Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:02:45 — 10.8MB)
Subscribe: RSS
Usually when a person is preparing to die, they want to summarize their lives on a high, positive note, but Moses doesn’t do this. He is given information from God Himself that the people of Israel will fall into apostasy after Moses’ death. This information does not surprise Moses but it’s certainly disappointing.
Last time, we talked about the people of Israel having another covenant with God, a covenant given after Sinai, just before they were preparing to enter the Promised Land. Moses warns the children of Israel that both the blessings and curses will eventually come upon them.
We don’t like to be held accountable, we prefer to blame someone else but God does not accept those excuses.
When God “curses” the word in Hebrew is קְלָלָה qelalah (Strong’s lexicon No. H7045). It comes from the root קָלַל qalal (H7043) which means, “to lightly esteem” or “to speak ill of.” What is in us will always come out of our mouth eventually.
God says that the children of Israel will be cast out but they will eventually return to the Torah and to Him. The Hebrew word for “return” or “turn back” is שׁוּב shuv (H7725), which is part of the word תְּשׁוּבָה teshuvah (H8666), or “repentance.” God will return their descendants to this land after a time of exile. Why does God want them to return to Torah? It’s the testimony of who God is. We have no way of knowing how to please God or why we should love God without the Torah.
What did Adam and Eve do? They had access to two different trees in the garden: the Tree of Life and the Tree of Knowledge? Which tree did they chose first? God tells us to choose life but they chose knowledge first instead of life.
God says that He will “circumcise their hearts.” What does that mean? We are to cut away those things in our lives that are against God’s word. We don’t know what is good and bad until God shows us. Sometimes when we cut the bad things away, it hurts but God knows what is best.
If God says something is good, then we should just do it. If God says something is bad, we should just believe Him. We shouldn’t have to know why God thinks something is good or bad, just trust that He’s smarter and knows.
When did God start circumcising hearts? Yeshua’s death show us how serious it is that we allow God to circumcise our hearts.
God told Moses that he would not lead the people into the promised land. That job would fall upon a young man named Yehoshua (Joshua). Moses gave that young man his name and it was not chosen haphazardly.
God tells them that as long as they follow Him with bravery, courageousness and without fear, God will be with them but if they play games with God and go after other god’s, God will leave them. God’s love is not co-dependent or enabling. He will not enable them to sin. He treats us the same way.
The “song of Moses” is a song God wrote as a testimony against the children of Israel. There’s joy and sorrow in the song. It’s a stern warning to remind them of the consequences of lawlessness.
The Torah itself was also to be placed beside the ark as a rebuke against them.
Moses tells the people that he is not surprised that the people will rebel against God after his death. They were rebelling against God during the entire 40 years he was with them.
Moses says that the 10 Commandments, the Torah, heaven, earth and the angelic hosts are all witnesses against them.
Reader: Jeff. Speaker: Richard. Summary: Tammy.