“Remember how the Lord your God led you all the way in the wilderness these forty years, to humble and test you in order to know what was in your heart, whether or not you would keep his commands.”-Deuteronomy 8:2
Today’s lesson resonates with me strongly.
Why?
Because it shines a light on a major character weakness of mine.
I’m talking about my arrogance and pride.
In other words, when things are going well in my life, I have a tendency to forget that ultimately it is the Lord who has enabled me to prosper and be successful.
This seems to be a tendency common to all human beings.
To this point, here in Deuteronomy, Moses is reminding the children of Israel to “remember” (ZAKAR in Hebrew) all of God’s acts of deliverance against their enemies…
…and also not to forget the harsh punishments they had to endure during their 40-year wilderness journey because of their many rebellions.
The Israelites needed to remember they were 100% dependent on God and His mercy for their sustenance.
Nor were they allowed to forget that God miraculously rescued them from Pharaoh in Egypt just at that point when it seemed like their destruction was inevitable.
Literally overnight, they were ushered from slavery into freedom.
Everything they had, their freedom and the land of abundance they were about to inherit had nothing to do with their human ability or merit of any kind.
It was all God’s Providence.
I want you to understand the recorded history of Israel’s wilderness journey is to be taken both literally and as a prophetic shadow of the process we will all go through as we move from personal slavery to sin…
…into freedom in the Lord…
…and then finally on into the Promised Land of eternity with HASHEM.
There’s an incredible pattern here I want you to catch.
I want you to notice that a good portion of the laws the people are learning really can’t be put into practice until they are actually inside the Promised Land.
For example, all of the following would only be able to be observed inside the Promised Land.
-the laws bringing in the first fruits of a harvest
-making pilgrimages to three of the Biblical Feasts
-the laws of Jubilee and the accompanying family inheritance issues
And I’m pretty sure there’s a whole lot more other commands that can only be implemented inside the Promised Land.
Here’s the thing.
The Israelites weren’t saved and then given God’s commands just so they could cast them aside and follow their own minds and hearts (a doctrine Christianity promotes).
In other words, once the Israelites entered the Promised Land, God didn’t to say to the them…
“Alright folks, now that you’ve entered the Promised Land, it’s no longer necessary to keep all of the Laws and Commands I taught you during your wilderness journey. You can just follow your own subjective inclinations from here on out”.
No, no…a million times NO.
Here’s the 20 billion dollar point I wanna make in this post.
Just as the Israelites were learning God’s Torah BEFORE they entered the Promised Land as preparation to live a life pleasing to Him…
…so to must we believers today study God’s Torah as preparation to live in eternity.
That just makes good sense doesn’t it?
I mean do you really think we’ve been redeemed by Yeshua and spent all this time being shown God’s commands and learning how to obey them just so that we can be told once we’re on the brink of eternity “now that you’re here, I’ve got news for you, there will be no more laws and commands, they’ve all been done away with”.
Have you ever heard anything more ridiculous than that?
Here’s the real truth.
Do you wanna know why it’s so friggin’ important to learn God’s commands NOW while we’re still living on this planet?
I’ll tell you why.
It’s because we’re gonna be living by those very same laws and commands throughout all eternity.
That’s right man!
Now you might be wondering, isn’t the way the laws are going to be expressed or applied in eternity going to be different as compared to now?
Of course.
I mean obviously.
Because the way the Law was observed in times of old is different than it’s observed today, right?
In fact, this was one area the Apostle Paul struggled to communicate to his followers.
Paul’s writings were NEVER about the Law being done away with.
Rather, he was trying his best to explain how the application of the Law transformed after Messiah came.
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