Deuteronomy 24–26

Father, I just thank you for the day. God, I just thank you for the fellowship that's here, God, and just the blessings they are, Lord. I just thank you for this opportunity to come and to worship you, Lord, and to serve you and just sit and spend some time in your word tonight, God. I just pray that you bless this time, bless the worship, and bless the word as it goes out.

And just ask these things in Jesus' name. Amen. You can go ahead and have a seat if you like, and we'll continue on here. Or I should say, I'll continue on. Father, God, I just thank you for the evening, Lord. Thank you for this opportunity just to be here in your presence, Lord. And what a joy it is to be here, Lord, in your presence just for a little while.

Father, God, that is our prayer tonight, God. We just want you to increase. We want us to decrease, Lord. God, just what a joy it is to sit, God, and just spend some time in your word and spend some time just lavishing praise upon you, Lord. But, God, tonight I just pray that as Pastor Ryan comes, Lord, God, I just pray that your word go out with power, and that we would just soak it up with joy, Lord, and just may you be glorified.

We love you, Father, and we thank you, and we praise you in Jesus' name. Amen.

Good evening. If you would open up in your Bibles to the book of Deuteronomy, chapter 24.

Deuteronomy, chapter 24. Thank you, sir.

As we come to this really long... This is the last part of the section on what God expects of the people. There's a handful of things that we'll cover, talking about marriage and divorce, some what I would call various laws, and then the first fruit offering. And so we pick up in chapter 24, verse 1, as he starts talking about marriage and divorce. It says,

When a man takes a wife and marries her, and it happens that she finds no favor in his eyes because he has found some indecency in her, and he writes her a certificate of divorce, and puts it in her hand, and sends her out from his house, and she leaves his house and goes out and becomes another man's wife, and if the latter husband turns against her and writes her a certificate of divorce and puts it in her hand and sends her out of his house, or if the latter husband dies, who took her to be his wife, then the former husband who sent her away is not allowed to take her again to be his wife, since she has been defiled. For that is an abomination. It is an abomination before the Lord, and you shall not bring sin on the land

which the Lord your God gives you as an inheritance. Ah, the controversial section on divorce. This is the section that the Pharisees brought up to Jesus when they asked him about divorce, as to what it meant in the law. If that's not what God intended, then why did Moses command to give a certificate of divorce? Then really what it comes down to is the interpretation of that,

that statement where it says, if a man finds an indecency or an uncleanness in his wife, the real question is, what does that mean? And so when they asked Jesus that, it's interesting, Jesus never really defines what that means. He instead reminds them about the principle of marriage. He says, what does it say in the scripture? It says that from the beginning, God created them male and female,

and for this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh. And of course, Jesus adds, but God has joined together, let no one dare to separate. Now, in the law, Moses, at this point in time, under the direction of God, gives them a way of handling a situation that was already taking place in the world. In the culture of that time, divorce was pretty common.

And so as many of the other aspects of the law do, God puts, if you will, restrictions on a custom that was already taking place. The ability to divorce one's wife, especially in the culture that Moses is living in at this point in time, was a pretty easy thing to do, because women were not given the status that they truly deserve. They were considered property and not the objects of affection that God had intended for them to be. And so he puts a limitation on this and really provides a protection for the woman, that if something happens and the husband decides he doesn't want to be married to her anymore, he can write out this certificate of divorce.

It sets her free from divorce. It sets her free from the bonds of her husband, so that she can then go and marry another. The scenario that's presented is that if she then gets divorced from her second husband, the first husband can't say, you know, I don't really know what I was thinking about divorcing her. I think I'm going to go try to win her back again.

The idea is this. Marriage is a binding contract. And you need to understand, and what Moses wants them to understand, is that if divorce is something that takes place, or divorce is something that's crossing one's mind, you must count the cost. You must count the cost because God intended marriage to be a permanent institution. Marriage is under attack right now, and it's been going on for quite some time.

But I would say since COVID, since all of the lockdowns have taken place, and all of the pandemic stuff has taken place, I would say that at this point in time, marriages are maybe under some of the most attack I've seen in my time in ministry, because this has been a pretty intense time for marriages. And I would venture to say that if we were to take a poll of people, we would say that you've sensed the strain in your own relationship as well. And may I say, oftentimes in the world that we live in, the automatic easy answer for people to take is to say, well, I think this isn't going to work out, so I'm just going to get a divorce. And I just have to tell you, that would never be the counsel that I would give to anyone.

