Deuteronomy 31 - 32

Deuteronomy — Steve Gregg

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Deuteronomy 33 - 34

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Deuteronomy 31 - 32

DeuteronomySteve Gregg

Moses imparts his final words to the people of Israel in Deuteronomy 31-32, reminding them to fear and obey the Lord so that they may live long in the land He has promised to them. The chapter also includes a warning that the people will turn away from God and turn to worship false idols, resulting in judgment and destruction. The speaker highlights the importance of protecting and keeping God's commands while also emphasizing the need for compassion and forgiveness towards others.

Transcript

In Deuteronomy chapter 31, Moses went and spoke these words to all Israel, and he said to them, I am a hundred and twenty years old today. I can no longer go out and come in, also as the Lord has said to me, you shall not cross over this Jordan. Now, when he says, I can't any longer go out and come in, he doesn't mean I'm old and decrepit and I can't move around like I used to, because he later says that's not the case.

He actually has not had a reduction in his natural strength. God has kept him healthy and strong. What he's saying, I can't lead you, go out and come in, is an idiom that's used frequently of the leaders of Israel.

They go out and they come in before Israel. That just means that they lead the armies out and they bring them back into camp and so forth. It's just referring to the generic role of leading the people.

And he's saying, I can't do that anymore. Not because he's physically incapacitated, but as he says, because God told him he's not going to be the one to lead them into the land. Their next going out and going in is going to be into the land of Canaan.

And he's not going to be able to take them there, not because he couldn't, but because he's not permitted to. And he says, the Lord, your God himself crosses over before you, he will destroy these nations from before you and you shall dispossess them. Joshua himself crosses over before you, just as the Lord has said, and the Lord will do to them as he did to Sion and Og, the kings of the Amorites in their land when he destroyed them.

The Lord will give them over to you that you may do them according to every due to them, according to every commandment which I have commanded you. Be strong and of good courage. Do not fear nor be afraid of them for the Lord, your God.

He is the one who goes with you. He will not leave you nor forsake you. Then Moses called Joshua and said to him in the sight of all Israel, be strong and of good courage, for you must go with this people to the land which the Lord has sworn to their fathers to give them and you should cause them to inherit it.

And the Lord, he is the one who goes before you. He will go with you. He will not leave you nor forsake you.

Do not fear nor be dismayed. You'll recognize because we sing a Joshua one. Eight is it or one nine that you'll recognize that this is the charge that we're told God gave to Joshua, and it may be that in saying that God just said the same words directly to Joshua that Moses previously said, or it may be that it's just referring back to the fact that God through Moses had given this charge to Joshua.

But in Joshua one, well, beginning with verse nine is the end of a long section here where God is speaking to Joshua, says, Have I not commanded you be strong and of good courage? Do not be afraid nor be dismayed for the Lord, your God is with you wherever you go. Now, that's exactly the same charge that Moses gave to Joshua here in these verses. It looks to me in Joshua one nine that God is giving it again where God says to Joshua, Have I not commanded you to do this? Apparently, the previous occasion when God had commanded him to do it is probably when Moses was saying it here.

So it's not just reflecting back or not just recording the time that God spoke to him through Moses, but an additional revelation God gave to Joshua after Moses was dead, reminding him of the charge that was given here. Don't be afraid. First, nine Deuteronomy thirty one nine.

So Moses wrote this law and delivered it to the priests, the sons of Levi, who bore the Ark of the Covenant of the Lord and to all the elders of Israel. And Moses commanded them, saying at the end of every seven years, at the appointed time in the year of release at the Feast of Tabernacles, when all Israel comes to appear before the Lord, your God, in the place which you choose. You shall read this law before all Israel in their hearing, gather the people together, men and women and little ones, the stranger who is within your gates, that they may hear and that they may learn to fear the Lord, your God, and carefully observe all the words of this law and that their children who have not known it may hear and learn to fear before the Lord, your God, as long as you live in the land which you cross over Jordan to possess.

Now, he delivered the law to the custody of the priests. They were the ones who would be keeping it and they would be the ones in charge of teaching it. This will be stated again later on in the blessing that Moses utters over Levi, that the Levites would be the ones who teach the law to the people.

This is also affirmed other places inscription. In fact, it was affirmed back in chapter 10 of Leviticus, back when Native and a value had just been incinerated. God spoke to Moses and Aaron in Leviticus, chapter 10, and God told them not to not to drink in verse nine, do not drink wine or intoxicating drink you or your sons with you when you go into the tabernacle of meeting, lest you die, it says in verse 10, that you may distinguish between the holy and the unholy, the clean and the unclean.

And he says in verse 11, that you may teach the children of Israel all the statutes which the Lord has spoken to them by the hand of Moses. So the Levites and the priests were the ones who would teach. And so Moses delivers the law to them.

Most people in Israel would not have a copy of their own. They couldn't go home and read the Bible for morning devotions every night or every morning. And they they just had to hear it from the priests on the occasions when the priests would teach it.

Now, at a later time in history, there were the synagogues much later than this. And the Jews could go to the synagogue every Sabbath and hear the law read. But initially there were no synagogues, there were no weekly meetings of that sort.

And so once every seven years, the regular Sabbath year, the year of release. Now, of course, we had teaching about that year. Every seventh year, they'd release the slaves, they'd release the debt.

