120514 - Deuteronomy 03-04 - Pisgah and Horeb

Monday SOAP: Two mountains - Pisgah and Horeb - show powerful reasons for honoring God and His Law. Moses, himself the penman of the Law, suffers greatly because he cannot keep the spirit of it. (Deut 6:5; Lev. 19:18) This implies the holiness of the ultimate Source as well as the coming fulfillment and End (telos) of it. (Matt. 5:17; Romans 10:4)

S: “And I pleaded with the LORD at that time, saying, ‘O Lord GOD, you have only begun to show your servant your greatness and your mighty hand. For what god is there in heaven or on earth who can do such works and mighty acts as yours? Please let me go over and see the good land beyond the Jordan, that good hill country and Lebanon.’ But the LORD was angry with me because of you and would not listen to me. And the LORD said to me, ‘Enough from you; do not speak to me of this matter again. Go up to the top of Pisgah and lift up your eyes westward and northward and southward and eastward, and look at it with your eyes, for you shall not go over this Jordan. (Deuteronomy 3:23-27)

See, I have taught you statutes and rules, as the LORD my God commanded me, that you should do them in the land that you are entering to take possession of it. Keep them and do them, for that will be your wisdom and your understanding in the sight of the peoples, who, when they hear all these statutes, will say, ‘Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people.’ For what great nation is there that has a god so near to it as the LORD our God is to us, whenever we call upon him? And what great nation is there, that has statutes and rules so righteous as all this law that I set before you today? (Deuteronomy 4:5-8)

O: God Himself points to the perfection of the Law given at Mt. Horeb as a proof of His existence. The Mt. Pisgah experience also makes a good proof, in a backhanded sort of way: Moses, the one who received the law was not himself able to keep it.

A: Who could, or would, invent a code of law like this, which is universal in application, above the reasonable reproach of any culture for these 3500 years, yet so impossible for the best of men to keep? (John 7:19, Acts 7:53) Connotatively, the Law of Moses is not just the Ten Commandments, nor just the 613-odd laws contained in the Torah, but the entire Torah. Moses, the writer himself, doesn't come off so well and ends on such a sad note. It's no wonder he appears in Pilgrim's Progress as a swift and merciless opponent to the character Faithful: "The law was given through Moses, grace and truth were realized through Jesus Christ."

P: And Father, I will add that only by your Spirit would those who have been relieved of bearing the penalty of the Law end up becoming the ones through whom its righteousness is fulfilled.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

We have all contracted the virus....

Last week and this weekend, I spent precious development time trying to rid myself of unwanted software on my coumputer called " Virtumonde ." Believe it or not, I'm pretty new to viruses and that kind of thing, coming from a background of developing on the Macintosh platform and using the Windows platforms to deliver product on. Well, this was a nasty wake up call to what Windows users have to deal with all the time. Virtumonde is called "Adware" and it's something that has sneaked on to your computer either by being installed along with some kind of trial software, or getting past your computer's defenses on the network. Its job is to watch what you do at all times with your computer, then occasionally pop up advertisements. In my case, most of the time, these advertisements were for anti-virus software. But they kept popping up an installation window for the software and beginning the installation even when I clicked, "no" for "do you w
Read more

2023—Week21: Ezra01-Nehemiah11; John19-Acts04

Ezra-Nehemiah 11 : In the Jewish Canon, Ezra and Nehemiah are one book, and, although the division in ours makes sense, it’s clear that they cover the same basic period. They form one answer to the question at the end of 2 Chronicles’ hanging question, “Therefore, who among the LORD's people trusts in his God? Whoever among this group wishes to do so may travel to Jerusalem.” (2 Chronicles 36:23, ISV) Yet despite their trust, the people are greatly weakened until the ministries of Ezra and Nehemiah (and Haggai and Zechariah, Ezra 5:1) encourage them. Ezra’s trust is clearly represented in 8:22, where he is ashamed to request a protective guard for the fortune in treasures he carries, instead trusting in the hand of God for protection. Ezra’s prayer in Ezra 9, Nehemiah’s prayer in Nehemiah 1:5-11, and the people’s covenant prayer in 9:5-37 are the outcome. Faith precedes confession, because we don’t fully understand how badly we fall short until it’s revealed to us. Even then, we ne
Read more

1 Samuel 28-29; Psalm 106; Romans 10

  June 4 : In Job 34:14 and Psalm 104:29, the authors make the point that if God withdraws His Spirit, we die and return to the dust. In today’s three passages, I see how crucial His continual presence is in my life. He withdrew His Spirit from Saul, and it upended his reign and legacy. He sent leanness to the souls of the Israelites in response to their repeated concupiscence and whining at Him about what He was providing. The religious leaders in Israel by the New Testament times had been purified to some extent of yearning for carnal pursuits and of literal idolatry by the captivity’s exposure to a carnal and idolatrous culture, but they had become religious relativists, taking their extreme fastidiousness about the Law as evidence of their holiness, while ignoring the purpose of the Law, which was to make them dependent upon God, to be ready for His salvation, to long for the true holiness they couldn’t find in themselves. As Paul has said, I have to avoid the ever-present temptati
Read more