Author: The Christian Campus

Session 8 – All that is yours

25 December 2020

Ps Ben Hooman

There will be more to challenge us in this series, but today is all about encouragement. I want you to savour all that is yours in Jesus Christ, to see and to enjoy—perhaps with a fresh perspective—what Christ has done, and what He is doing in your life and in the life of every other Christian.

“Rejoice before the LORD your God at the place He will choose as a dwelling for His Name…” (Deuteronomy 16:11)

The people who rejoice in God

Deuteronomy records the teaching of Moses in the last weeks before his death. The old man is pouring out his heart to a younger generation, about to enter the Promised Land. Under the inspiration of God, Moses says, “When you get into the land, don’t forget the Lord. Remember to teach your children. Don’t follow other gods. Cancel debts and free your servants…”  

Then, right in the middle of the book, Moses tells them, “When you get into the land, rejoice! Enjoy what God is giving you! Celebrate!”

Celebrate the Passover (16:1-8)

Celebrate the Feast of Weeks (16:9-12)

Celebrate the Feast of Tabernacles (16:13-15)

“Rejoice before the Lord your God.” (16:11)

“Be joyful at your Feast…” (16:14)

“Your joy will be complete.” (16:15)

Reading this chapter made us think of Romans 5:11, where Paul says, “We rejoice in God.”  This is the character of the Christian community, a distinguishing mark of the church. We are the people who rejoice in God, and God’s people are to observe specific occasions and events with the single purpose of cultivating joy!

These festivals were a big deal because they were held at one location. So, wherever you were in Israel, you had to go to one place to celebrate. Each celebration was one massive gathering of God’s people.

“You must not sacrifice the Passover in any town… except in the place he will chose as a dwelling for his Name.” (Deuteronomy 16:5-6)

“Rejoice before the Lord your God at the place he will choose as a dwelling for his Name.” (Deuteronomy 16:11)

“For seven days celebrate the Feast to the Lord your God at the place the Lord will choose.” (Deuteronomy 16:15)

Where is the place God chose to put His great name? In later years, King David identified Jerusalem as that place. That means people would come from all over Israel to Jerusalem for these feasts.

In the New Testament, we see how important this was in the life of our Lord Jesus, “Every year His parents went to Jerusalem for the Feast of the Passover” (Luke 2:41). This was part of the rhythm of life for our Lord, growing up as a boy.

On one occasion, Jesus’ brothers told him to go to the feast, the Feast of Tabernacles, so that His disciples could see his miracles (John 7:3). Jesus said, “My time has not yet come,” but then He went secretly. And on the last day of the feast, Jesus stood up and said, “If anyone is thirsty let him come to Me and drink” (John 7:37).

There are other feasts and festivals mentioned in the Old Testament, but Moses picks out these three to talk about. These feasts were tied to specific events that had special significance for the people of God. Celebrating these events every year strengthened their faith and increased their joy. What you know can leave you unaffected. What you celebrate can shape your life.

What you celebrate

What we celebrate is very important and it says a great deal about us. You can tell a great deal about a family, a church, a community or even a nation by what we celebrate.

What do you celebrate?

When someone sends you a birthday message, you are glad because they are celebrating your life. We celebrate anniversaries because we value marriage.

We also have other celebrations, we have Mother’s Day and Father’s Day, Women’s Day, and many others.

In the church, we celebrate union with Christ. Baptism celebrates that union sealed. The Lord’s Supper celebrates that union sustained.

All over the world Christians celebrate the birth of Christ, the incarnation of the Son of God, and Easter—the death and resurrection of our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ.

Celebrations matter. They identify what we value.

This raises an important question for the people of God. What is worth celebrating? I want you to see how greatly Moses’ answer speaks to us today.

Celebrate the Feast of Passover

“Observe the month of Abib and celebrate the Passover of the Lord your God.” (Deuteronomy 16:1) 

(You can read the story of the Passover in Exodus 12.)

God’s people were slaves in Egypt. It had been like that for over 400 years. They had been oppressed by a cruel tyrant who defied God and abused his people. Then God said to the tyrant, “Let My people go,” but Pharaoh cared nothing for the word of God.

So God came down in judgment and mercy. His judgment broke the power of Pharaoh, and His mercy protected His own people. “The wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23), and death came to every home in Egypt on that night of God’s judgment.

It was an awful day of judgment, as the final day of judgment will be, but God said to His people, 

“Sacrifice a lamb, and paint the blood of the sacrificed lamb on the sides and top of the door frame of your house, and ‘When I see the blood I will pass over you’” (Exodus 12:13).

That’s where “The Passover” comes from. God saved His people from the fearsome wrath of His judgment, through the blood of a sacrifice, and brought them out of slavery. Then God said, “Celebrate this!”

What would you have done if you had been among God’s people and Moses told you to paint blood on your doorframe? You are outside with your neighbours, “Are you going to do this? Do we really need to do it? Will this really work?”  Would you have taken God at His word? Would you have done what He said?

God said it. His people did it. And through the blood of the sacrifice, they were saved from God’s judgment that came over the whole land, and they were brought into a covenant where God said to them, “You will be my people and I will be your God.”  Now Moses says, ‘This is worth celebrating!”

Celebrate with “the bread of affliction”

“For seven days, eat unleavened bread, the bread of affliction… so that… you may remember the time of your departure from Egypt.” (Deuteronomy 16:3)

Imagine that you are living in the north of Jerusalem, as our Lord did, and that you are traveling on foot to this festival. When you arrive, what will you eat for the next seven days? Dry crackers! Centuries after the Exodus, God’s people were to taste life, as it would have been, if it had not been for the mercy of God.

Celebrate with “the sacrificed lamb”

“Sacrifice the Passover when the sun goes down… Roast it and eat it in the place the Lord your God will choose.” (Deuteronomy 16:6-7)

Where does the New Testament go with this? Jesus was crucified during the Passover. And when John the Baptist first saw Jesus he said,

 “Behold the lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world” (John 1:29) 

When Jesus gathered with His disciples for the last time before He went to the cross, Luke tells us what He said to them…

“I have eagerly desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer” (Luke 22:15)

“He took bread, gave thanks and broke it, and gave it to them, saying, ‘This is my body given for you.’” (Luke 22:19)

“In the same way, after the supper He took the cup, saying, ‘This cup is the new covenant in My blood, which is poured out for you’” (Luke 22:20)

Do you see what Jesus was saying? “The mighty intervention of God in the Exodus, the greatest thing that has ever happened in the history of Israel, is only a shadow of what God is about to do. It points to this mighty intervention: My body will be given. My blood will be shed. I will become the sacrifice by which you will be redeemed from divine wrath and set free from sin’s power.”

When we celebrate the Lord’s Supper, we don’t roast the lamb. The sacrifice has been made. We take the cup and remember that the blood of Christ was shed, and that by faith His blood is applied to your life. You are delivered from the wrath of God and brought out of the position you used to be in—a slave, and you are brought into the freedom of a new life with God, in which He says to you, “You are Mine, and I am yours.”

This is not a process—it’s been accomplished. God gives you this feast so you won’t spend the rest of your life wondering if He loves you. You see that He loves you in the cross. God gives you this feast so that you won’t spend the rest of your life wondering if you will be forgiven. You are forgiven in the cross, and faith sees that.

God gives you this feast so that you will not live the rest of your life as if you are still a slave. Through the Passover, God’s people saw that God had put them in an entirely new position. No matter what your difficulties are in life, you are no longer a slave! This is what God says to us in the cross: You may face all kinds of battles in life, but you are not a slave! You are redeemed! You have been set free by the blood of Christ. Sin will always be your enemy, but it is no longer you master. That is worth celebrating!

Celebrate the Feast of Weeks (or the Feast of First fruits)

“Count off seven weeks from the time you begin to put the sickle to the standing grain.” (Deuteronomy 16:9)

The timing of these festivals is a matter of some debate among scholars. We don’t need to get into that today. The Feast of Weeks is connected with the harvest. In Exodus 23:16, this festival is called, “the Feast of Harvest.”  It is also tied to the beginning of harvest, “On the day of first fruits, when you present to the LORD an offering of new grain during the Feast of Weeks…” (Numbers 28:26). The day of first fruits was the day when people brought the first sample of the harvest as a gift to the Lord.

Where does the New Testament go with this?

Jesus Christ is “the first fruit”

“Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep.” (1 Corinthians 15:20)

The “first fruit” was a sample of what was still to follow in the harvest. Paul says Christ is the “first fruit.”  He has been raised from the dead. That’s marvellous, but what does it have to do with us? Paul says, “He is the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep.”  When Christ rose from the dead, He was the first of many who would rise from the dead.

Just as the first basket of fruit that is picked from a tree gives you a taste of what is coming from the tree during the whole time that it produces fruit, so the resurrection of Christ is the first glimpse of the day when all His people will be raised incorruptible, 

“As in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive. But each in his own turn: Christ, the first fruits; then, when He comes, those who belong to Him” (1 Corinthians 15:22-23)

The Festival of First fruits (or Weeks) points directly to our glorious hope in our Saviour and Lord Jesus Christ. He is the first fruits. He is the hope of resurrection for you.

The Holy Spirit is “the first fruit”

“We ourselves, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies.” (Romans 8:23)

By New Testament times, the Feast of Weeks was known by another name. If you count forward seven weeks from Passover (that’s forty-nine days) the next day, the fiftieth day, is referred to as “Pentecost.”

“When the day of Pentecost came, they were all together in one place” (Acts 2:1) 

Luke says, 

“There were staying in Jerusalem, God fearing Jews from every nation under heaven” (Acts 2:5) 

Why did they come from every nation under heaven to Jerusalem? They had come to celebrate the Feast of Weeks. Luke tells us how the Holy Spirit fell, not just on the Apostles, but on all of the believers. This was the beginning of the harvest from the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Paul says, “The Holy Spirit is given to us as the first fruits.”  

The Holy Spirit lives within you, giving you a sample of the life to come: A taste of the love of God, a glimpse of the glory of Christ, a beginning of the new life that will be yours forever. That taste, that glimpse, that beginning is the pledge of all that is to come.

Speaking of our eternal dwelling Paul says, “God made us for this very purpose, and has given us the Spirit as a deposit, guaranteeing what is to come” (2 Corinthians 5:5, 1:22, Ephesians 1:14). You have a taste already, just like the first basket of fruit, but there is a whole harvest to come.

The Feast of Weeks (or first fruits) points us to the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ and to the gift of the Holy Spirit. Jesus’ great promise ties these two together, 

“I will not leave you as orphans [promise of His resurrection]. I will come to you [promise of the Holy Spirit]” (John 14:18) 

Christ is with us. Now that is worth celebrating!

Celebrate the Feast of Tabernacles (or the Feast of Booths)

“Live in booths for seven days…” (Leviticus 23:42)

Of all the festivals, this must have been the most fun for the kids. They actually built a shelter from leaves and sticks. This was a camp out… for a whole week, “Hey dad, when is the Feast of Booths? What are we going make this year? The neighbours had a really cool one last year! We’ve got to make a better one!”

The idea of the festival was to remind God’s people that when they came out of Egypt, they did not live in houses, they lived in tents (or in booths) in the desert for 40 years. You’re living in a wonderful house in the Promised Land, so live in a booth one day a year to remind you that this earth is not your home. One day this tent, which is my body, will be destroyed, but that won’t be the end of me.

Where does the New Testament go with this?

“We know that if the earthly tent we live in is destroyed, we have a building from God, an eternal house in heaven, not built by human hands.” (2 Corinthians 5:1)

John Bunyan is best known for writing Pilgrim’s Progress,  but he wrote many other wonderful books. Bunyan spent twelve years in prison for preaching the Gospel. When he was in court, the judge said he would let Bunyan go if he would promise not to preach. Bunyan said, “If you let me go today, I will preach tomorrow.”

Bunyan had a wife and three children, including a daughter who was close to his heart and blind. He spent twelve out of his 60 years in prison. In his autobiography he said saying goodbye to them was like “pulling the flesh from my bones.”  

When he was finally released, Bunyan had much to teach his people about how to endure difficulties. I’d like to listen to that pastor, wouldn’t you? This is what he wrote in 1685:

“Sometimes I look upon myself and say, ‘Where am I now?’  I give myself this answer: ‘I am in an evil world, a great way from heaven… sometimes benighted, sometimes beguiled, sometimes fearing, sometimes hoping, sometimes breathing, sometimes dying… but then I turn the tables, and say, ‘But where shall I be shortly? Where shall I see myself [soon] after a few more times have passed over me? I shall see myself with Jesus.’  When I can answer myself thus… this yields glory, even glory to one’s spirit now.” 

Bunyan says, “I ask two questions.  Where am I now? Where will I be soon? I am in the booth, but soon I will be in the city. I live in this fallen world. But soon I will be with Jesus. When my soul can grasp that I am strengthened”.

The Feast of Tabernacles (or the festival of booths) reminds me that this world is not my home. It points to the Second Coming of Jesus, and the great inheritance that will be ours on that day. Faith will be turned to sight. Our lowly bodies will be changed to be like His glorious body, and we shall be forever with the Lord. Christ will bring us home, and when He does “your joy will be complete” (16:15). That is worth celebrating!

These three great festivals point us to Jesus and help us celebrate all that is ours in Christ.

The Passover points to the death of Christ. The Feast of Weeks (or first fruits) points to His resurrection and the gift of the Spirit. The Feast of Booths reminds us we are pilgrims in this world and soon we are going home. These things are not just worth knowing, they are worth celebrating, because that can change your life.

Christ redeemed me. Christ is with me. Christ will take me home.

Christ crucified! Christ risen! Christ coming again! Now, that’s worth celebrating!