But they'd also now on the Feast of Tabernacles of that year, each seven years, have all the people stand to hear the law read. Now, what that means, the whole Pentateuch, the whole Torah, or whether it just means, for example, the Book of the Covenant or the Book of Deuteronomy, which contains, of course, a lot of the. Essence of the law of God, these people were supposed to be acquainted with it and re familiarized with it every seven years so that the children, he says, who have not known it may hear and learn to fear the Lord.

If you were if this was being practiced and I don't know whether it was or not, we read that as commanded. We don't know that they practiced it. If it was practiced properly, then every child by age seven would have heard the law one time, although he might have heard it when he was one year old.

He heard a second time when he was eight year old. By the time he was 14, he would certainly have heard it twice and by the time he is 21 or essentially, you know, starting a family or something like that, he would have hopefully heard the law at least three times the whole thing. And you might think that they could stand here more often than that.

But this was the minimum, of course, there is nothing to prevent the Levites in the various tribes to teach the law in other situations, even day by day or Sabbath by Sabbath. But this one thing was where all Israel would hear it together to make sure that every seven years they would at least be reminded of everything in it. Verse 14, then the Lord said to Moses, Behold, the day's approach when you must die, call Joshua and present yourselves in the tabernacle of meeting that I may inaugurate him.

So Moses and Joshua went and presented themselves in the tabernacle of meeting. Now, the Lord appeared at the tabernacle in a pillar of cloud and the pillar of cloud stood above the door of the tabernacle. And the Lord said to Moses, Behold, you will rest with your fathers and this people will rise and play the harlot with the gods of the foreigners of the land where they go to be among them and they will forsake me and break my covenant, which I have made with them.

You know, if I was Moses, I would have said, you know, God, I mean, it's OK that I'm going to die, but I would rather not be told what's going to happen afterward. You know, if my children are not doing well in their faith and I was on my deathbed and looking at my soon passing and seeing my children not doing very well, I could at least like to die with the thought that maybe when I'm gone, you know, things go well for them. They'll be serving God and, you know, they'll be well and have good families and good marriages and things like that.

It'd be a little easier to die with that kind of information. But if you're dying, you're told now when you're when you're gone, your kids are all going to be criminals. You know, they're all going to be murderers and die on death row, you know, in prison and they're going to ruin their whole lives and destroy the lives of their children and so forth.

I mean, that's just not the news you want to hear. It's surprising to me that God shared it with Moses. But you know what? I have to assume that God was not being cruel to Moses.

Moses probably wondered about that. Moses probably wanted to know how things were going to go, even if the news was bad. He you know, he's he's really going to be disappointed about this when he hears it.

But he probably didn't want to die without knowing how things were going to go. So God tells him it's not good news. And it says my anger shall be aroused against them in that day.

And I will forsake them and I will hide my face from them and they shall be devoured. And many evils and troubles shall befall them so that they will say in that day, have not these evils come upon us because our God is not among us? And I will surely hide my face in that day because of all the evil that they have done in that they have turned to other God. Now, the Jews have suffered horrible things.

In their history, many of them, they suffered before the time of Christ, but the worst of it has happened to them since the time of Christ. Since as a as a nation, they largely have rejected Christ. Now, there are as a remnant of those in Israel who have followed Christ and who are Christians, just like we are.

And what I say does not apply to them, but there are Jewish people who have rejected Christ and sadly, great, horrible things have happened to them. And often when people think of the Holocaust, especially when atheists are trying to think of reasons not to believe in God. Or even Christians who are just sensitive about this and wonder, you know, why did God allow that? Where was God at the time of the Holocaust? The answer is given by God himself.

He was hiding his face from them. He didn't make it happen. I think it'd be a mistake to say God brought about the Holocaust.

I think he just didn't protect them from it because he said he would. If they forsake him. He will not help them.

He warned them that they would be treated very badly by other nations, but he didn't indicate that this would be his doing necessarily. It's rather that he would simply not intervene if they had been faithful to him. The promises of Moses are that God would intervene on their behalf, but he just left them to their own selves without himself because they wanted to live without him.

And that's what happened. Now, people might say, but the Jews didn't. It's not like they were trying to live without God.

Many of them were devout Jews. And that is a very sad thing. And God knows to what degree any of them are responsible for their ignorance of Jesus and so forth.

But the truth is, they had, you know, for the most part, they had turned from Christ. That is, they had not. They knew about Christ.

They were living in so-called Christian lands. They weren't very Christian, but lands where the church certainly had a witness, probably not a very good one, but they were responsible, like everybody else, for turning to Christ or not. The thing that made them different than other people is that for some reason, insane and demonically inspired people wanted to hurt them and kill them.

But they were the only ones. The gypsies also were persecuted, just the same as the Jews by the Nazis, the gypsies and and the mentally retarded. You know, Hitler wiped out a bunch of those people, too.

It wasn't only the Jews, but but the Jews did suffer more than they would have needed to if God had been on their side. And what it's saying is when these things happen, they'll say in verse 17 at the end, it says, have they'll say, have these evils not come upon us because our God is not among us? That's it. It's because God was not among them.

It's not because God was coming after them. It's not like God was aggressively attacking them. It's just he wasn't there for them.

They weren't there for him and he was not there for them. And so left to the devices of wicked men, these things happen to them. Verse 19.

