship Him, which goes against His character.
The blessings are “Yes I will!” and the curses are “If you don’t, I will.” That’s pretty heavy.
God can and will use natural processes to be a blessing or a curse to His children. He sometimes brings a sickness on someone to teach them a lesson and then He heals them once the lesson is learned and taken to heart.
God warns that He will bring “madness” on people. They will not be able to hold a logical coherent thought and will grope in the light like a blind person gropes in darkness. There will be so much fear that at night, they will want the sun and in the day, they will want to hide in the darkness. There will be a lot of paranoia.
When God brings judgement on a nation, we may be tempted to blame a particular person, or a particular political party for the problems in the land, but God tells us that He is the one who brings nations up and brings nations down.
Reader: Jeff. Speaker: Richard. Summary: Tammy.