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Friday 25 December 2020

Ps Ben Hooman

“In those days a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be registered. This was the first registration when Quirinius was governor of Syria. And all went to be registered, each to his own town. And Joseph also went up from Galilee, from the town of Nazareth, to Judea, to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and lineage of David, to be registered with Mary, his betrothed, who was with child. And while they were there, the time came for her to give birth. And she gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped him in swaddling cloths and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn. And in the same region there were shepherds out in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. And an angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were filled with fear. And the angel said to them, “Fear not, for behold, I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, who is Christ the Lord. And this will be a sign for you: you will find a baby wrapped in swaddling cloths and lying in a manger.” And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying, ‘Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among those with whom he is pleased!’ When the angels went away from them into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, “Let us go over to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has made known to us.” And they went with haste and found Mary and Joseph, and the baby lying in a manger. And when they saw it, they made known the saying that had been told them concerning this child. And all who heard it wondered at what the shepherds told them. But Mary treasured up all these things, pondering them in her heart. And the shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen, as it had been told them.” (Luke 2:1-20)

Some of the most familiar and happy words of Christmas are these from Luke 2:

“For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord. And this will be a sign for you: you will find a baby wrapped in swaddling cloths and lying in a manger.” And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among those with whom He is pleased!” (Luke 2:11–14)

I want to exult with you this Christmas over the wonders in this text, with our focus mainly on verse 14: “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among those with whom He is pleased!”

It was a real day

“For unto you is born this day . . .” (Luke 2:11)

It happened on a day. A day in history. Not a day in some mythological, imaginary story, but a day when “Caesar Augustus was the emperor of Rome and Quirinius was governor of Syria.”

It was a day planned in eternity before the creation of the world. Indeed, the whole universe with untold light-years of space and billions of galaxies, was created and made glorious for this day and what it means for human history.

“For by Him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through Him and for Him.” (Colossians 1:16)

For Him! For His appearance. For this day of His appearing.

“When the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law” (Galatians 4:4)

It happened on a day. The perfect day. In the fullness of time. The perfect time appointed by God before the foundation of the world. “For unto you is born this day!”

It was a real city

“. . . in the city of David, which is called Bethlehem” (Luke 2:4)

It happened in a city. Not in Narnia. Not in Middle Earth. Not in a galaxy far away. It happened in a city and that city still exists today. This city is real. The city’s name is Bethlehem (Luke 2:4, “Joseph also went up from Galilee . . . to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem.”) Bethlehem, about ten kilometres from Jerusalem. Bethlehem, the city where Jesse lived, the father of David, the great king of Israel. Bethlehem, the city that Micah prophesied over:

“But you, O Bethlehem Ephrathah, who are too little to be among the clans of Judah, from you shall come forth for Me one who is to be ruler in Israel, whose coming forth is from of old, from ancient days.” (Micah 5:2)

It happened in a city. A real city, just like Krugersdorp, or Pretoria, or Cape Town.

Saviour, Messiah, Lord

“For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour who is Christ the Lord.” (Luke 2:11)

A Saviour born to us. If you have ever sinned against God you need a Saviour. The angel said to Joseph,

“She will bear a son, and you shall call His name Jesus, for He will save His people from their sins” (Matthew 1:21)

Only God can forgive sins against God. That is why God sent His eternal Son into the world, because He is God. That’s why Jesus said, “The Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins.”  Therefore, a Saviour was born. “For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, who is Christ.”

Christ is the English for Christos, which is means “anointed one,” which is the meaning of “Messiah” (John 1:41; 4:25). This is the one long-predicted, long-awaited, the One anointed above all others! (Psalm 45:7).

The final anointed King. The final anointed Prophet. The final anointed Priest. In Him all the promises of God are yes!

“For all the promises of God find their Yes in Him. That is why it is through Him that we utter our Amen to God for His glory” (2 Corinthians 1:20)

The one who fulfil all hopes and dreams!  And more, vastly more. Because He is also the Lord “For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, who is Christ the Lord.”

The Ruler, the Sovereign, the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father. The Lord of the universe.

“For to us a child is born, to us a Son is given; and the government shall be upon His shoulder, and His name shall be called Wonderful Counsellor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. Of the increase of His government and of peace there will be no end.” (Isaiah 9:6–7)

Christmas in Sum

The Lord of never-ending, universal, sovereign governance. The Lord of all lords!

On a day — in real history.

In a city — in a real world.

The Saviour — to take away all our guilt.

The Christ — to fulfil all our hopes.

The Lord — to defeat all our enemies, and make us safe and satisfied for ever.

So, I exult with you this Christmas that we have a great Saviour, Jesus, the Christ, the Lord, born on a day in a city to save us from our sins — our many sins!

Two great purposes for this great news

An angel had announced this great news of the birth of Christ into this world to the shepherds and pointed them to the very animal shed where the baby lay,

“And an angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were filled with great fear, and the angel said to them, ‘Fear not, for behold, I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, who is Christ the Lord. And this will be a sign for you: you will find a baby wrapped in swaddling cloths and lying in a manger’. And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying, ‘Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among those with whom He is pleased.” (Luke 2:9-14)

Evidently, one angel can bring the news, but it does not suffice for one angel to respond to the news. The meaning of this news, the ultimate outcome of this news — that demands an army of angels.

And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host [army!] praising God and saying, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among those with whom He is pleased!”

The joyful news that on a day, at the perfect fullness of time, in the perfect prophesied city, a Saviour was born, who was Christ, the Lord — that news has two great outcomes. Two great purposes. “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among those with whom He is pleased!”

God’s glory and our peace

The coming of this child will be the greatest revelation of the glory of God even among the heights of heaven, and the coming of this child will bring peace to God’s people, who will one day fill the whole earth with righteousness and peace.

“Of the increase of His government and of peace there will be no end.” (Isaiah 9:7)

First and foremost, God is glorified because this child is born. And second, peace is to spread everywhere this child is received. These are the great purposes for the coming of Jesus: Glory ever-ascending from man to God. Peace ever-descending from God to man. God’s glory sung out among men for the sake of His name. God’s peace lived out among men for the sake of His name.

There is hardly a better way to sum up what God was about when He created the world, or when He came to reclaim the world in Jesus Christ — His glory, our peace! His greatness, our joy! His beauty, our pleasure!

The point of creation and redemption is that God is glorious and means to be known and praised for his glory by a peace-filled new humanity.

To experience this peace that He brings

“Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among those with whom He is pleased!” Luke 2:14)

The NIV says, “and on earth peace to men on whom His favour rests.” The NASB says, “and on earth peace among men with whom He is pleased.” And the ESV says, “and on earth peace among those with whom He is pleased!”

The point is that, even though God’s offer of peace goes out to all, only His chosen people — the people who receive Christ and trust Him as Saviour and Messiah and Lord, will experience the peace He brings.

You get a glimpse of this meaning in Luke 10:5–6, Jesus says to His disciples, “Whatever house you enter, first say, ‘Peace be to this house!’ [that’s the offer of peace to all] And if a son of peace is there, your peace will rest upon him. But if not, it will return to you.”

God’s peace in Christ is offered to the world. But only the “sons of peace” receive it. How do you know if you are a “son of peace”? How do you know if you are part of the angels’ promise, “Peace among those with whom he is pleased!”? Answer: you welcome the Peacemaker, you receive Jesus.

Three relationships of peace

My great desire for you this Christmas is that you enjoy this peace. We know that there are global aspects to this peace that lie in the future when “the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord as the waters cover the sea” (Habakkuk 2:14). When, as Isaiah says, “Of the increase of His government and of peace there will be no end” (Isaiah 9:7).

But Jesus has come to inaugurate that peace among God’s people. And there are three relationships in which he wants you to pursue this peace and enjoy this peace,

• Peace with God,
• Peace with your own soul,
• And peace with other people, as much as it lies in you.

And by peace, I mean not only the absence of conflict and animosity, but also the presence of joyful tranquillity, and as much richness of interpersonal communication as you are capable of.

So, let’s look at each of these three peaceful relationships briefly and make sure that you are enjoying as much as you can. The key to each of them is not to separate what the angels kept together: the glory of God and the peace you long for. “Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace.”

The main point of peace

God’s purpose is to give you peace by being the most glorious Person in your life. Five times in the New Testament He is called “the God of peace” (Romans 15:13; 16 :20; Philippians 4:9; 1 Thessalonians 5:23; Hebrews 13:20). And Jesus said, “My peace I give to you” (John 14:27). And Paul says “Jesus Himself is our peace” (Ephesians 2:14).

What this means is that the peace of God, or the peace of Christ, can never be separated from God Himself and Christ Himself. If we want peace to rule in our lives, God must rule in our lives. Christ must rule in our lives. God’s purpose is not to give you peace separate from Himself. His purpose is to give you peace by being the most glorious Person in your life.

So, the key to peace is keeping together what the angels keep together: Glory to God, and peace to man. A heart bent on showing the glory of God, will know the peace of God.

And what holds the two together — God getting glory and us getting peace — is believing or trusting the promises of God obtained by Jesus.

Romans 15:13 is one of those fundamental texts pointing to this crucial role of faith. “May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing.” In believing. In other words, the way God’s promises become real for us and produce peace in us and through us is “in believing.” When we believe them. That’s true whether we are talking about peace with God, peace with ourselves, or peace with others.

Peace with God

The most basic need we have is peace with God. This is foundational to all our pursuits of peace. If we don’t go here first, all other experiences of peace will be superficial and temporary.

“Therefore, since we have been justified by faith [there’s the pivotal act of believing], we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.” (Romans 5:1)

Here is the pivotal act of believing, “have been justified by faith”. Justified means that God declares you to be just in His sight by imputing to you the righteousness of Jesus. And He does that by faith alone: “Since we have been justified by faith.” Not by works. Not by tradition. Not by baptism. Not by church membership. Not by piety. Not by parentage. But by faith alone.

When we believe in Jesus as the Saviour and the Lord and the supreme Treasure of our lives, we are united to Him and His righteousness is counted by God as ours. We justified by faith.

And the result is peace with God. God’s anger at us because of our sin is put away. Our rebellion against Him is overcome. God adopts us into His family. And from now on all His dealings with us are for our good. He will never be against us. He is our Father, and our Friend. We have peace. We don’t need to be afraid any more. This is foundational to all other people.

Peace with ourselves

And because we have peace with God because of being justified by faith, we can begin to grow in the enjoyment of peace with ourselves — and here I include any sense of guilt or anxiety that tends to paralyze us or make us hopeless. Here again believing the promises of God with a view to glorifying God in our lives is key.

Philippians 4:6–7 is one of the most precious passages in this regard:

“Do not be anxious about anything [the opposite of anxiety is peace], but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God [in other words, roll your anxieties onto God]. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” (Philippians 4:6-7)

The picture here is that our hearts and our minds are under assault. Guilt, worries, threats, confusions, uncertainties — they all threaten our peace. And Paul says that God wants to “guard” your hearts and minds.

He guards them with His peace. He guards them in a way that goes beyond what human understanding can fathom. Don’t limit the peace of God by what your understanding can see. He gives us inexplicable peace, supra-rational peace. And He does it when we take our anxieties to Him in prayer and trust Him, that He will carry them for us (1 Peter 5:7) and protect us.

When we do this, when we come to Him — and remember we already have peace with Him! — and trust Him as our loving and Almighty heavenly Father to help us, His peace comes to us and steadies us, and protects us from the disabling effects of fear and anxiety and guilt. And then we are able to carry on and our God gets the glory for what we do, because we trusted Him.

Do that this Christmas. Take your anxieties to God. Tell Him about them. Ask Him to help you, to protect you, to restore your peace, and then to use you to make peace.

Peace with others

The third relationship where God wants us to enjoy His peace is in our relationships with other people. This is the one we have least control over. So, we need to say it carefully the way Paul says,

“If possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all.” (Romans 12:18)

For many of you when you get together with family for Christmas, there will be some awkward and painful relationships. Some of the pain is very old. And some of it is new. In some relationships you know what you have to do, no matter how hard it is. And in some of them you are baffled and don’t know what the path of peace calls for.

In both cases the key is trusting the promises of God with heartfelt awareness of how He forgave you through Christ. I think the text that puts this together most powerfully for me again and again is Ephesians,

“Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamour and slander be put away from you, along with all malice. Be kind to one another, tender hearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.” (Ephesians 4:31-32)

Continually cultivate a sense of amazement that in spite of all your sins God has forgiven you through Christ. Be amazed that you have peace with God. It’s this sense of amazement, that I, a sinner, have peace with God, that makes the heart tender, kind and forgiving. Extend this to others seventy times seven!

It may be thrown back in your face. It certainly was thrown back in Jesus’ face on the cross. That hurts and it can make you bitter if you are not careful. Don’t let it. Keep being more amazed that your wrongs are forgiven than that you are wronged. Be amazed that you have peace with God. You have peace with your soul. Your guilt is taken away.

Keep trusting God. He knows what He is doing. Keep His glory, not your success, not your effectiveness in peace making, or your relationships, supreme in the treasure chest of your heart.

And then you will be like the angels: Glory to God in the highest is the first thing. Peace among His people, is the second thing.

“For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, who is Christ the Lord.” This is why He came — on a day, to a city, as the Saviour, Messiah, and Sovereign. That God would get glory, and that you would know peace.

May the God of peace give you peace, and get His glory!

Session 7 – Love Your Neighbour

21 December 2020

Ps Ben Hooman

I want you to see how the root of loving God produces the fruit of loving others. Real self-sacrifice is not produced within us; it has its root in the love of God.

“At the end of every seven years you must cancel debts.” (Deuteronomy 15:1)

Today, we come to chapter 15, which is an exposition and application of the fourth commandment, “Remember the Sabbath day and keep it holy” (Deuteronomy 5:12).