Now, therefore, write down this song for yourselves, God says, and teach it to the children of Israel. Put it in their mouth that this song may be a witness for me against the children of Israel. This is not a happy song, by the way.

We'll read the song in Chapter 32, but it's it's a song basically condemning Israel for the rebellion. But it was they had to learn it, they had to memorize it and sing it. Why? Because it would remind them of things.

Songs are a pretty easy way to memorize things. A lot of scriptures that I've memorized, I only memorized because we sing them and it's hard to forget them. Once you once you know a song, it's hard to forget the words or the tune.

And a lot of times the tune even goes through your head when you're not thinking about it. And then you realize what it is and the words of the song come back to you and so forth. And songs are a good way to store information that you want to remember, because it's more memorable when it's in poetry and when there's a tune associated with it.

Because there's more than one thing to trigger your memory of the information. But remembering the tune also triggers the information. And by the way, when something is in poetry, as songs are and as the song of Moses in Chapter 32 is, poetry is much easier to memorize than ordinary prose.

For one reason, you can always tell when you're forgetting part of it. You know, if you're just memorizing a paragraph out of the newspaper, you might forget a whole line and not realize that you forgot it. But when it's a poem, you realize, oops, that didn't work out.

There's something missing in there. What did I leave out? And so poetry becomes a and song, a memory device. And this is what this is what Moses is going to leave them with.

That's his best shot. He's going to be gone. What else can you do to make sure they'll remember what he said? Well, as almost his last act, he writes a song and teaches them to sing it so that they'll remember it.

And it says in verse 20, when I have brought them into the land flowing with milk and honey, of which I swore to their fathers and they have eaten and filled themselves and grown fat, then they will turn to other gods and will serve them and they will provoke me and break my covenant. Then it shall be when many evils and troubles have come upon them, that this song will testify against them as a witness for it will not be forgotten in the mouths of their descendants. Again, it's easier to remember a song.

Moses, your words may be forgotten, but the song will not be forgotten. And when these things happen on in the tune will come back to their head and say, you know, the song that we learned, it predicted all these things. It testifies against us, for I know the inclination of their behavior today, even before I have brought them to the land which I swore to give them.

Therefore, Moses wrote this song the same day and taught it to the children of Israel. He inaugurated Joshua, the son of Nun, and said, Be strong and of good courage for you shall bring the children of Israel into the land of which I swore to them and I will be with you. So it was when Moses had completed the writing of the words of the law of this law in a book when they were finished, Moses commanded the Levites who bore the Ark of the Covenant of the Lord, saying, take this book of the law and put it beside the Ark of the Covenant of the Lord, your God.

That it may be there as a witness against you. So the law would be a witness against them. It'd be in storage so that people, you know, that people violated it and they said, well, can't blame us.

We didn't know better. He can pull out the law and said, remember this? You've had this all along, this law. It's a witness against you that you are indeed responsible.

For I know your rebellion and your stiff neck. If today, while I am yet alive with you, you have been rebellious against the Lord. How much more after my death? And that is, of course, a good question.

If Moses was there with his rod, able to call plagues on Egypt and plagues on Israel, too, and that didn't stop them when he was there, you know, overseeing them, what's going to happen when he's not there doing that? How could what is it that's going to keep them in line? And so he says in verse 28, gather to me all the elders of your tribes and your officers that I may speak these words in their hearing and call heaven and earth to witness against them. For I know that after my death, you will become utterly corrupt and turn aside from the way which I have commanded you. And evil will befall you in the latter days because you will do evil in the sight of the Lord to provoke him to anger through the work of your hands.

Now, I don't know how wise it is to tell the people that. But I guess I'm not as wise as Moses that may have been the right thing to do. I'm sure he was just saying it almost sounds like he's just ventilating because if he's just saying, I know you're going to ignore all this.

You know, the question has been, why bother telling us? You know, what's what hope is there for us? You know, why even try if you know we're going to fail? Now, I would say this. This certainly is something that seems to fly in the face of openness theology, the idea that God doesn't know what people will do beforehand. Because he's telling very clearly what they will do.

He's announcing it. It almost has to happen now, because if it doesn't, it seems like he's prophesying falsely. And yet, I suppose openness people could say, well, God tells how it is that he knows what they'll do.

He says in verse 27, for I know your rebellion in your stiff neck. And in verse 21, the second half of that verse, he says, for I know the inclination of their behavior today, even before I brought them to the land. In other words, God, I know they're going to rebel because I see what they're like now.

Their stiff neck. I can see their inclinations. I can see the trajectory of their behavior.

In other words, someone who believed in openness could say, well, God did know they were going to do it, but not because he has absolute knowledge of the future, but because he could see what kind of people they were. He could see they were just the type who would do that kind of thing. He could tell that the same thing Moses could.

If they're doing this while Moses is here, they'll certainly do it when he's gone. But it does still seem as if by telling them that they'll do it, it almost seems to doom them to it. I mean, now it's going to have to happen that way now.

But that's one of the great mysteries associated with the foreknowledge of God is how can he really know the future things people do? Is it because he can just kind of project forward from the way things going now, like a like a computer could do? You put all the data in and project it out into the future and it'll tell you what the numbers will be or what the position will be of the stars or whatever a thousand years from now. Or is it that he has some kind of like a different kind of supernatural access to all knowledge of all time? In any case, if God does know the future, it raises questions as to whether the future could be changed after it's been predicted. Seemingly not.