As a matter of fact, I worked with a couple at one point in time, quite a few years. Back now. And this couple was bound and determined to get a divorce. And they said, all of our friends are saying that's the right thing to do. And I said, well, I'm telling you, it's not. I'm telling you that God wants you to work this out. Forgiveness can take place. Restoration can take place because God wants that marriage to work.

Now, of course, there are protections. I don't believe that God would have a woman to stick around and be a punching bag. I don't believe that whether physical or verbal, I don't believe that you should live in a relationship, a relationship where serial adultery is taking place, things along those lines. But those are more of the extremes. Those are more of the exceptions rather than the rule.

I would venture to say that the number of divorces that come about because we just decided we can't get along anymore is really one of the bigger issues that we deal with. Usually what needs to happen is one of us, if not both of us needs to die to our flesh. And one of us, if not both of us, needs to decide that we're going to, follow the biblical counsel that God gives to us for what husbands and wives are supposed to do. You see, God makes it very clear in scripture what exactly the roles are that husbands and wives are to fill. Now, I'm not talking about cultural roles. I think that there's some

room for interpretation where some of those things are concerned. Who should go to work? Who should do the dishes? Who should do the cooking? I'm okay with a certain amount of freedom in some of those cultural norms, but there are a couple of roles that God's very specific about in scripture. God's very specific that we as men are to love our wives as Christ loves the church.

That means loving in a sacrificial way, not only willing to give up my life, but to serve with my life the wife that God has provided for me. It means that I take on the role of a servant leader in my home. It means that I take on the role of a servant leader in every aspect of my household, and I don't just tell her that I love her. I show her that I love her.

I always hate when Valentine's Day rolls around. You know why I hate when Valentine's Day rolls around? I know this is going to get me in trouble, but what else is new, right? I hate when Valentine's Day rolls around because for some reason on this one day, I'm supposed to prove to my wife that I love her. I'm supposed to prove to my wife that I love her. I'm supposed to prove to my wife that I love her.

I'm supposed to prove to my wife that I love her. In all fairness, my wife's not a huge fan of the day either because I tell her on Valentine's Day, I said, I'll tell you what, I'll do the same thing I do every morning. I'll get up, and I'll make you coffee, and I'll pour it for you, and I'll make sure that your creamer's the way that you want it to be, and I'll do all the things that I do every other day of the year to show you that I love you, and she says, so will I, and I say, perfect, and we just roll on with life because, men, we should not just be showing our wives that we love them one day out of the year. It should be showing our wives that we love them every day out of the year.

It's so much of a lifestyle that when that one day rolls around, we go, why would I do anything different today than I do every other day? I try to show you how much I love you every single day of the year, and wives, God has called you to respect your husbands. It's not a popular statement that's made in this culture today, but that's called submission. God has intended men to be the leaders in households, not because they're better at it, but because he's given them that responsibility, and listen, if men don't take that responsibility, God will still hold them responsible, but your job as a wife is to respect your husband.

You see, something interesting happened to us at the fall. When the fall happened, Adam didn't fulfill his role, and Eve didn't fulfill her role, and ever since then, there's been this enmity between men and women. It's actually part of the fall. You see, when Eve was cursed, she was told that childbirth was going to be a real bummer, and that her desire would be for her husband, except that word desire is the same word that's used with Esau when it says sin is desiring to rule over you. That's the same word that's used there, and the idea is

this. Your desire from now on will be to rule over your husband, and so in marriages that aren't following biblical roles, there's always a power struggle, and the power struggle usually goes like this. You want to be in charge, and women do, and men, it's time for us to begin to fulfill our biblical role, and ladies, it's time for you to fulfill your biblical role, because God takes marriage very seriously, because marriage is a permanent institution, and divorce should be a last resort that we need to understand has lasting consequences. Well, he goes on from there to continue to talk about marriage when he says, when a man takes a new wife, he shall not go out with the army, nor be charged with any duty. He

shall be free at home one year, and she'll give happiness to his wife whom he has taken. I love this as a principle, because for that first year after a husband and wife get married, there should be a transition that takes place. There's an adjustment period that takes place. This is the unfortunate thing about couples that live together before they get married, which by the way is completely opposed to biblical.