Using the Old Testament law properly

As we study Deuteronomy, it is important to remember that the particular applications of the Ten Commandments that are laid out here were given to the nation of Israel.

In the 12^th century, a Jewish philosopher by the name of Maimonides published a definitive list of Old Testament laws from the Pentateuch, in which he listed 248 commands, and 365 prohibitions for a total of 613 laws. These laws relate to worship, the temple, sacrifices, dietary laws, vows, ritual washings, festivals and a host of other things.

It would be a great mistake to draw a direct line from these Old Testament laws given to Israel to the Christian life today. For example, in Chapter 14 we have laws about clean and unclean foods. These laws were for Israel.

But in the New Testament Christ proclaimed all foods clean,

 “And He called the people to him again and said to them, ‘Hear Me, all of you, and understand: There is nothing outside a person that by going in to him can defile him, but the things that come out of a person are what defile him’…. ‘Do you not see that whatever goes into a person from outside cannot defile him, since it enters not his heart but his stomach, and it is expelled?’ Thus He declared all food clean.” (Mark 7:14,18-19)

This was a huge issue in the early church. Some people were saying that in order to be a Christian you had to believe in Jesus and keep the 613 Old Testament laws. When the Apostle Paul dealt with this, he made it clear that those who said this had “turned to a different gospel, which is really no gospel at all” (Galatians 1:6-7).

So, the command to cancel all debts every seven years (15:1) is not a command that God gives for you today. If someone owes you money, and they repay it to you over ten years, you are not sinning if you receive it.

In the same way, it would be a great mistake to draw a direct line from the promises specifically given to Israel and drop them on the Christian today. For example, 

“[God] will richly bless you, if only you fully obey the Lord your God” (Deuteronomy 15:4-5).

Teachers of the “prosperity gospel” seize on words like these that were clearly given to covenant Israel, as if they were given to every Christian: “Obey God and you will be rich. ‘The Lord your God will bless you as He has promised and you will lend to many nations and will borrow from none’” (15:6). But that promise is given to Israel. God has not promised material prosperity to every Christian.

It is a great misapplication of the Old Testament, if you apply every command and every promise that was given to Israel and apply it directly to the Christian, you end up in great difficulty and confusion.

We must not take what is distinctive to God’s covenant with Israel and apply these commands and promises to all people in every circumstance. Having said that, the law of God reflects the character of God. And the New Testament makes this clear, speaking of the Old Testament, “These things… were written down for us as warnings” (1 Corinthians 10:11).

The Old Testament law is full of principles that guide us in wisdom, as they are rightly understood and applied to our lives, “All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness” (2 Timothy 3:16).

I want us to see today how God’s words in Deuteronomy 15, that reflect His glorious character and purpose, teach us and rebuke us, correct us and train us in righteousness.

I want to highlight some distinct ways that God speaks to us here:

The abundant provision of God

“There should be no poor among you, for in the land the LORD your God is giving you… he will richly bless you.” Deuteronomy 15:4

When God’s people come out of the desert, and He speaks to them on the edge of the Promised Land, each family is given a portion of land. These tent dwellers, who owned nothing, became property owners with land and the means of sustaining an income.

What God gave to them, they were able to pass on to their children, which is why the word “inheritance” was used. If ever there was a land of equal opportunity, this was it. Everyone was given a house, and everyone was given a means of generating income.

We have called this series, “A New Start.” God’s people had a fresh start in the land, where God had supplied all that was needed to sustain all of His people. So, God says, “‘There should be no poor among you’ (15:4), because everyone is to be given a house, and the land is abundant to supply for all your needs.”

Obey the Lord and you won’t need laws about cancelling debts, because you won’t have debts. You won’t have debts because no one will be poor among you, and no one will be poor among you because God will bless you in the land.

God has provided all that is needed to sustain all people in all places at all times. “There should be no poor among you” (15:4), so where there is poverty, it is not because God has failed to provide.

The reality of our world is that no one fully obeys the Lord. None of us loves God with all his heart, and we do not love our neighbour as ourselves.

So, God gives us laws to put a brake on human greed. God gave these laws in Deuteronomy 15, so that the poor would find relief, and so that no one would be trapped in crippling debt.

The kindness of God’s law

“At the end of every seven years you must cancel debts.” (Deuteronomy 15:1)

Thomas Cameron wrote a book entitled, The Kindly Laws of the Old Testament. In it he picked up on how many of the 613 laws in the Pentateuch showed kindness to the poor and to those in need. God cares about the needs of the poor, and the Old Testament is full of laws that were given to alleviate poverty, and to help God’s people in times of need.

This Sabbath law of cancelling debts is a flagship, leading the way for many other Old Testament laws: 

“This is how it is to be done: Every creditor shall cancel the loan he has made to his fellow Israelite. He shall not require payment from his fellow Israelite or brother, because the LORD’s time for cancelling debts has been proclaimed.” (Deuteronomy 15:2)

Think about the practical effect of God’s kind laws:

Restraint for lenders

Under this law, no loans lasted more than seven years. We are not talking about mortgages or home loans. The homes were given by God to His people, and if a person became so poor that they had to sell their home or their land, there was another law by which it had to be returned to the family at the Jubilee (every 50 years), once in every lifetime.

Setting aside the home, where most people borrow over a longer period of time, this law has much to teach us. Lenders could not give out loans that were larger than people could reasonably expect to repay in a seven year period. That is a restraint for lenders. Think of all the good this principle could do in the world today.

Discipline for borrowers

Since loans were cancelled at the end of every seven years if they could not be repaid, the repayment would be scheduled over a maximum of 84 months. No loan was for longer than seven years.

In most cases, the repayment schedule was much shorter. If you were in the fourth year of the cycle when you borrowed money, the loan would be scheduled for repayment over three years. If you were in the fifth year of the cycle when you borrowed money, the loan would be scheduled for repayment over two years. There is restraint and discipline. God allows his people to borrow money, but He does not want them living on credit.

This law was not given so borrowers should default on their loan. This was the kindness of God for the relief of the poor. A reasonable loan had been taken, a sensible schedule of repayments set, but then if a husband had died, or some other calamity came, rather than being caught in a trap for the rest of their life, they came to be released every seven years.

The principle we learn here is very simple: Borrow if you need to, but borrow as little as you can and repay as fast as you can. Don’t borrow more than you can reasonably expect to repay in a short period of time. Wisdom from God’s law that is transferable across cultures and across time. Let no debt remain outstanding (Romans 13:8).

Relief for the courts

Can you imagine what the cancelling of debts every seven years would do in our world today? Luther describes this as a beautiful and fair law, and he longs that the rulers of the world would imitate it:

“They would have fewer [cases] and commotions, for people would know that suits, disputes, debts, dealings, agreements, judgments, seals and letters would all be removed at one time and cancelled in the seventh year… and not be postponed and continued forever into endless litigation.”  

But can you imagine the impact of everybody drawing a line at the same time? All claims against you are being cancelled, and you are cancelling all claims against everybody else. For every grievance there is a time to let go.

The stubbornness of God’s people

These are the words of Moses, “At the end of every seven years you must cancel debts” (15:1), that’s Moses the lawgiver. 

“There will always be poor in the land. Therefore, I command you to be openhanded towards your brothers and toward the poor and needy in your land” (Deuteronomy 15:11)

That’s Moses the preacher. It’s not enough to have great laws. Moses is also preaching—calling the people to live with a right heart. He warns the people about four dangers:

A hard heart

“If there is a poor man among your brothers… do not be hardhearted.” (Deuteronomy 15:7)

A closed hand

“Do not be hard hearted or tight fisted. Rather be openhanded and freely lend him whatever he needs.” (Deuteronomy 15:7-8)

A wicked thought 

“Be careful not to harbour this wicked thought: ‘The seventh year, the year of cancelling debts is near,’ so that you do not show ill-will toward your needy brother and give him nothing.” (Deuteronomy 15:9)

A grudging spirit

“Give generously to him and do so without a grudging heart.” (Deuteronomy 15:10)

This comes over into the New Testament as “God loves a cheerful giver” (2 Corinthians 9:7).

Moses received these laws from the finger of God. He went up on the mountain and received these perfect laws from God. The fact that Moses says so much about the heart, reminds us that the law has limits.

Even the best law has loopholes. If you have a hard heart, you will sin against God even while you are keeping His laws! That is why in the New Testament we have this teaching about what the law cannot do, “in that it is weakened by the sinful nature” (Romans 8:3).

Our country desperately needs the Gospel of Jesus Christ, because laws cannot change the human heart. The glory of God’s Son is needed.

The glory of God’s Son

How would you have liked to live under these laws? That probably depends on whether you were a lender or a borrower. These laws were great for debtors, but tough for the creditor.

God gave wonderful laws for the protection of the poor in Israel. But how often do you think these laws were actually kept? D. A. Carson says: “The extent to which these… statutes were ever enacted is disputed. There is very little evidence that they became widely observed public law in the Promised Land.” 

Are you surprised? Why were these laws not enacted in the Promised Land? The people who had the power to proclaim the year of release never had the will to do so. It would be too costly. Because of human sinfulness, the history of Israel, like the history of the rest of the world, was one of frustration for the poor.

Jesus’ first public words

“The Spirit of the Lord… has anointed Me to preach good news to the poor… to release the oppressed and proclaim the year of the Lord’s favour.” (Luke 4:18-19)

The “release” is a direct reference to Deuteronomy 15, and the cancelling of debts. Literally, Moses said, “At the end of every seven years there must be a release.” God is saying, “This is what I have come to do. I am going to do for you what you have not done for each other. I have come to release you from your eternally crippling debt towards God.”

There was only one way in which that could happen: If someone owes you a thousand rand and you release them from that debt, then you will be down a thousand rand yourself. You bear the loss yourself and the amount of the loss that you bear is the amount of the debt you are owed.

So, when Jesus goes to the cross, what is He doing? He is assuming our debt before God. He bears our sin in His body on the tree (1 Peter 2:24). He assumes the loss, and in this way, He cancels our debt. He offers this release to all who will come to Him in faith and repentance.

“… The Lord’s time for cancelling debts has been proclaimed” (Deuteronomy 15:2). A full pardon was gained by His blood, shed on the cross.

The distinctive of God’s Church

“There will always be poor people in the land.” (Deuteronomy 15:11)

This is a striking contrast with, “There should be no poor in the land” (Deuteronomy 15:4), because of the Lord’s abundance of provision.

Our Lord quoted these words when Mary poured an expensive jar of ointment over Jesus. Judas criticized, “Why wasn’t this perfume sold? And why wasn’t the money given to the poor?” Jesus defended Mary’s actions, “You will always have the poor among you, but you will not always have Me” (John 12:8).

Some people have misconstrued the words, “The poor you will have with you always,” to mean, “There’s nothing we can do,” so they walk away from the problem. That is why it’s so important to read this in context.

Looking at the context in Deuteronomy 15 is the only way we can rightly understand what our Lord says, “There will always be poor people in the land. Therefore, I command you to be openhanded toward your brothers and toward the poor and needy in your land” (15:11).

When Jesus quotes Deuteronomy 15, He is not saying, “There will always be people in need, so do nothing.” He is saying, “There will always be people in need, so God says, ‘I command you to be generous.’”

This culture of kindness is a distinctive calling of the church of the Lord Jesus Christ. Christ has released us from our debt to God, a debt that we had no means to repay. His Spirit lives in His people. Acts of kindness that help those who are in great need, from Acts 2 onward, are a distinctive mark of Christ’s church.

Marks of kindness in the Old Testament and in the New

This kindness is to be shown to all, but I want you to notice from the Old Testament and in the New Testament, that God calls us to this especially among His own people. Notice how often the word “brother” is used:

“Cancel the loan to your fellow Israelite.” (15:2)

“He shall not require payment from his fellow Israelite or brother.” (15:2)

“There should be no poor among you.” (15:4)

“If there is a poor man among your brothers…” (15:7)

“Do not show ill will toward your needy brother…” (15:9)

“I command you to be openhanded toward your brothers.” (15:11)

This makes you think of Cain’s question back in Genesis: “Am I my brother’s keeper?” (Genesis 4:9). No, but you are your brother’s brother! You ask, “Is that in the New Testament?” Yes, it is.

While kindness is to be shown to all people, there is a special priority given to the family of God, 

“Let us do good to all people, especially to those who belong to the family of believers” (Galatians 6:10)

One way in which we do this is through benevolence. This is being greatly used in these days of economic hardship and high unemployment caused by poor governance by government and Covid 19.

But that’s only a small part of it. The larger part is in the quiet acts of kindness that take place every week between one believer and another, between one family and another, for the glory of God.

Stories of kindness

I often get to hear the stories, and I’d like you to have that opportunity too. So, here’s an invitation: Think about a time in your life where someone in the body of Christ has helped you, shown you a practical kindness, helped you when you were facing a particular difficulty.

It may have been a gift when you were in need. It may have been help with food or with a car. It may have been help with your children or with a job. Someone took an interest in you. Someone showed kindness when you were in need, and they helped you and blessed you.

Most of us will have a story like that. If you would be willing to share that story with others, I’d like you to write to me. We will put some of these stories on the web, so that all of us can be encouraged, and so that all of us can get a sense of what it means to be the family of God.

If you would like to send me your story, just put “Stories of Kindness” in the subject line, and send it to: ben@tccc.co.za

Don’t tell us the name of the person who showed you this kindness. We don’t want anyone to lose their heavenly reward! Just tell us:

The situation you were in,

The kindness that was shown to you, and

What it meant to you (or the impact that it had on you).

Things happen in the body of Christ that don’t happen anywhere else. It is wonderful to see the body of Christ in action. I’d like to hear your story, even if it seems like a small thing to you.

 We have all been shown an extraordinary kindness, and after our giving to the Lord, our first priority must be to repay the kindness that has been shown to us.