So there are philosophical mysteries that are not explained to us associated with the foreknowledge of God and how that interacts with human responsibility. Verse 30, Then Moses spoke in the hearing of all the congregation of Israel, the words of this song until they were ended. And here's the song in chapter 32.

It's a long song and it belongs to a long chapter. But I think we can we can take it all here. Give ear, O heavens, and I will speak.

And hear, O earth, the words of my mouth. Now, this is typical of Hebrew poetry, as you'll find in the Psalms and the Proverbs and the Prophets even. And in the songs of the Old Testament, they are repetitious.

I mean, there's these parallel phrases he's calling heaven and earth to witness, as he said he would do earlier. He said, I call heaven and earth to witness against you that, you know, you're going to if you do the wrong thing, that things go badly for you. And now he calls them, but one at a time in a parallelism that's typical of Hebrew poetry.

Give ear, O heavens, and I will speak. Hear, O earth, the words of my mouth. Let my teaching drop as the rain, my speech distill as the dew.

As rain drops on the tender earth, as showers on the grass. You see the parallelism there? It's all every thought is repeated in different words. For I proclaim the name of Yahweh, a scribe greatness to our God.

He is the rock. His work is perfect for all his ways are justice. A God of truth and without injustice, righteous and upright is he.

By the way, that's also a song. I don't know if you know that one. I would have liked to teach that, but we didn't.

We taught too many other songs this 10 weeks. It's a great song. All his ways are justice.

He's a God of truth and without injustice, it says in verse four. And therefore, nothing God does is unjust. In fact, it says all his ways are justice.

It's interesting. You think you say all his ways are just like all his ways are just and fair. But it says all his ways are justice.

It's almost like the definition of justice is all of what God does. What is justice? Justice is what God does all his ways. That is the definition of justice.

All of his ways are justice. Everything he does is righteous and upright. They have corrupted themselves.

They are not his children because of their blemish, a perverse and crooked generation. Do you deal with thus with the Lord, O foolish and unwise people? Is he not your father who bought you? Has he not made you and established you? Now, he says that God is your father, but it says that they are not his children. Of course, in saying they are not his children means essentially that they are disowned.

He is their father. But like the prodigal son who's left his father, he's got a connection. A historical connection with his father, a biological connection, but he has no other connection to his father.

He doesn't have a relational connection because of his rebellion. And so Israel also. This is how Jesus described Israel.

But he was specifically describing that story of the prodigal, that portion of Israel that returned to God and repented the tax collectors and prostitutes that came to him were the prodigals that returned in that parable. But here the whole nation is seen as prodigal. Remember the days of old.

Consider the years of many generations. Ask your father and he will show you your elders and they will tell you when the most high divided the inheritance of the nations, when he separated the sons of Adam, he set the boundaries of the peoples according to the number of the children of Israel. For the Lord's portion is his people.

Jacob is the place of his inheritance. He found him, as God found Jacob in the desert land, in the wasteland, a howling wilderness. He encircled him.

He instructed him. He kept him as the apple of his eye. Now, the term the apple of his eye is a term that's found more than once in Scripture, but not frequently.

Zechariah also uses it where he says, God says to Israel, he that touches you touches the apple of my eye. We use the term apple of the eye, which we got from the King James Version, no doubt. I mean, the King James Version and the Bible in general has supplied many phrases and expressions into the English language over the centuries.

One of those is this expression, the apple of my eye. And because it says things like he kept them as he keeps the apple of his eye. People tended to think of the apple of the eye just means sort of something that you're fond of.

She's the apple of my eye means, you know, she's my she's my beloved. And the apple of the eye is often used that way in modern parlance, but it's not what it means. The word apple of the eye is a Hebraism for the pupil of the eye.

The pupil is called the apple of the eye in their language. And when it says, for example, in Zechariah, he that touches you touches the apple of God's eye. It's saying basically, if somebody afflicts God's people, it's like they're poking God in the eye.

It hurts him. And he'll probably react. You poke someone in the eye, good chance they'll react adversely towards you.

And so to touch Israel, that is when Israel was God's people to afflict them is to like poke God in the eye. That's what it means when it says he that touches you touches the apple of my eye. Here it says he kept them as the apple of the eye.

I mean, if he protected them the way a person protects his eyes from dust and a sandstorm or from any flying object, your eye. I mean, everyone keeps their eyes protected, even inadvertently. There's an involuntary reaction.

If something comes near you, you don't think, oh, I better close my eye. Your eye just shuts. You it's a reflex that when your eye is in danger, you protect it.

And that's how God protected Israel reflexively when they're in danger. He protected them like a man protects his eyes from injuries as an eagle stirs up its nest, hovers over its young, spreading out its wings, taking them up, carrying them on its wings. So Yahweh alone led him.

There was no foreign God with him. That is, Israel safely made it through the wilderness. How'd they do it? There were no foreign gods with them.

They didn't have idols with them protecting them. Obviously, Yahweh gets all the credit for it. There were no foreign gods that they were at that time worshiping.

And therefore, all that has been accomplished has got to be attributed to the one God who was with them, Yahweh, and they should not give honor to any other gods. Then liken it to an eagle mother stirring up her nest. This is no doubt referring to God making life uncomfortable in Egypt when Jacob and his family first went into Egypt, they were comfortable there.