The first thing is your giving to the Lord. It’s easy to say that you will be generous when you have paid your mortgage, when the kids are finished college or when you have enough for retirement. That day will never come. Generosity is a habit of the heart, developed over time.

That experience has had a lasting effect on our lives. “Freely you have received. Freely give!” (Matthew 10:8). As others have shown kindness to you, so practice kindness to others. Where is there a need that you know about? Where is there a burden that you can lift? What can you do to help another person make a new start?

As we have opportunity, let us do good to all people, especially to those who belong to the family of believers. (Galatians 6:10)

https://www.facebook.com/thechristiancampus

Sunday 20 December 2020

Ps Ben Hooman

In this commercialized world this festive time of celebrating the birth of Christ is a time of giving, and therefor a time of shopping for gifts. Even since the wise men from the East showed up at the stable carrying gold, frankincense, and myrrh, people are exchanging gifts at Christmas.

Today it is more complicated than it was for the wise men. They have seen the star in the east and came to worship Jesus. In the world today there are all kinds of media advertising Christmas in different forms and formats; newspapers, television, social media, etc.

Shopping malls are contending with one another as parents, families, and friends are going from store to store searching for that latest play station, or other gadgets on the market.

The wise men did not have to worry about sizes, or colours, or return policies. They had plain gold, and frankincense, and myrrh. Nothing that was out of fashion, that they don’t like, that is too small, or too big, too cheap or too expensive.

Well, this year, although different from other past festive seasons due to Covid-19 regulations, millions of people young and old, will open millions of gifts. Some won’t fit, some the wrong colour, many will be returned or exchanged, all focussed on the likes of self.

But there is one gift that meets everyone’s needs, one gift that will never wear out, never break or need any repairs. A Gift that is appropriate for a small child, for a teenager, an adult, as well as for seniors, boy or girl, man or woman. A Gift that meets everyone’s needs and available all year round, not just for a season but for a life time! The Gift that we all need and the most valuable gift of all, Jesus Christ our Saviour! The on that not only the season is about, but also what life is all about.

At Christmas we celebrate that God gave us the gift of His Son Jesus Christ so that through faith in Him we are forgiven and have eternal life.

“For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.” (John 3:16)

I want to make three points about this wonderful lifesaving Gift:

The Gift is Jesus Christ Himself

The gift God offers us is the person Jesus Christ. To know Him and to understand His presence, to know Him intimately as a friend, and to have fellowship with Him, to love and be loved in a relationship with Him.

The gift God offers us is to be known and loved by Christ.

“You are My friends if you do whatever I command you. No longer do I call you servants, for a servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all things that I heard from My Father I have made known to you.” (John 15:15)

“And this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent.” (John 17:3)

Have you received and accepted this gift? Do you have this kind of relationship with Christ to seek His presence, and to know this only true God? Do you see Him as your friend as you follow and obey Him? Is He someone you know you can talk to, cry to, to counsel with and receive counsel from? Are you at ease in His presence? Do you believe He abides in you or do you feel that you have to ‘clean-up” your spiritual house, that you have to perform to welcome Him in?

“Christ Jesus is present with us and His Spirit lives in us. Our fellowship is with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ.” (1 John 1:3)

People think of our faith as nothing but a set of burdensome responsibilities doing things you do not want to do. Things like going to church when you rather want to be on the dam, a life filled with rules with a lot of do’s and don’ts. A bit more positively, many see it beneficial to self, lots of benefits to self, and they might even miss the mark.

The essence of our faith is not in do’s and don’ts or even blessings and benefits, but a relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ. The Gift is Christ Himself!

Yes, there are many benefits, like joy, hope and peace. But they all come through Christ and it all flow from my relationship with God. The greatest gift to your children is not a few boxes wrapped in coloured paper over Christmas or birthdays. No, this most valuable you can offer them is a relationship. Your love, your time, and your attention, your commitment to always be there for them when they need you. All that God stands for, and we as parents to be an extension of Him to our children. God’s greatest gift to us is a relationship, a relationship with Jesus Christ. He is always present and in His presence I dwell.

This Gift has great value

At the birth of Christ, when the people looked in the manger, what did they see? Did they see a baby or did they see a king? Some did not see the King of kings and the Lord of lords, the Prince of peace.

There was a multitude of angels, an array of bright shining beings praising God loudly,

“And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying: ‘Glory to God in the highest, And on earth peace, goodwill towards men!’. Did the people of Bethlehem or Jerusalem see it? Did they hear the angels?

So many missed it. The inn keeper missed it, the religious leaders missed it, all to busy with their own works. They had no time for a relationship with Christ.

Some past by the manger and looked at the gifts; at the gold, the frankincense, and myrrh. Many today still don’t want to see the King, but rather the presents of this world.

Which do have more value?

“Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and hid; and for joy over it he goes and sell all that he has and buys that field. Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant seeking beautiful pearls, who when he had found one pearl of great price, went and sold all that he had and bought it.” (Matthew 13:44-46)

Knowing Christ intimately is worth more than anything else in the world. Jesus Christ is the treasure, the pearl of great value, and God’s gift to us!

“Thanks be to God for His indescribable gift.” (2 Corinthians 9:15)

The Gift must be received

This is a Gift available to everyone, but God does not force it onto anyone. We have to receive it, we have to take the package, open the box, and accept it as our own.

“But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His Name, who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.” (John 1:12-13)

Not all who heard about Him, or agreed with His teachings, not all who attended church, not all who try to follow all the rules, but the one who received Him. A gift you do not pay for, you do not have to earn, not something that you deserve. A gift you have to pay for is not a gift at all.

Many gifts received for Christmas or for a birthday end up lying on a shelf gathering dust. When there is a need for it from time to time, it is dusted off and used.

Maybe some gifts had not been opened yet and is still wrapped, maybe still under the tree, maybe a Bible. Maybe you have opened this gift from God many years ago, but lately you placed it on the shelf. You have been too busy, too distracted, too hurting, to give Jesus His rightful place in your life and to really experience His presence.

My prayer today is that you take Him back, give Him the rightful place in your heart, into your life. This Gift from God has a tag, a card, with your name on it. What better day than today to begin a life of fellowship, a relationship with Jesus Christ!

To experience the presence of the Present, Christ Jesus! Glory to God in the highest!

Session 6 – The Test of Success

18 DECEMBER 2020

Ps Ben Hooman

This is a warning. Be careful! Watch out! There is a particular danger that you are going to encounter as God’s blessings flow into your life.

“When the LORD your God brings you into the land he swore to your fathers, to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, to give you… then when you eat and are satisfied, be careful that you do not forget the LORD, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.” (Deuteronomy 6:10-12)

A great change is going to happen in your life

You are going to enjoy the blessing of God in ways that your parents never knew. It will come to you in three ways:

• Opportunity

“A land with large, flourishing cities you did not build…” (Deuteronomy 6:10)

Cities are places of opportunity. Cities have infrastructure. They have large populations. Business thrives in the city. Cities are built over decades and generations, but these people will have all the opportunity of life in cities they did not even build. Enemies are going to be cleared from these cities. God took these people from the desert, where there is no opportunity, and put them in a place of extraordinary opportunity.

• Property

“Houses filled with all kinds of good things you did not provide…” (Deuteronomy 6:11)

God was going to give this land to his people, and each tribe and clan would be given their own property as an inheritance. They had lived in tents in the desert, but now they will live in homes and with no mortgages! This is what is going to happen. And the land and the houses that God will give to each tribe and family is to be passed down from generation to generation.

God is giving these people homes. Property! Their parents left Egypt with nothing. Now there would be a family home, property and an inheritance that would be passed from one generation to the next.

• Income

“Vineyards and olive trees, you did not plant…” (Deuteronomy 6:11)

Vineyards and olive trees give the means of generating an income. You will have land. You will be able to sow and plan and harvest. You will not only have food, but you will be able to generate an income.

This is a marvellous promise of the blessing of God. When you go into the Promised Land, here’s what will happen: You will be surrounded by the opportunity of the city, you will be property owners, and you will have the means of generating an income.

Now here’s the surprise. Moses says, “When this happens be careful” (Deuteronomy 6:12). Why does he say that? You would expect him to say, “Be thankful. lift up your hands in praise,” but that’s not what he says. He says, “Be careful!”

When this great change happens in your life and you have opportunity and property, and when you have an income -watch out! This will harbour for you a time of great danger.

That is why this session is called; The test of success.Now, please turn with me to Deuteronomy 8, where Moses explains why the blessing of God carries within it a hidden danger.

We see this in Deuteronomy 8:6-11. When you experience the blessing of God, and it’s the same for us today, one of two things will happen: The first is that the blessing of God can intensify your gratitude, and increase your love for the Lord. I’m going to call this “the circle of praise.”

The Circle of Praise

Fear the Lord

“Observe the commands of the Lord your God, walking in His ways and revering Him.” (Deuteronomy 8:6)

Fear the Lord as you love Him, and love the Lord as you fear Him. Give weight to the Lord in all your ways. Hear what He says. Do what he commands.

God’s Blessing

“The LORD your God is bringing you into a good land–a land with streams and pools of water, with springs flowing in the valleys and hills; a land with wheat and barley, vines and fig trees, pomegranates, olive oil and honey; a land where bread will not be scarce and you will lack nothing; a land where the rocks are iron and you can dig copper out of the hills.” (Deuteronomy 8:7-9)

If you fear the Lord, if he carries weight in your life, and you love Him as you fear Him and fear Him as you love Him, then the blessing of God will lead you to praise.

Praise

“When you have eaten and are satisfied, praise the LORD your God for the good land He has given you.” (8:10)

If you fear the Lord, then when His blessing and His abundant goodness comes to you, you will say, “All that I have has come from His hand.” And the very act of praise will lead you back to the Lord, so that the circle is complete.

Do not forget

“Be careful that you do not forget the LORD your God…” (Deuteronomy 8:11)

If I fear the Lord, His blessing will lead me to praise. Praise calls His goodness to mind so that I am even more in awe of His goodness, and so the circle of praise continues. That’s where we want to be. We want to live in the circle of praise, so that when the blessing of the Lord comes it leads us back to Him.

I want you to notice what Moses says next: “Be careful that you do not forget the Lord… Otherwise…” (Deuteronomy 8:11-12). 

Now he is going to introduce another cycle of events. If you fear the Lord, His blessing will lead you to praise, but if you forget the Lord, the good things that happen in your life will have a completely different effect. I’m calling this effect “the circle of pride.”

The circle of pride

Forget the Lord

To forget the Lord doesn’t mean to forget that He exists. It simply means that you no longer have Him in mind. You lose sight of His hand in the events of your life, in a way that you once did.

If you forget the Lord, here is what will happen:

God’s blessing

“When you eat and are satisfied, when you build fine houses and settle down, and when your herds and flocks grow large and your silver and gold increase and all you have is multiplied…” (Deuteronomy 8:12-13)

God gives material blessings to those who forget Him, as well as to those who fear Him. He causes the sun to shine and the rain to fall on those who hate him as much as on those who love Him (Matthew 5:45). What will happen then?

Pride

“Then your heart will become proud…” (Deuteronomy 8:14)

If you forget the Lord, His blessing will lead you to pride. You will take the credit to yourself and that will intensify your forgetting of the Lord. You’ll say, “This is marvellous! Look at what I’ve been able to accomplish.” 

Praise leads you back to the Lord, because your eye is on Him. Pride leads you away from the Lord, because your eye is on yourself.

I have done this

“You may say to yourself, ‘My power and the strength of my hands have produced this wealth for me.’” (Deuteronomy 8:17)

Here is the subtle test of success, the great danger that lurks in every blessing: We think it comes from our own hand, from our own strength. So Moses says, “Be careful! Watch out!” It’s like a big “Danger!” sign, “Be careful that you do not forget the Lord” (Deuteronomy 6:12), “Be careful that you do not forget the Lord your God” (Deuteronomy 8:11).

Success Can Destroy

What this means for us is this: When you move into that new home, there is a temptation for you to face. When you graduate with that degree, there is a spiritual danger for you to overcome. If your salary moves from five figures to six figures, there is a subtle test that you will face. You cannot avoid it. These good gifts are to be welcomed and celebrated, but be careful, because every blessing of God carries within it the subtle test of success.

Success can destroy an individual, if we forget the Lord

This is counter-intuitive—the opposite of what we usually think. The time of your greatest spiritual danger may not be when you are sick, but when you are well. You’re more likely to forget the Lord. You’ll pray when you’re sick. The time of your greatest testing may not be when you lose a job, but when you find one.

You are more likely to grow cold in your walk with the Lord, not when the stock-market goes down, but when it goes up. Students, if you are getting straight “A’s,” you may be in more danger of spiritual pride than if you had gotten a “B” or a “C.” 

Moses says, “When these good things happen to you, be very careful! Watch out! See the danger, because success carries with it the subtle temptation of spiritual pride.

Remember this when you are tempted to envy those who have more than you—a greater opportunity, a larger property or a bigger income. Don’t wish yourself into another man’s temptation. You don’t know what kind of steward you would be. The very fact that you are struggling with envy suggests that it may be God’s kindness and mercy that is keeping you from the ravages of that temptation.

“From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded and from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked.” (Luke 12:48)

We can think with great sadness about people who told you once, with great joy on his face, how he had been head-hunted by a large company and they had tripled his salary overnight. Then saying something wonderful has happened and it can only be the blessing of God.

We saw them change. Within a year he had denied his faith, left his wife and children. Satan got him. All it took was an increase in his salary. He forgot the Lord. He said, “My strength and my power have produced this wealth.” He felt strong and it destroyed him. 

C. S. Lewis put it like this: “Prosperity knits a man to the world. He feels that he is finding his place in it, while really it is finding its place in him.”  