Joseph was the grand vizier. They had everything supplied to them. They had the best of the land of Goshen for their flock.

They were very comfortable in Egypt, like little baby eagles in a nest are comfortable because the mother eagle has lined it with her down and her feathers. And it's like a feather bed for the baby eagles. In fact, they don't have any incentive to leave.

And the time comes when the baby eagles have got to grow up, they've got to fly, they've got to leave the nest. But who wants to? It's like a feather bed. And so the mother eagle, in order to get the babies to leave the nest, has to break up the bottom of the nest that turns the twigs up.

So the points are up and the baby eagles don't have a comfortable place to sit. And suddenly the nest has become an uncomfortable zone for them. And so they have incentive to think about going elsewhere.

And that's what God did to Israel. He stirred up the nest in Egypt. He made it uncomfortable for them.

He brought bondage upon them and affliction from the pharaohs that made Israel willing to leave Egypt, where they had formerly had a luxurious and privileged position. Now they really wanted to get out. And that was God stirring up the nest.

And then like a mother eagle carries her eagles on her wings. I've never observed this, but I've heard that when the baby eagles leave the nest, they're not really strong flyers yet. They, you know, they they flit around a bit, but the mother eagle stays close by.

And if they start dropping like a rock, she gets under them and puts her wing under them and lifts them up again. And carries them on her wings. And that's apparently what is being referred to here.

So this similarity to a mother eagle, we see that there are times when God is his heart is likened to a mother's heart and not only a father's heart. Now, God is always revealed as the father. And I, you know, I think it's a huge mistake for people to start trying to use gender neutral language for God, because the Bible doesn't choose to do that.

God continually is referred to as our father. And there is a difference between a father and a mother. And the relationship between us and God is to be like that of children to a father.

But God is not lacking in those motherly sentiments, either like a mother eagle or like a hen that wants to gather her chicks under her wings, as Jesus put it. And there are positive traits in mothers and in fathers that need to be considered and appreciated and which are present in God, though he is mostly described as a father. All the good things about mothers are true of him, too.

He made him right on the heights of the earth that he might eat the produce of the fields. He made him to draw honey from the rock and oil from the flinty rock, curds from the cattle, milk for the flock, the fat of lambs, rams of the breed of Bashan and goats with the choicest wheat. You drink wine, the blood of grapes.

Now, here he's not describing their life in the wilderness. He's describing the luxury that they were going to come into in the land. The song is to be remembered after that's all over.

Remember, the purpose of this song is for them to remember it once they've given up all these blessings, once they've rebelled against God and he's driven them out of the land and this song is to remind them of what God has done for them before. And therefore, though Moses and the children of Israel at the time this is written have not experienced those things, that's what they were going to be experiencing and which they would be forsaking at a later date when they would rebel. So he talks about the wheat and the cattle and the grasslands and the wine that they enjoy.

Of course, none of that was in the wilderness. That was what they're coming into. But it says in verse 15, but Jeshurun grew fat and kicked.

Now, I don't know why Jeshurun is used as the name. The word literally means my little righteous one. And it may be used somewhat sarcastically, but it is.

It's a poetic name for Israel. It's used three times in Deuteron. It's used here and then over in chapter 33, verse five.

It says that God says he was king in Jeshurun. And in chapter 33, verse 26, he says, there is no one like the God of Jeshurun. And these are the only places really in the Bible that use that expression and how it can be chosen, why it is used here and not elsewhere, why it is used at all is not explained.

But it means my little righteous one. And it's a poetic name for Israel in this song. But Jeshurun grew fat and kicked, you grew fat, you grew thick, you're covered with fat.

Then he forsook God who made him and scornfully esteemed the rock of his salvation. In the early chapters of Deuteronomy, there were repeated warnings. Once you come into the land, once you're not eating this man anymore, but you're eating crops in your comfortable houses and you're fat and sassy, don't forget God.

And this song presupposes a future time when they will have forgotten God for that very reason. They grew fat, they grew sassy, they forgot their need for God, and they forsook God and scornfully esteemed the rock of their salvation. They provoked him to jealousy with foreign gods, verse 16 says, with abominations, they provoked him to anger.

They sacrificed to demons, not God, to gods they did not know, to new gods, new arrivals that their fathers did not fear. Of the rock who begot them, you are unmindful and have forgotten the God who fathered you. And when Yahweh saw it, he spurned them because of the provocation of his sons and his daughters.

And he said, I will hide my face from them. I will see what their end will be, for they are a perverse generation, children in whom is no faith. And faith here might mean faithfulness, they're unfaithful children.

They have provoked me to jealousy by what is not God. They have moved me to anger by their foolish idols, but I will provoke them to jealousy by those who are not a nation. I will move them to anger by a foolish nation.

Now, this jealousy that God has towards people is always in the context of his role as their husband, so to speak. Like a husband is jealous over his wife, God is jealous over Israel. And he says, they made me jealous by going after other gods, just like a husband would be jealous if his wife was sleeping with other men.

That's the parallel that is always drawn in the Old Testament. But Israel worships other gods instead of the real God. She is giving to them what she owes to God, just like when a woman has sex with another man, she's giving to that man what she owes only to her husband.