Success can destroy a generation, if we forget the Lord

“You may say to yourself, ‘My power and the strength of my hands have produced this wealth for me.’” (Deuteronomy 8:17)

“Rebellion against God does not begin with the clenched fist of atheism but with the self-satisfied heart for whom ‘thank you’ is redundant.” ^[iii]

That is in large measure the story of this generation.

Success can destroy a church, if we forget the Lord

Apply what we are learning here to a church, and you will see that there is a subtle test that comes to a church that grows, a church that expands.

When a church grows, other churches want to know how it happened, “What is the secret of your success?” Books get written, seminars go on the road. The church begins to say, “Look what we were able to do.” And Satan runs rampant. Have you not seen this?

If Moses was here, he would have said to that church; “Be careful! This is a time of great spiritual danger. And whatever you do, do not say, ‘We have done this by the strength of our own hands.’”

When we are in a time of trouble, we know how to call upon the Lord, but when we are in a time of blessing, that’s when it is easy to forget the Lord. Remember the church at Laodicea? They were saying, “I am rich, I have acquired wealth, I do not need a thing.” But Christ says to them, “I am about to spit you out of my mouth” (Revelation 3:16-17).

Breaking out of the circle of pride

What is success doing in your life? Is it increasing your praise or is it increasing your pride? Maybe you find yourself saying, “There is too much pride and too little praise in this heart.” Then the great question is, how can we break out of the circle of pride?

Moses is describing a person locked into the circle of pride, “You may say to yourself, ‘My power and the strength of my hands have produced this wealth for me’” (Deuteronomy 8:17) He goes on to say, “but,” here’s how you break out of the cycle of pride, 

“But, remember the LORD your God, for it is he who gives you the ability to produce wealth, and so confirms his covenant, which he swore to your forefathers, as it is today” (Deuteronomy 8:18).

Moses is making this obvious point: “You say it was ‘my strength’ that did this. You say it was ‘the power of my hands’ that produced this wealth, but where did that power and strength come from? Who gave you the mind to discern these truths? Who gave you the skills that built this business?”

The Bible tells us about Nebuchadnezzar, a king who accomplished extraordinary things. One day he was walking on the roof of His palace in Babylon, admiring the wonders of the ancient world in his kingdom and he said, “Is this not the great Babylon I have built… by my mighty power and for the glory of my majesty?” (Daniel 4:30). That’s what Nebuchadnezzar said on the roof of his palace.

While he was still saying this, God spoke and within a moment Nebuchadnezzar lost his mind. He became completely mad. For a time after that, he ate grass and lived among the animals of the field. His hair grew like the feathers of an eagle and his nails like the claws of a bird (Daniel 4:33). Can you imagine how desperate that man became?

After some time, Nebuchadnezzar gives us his testimony, 

“At the end of that time, I, Nebuchadnezzar, raised my eyes toward heaven, and my sanity was restored. Then I praised the Most High; I honoured and glorified Him who lives forever. At the same time that my sanity was restored, my honour and splendour were returned to me… Now I, Nebuchadnezzar, praise and exalt… the King of heaven, because everything He does is right and…those who walk in pride He is able to humble” (Daniel 4:34-37).

Luther says: “God uses our effort as a mask under which he blesses us.”   The world sees what you have done. They see the mask. The world says, “He is a great man. Look at what he has accomplished.” Luther says, “Your effort, your gifts, your enterprise, your skills, are a mask.” The real reason underneath your success is the blessing of God. Only God can say, “I AM who I AM.” What we must say is, “By the grace of God, I am what I am” (1 Corinthians 15:10).

Matthew Henry says: “When we have got it, we must not say, it was the might of our hand that got it. But must own that it was God that gave us the power to get it. And therefore, to Him we must give the praise and consecrate the use of it.”  

“What do you have that you did not receive?” (1 Corinthians 4:7). This takes us to the heart of the Gospel: 

“We are justified by His grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by His blood, to be received by faith” (Romans 3:24-25)

“Where then is boasting? It is excluded” (Romans 3:27), because we are not redeemed by the strength of our hands or by our intelligence, not by our efforts, but by the shed blood of Christ.

Some of you will know Carl F. H. Henry, a man whose brilliant mind and wise judgment were used by God—perhaps more than any other in the shaping of evangelicalism in the second half of the 20th century. Carl Henry, who is with the Lord now, was a man of extraordinary scholarship, a prolific author, the founder of Fuller Theological Seminary, and the first editor of Christianity Today.

Don Carson conducted an interview with Carl Henry late in his life, and asked him: “Having achieved all this in your life, how do you stop it going to your head?” He said, “How can a man possibly be proud when he is standing beside a cross?”

There are ultimately only two kinds of men, two kinds of women. There are those who are standing on their own achievement, and there are those who are standing beside the cross. What about you? Forget the Lord and His blessing will lead you into a life of pride, but how can anyone be proud if he or she is standing beside a cross?

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session 5 – Tell your children

14 DECEMBER 2020

Ps Ben Hooman

If you love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength, what will be the impact on your family? If I extend myself in serving the Lord, will it hurt my children?

This is a very real question for many parents and grandparents. You love the Lord and you want to serve Him. You want your life to count for Him, but you also have a family.

“In the future, when your son asks you, ‘What is the meaning of the stipulations, decrees and laws the LORD our God has commanded you?’ tell him: ‘We were slaves of Pharoah in Egypt, but the LORD brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand.’” (Deuteronomy 6:20-21)

You feel a tension between these two things.

You love your children and you want to be a good mother, a good father. What does it look like to love the Lord with all your heart, soul and strength, when you are married, and when you have children?

It is very significant that when Moses says, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart” (6:5), he immediately goes on to describe the impact on the family. Far from destroying your family, I want you to see from the Scripture today that if you choose to love the Lord with all your heart, and with all your soul and with all your strength, your family will be blessed.

The best way to serve your family, the best way to love your family is to live for the Lord. Indeed, any other choice will be destructive to the people you love. Here’s the principle: Love the Lord first, and the family will be blessed. Love the family first, and the family will suffer. I want you to see how this works out in practice.

The great irony of putting family first

Moses is speaking to a new generation of God’s people on the verge of the Promised Land. Forty years earlier God had called their parents to step forward and enter the land. You remember the story: They sent out spies, and the spies reported, “It is a good land, but there are giants there, and the cities are massively fortified.” When these parents heard the report and turned back, they wandered in the desert for the next 40 years.

Why did they make this decision? Why did they refuse to go up into Canaan? There must have been many factors, but we get a fascinating insight into what they were thinking, “The little ones that you said would be taken captive, your children… will enter the land” (1:39).

You see what was happening: The spies came back and said, “There are giants in the land.” And the parents said, “This is far too great a risk. We have little children. We have to think about what’s best for them. If we go into the land, our children could be taken captive.” That is what they said. I understand that. Don’t you?

“The risk is too great. We can’t do what God says, we have little children.” They put the children first.  And what was the result? The children they tried to protect spent the largest part of their lives wandering in a desert.

Here is the great irony: If the parents had put the Lord before the children, the children would have been raised in a land flowing with milk and honey. But because the parents put the children before the Lord the children spent the largest parts of their lives wandering in the desert.

The parents put the children first, and it was devastating for the children. Yes, if they had gone into the land, some families would have lost their sons and their daughters. Obedience always has a cost. But by putting the children first, these parents did themselves and their children a great disservice.

Don’t live for your spouse or your family

Putting your children first is the worst thing you can do for your children. The best way to serve your family is to love the Lord with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. The same is true of marriage.

Marriage: Who holds first place?

Think about this. It is so different than the culture around us. Wives, don’t desire to be first in your husband’s life. Desire that Christ will be first in your husband’s life.

If he loves Christ with all his heart and soul and strength, he will love you well, even when you are most unlovable. If you are first in his life, then you have taken the place of God. Taking the place of God is a burden that you cannot bear. You can only fail, and you can only disappoint if you are there.

Husbands, by all means, buy a card for your wife that says, “I love you.” But don’t buy a card that says, “I live for you.” You will find many cards that say something like this out there. That’s idolatry.

If you live for your wife or live for your husband, you make yourself an idolater, and you place on your spouse a burden that they cannot possibly sustain. That is not love. That is destroying the very thing that God is seeking to build. Only God can be God to you. Your spouse does not have that capacity.

Children: How much do you love them?

The same principle holds true for children: The first commandment is, “You shall have no other gods before me,” and that includes your children. That is why our Lord said, “Anyone who loves his son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.” (Matthew 10:37). People read that and say, “How could He say such a thing?” When Jesus said this, He was simply applying the first commandment.

If you let your children take first place in your heart and first place in your life, and have first claim on your money, you have made them an idol. If you make them an idol, what are you teaching them to do? You are teaching them to worship themselves.

When Satan came into the garden, he said, “You will be like God” (Genesis 3:5), and paradise was lost. When the Lord came down on the mountain, He said, “You shall have no other gods before me” (Deuteronomy 5:7), and the Promised Land was gained.

Don’t life for your spouse or for your family. Then you can say with the apostle Paul, “For me to live is Christ, and to die is gain” (Philippians 1:21).

Align your life around one consuming passion for the Lord

Forty years later, the little ones whose parents tried to protect them from the risk of full obedience, are now mature adults in middle life. Their parents had put them first. They had suffered as a result.

You must choose how you will live

Now Moses brings this new generation to the verge of the Promised Land. Picture this in your mind: The little ones have become parents. Now they have children of their own. There are still giants in the land. The cities are still fortified. God is calling the next generation to enter the Promised Land. This new generation knows it will be costly.

Moses says to them: “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.” Your parents didn’t do that! They had a faith, but no mission. They put you first! Look what it did to them and look what it did to you!

Now you are standing here with your little children. You must choose how you will live. You’ve seen how their half-hearted love for the Lord was toxic to children. “Love the Lord with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. Do it so that it will go well with you and with your children” (Deuteronomy 5:29).

Aligning is not prioritizing

Align your life around one consuming passion for the Lord. Aligning your life around a single passion is not the same as prioritizing. People sometimes say, “God first, your family second and ministry third.” I have never found that helpful.

How can you separate loving God from serving God? Loving the Lord is seen in obeying His commands and in devoting your life to serving Him. Christ lays claim, not to a part of your life, but to the whole of your life. He lays claim to my family as much as to me. The language of priority does not help us here.

Aligning is not balancing

When the issue of loving God and loving your family is raised, people often say, “Well, you have to keep a balance. You should set aside time for ministry, and time for your family. You should love the Lord, and you should love your family. Keep a balance.”

Whenever people say, “Keep a balance,” it sounds good, but it is surprisingly unhelpful. If loving the Lord and loving your family, or serving the Lord and serving your family have to be kept in balance, it means these two things have become separated: They are on opposite sides of the scale. They are being weighed against each other. I don’t want my family to be weighed against the Lord, I want my family to be weighed for the Lord.

We are not looking to maintain a balance, but to achieve an alignment. Moses tells us how to do that:

Your heart

“These commandments… are to be on your heart” (6:6).

Love the Lord with all your heart. But it has to begin with your own heart. We saw last week how this is learned over the course of a lifetime at the foot of the cross.

Your conversation

“Talk about them when you sit at home…” (6:7).

We are talking about family conversation. Don’t let your love for the Lord, your work for the Lord or your giving to the Lord remain private. Talk about it with your family. Open your heart to them. Let them see, as they grow, and in an appropriate way, the passion that drives you.

Luther says, Moses is not speaking here (6:5) about the Ten Commandments in general, he is talking about the first commandment in particular. The family is not to engage in constant conversation about, “Why we don’t commit murder” or “Why we don’t steal.” We are to talk about, “Why we love the Lord with all our heart and all our resources. Why do we live this way?” What it means to live for Him is to pervade everything.

Luther says, “This first commandment is the chief source and fountainhead which flows into all the others.” And, “Where the heart is rightly disposed toward God and this commandment is observed, all the others follow.” ^[i]

Your example

“Tie them as symbols on your hands” (6:8).

The hand is the means of action. Let this love for the Lord that is in your heart, and in your conversation, also be put into practice through your commitments, your choices, and your ministry. If you want to align your family around a single passion for the Lord, you have to step out and lead by example yourself. Don’t just talk about it. Do it.

Your family

“Write them on the door frames of your houses and on your gates” (6:9).

Bring your children increasingly into this great consuming passion of your life. Let them be a part of it, as they see it. Allow them to participate in it.

Seeing a passionate love for Christ in my father and in my mother has had a profound life-shaping impact on me. My father worked two jobs when I was young to sustain the family. Some of you know what this is like—utterly exhausting.

He served on the church board (they were called “deacons”), taught a Sunday school class, as well as editing and producing the church magazine. It was a family production line: Typed by my mother and then duplicated, collating the covers and the inserts, and then stapling it together in our home on Friday nights.

My folks lived this verse of Scripture. Oh, that God would burn this into our hearts, “As for me and my household, we will serve the Lord” (Joshua 24:15). My parents wanted me to catch a glimpse of living for one, single passion for the Lord. And I saw it!

Karen and I have tried to follow that model in a small way in our own family. When we came here to The Orchard, we decided to get to know as many of the people as we could. So, we invited all the members of the church to our home. There were about 800 people and it took a year of Sunday evenings to do it.  Our boys were 10 and 8 years old at the time. They got involved, opening the door, giving out name tags, and serving coffee.

People often ask me, “How do you protect your children from the pressures of life in the ministry?” Our children have received immeasurable benefits from their exposure to ministry: The people they have met, experiences they have enjoyed, and life lessons that they have learned. It’s the tapestry of a family that’s trying to live out, “As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.”

Many of you have grasped this vision and you are doing this in ways that fill me with admiration and thanksgiving. You worship as a family. You serve as a family. You say, “We are going to support Dad, or Mum in doing this, because by giving this support our family is doing something for the Lord.” This is what it means for us to get behind this.

The parents who said, “We can’t enter the land because of the children,” led their children into the desert. The parents who said, “As for me and my house we will serve the Lord,” that was the generation that led their children into the Promised Land.

Let the Cross explain the passion of your life

As you live with one consuming passion for the Lord, your life will provoke questions. It will need explaining. Moses does not say, “If…” but, “When your son asks you, ‘What is the meaning of the stipulations, decrees and laws the Lord our God commanded you…’” (6:20). If you love the Lord with all your heart, soul and strength, that question will be asked, “Why do so many people come to our home? Why are we giving all this when it could be used for other things? Dad, other families are not like this…”

Christopher Wright has a marvellous comment on this. He says, it would be easy to jump from the question (in 6:20) to the answer (in 6:24). Question: Why do we keep these laws? (6:20) Answer: Because the Lord commanded us (6:24). He says, “Most parents will have felt the temptation to answer children’s “why’s” in similar fashion.” ^[ii]

Before we get to the Lord who commanded us (in 6:24) we come to the Lord who redeems (in 6:21-23). Why are we living with this one consuming passion for the Lord?

Tell them, “We were slaves in Egypt, but the Lord brought us out with a mighty hand.”

Son, if it wasn’t for the Lord, I would have been a slave. He redeemed me. Not only has he redeemed me from past slavery, He has promised me the future inheritance of His promised land.”

The meaning of the law is to be found in the Gospel.  

Even in the Old Testament God is calling parents to do more than teach their children a moral code. It is about loving the Lord with all your heart and all your strength. That is far deeper than morality.

Here are fathers and mothers who live in such a way that their children are asking, “Why do you have this deep passion for God? Dad, how do you sustain love in your marriage?

Why is there this contentment in you?”

When he asks you these questions, tell him what the Lord has done for you. Tell him what the Lord means to you. Tell him, The Son of God loved me and gave Himself for me and everything I have, I have received from Him.

Live for your family and you will lead your family into the desert. Live for the Lord and you will lead your family into the Promised Land.

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Session 4 – Love God with your whole heart

11 DECEMBER 2020

Ps Ben Hooman

If you have the idea that the Old Testament is all about external rites and rules, then take this in: Love God with all your heart (6:5), These commands are to be on your hearts (6:6). We are talking about a personal, spiritual relationship with Almighty God, formed by faith and characterized by love—and it is right here in the Old Testament.

“Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.” (Deuteronomy 6:4-5)

The Gospels remind us of the central place of these words in the Scriptures. On one occasion a teacher of the law asked Jesus, “Of all the commandments, which is the most important?” That’s a good question. Of everything God has said, what matters most? What is it that God wants of me?

Jesus answered: “The most important one is this, ’Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul, and with all your mind and with all your strength…’ And the second is this: ‘Love your neighbour as yourself’” (Mark 12:29-31).

Then Jesus said, “All the Law and the Prophets hang of these two commandments” (Matthew 22:40). Everything that God says to you, all that He calls you to do can be summed up in these two things:  Love God with all your heart. Love your neighbour as yourself.

The Ten Commandments, which were given back in Deuteronomy 5, lay out what loving God and loving your neighbour looks like. 

The first four commands tell us what it means to love God:

You shall have no other gods before me (5:7)

You shall not make an idol (5:8)

You shall not take the Lord’s name in vain (5:11)

Remember the Sabbath day and keep it holy (5:12)

The last six commands spell out what it means to love your neighbour:

Honour your father and mother (5:16)

Don’t murder (5:17)

Don’t commit adultery (5:18)

Don’t steal (5:19)

Don’t give false testimony (5:20)

Don’t covet what God has given to your neighbour (5:21)

The Ten Commandments tell us what it means to live a life of love. They spell it out. The book of Deuteronomy is that it is an exposition of the Ten Commandments:  Chapters 6-18 apply the first four commandments. They explain what it means for God’s people to love Him. These chapters are about worship, keeping from idols, etc.

Chapters 19-26 apply the last six commandments. They explain what it means to love your neighbour as yourself—unsolved murders, violations of marriage, weights and measures in the market place and so on. Chapters 27-34 set out the blessings the lie on the path of obedience to these commands and the curses that lie on the path of disobedience.

You could say that this whole book is an exposition of love. God is love, and His people are called to a life of love. The commandments tell us what this love looks like, what it means to love God with all your heart and to love your neighbour as yourself. That is why love is the fulfilment of the law (Romans 13:10). The law is an explanation of what love is.

If you love God with all your heart and you love your neighbour as yourself, then you will have done all that God commands you.

The People

“Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one.” Deuteronomy 6:4

Moses is speaking to Israel, and He describes the LORD as our God.

• They are God’s people because God has chosen them

“The LORD your God has chosen you out of all the peoples on the face of the earth to be his people, his treasured possession.” (Deuteronomy 7:6)

They are God’s people, not because they have made God theirs, but because God has made them His. Nations choose their gods, but God has chosen this nation.

• They are God’s people because God has redeemed them

“Has any god ever tried to take for himself one nation out of another nation… like… the LORD your God did for you?” Deuteronomy 4:34

Look at what God has done for you:  “Do not forget the LORD who brought you ought of the land of slavery” (6:12), “when your son asks you… tell him we were slaves in Egypt, but the Lord brought us out” (6:21), “it was because the Lord loved you… that he… redeemed you from the land of slavery” (7:8).

• They are God’s people because God has made a covenant with them

“The LORD our God made a covenant with us at Horeb.” Deuteronomy 5:2

God has bonded these people to Himself forever in a unique covenant that goes back to the promise He made to Abraham, “I will make you into a great nation” and “All peoples on earth will be blessed through you” (Genesis 12:2-3).

This command to love God with all your heart is not given to God’s enemies but to His friends. This command is given to the people He has chosen, the people He has redeemed from slavery, the people to whom He has pledged His promises, the people He is leading into the Promised Land.

God does not call His enemies to love Him, for the simple reason that they cannot do it. God calls on His enemies to repent and believe the Gospel. God calls on His enemies to be reconciled to Him. But to His redeemed people, He says, “Love the Lord your God.”

The message to your unbelieving friends or to your rebellious children is not “Love God with all your heart.” They can’t do that. They don’t have it in them. Our message to the world is not, “Love the Lord your God,” our message is, “Repent and believe the Gospel.” But to those who do repent and believe, God says, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart.”

This message today is for Christian believers. It is not for everybody. But, if you know the Lord Jesus Christ, it is for you. If God has laid His hand on your life, if you have been redeemed by the blood of Jesus Christ, if you have embraced the Saviour by faith, this message is for you.

I want to call you today, if that describes you, to love the LORD your God with a love that reflects what He is doing for you in Jesus Christ. And the Holy Spirit will bear witness to you because you belong to Christ.

The LORD

Whenever you see the word “LORD” in four capital letters in the Old Testament it is because the Divine name is being used.

When God appeared to Moses in the burning bush, Moses asked, “What is your name?” God said, “Yahweh,” which means “I Am” (Exodus 3:14). The name “Yahweh” was never actually pronounced by the Jews and was normally written without vowels “YHWH.” When it was anglicized to “JHVH” it was thought that the Divine name was Jehovah. But there is general agreement that the name Moses heard from the fire was “Yahweh.”

It is the personal name of God that is used here. You are to love Yahweh, your God. Now that’s important because in a pluralistic society, loving God becomes, for many people, loving God as I conceive Him to be. When you say “love God,” to someone who is not a believer, they often feel the freedom to fill the word “God” with their own content. But God is not whoever you want Him to be. He is who He is.

Yahweh is not whoever you want Him to be. He is who He is, “Yahweh our God, Yahweh is one. Love Yahweh, your God with all your heart…” (6:4). He is the One who made promises to Abraham and appeared to Moses. He is the One who brought Israel out of Egypt and who came down to Sinai in the fire. He is the one who cut a covenant, making these people His own, and who spoke through the prophets. Supremely, He is the One who has revealed Himself through Jesus Christ.

God’s name is of great importance, especially because the kind of religion that is becoming increasingly prominent is one in which God becomes nameless. It says, “Have a faith, but you define who or what that faith is in—whatever works for you. Love God, and let the god you love be a god of your own choosing.”

Pluralism thrives on the assumption that all names for God are simply human constructions, human stories, merely human ways of expressing what is ultimately unknowable. Our culture is quickly moving from a consensus that there is one God who has revealed himself in the Old Testament and the New, to a consensus that everything is one. Our culture is sliding from “monotheism” to “monism.”

“Monotheism” is the conviction that there is one God (6:4), and “monism” is the conviction that everything is one. There is all the difference in the world between these two things! To get from “monotheism” to “monism,” you have to take out the “theos.” You have to take God out of the middle. That is why religion will always be popular, but the name of God will always be offensive.

Our distinctive witness is not that we are “people of faith,” or that we uphold “religious values.” Our witness is tied to the Lord’s name. Our witness is that we love Yahweh, and that there is no one like Him. Our witness is tied to the name of Jesus Christ, whom Yahweh has sent, in whom Yahweh is known, and by whom Yahweh has reconciled us to Himself. We love Him and our loyalty is to Him before any other.

The Love

“Love Yahweh your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.” (Deuteronomy 6:5)

• Love Yahweh your God with all your heart

Love God with all your affection. Don’t ever think of your salvation as some kind of business transaction in which Jesus Christ does certain things, and then you do certain things and it is all done and settled with a courteous handshake.

Christ redeemed you. He shed His blood to bring you to Himself. He does this because He loves you. The relationship into which He brings you is one in which you know Him and you come, increasingly, to love Him.

The heart is more than affection—never less, but always more. In the Hebrew language, heart includes the mind, the will, the desire, the intent and the motive. Your thinking, feeling, and your desiring are all done in your heart.

We often think of the head and the heart as two different departments that have difficulty communicating with one another, “Should I go with my head or my heart?” But when Jesus quoted these words, He added the word “mind,” making it clear that the head is in the heart.

“Love God with all your heart,” means “Love Him with all that is in you.” Bless the Lord, O, my soul, and all that is within me, bless his holy name (Psalm 103:1)

• Love Yahweh your God with all your soul

The word “soul” could also be translated “life.” Love the Lord with all your energy, with all your talent and with all your years. Make commitments that will deploy what God has given you in ways that show you love Him. People see that you love your family, that you love your work and that you love your sports. What are you doing that makes it obvious that you love Christ?

Love the Lord with all of your life! Don’t let your years slip away. Don’t let your talents lie wasted.

• Love Yahweh your God with all your strength (all your “much-ness”)

The word strength literally means “your very much-ness.” Love God with all your much-ness! It means your substance, your possessions—all that God has given you in this life.

Jesus spoke with a man who had great “much-ness.” He had lived a moral life and felt that he had kept all the commandments—no murders, no adultery, no stealing and he had cared for his father and mother.

The man thought he had kept the law, but Jesus brings him to see that he has missed the point. The whole point of the law is this: Love God with all your heart and soul and strength and then love your neighbour as yourself.

So, Jesus challenges this man to love God and his neighbour with his much-ness. Jesus says, “Here’s what you can do:  Go sell all you have. Give to the poor and come follow me.”

He was saying, “You are living a moral life and you think this fulfills the commands, but you have missed the point. You love your much-ness more than you love God. Your much-ness is the idol in your life. Love God with all your much-ness!”

What happened? When Jesus said this, the man walked away sad. That is what happens with people who want to keep the Lord Jesus Christ at a distance.

What are you doing with your much-ness? The way you use your much-ness is a reflection of what you love. What proportion of your “much-ness” would be a suitable expression of your love for Christ this year on your tax return—that advances the name of Christ? Is it ten percent?

What do you think of the man who says he loves his wife, but he never goes out and splurges on her? He doesn’t know what love is! “Where your treasure is there your heart will be also” (Matthew 6:21). Love God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength—all your “much-ness.”

How are you doing?

“Jesus said, ‘Simon… do you truly love me?’” (John 21:16)

Can you picture the risen Lord Jesus Christ looking deep into your soul and asking you that question? “Do you really, really love me?”

“I chose you, I have redeemed you. I went to a cross for you. My body was broken for you, my blood shed for you. I awakened you, regenerated you, breathed life into you, gave you faith and repentance.”

“I made a covenant with you. I watch over you. Before a word is on your tongue, I know it completely. I have loved you with an everlasting love. I have said to you, ‘I will never leave you. I will never forsake you.’”

I would be saying with Peter, “Lord, you know that I love you” (John 21:16).

And as I said it, I would be feeling ashamed that my love for Him is so small. Don’t you feel that as you look at the immensity of all He has done for you?

I believe it was R. C. Sproul who read these words, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength,” and then said, “All your heart? All your soul? All your strength? I haven’t done that for five minutes.”  

I look at this and do you know what I see? I see that I need a Saviour. I need a Saviour who can forgive me, because my best attempts at loving God come nowhere close. I need a Saviour who can lead me to love God with more of my heart and more of my soul and more of my much-ness. I need a Saviour who can bring me into this—constantly and increasingly.

When I think about the Son of God who loved me and gave Himself for me, I feel ashamed of my own love for him. It seems such a small thing compared to His amazing love for me. My love for Christ is so much less than it should be…

“And yet I want to love thee Lord O light a flame within my heart.

And I will love thee more and more

Until I see thee as thou art.”  

How can I love God more?

We love Him because he first loved us. When I see more of His love for me, then I love Him more. That is one reason we gather for worship every week.

Bishop Ryle tells a story about an Englishman traveling in America.  He meets an Indian who talks with great enthusiasm about Jesus Christ: The Englishmen is rather reserved, as they tend to be, and he says to his new friend, “You are always talking about Jesus Christ. Why do you make such a big deal of Him?”