But the interesting thing here is that God says, since you make me jealous by going after other gods, I'll make you jealous. I'll find some other people. And so God is essentially saying here, the marriage will be off.

I'll find some other wives. I mean, God's not going to go out and have an affair just to make his wife jealous. He will abandon her and take a new wife.

And so that is what is implied here. I will provoke them to jealousy by those who are not a nation, that is, by Gentiles who are not at this time a present nation and not a people of God, certainly. This verse, by the way, these verses about jealousy are quoted by Paul in Romans chapter 10.

And maybe we can look at that briefly here, if you could take a moment for that. In Romans chapter 10, verse 18, Paul says, But I say, have they not heard? Yes, indeed. And now he quotes Psalm 19, the opening verses.

Their sound has gone out to all the earth and their words to the ends of the world. But I say, did Israel not know? First, Moses says, I will provoke you to jealousy by those who are not a nation. I will anger you by a foolish nation.

But Isaiah is very bold and says, I was found by those who did not seek me. I was made manifest to those who did not ask for me. Now, what he's saying is what Paul is saying is that God saving Gentiles and passing over the unbelieving Israel is something that Moses and Isaiah predicted.

Isaiah predicted that there are those who had never sought God previously, the Gentiles who had previously worshiped other guys who in the new covenant through the outreach of the Messiah, those people who had never sought God before will become the ones who do seek him. The Gentiles, as opposed to Israel, who had historically been the ones who had sought Yahweh, they they won't find him because they have stopped seeking him. But the nations that used to not seek him will seek him and be found by him.

And likewise, he quotes this verse in Deuteronomy in Romans 10, 19, where God says, I will provoke you, Israel, to jealousy by those Gentiles, basically, who are not a nation. I will anger you by a foolish nation. That is, the Gentiles were considered foolish because they didn't have the law.

They didn't have the wisdom of God. The Jews look down on the Gentiles as foolish and unlearned and a lesser breed without the law. And yet those are the very ones that God will choose instead of Israel.

So there is here in Deuteronomy 32 and verse 21, a prediction of the Gentiles replacing Israel, not the Gentiles as a whole, but more like the church, which will be made up very predominantly of Gentiles, as well as some Jews. Verse 22, for a fire is kindled in my anger and shall burn to the lowest shale or to the lowest part of shale. This is one of the few places that we would find the Bible actually referring to fires associated with shale.

Shale is the same thing later in the New Testament called Hades. It is not the place of the ultimate judgment of the lost. That's the lake of fire.

And that's not the same. The lake of fire is where people are thrown. Even Hades itself is thrown into the lake of fire after the last judgment, according to Revelation 20.

But Hades is the place where the dead are now. And in general, the Bible doesn't tell us in the Old Testament very much information about what what Hades is like or shale is like here. There is a reference to fire.

It's probably figurative. It's talking about God's anger is like a fire that burns the lowest part of shale. I think maybe what it means is this, that the fire of God's wrath will pursue the rebellious Israel, even to the grave and even beyond the grave.

Even once they go into shale, they will not escape it. His anger will pursue them even there. Now, whether he's speaking literally of there being fires in Hades or not, one maybe could not say with certainty here, although Jesus talked about Hades as a place where the rich man was tormented in flames.

And that too may be figurative. But it's interesting that there's a couple of times here and in Luke 16 that speak about this place where the dead go as being a place where the fire of God's wrath continues to pursue them. It shall consume the earth or the land with her increase and set on fire the foundations of the mountains.

I will heap disasters upon them. I will spend my arrows upon them. I mean, I'll exhaust my supply of weapons in fighting against them.

They shall be wasted with hunger, devoured by pestilence and bitter destruction. I will also send against them the teeth of beasts with the poisonous serpents of the dust. The sword shall destroy outside.

There shall be terror within for the young man and virgin, the nursing child, the man of gray hairs. I would have said I will dash them in pieces. I will make the memory of them to cease from among men.

Had I not feared the wrath of the enemy. Lest their adversary should misunderstand, they should say our hand is high and it is not Yahweh who has done this. That is, I would have totally wiped them out at the hands of their enemies.

I don't want their enemies to take too much credit. I don't want the enemies to think that they have done it all. So I'm going to limit a little bit the extent of this judgment.

Don't want the enemies to take credit for themselves and not know that I am the one involved here so God can bring judgment. They can also limit the judgment. The enemies might want to do unlimited judgment, but God won't let them totally wipe out every last Jewish person, which is no doubt why Hitler failed to.

For they are a nation void of counsel, nor is there any understanding in them. Now, God gave them plenty of counsel through Moses, but they are void of counsel nonetheless, because it's not received by them. All that they were wise, that they understood this, that they would consider their latter end.

How could one chase a thousand and two put ten thousand to flight unless their rock had sold them and Yahweh had surrendered them? Now, this idea of one chasing a thousand, two chasing ten thousand. It's an interesting thing that preachers sometimes have talked about, because one person chasing a thousand, you'd expect that two people would chase two thousand, but instead two people chase ten thousand. And sometimes this is used as an example of how unity and united effort can bring about more than the sum of its parts.

Instead of two people accomplishing twice as much as one person, two people accomplish ten times as much as one person. It's a great thought. It's a great motivating concept, and I don't know.

I don't know to what degree it's intended here, but it's not here talking about good guys accomplishing this. It's talking about the bad guys, the people chasing Israel. Israel will be put to flight in such a way and so much at the mercy of their enemies that one enemy soldier can overpower and put to flight a thousand Jews when God has abandoned Israel and two can chase ten thousand of them.

And it is how could that be? How could such a thing be? I mean, even in natural circumstances, you would not expect one man to be able to chase a thousand men, although Samson managed to kill a thousand with the job of an ass all by himself when God was with him. But the enemy can do the same thing to Israel when God isn't with them, and you wouldn't expect that. I mean, that's that's an extreme degree of weakness on the part of Israel, but he says you couldn't expect that to happen unless God had abandoned them.

And therefore, when their enemies do put them to flight in this manner, you can pretty much conclude that God is not on their side and he's left them to their enemies mercy. Verse 31, for their rock is not like our rock, even our enemies themselves being the judges. That is, even our enemies know that our God is different than their God.

Our God is more powerful. Certainly they knew that the people of Jericho knew that we find out when Joshua sends five, they find out that the people of Jericho are trembling because they know what Yahweh has done to Egypt. They know that the gods of Egypt were no match for Yahweh, and they fear that their gods are no match for Yahweh.

Even our enemies themselves are witness to this. They themselves, by their own assessment, their judgment, recognize their gods are not like our gods for ours is the real one who really does things for their vine is the vine of Sodom and of the fields of Gomorrah. Their grapes are grapes of gall.

Their clusters are bitter. Their wine is the poison of serpents and the cruel venom of cobras. This is a reference to Israel when they're corrupted.

They're like Sodom. They're like Gomorrah. And we've seen that comparison already earlier.

Verse 34 is this not laid up in store with me sealed up among my treasures. Vengeance is mine and recompense their foot shall slip in due time for the day of their calamity is at hand and the things to come hasten upon them for the Lord will judge his people and have compassion on his servants when he sees that the power is gone and that there is no one remaining bond or free. He will say, where are their gods? The rock in which they sought refuge, who ate the fat of their sacrifices and drank the wine of their drink offerings.

Let them arise and help you and let them be your refuge. Now, his statement vengeance is mine in verse 35 and then in verse 36, the Lord will judge his people. Of course, this is about God bringing vengeance against Israel.

Because of their rebelling against him. Now, the statement in verse 36, the Lord will judge his people and have compassion on his servants means that though God will judge the wicked, he will recognize the remnant who are faithful. He will not be indiscriminate in his judgment.

He will discriminate between those who are his true servants and those who are not. And he'll have compassion on those who are. But the rest will be judged.

Now, these are in the context of judging Israel when they're rebellion. Paul quotes both of these. And so does the writer of Hebrews.

These scriptures in Hebrews chapter 10 and Paul quotes actually Paul quotes in Romans 12, 19, just the first of those. And then in Hebrews chapter 10. We have both of these scriptures quoted in Hebrews chapter 10.

It is in the context of the coming judgment upon Israel. The context here is of Jews who had been Christians, but who have turned back and we're going back to Judaism and the writer throughout the book of Hebrews is warning them that Judaism and its institutions, its city, Jerusalem and its temple are going to be destroyed. And he says.

In verse 28, anyone who has rejected Moses law dies without mercy on the testimony of two or three witnesses of how much worse punishment do you suppose he will be thought worthy who has trampled the son of God underfoot, counted the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, an uncommon thing and insulted the spirit of grace. This is what would be the case with someone who has known Christ and turned away from Christ. It's all in the context here of the Jewish people going back to Judaism.

And it says, for we know him who said, Vengeance is mine, I will repay. Says the Lord, and again, the Lord will judge his people. It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.

He's saying, if you're going back to Judaism that God has said he's going to judge the apostate Judaism. And in the time that Hebrews was written, the imminent destruction of Jerusalem was apparently looming because the writer of Hebrews makes several references to the impending destruction of the city of Jerusalem and the impending disappearance of the old covenant system. In Romans chapter 12, Paul also uses this vengeance is mine to make a different point, a point about Christian behavior and Christian relationships toward people who wrong you.

In Romans 12, 19, Paul said, Beloved, do not avenge yourselves, but rather give place to wrath, for it is written, Vengeance is mine. I will repay, says the Lord. That is, don't take vengeance on people who do you wrong, leave that to God, give room to God to move.

He said he'll avenge. Leave it to him to do so. Well, then what should you do when people abuse you? Well, Paul goes on to say, therefore, if your enemy hungers, feed him.

If your enemy thirst, give him drink. That's what you should do. In doing so, you'll heap coals of fire on his head.

Romans 12, 20 is a quotation from Proverbs chapter 25, verses 21 and 22. And basically saying your enemy, if he treats you wrongly, you treat him well anyway. If he's hungry, feed him.

If he's thirsty, give him drink. Now you will be, of course, contributing to the judgment that's coming upon him by being good to him. You are leaving the redress of the wrongs he's done to you in the hands of God.

You are, as it were, heaping up coals of fire in his head, which God in due time will release in the form of judgments. But you're not doing it yourself. If you retaliate against the person who wrongs you, you don't give God room to avenge.

You will have already taken all of the wind out of his sails. The person already will have suffered at your hands, so there won't be anything left for God to do. But if you do good to your enemies, then it remains in God's hands, the interest of vengeance and God has promised he will repay.