The Indian knelt down and gathered some leaves, some twigs and some moss, and placed them in a circle on the ground. He picked up a live worm and put it in the middle of the circle. Then he lit the leaves.

As the flames rose, the worm began to move, but every way it moved, it got nearer to the flame, and so after a few moments, the worm curled up in the middle and prepared to die.

The Indian reached his hand into the flame, picked up the worm, and held it next to his heart. Then he said, “I was the worm—helpless, hopeless and on the brink of an eternal fire. Jesus Christ stretched out His hand. He saved me from the fire, and took me into the heart of his love. That is why I make much of Him.”

Loving God is learned at the cross:

When I survey the wondrous cross
On which the prince of glory died
My richest gain I count but loss
And pour contempt on all my pride.

Were the whole realm of nature mine,
That were an offering far too small
Love so amazing so divine
demands my life my soul my all.  

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Session 3 – Right kind of Fear

7 DECEMBER 2020

Ps Ben Hooman

Children have an amazing capacity of memory. As a child many of us were encouraged and taught a good number of verses from the Bible, as well as a fair chunk of the hymn book. What you learn when you are young stays with you all your life. If you are learning verses of the Bible in church or at home, you will never regret that you did.

“Oh, that their hearts would be inclined to fear Me and keep all My commands always, so that it might go well with them and their children forever!” (Deuteronomy 5:29)

Many of us memorised verses like: “God so loved the world that He gave his own and only Son” (John 3:16), and “God demonstrates His love towards us in this, that while we were still sinners Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8).

But there were others that have also been of great value to us in life: “It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God” (Hebrews 10:31), and “Our God is a consuming fire” (Hebrews 12:29).

I wonder what you think about planting that in the memory of a child? Why would you plant in the mind of a young boy that it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God? Why would you want him to associate the God you want him to love with a consuming fire? Why would you teach him to remember this and carry it with him in his soul all the days of his life?

Some people today would say that teaching these words to a child is a form of abuse. What do you think? Now you may say, “That’s going too far, but I wouldn’t want to teach my children that it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God, and that our God is a consuming fire.”

Well, be glad if your parents did, or your Sunday school teachers did. Be glad that they taught you these great truths, as well as the great Scriptures on the love of God. I want us to see from the Bible today, the place of godly fear in the Christian life.

Two Kinds of Fear

Let’s begin with an important distinction. There is a fear that love removes and a fear that love brings.

• The fear that love removes

We know that “perfect love casts out fear” (1 John 4:18). But what kind of fear does love cast out?

• Love casts out the fear that keeps you hiding from God

“I heard you in the garden and I was afraid… so I hid.” (Genesis 3:10)

When Adam sinned, he hid from God. There is something to be said for this. The fear that kept Adam from God was better than not fearing God at all. Far better that he hides from God, than that he walks about in the garden as if nothing was wrong. At least he knows his sin is a problem!

It is better to have a sense of fear that keeps you from God, than to have no fear of God at all. Only the wicked have no fear of God. It is better to have a sense of shame over an evil you have done, than to be shameless about it.

But when God comes into the Garden, His love overwhelms this fear. He reaches out to Adam and to Eve and embraces them with His promise and His love.

• Love casts out the fear that keeps you from serving God

“I knew you are a hard man, and I was afraid so I dug a hole and hid the money. Here is what belongs to you.” (Matthew 24:25)

When the master returned, in the parable of the lazy servant, he found that his servant had dug a hole and hid his money in the ground. It was better to bury the money than spend it on riotous living, like the prodigal son. At least he was able to give it back! But a man who knew his master’s love would have done better than bury the talent in the ground.

There is a fear that love removes—perfect love casts out fear. We usually think of fear and love as alternatives: Where there is fear there is no love. Where there is love there is no fear. But love and the right kind of fear are inseparable companions.

Think of it like cholesterol. Is cholesterol good or bad? Actually, there are two kinds of cholesterol. There is a bad cholesterol. If it goes up, your health is getting worse. You need to do something about it. But there is also a good kind of cholesterol. And if the good cholesterol goes up, your health is getting better. So, think of fear in the same way: We want less of the bad kind. We want more of the good kind.

Some of us think that there is only one kind of fear, and it is bad. We have never understood the fear of the Lord, that there is a kind of fear that is a sign of health.

• The fear that love brings

“With you there is forgiveness; therefore you are feared.” (Psalm 130:4)

If the only kind of fear was a bad kind, this verse would say, “With you there is forgiveness; therefore you are not feared.” Since you are a God who forgives, we don’t need to fear you anymore. We can forget about fear and focus on love.

But that’s not what he says. He says precisely the opposite—with you there is forgiveness, therefore you are feared! There is a kind of fear to which you are introduced when you are forgiven!

Forgiveness is a massive gift of love that brings you into the right kind of fear! This is what the Bible means by “the fear of the Lord.” So, there is a fear that love removes and a fear that love brings. Love and the right kind of fear are inseparable friends.

Someone may say, “Isn’t the fear of the Lord an Old Testament idea? Isn’t it the case that people feared God in the Old Testament, but in the New Testament they grew out of that and learned to love God instead?

Fearing God

• In the New Testament: A fear we grow into

The words of Mary, the mother of our Lord, “His mercy extends to those who fear Him, from generation to generation.” (Luke 1:50)

The words of Jesus to His disciples, “Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather, be afraid of the One who can destroy both soul and body in hell.” (Matthew 10:28)

A description of the church at its best, “Then the church… enjoyed a time of peace. It was strengthened; and encouraged by the Holy Spirit, it grew in numbers, living in the fear of the Lord.” (Acts 9:31)

Our mandate for the Christian life, “Work out your salvation with fear and trembling.” (Philippians 2:12)

A direct command, “Love the brotherhood of believers, fear God, honour the king.” (1 Peter 2:17)

The experience of John the apostle, the disciple whom Jesus loved, the one who sat next to Him at the last supper, “When I saw Him, I fell at His feet as though dead.” (Revelation 1:17)

Do you think it would be different with you? So, the Saviour comes to him and says, “John, do not be afraid,” and He picks him up.

This is not a fear that we grow out of, as if religion has somehow evolved away from it. This is a fear we grow into. We are to fear God as we love Him and we are to love Him as we fear Him. Both the Old Testament and the New Testament make this plain.

John Bunyan, the great puritan preacher and the writer of the Pilgrim’s Progress wrote a marvellous book on the fear of God: “Godly fear… flows from a sense of the love and kindness of God to the soul.”  

The fear of the Lord is better described than defined. It is better experienced than analysed. Can you follow that?

When you counsel a couple who were preparing to be married, you say to the guy, “When she says that she will have you to be her husband, and when she makes this pledge to be yours… for better for worse, for richer for poorer, to forsake all others, to embrace only you, and to do this all of her life… she is giving you a more priceless gift than any other gift you will ever receive in all of your experience. And you should be in awe of it! And I say the same to her.

There is an awe that flows out of the experience of the love and the kindness of God in Jesus Christ. There is a fear that is removed by love, but there is a fear that love brings you into.

• In the Church: The weightlessness of God

David Wells has described the plight of Christianity in our times by saying that God has become “weightless.” That is, He is less compelling to many people than sport or fashion. He is less attractive to many than money or sex.

Taking up this theme, Philip Ryken says, “It is the weightlessness of God, more than anything else that explains the failings of the evangelical church. It is because God is so unimportant to us that our worship is so irreverent, our fellowship so loveless and our witness so timid. We have become children of a lightweight God.” 

Here is the burden of my heart: The church today desperately needs to rediscover the fear of the Lord. I don’t know a better place to begin than Deuteronomy 5. This chapter is designed to teach us the fear of the Lord.

Notice that it begins with the Ten Commandments. Remember, the commandments had been given forty years earlier. So, most of the people listening to Moses here, like us who are hearing the Word tonight, were not even born when God gave the Ten Commandments at Mount Sinai. Then Moses gives the commandments to this new generation. This is the reason the book is called “Deuteronomy,” or “second law.”

This is important for every parent to notice: Moses does more than tell them the commandments. He wants them to learn about and fear the awesome God who gave them. Moses brings them into what their parents had experienced forty years earlier.

Moses describes the scene. The whole event was terrifying, apocalyptic. Try to imagine it: Darkness and the blast of trumpets. The sound of a voice amplified so intensely that you could hardly bear to hear it. But overwhelming all of that was this massive ball of fire that came down and rested on the mountain of Sinai.

Notice how the fire dominates what Moses says. The sheer terror of the fire on the mountain was etched on his mind. It’s in every verse:

“The Lord spoke out of the fire…” (v22)

“The mountain was ablaze with fire.” (v23)

“Today we have heard His voice out of the fire.” (v24)

“They said the great fire will consume us and we will die if we hear the voice of the Lord any longer.” (v25)

“What mortal man has ever heard the voice of the living God speaking out of fire as we have and survived?” (v26)

The fear of the Lord was pressed in on Moses that day and now he describes the scene because he wants these people (who had not yet been born when God first gave the commandments at Sinai) to see and feel the holy fire of the presence of God, “The sight was so terrifying that Moses said, ‘I am trembling with fear’” (Hebrews 12:21).

Do you know what was happening when the fire of God came down on Sinai? God’s people caught a glimpse of the Day of Judgment. The Judge of all the earth came down and they saw His holy fire. They felt His power—the earth was shaking. They were in awe and they said, “This is our God! Look at who saved us and what we have been saved from.”

But God knows that impressions wear off quickly. Moses went up the mountain and within a few weeks, they were dancing round the golden calf. So, He says, “Oh, that their hearts would be inclined to fear me so that it might go well with them and their children forever!”

I want you to see that the fear of the Lord is not a side issue in the Bible—it goes everywhere! It’s more than hearing a sermon on fearing God. It’s more than memorizing a verse from Hebrews. It’s more than learning the 10 commandments. It is life-transforming.

Seven Reasons to Cultivate the Fear of the Lord

• Fearing the Lord will give you wisdom

“The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom” (Psalm 111:10)

When God carries weight in your life, you with be on the path of wise decisions. How does God see what I am doing? How does He view what I am saying? How does what I am thinking play in the light of eternity when I will stand in His presence?

Without this fear you will make the wrong decisions, you will choose the wrong path, you will mess up your life. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.

• Fearing the Lord will keep you from sin

“Do not be afraid. God has come to test you, so that the fear of God will be with you to keep you from sinning.” (Exodus 20:20)

If you are in a car and the traffic in front of you suddenly stop, you want to be sure your brakes are in good order. Good brakes keep you from disaster.

The fear of the Lord is a brake against sin. It holds you back. To fear the Lord means you learn to act as if you could see the fire on the mountain. You feel an impulse to sin but you say, “How can I do this when God is watching?” The more you know of the fear of the Lord, the stronger your defence against sin will be.

Some of you have come to a place in your life that felt so dark, you thought about taking your own life. The fear of God held you back. Thank God for that.

You knew that death takes you into the presence of God. You have to give an account to Him. The fear of the Lord restrained you. It was the means by which God guarded your life.

I’m glad I learned that “It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God,” and that “Our God is a consuming fire.” I need that truth as a brake in my life.

• Fearing the Lord will motivate you in evangelism

“Since, then, we know what it is to fear the Lord, we try to persuade men.” (2 Corinthians 5:11)

You see what Paul is saying: We have seen the holy fire. We have felt the weight of the judgment that is to come—that is why we have turned to Jesus Christ—and since we know what it is to fear God we try to persuade men. Now fear and love are inseparable companions, so later he says that the love of Christ compels us, but he starts with the fear.

A church that ceases to believe in hell may do a great deal of good in humanitarian and social action. But it will not evangelize for long. Men and women who have seen the fire on the mountain, and have learned the fear of the Lord will be compelled to declare the unique glory of His one and only Son.

• Fearing the Lord will elevate your worship

“Let us be thankful, and so worship God acceptably with reverence and awe” (Hebrews 12: 28)

Where the fear of the Lord is lost, worship is trivialized and adoration becomes entertainment. But when a congregation becomes gripped with a massive vision of the glory of God, when God’s people say, “We have seen the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ,” worship is lifted and God’s people come before Him with reverence and awe.

• Fearing the Lord will make you more like Jesus

Did Jesus live in the fear of the Lord? Listen to these words about Him:

“The Spirit of the LORD will rest on him… the Spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the LORD–and he will delight in the fear of the LORD” (Isaiah 11:2-3). To be filled with the Spirit is to delight in the fear of the Lord.

Professor John Murray says, “The fear of God is the soul of godliness.” 

Do you want to grow in a godly life? There has never been a generation that has been told more that God loves them, and there has never been a generation that feels that God loves them less than this generation.

• Fearing the Lord will deliver you from other fears

“Blessed is the man who fears the Lord… His heart is secure, he will have no fear.” (Psalm 112:1, 8)

He will not live in the fear of receiving bad news. Knowing this God and seeing that He is for you puts strength into you to face all other fears. Why? Because if he lives in the fear of the Lord, he will have strength for whatever comes this week.

“Fear Him you saints and you shall than have nothing else to fear.” 

• Fearing the Lord will lead you to seek the Mediator

“This great fire will consume us, and we will die if we hear the voice of the LORD our God any longer.” (Deuteronomy 5:25)

After the people said this, they say to Moses, “Go near and listen to all that the LORD our God says. Then tell us whatever the LORD our God tells you. We will listen and obey” (5:27). 

Moses had already been acting as their mediator when God gave them the commands, “At that time, I stood between the LORD and you” (5:5).

They want Moses to continue to be their mediator. And Moses says, 

“The LORD heard you when you spoke to me and the LORD said to me, ‘I have heard what this people said to you. Everything they said was good’” (5:28). 

It is good thing that they see the need of a mediator. When you see the fire on the mountain, when you see the awesome holiness of God, and when you see that it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God, you will ask, “How can I live in the presence of a holy God who is a consuming fire?” Then you will see that you need a mediator.

The fear of the Lord drives us to Jesus Christ, and the love of Christ leads us further into the fear of the Lord. God has provided a better mediator than Moses. Moses went up into the presence of God. Jesus Christ has come down to us.

We have a better place than Sinai to learn the fear that love brings. That place is called Calvary. When Jesus went to the cross, the fire of God’s judgment on human sin was poured out on Him. He went into the fire for us. He entered our hell on the cross. He rose from the dead, and ascended into heaven, and then something amazing happened:

When the day of Pentecost came, they were all together in one place. Suddenly a sound like the blowing of a violent wind came from heaven and filled the whole house where they were sitting. They saw what seemed to be tongues of fire that separated and came to rest on each of them. (Acts 2:1-3)

Almighty God is with them. And He does not consume them. They are in Christ. And the presence of the Holy One is with them in love. What do you know of this fear of the Lord in your life? The fear the love brings?

In the book of Psalms, David framed this powerful prayer, 

“Give me an undivided heart, that I may fear your name” (Psalm 86:11)

That prayer is answered by this great promise, 

“They will be my people, and I will be their God. I will give them singleness of heart and action, so that they will always fear me for their own good and the good of their children after them” (Jeremiah 32:38-39)

“The Lord delights in those who fear him, who put their hope in his unfailing love.” (Psalm 147:11)

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SESSION 2 – THE PAST – THE FUTURE

04 DECEMBER 2020

Ps Ben Hooman

The book of Deuteronomy begins with a flashback: God’s people are on the cusp of entering the Promised Land, and Moses says, “Let me remind you how we got here…” Moses goes back 40 years: “The Lord our God said to us at Horeb, ‘You have stayed long enough at this mountain…’” (Deuteronomy 1:6), and he tells the story of how the people rebelled against God.

“Thirty-eight years passed from the time we left Kadesh Barnea until we crossed the Zered Valley. By then, that entire generation of fighting men had perished from the camp, as the LORD had sworn to them.” (Deuteronomy 2:14)

The people of God refused to trust Him and, instead of entering the Promised Land, they wandered in the desert for 40 years. “In that time, all the men who had been of fighting age had died” (2:14). Let’s assume that the fighting age was 18. If everyone over the age of 18 is dead after 40 years, then nobody over age 58 is alive.

Think about what that means:

• Everyone over age 18 at the time of the Exodus had already died.

After forty years, the 18-year-olds were now 58 years old, and they would be the oldest people in the camp. All the adults who came out of Egypt in the Exodus died in the desert. None of them entered the Promised Land.

• Children under age 18 at the time of the Exodus are now 40-58 years old.

Imagine a nation where the oldest people in the community were just 58 years old! They were just children when God came down at Sinai. Just children when their parents had turned back from Canaan.

Forty years ago it was 1980. Do you have vivid memories from 1980? Those who were now in their 40’s and 50’s, probably had only vague memories of the events surrounding the Exodus.

• The vast majority of the people under the age of 40.

These people were all born in the desert. This was a young nation with no one over 60 years of age, except Moses, Caleb and Joshua. Since Moses was over 100, the next oldest guy would have been 58 years old—talk about a massive generation gap,

I want to make sure that we’ve got this, so let me ask you:  Are you under age 40? You would have been born in the desert. That means you weren’t even a twinkle in your parents eyes when they decided that it would be too dangerous to go into the land of Canaan.

Are you between the ages of 40 and 58 years old? You would have been there at Mount Sinai, but you would have been very young. When your parents decided not to go into Canaan, you did not get a vote. 

Those of you who are over 58, be very thankful that you were not in the generation that came out of Egypt, because you wouldn’t be alive! Thank God for His gift of life to us.

So, when Moses says, “The Lord our God said to us at Horeb, ‘You have stayed long enough at this mountain’” (1:6). He is talking about something that happened 40 years ago, when most of the people weren’t even born and many of the rest were too young to remember.

Look at what Moses says next, and see if you notice something strange: “You were unwilling to go up… You rebelled against the Lord… You grumbled in your tents and said ‘The Lord hates us…’ You did not trust in the Lord your God” (1:26-27, 32).

Why is Moses saying this? Is he blaming the children for the sins of the parents? No! He is teaching the children to learn from their parents. Moses is making it plain:  What was in your parents is also in you. You will face the same temptations, the same struggles they did. What defeated them, you must overcome—in your time and in your life.

That’s why we call this session “Owning the past to change the future”. Change the future by owning the past.” What is the past that they (and we) must own? What is it that is in these people and their parents, by nature, that they must overcome?

Six impulses that are in you by nature

• By nature, I rebel against God

“You were unwilling to go up; you rebelled against the command of the Lord your God.” (Deuteronomy 1:26)

What this means is that our corruption, the effect of sin in us, goes deeper than a few sins and mistakes. By nature, I resent God, and I resist His authority over my life. By nature, I want to assert my independence from God. I want to be my own saviour and my own lord.

• By nature, I treat God with contempt

“You grumbled in your tents and said, ‘The Lord hates us: so he brought us out of Egypt to deliver us into the hands of the Amorites and destroy us.’” (Deuteronomy 1:27)

The deliverance from Egypt was an extraordinary miracle of God’s grace. And these people are treating God’s grace with contempt.

Sin makes them so twisted that they see God’s miraculous deliverance as God plotting against them. This is me by nature! By nature, we hold back praise for God’s goodness, and blame Him whenever we experience evil. By nature, we say, “Here I am in a desert, and it is all God’s fault.” By nature, I insult God, and treat the goodness of God with contempt.

• By nature, I blame others

“Our brothers have made us lose heart. They say, ‘The people are stronger and taller than we are.’” (Deuteronomy 1:28)

When the spies came back, from Canaan, ten of them said that it would be too difficult to conquer the land. Here the people blame the spies. It’s all their fault.

By nature, I blame others for all my problems. What’s wrong is always somebody else’s fault. By nature, I detect the speck of dust in the eye of others, while I cannot see the plank of wood in my own.

• By nature, I resist the truth

“[Moses] said to [the people], ‘Do not be terrified; do not be afraid of them. The Lord your God who is going before you will fight for you as he did for you in Egypt… and in the desert.’” (Deuteronomy 1:29-31)

Moses is pleading with the people here. They are full of fear, so, speaking as a prophet, Moses pours the Word of God into their lives. But it makes no difference.

These people hear the Word of God, but it slides off them like water off a duck’s back. It doesn’t go in. It makes no difference, “In spite of this, you did not trust in the Lord your God” (1:32). I am always seeing God at work, but I never perceive it.

• By nature, I refuse to believe

“You did not trust in the Lord your God, who went ahead of you.” (Deuteronomy 1:32)

By nature, I am suspicious of God, and I hold back from full devotion to Him. By nature, I do not trust Him. God was beside these people in the pillar of cloud and the fire, and yet still they would not trust Him. They refused to believe (Numbers 14:11).

None of us is neutral when it comes to this matter of faith. By nature, I am antagonistic towards God, and so are you. By nature, we are unwilling to believe (John 5:40).

• By nature, I am under the wrath of God

“When the Lord heard what you said, He was angry and solemnly swore: ‘Not a man of this evil generation will see the good land I swore to your forefathers.’” (Deuteronomy 1:34)

By nature, I am alienated from God, and justly under His wrath. There is a heaven but, by nature, it’s not for me or for you. By nature, I have no basis on which to enter the land of promise that is full of good things.

Moses is saying, “All that was in your parents”. But don’t think it stopped with them. All of this is also in you.” It makes you want to weep, doesn’t it? This is the human condition. By nature, this is my condition. This is your condition. This is who we are, and it crosses all economic and social barriers. This is what sin has done to us. This is what we need saving from.

Can you see yourself here? Maybe you are saying right now, “Yes I see it. I see that I have totally messed up. I see that I have rebelled against God.

I see that I have treated God with contempt. I see that I have blamed others for what’s wrong in my life. I see that I have resisted the truth. I see that I have refused to believe. And I see that I am under the wrath of God. So, what hope is there for me?”

If everything that kept your parents out of Canaan is also in you, what hope is there of you ever getting into the Promised Land? Let me tell you what won’t help you, and then let’s look at what will.

TURNING OVER A NEW LEAF

When the people realized they had messed up in their rebellion and unbelief, they decided to try and put it right. There were sure that they could fix their own problems. They were sure that there was nothing they had done, that they couldn’t undo.

The people of God decided that they would go up to Canaan after all, “but God said to them, ‘Don’t go up, because I will not be with you. You will be defeated by your enemies’” (1:42). But they went up anyway, and they were completely defeated.

Turning over a new leaf doesn’t change you. Becoming religious won’t alter what’s in you. Trying harder won’t work. It’s never the answer. All that happens when you turn over a new leaf is that what’s in you gets written on the new page.

So what hope is there for these people? What hope is there for us? Where can we find the power for a fresh start? Please turn forward to Deuteronomy 5, and you will see something wonderfully strange: “Moses summoned all Israel and said… ‘The Lord our God made a covenant with us at Horeb’” (5:2).

I think I would be saying, “Moses, here you go again. I know you are over 100 years old, and when you get over 100 years old, you can’t remember much. But most of us weren’t even born yet at Mount Horeb, and the rest of us were just little children!”

Moses says, “Now you listen to what I am saying… I know most of you weren’t born when God came down at Sinai but I’m telling you, God made a covenant with us at Horeb! “It was not with our fathers that the Lord made this covenant, but with us, with all of us who are alive here today” (5:3). You see what he is saying:  God made a covenant. He made it before you were born, and it is for you!

I’m here today to say, from the heart and from the Bible, God made a covenant of grace before you were born, and it is for you. The covenant is that He will redeem sinners like us for Himself through His Son, Jesus Christ. This covenant was not written on tablets of stone. It is sealed in the blood of Jesus Christ.

I want you to stand with me today, not at the foot of Mount Sinai with all these Israelites, but at another mountain called Calvary. There’s a man hanging on a cross and He is the Son of God. His body is being torn. His blood is being poured out. And He says, “My body is given for you. Through the shedding of this blood, I am sealing a new covenant, which is poured out for the forgiveness of your sins.”

Two great events that shape your life happened before you were born: What’s in you, by nature, goes all the way back to the Garden of Eden.

What can be in you by grace goes all the way back to the cross of Jesus Christ. And we change the future by owning the past.

Owning what is mine by nature is what the Bible calls “repentance”

I need to own what is in my nature. I need to be clear about what I am up against in living the Christian life, “Lord, by nature I’m a rebel who treats your kindness with contempt, blames others, resists your Word, refuses to believe and deserves to be under Your righteous judgment.”

As long as you are trying to tell yourself what a great and good person you are, you will never make progress in the Christian life. Owning what is in you, by nature, is where repentance begins and how it continues.

Owning what is mine by grace is what the Bible calls “faith”

You need to own what is yours by grace. You need to know who you are in Christ. You need to be clear about what this Saviour has for you in living the Christian life.

Faith looks at all that the grace of God has done: God has made a covenant for you, He has sent His Son to redeem you and He gives His Spirit to empower you, and says, “This is mine!” Repentance begins when I own what is mine by nature. Faith begins when I own what is mine by grace.

The drama of this moment

A new generation stands on the verge of Jordan. Which way will they go? Will they follow what is in them by nature? Or will they receive what is theirs by grace?

What about you? Will you follow the impulse to hear God’s Word or will you follow the impulse of unbelief that is in you? Will you spend your life praising God or will you treat Him with contempt? Will you own what is in you, by nature, or will you spend your life blaming others and end up under the wrath of God?

I know that as soon as the preacher uses the words “repentance” and “faith,” its natural for many of us to say, “he’s talking about what unbelievers need to do to become Christians.” That’s true, but there’s more to it than that.

Repentance and faith are not only what unbelievers do to become Christians. Repentance and faith are what believers do to live as Christians. Otherwise, all you have is a decision that leaves you fundamentally unchanged.

God calls us to a life of repentance and faith. That is, a life in which we are to sustain an ongoing struggle against what is in us by nature, by laying hold of what Christ has for us by grace.

If you are to live this Christian life, you need to be realistic about what is in you by nature. By nature, I am a rebel who treats God’s kindness with contempt, blames others for my problems, resists God’s Word and refuses to believe. All of that is in me. So, every day I have a fight on my hands.

If I am to live this Christian life, I need lay hold of all that Christ is for me. The Son of God loves me. He gave Himself for me. He reigns in heaven, and nothing happens to me unless it comes through His loving hand first.

I do not understand all that He does, allows or brings into my life. Nor do I expect to, because He is God in heaven and He sees the events of this world from eternity, and I am only a man on the earth in a little capsule of time. But I know that I can trust Him. I know that He is for me even in my darkest hour.

I know that I am forgiven. I am not under His wrath. I live in His mercy and I am never alone, because He walks beside me. By grace I have come to love Him, and to trust Him, and I count Him worthy of the supreme devotion and sacrifice of my life. That’s faith.

It is possible to be a Christian atheist:  A person who believes in God, but lives and acts as if He did not exist. You say you trust Him, but you don’t actually trust Him in anything that is happening in your life.

The folks who came out of Egypt received God’s promises, experienced His provision, and carried His name. But they lived, thought and acted in unbelief. It is one thing to profess faith—to say you believe. It’s another to speak and act and live with faith.

My prayer is that even now God would breathe faith into your soul, that you would see that in all your battles and in all your struggles, this Christ is for you. That you would embrace Him with faith in all you are facing today. That you would say, “If God is for me, who can be against me?”