So by doing good to your enemies, you're heaping up a future judgment from God upon them. But you're not supposed to bring it upon them yourself. So Paul takes this statement that God makes in this song of Moses in Deuteronomy 32, and he uses it as a basis for Christian ethic of non retaliation.

That's not the point that God is making in Deuteronomy 32, 35, but it is not an inappropriate application. And Paul sees that verse 39. Now see that I even I am he and there's no God besides me, I kill and I make alive, I wound and I heal, nor is there any who can deliver from my hand.

For I lift my hand to heaven and I say, as I live forever, if I want my glittering sword and my hand takes hold on judgment, I will render vengeance to my enemies and repay those who hate me. I will make my arrows drunk with blood and my sword shall devour flesh with the blood of the slain and the captives from the heads of the leaders of the enemy. And in this case, of course, the enemy is apostate Israel.

That's who he's talking about here. When Israel becomes God's enemies, they shall find that he can treat them the same way he treats his other enemies. They have seen how he has treated his other enemies, the Egyptians and the Amorites and the Canaanites eventually.

But they'll find that if they make themselves his enemies, then they're inviting the same thing, you know, over in James chapter four, I believe it is. I'm reminded of this passage because he says. In verse four, James 4, 4, adulterers and adulteresses, and in this context, he's not spiritual adultery, talking about people who are covetous and stuff in verse two and who and that leads to war because you want to take things from other people.

Adulterers and adulteresses, do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God as you're making yourself God's enemy? If you're a friend of the world, whoever therefore wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. So you can you can make yourself an enemy of God. All you have to do is be a friend of the world.

The world is against God, the world's ways and values and pursuits are contrary to God. You be friendly with them and you've made yourself an enemy with God. That's exactly what Israel was warned about.

You can make yourself an enemy of God, but you'll find that God's sword will devour the flesh of his enemies. His arrows would be drunk with their blood and you don't want to be one of those. And so in Deuteronomy 32, the song ends in verse 43 with this rejoice, O Gentiles with his people, for he will avenge the blood of his servants and render vengeance to his adversaries.

He will provide atonement for his land and his people. Now, it's interesting here because in the context of God avenging the blood of his servants, this is an occasion for rejoicing among the Gentiles. Why would the Gentiles rejoice that God avenges his servants unless the Gentiles are his servants? The people who rejoice at being avenged are those who were the ones being avenged.

They are his servants. This verse predicts that the Gentiles, along with the remnant of Israel, will be God's servants and will be avenged by God destroying their enemies. In this case, the apostate Jews.

In Paul's day, there were many Gentiles who had become Christians and they were being persecuted by apostate Israel, as Paul himself was persecuted by apostate Israel. And in Romans, Paul is pointing out that there were many things in the Old Testament that predicted this very circumstance. And he lists quite a few verses from the Old Testament, from the Psalms and such.

And this verse is one that he quotes. He quotes it in Romans 1510. It's in a string of verses from the Old Testament that are all making the same point, namely, that God has predicted that the Gentiles will be included among those who are his servants, that is, in the church.

And so rejoice, O Gentiles, with his people, Paul quotes there in Romans chapter 15. And as I say, it's only one of several Old Testament passages that are linked together to make a strong case for this particular point. He begins in Romans 15, 8. Now, I say that Jesus Christ also, it says, became a servant to the circumcision, the Jews, for the truth of God to confirm the promises made to the fathers and that the Gentiles might glorify God for his mercy as it is written.

And then he quotes, as I say, he quotes from various Psalms, but also in verse 10, he quotes this verse and rejoice, O Gentiles, with his people so that these various Old Testament quotes confirm the church and the Gentile inclusion that Paul was arguing for. Real quickly, let's finish out this chapter. It's time to quit this session, but we can quickly finish the song.

Verse 44 says, So Moses came with Joshua, the son of Nun, and spoke all the words of this song in the hearing of the people. Moses finished speaking all these words to all Israel, and he said to them, set your hearts on all the words which I testify among you today, which you shall command your children to be careful to observe all the words of this law, for it is not a futile thing for you because it is your life. And by this word, you shall prolong your days in the lands which you cross over the Jordan to possess.

It's not a fruitless thing. It's not something that will have no positive result for you to keep the law. It is actually your survival and your maintenance of your property that is at stake.

Verse 48, Then the Lord spoke to Moses that very same day, saying, Go up to this mountain of the Abarim, Mount Nebo, which is in the land of Moab across from Jericho. View the land of Canaan, which I give the children of Israel as a possession and die on the mountain which you ascend and be gathered to your people. Just as Aaron, your brother, died on Mount Hor and was gathered to his people because you trespass against me, the children of Israel among the children of Israel at the waters of Maribach, Kadesh in the wilderness of Zin, because you did not hallow me in the midst of the children of Israel.

Yet you shall see the land before you, though you shall not go there into the land which I am giving to the children of Israel. So we're almost done. Moses is going to go up the mountain that very day.

All that really remains is for him to utter sort of a patriarchal blessing over the tribes as Jacob did in the close of his life and in the 49th chapter of Genesis. So in Chapter 33, we have a blessing pronounced upon Israel by Moses, tribe by tribe. It's kind of similar to the blessings of Jacob that he gave.

We'll talk about that in our next session. And then we have a short chapter, 34, that will bring us to the end of Moses' life and the end of the Pentateuch.