It's completely opposed to God's plan. The plan is that you will get married and then begin to live together, because there's an adjustment period that takes place, and part of that adjustment period is learning an important lesson, and the important lesson that we should learn in that first year of adjustment period is that my marriage takes precedence over everything else in my life, except for one thing, and that's my relationship with Jesus, but my marriage takes precedence over everything else in my life, because that's the most important relationship next to Jesus Christ that I have, because it is the picture of Jesus and his relationship with me. It's the picture of Jesus and his relationship with the church, and it's not only a reflection

of the gospel, but it is for the founding and continuation of a godly society, and so he says, take that first year and please your wife. Pour into your relationship with her. Pour into you your relationship with each other, and brothers and sisters, if you're sitting back and thinking, you know, I don't know that I started off real good and pouring into my relationship with my spouse, well, then today's a really good day to start. You say, well, I didn't really take that first year and really develop those good habits. Well, then there's no time like the present

to begin to develop those really good habits and start pouring into your relationship that you have with your spouse. Well, he goes on from there to talk about the first year of adjustment, what I've simply entitled various laws, because I have no other creativity other than that. Within those various laws, the first I've encapsulated with the idea of loving your neighbor. It says this, no one shall take a hand mill or an upper millstone in pledge, for he would be taking a life in pledge. Now, this first statement that he makes about not

taking the millstone means if you loan somebody something and they put up something for collateral, you're not taking it. You're not taking it. You're not taking it. You're not taking it. You're not taking it. You're not taking it. You're not taking it. You're not taking it. You're not taking it. allowed to take the millstone from them as collateral for two reasons. Every home had a

millstone at this point in time because they didn't have a flour mill that provided a way for them to get flour to bake the bread. So everybody within their home had some form of a flour mill. It was not only the way that perhaps they made their living, but it was also the way that they provided their daily bread. And so he says, if someone takes out a loan from you, you cannot take their means of livelihood from them as pledge. It's a way of showing love to your neighbor. Choose

something different. And he'll talk about that more in just a moment. He says, if a man is caught kidnapping any of his countrymen of the sons of Israel, verse seven, and he deals with him violently or sells him, then that thief shall die. So you shall purge the evil from among you. We have an issue with this in our world right now. Do you know that? The issue that we have in our world

right now is a little bit different than what we dealt with in the slave trade that took place early on in our nation, as well as the nation of England's history, where they bought and sold human beings, which is the height of disrespect for God's creation. But there's something that I think is maybe even more heinous going on right now. And that's the sex trade that takes place, where young ladies are bought and sold for one reason and one reason only, and that's the satisfaction for some pervert. And I'm here to tell you right now, if we dealt with things the way that the Bible right here calls us to deal with things, I have a feeling we'd start dealing with a good percentage of the issue.

Because I think if some of these men that were taking part in this slave trade were caught and they were put to death, it might start to make people think twice. But you see, in our world today, unfortunately, there's way too much, concern over the rights of the perpetrator and not nearly enough concern over the rights of the victim. But God's pretty clear with what to do with those who would kidnap and treat violently other people. And that's, it's a capital offense and it's to be dealt with, with the death penalty. He goes on from there to say, verse eight, be careful against an infection

of leprosy that you diligently observe and do according to all that the Levitical priests, teach you. As I have commanded them, so you shall be careful to do. Remember what the Lord your God did to Miriam on the way as you came out of Egypt. See why I labeled this various laws? Because there's almost no rhyme or reason to the way some of these are put together. Now he tells us to

remember, be careful about leprosy. Now the word leprosy can involve any type of skin disease. And he says, be careful about leprosy and make sure that you follow the Levitical rules for that, which had to do with inspection. And then, treatment for the leprosy. He says, because remember what God did to Miriam. If God didn't spare Miriam, Moses's sister, then that means leprosy can happen to anyone. But if you remember,

we said that leprosy always stood for something in scripture. Leprosy was always synonymous with sin. And so we as believers in Jesus Christ should not only be aware of skin diseases, but we should also be aware of leprosy. And so we as believers in Jesus Christ should not only be aware of skin diseases, but we should also be aware of sin diseases. Now I didn't steal that from John Corson, but I feel

like that's a line he would use. But we must be aware of those kinds of things. Therefore, we must always be examining ourselves. You see, when he told them this, they would have known, okay, so I should constantly be on the lookout for those types of skin diseases. And brothers and sisters, when it comes to our lives in Christ, we should always be on the lookout for those sin diseases,

because they can come on us faster than we realize. Because it can happen to us, and to us a lot quicker than we're aware of. Because quite frankly, we're just not as strong as we think we are. And we must always be aware. And while in our world, we don't know about Miriam quite as well, we do know about great men and women of God who have had the same fate as Miriam

because they've fallen into deep sin. And may it be a reminder to us that none of us stands apart from the grace of God. He goes on from there to say, verse 10,

Verse 10, He once again deals with this aspect of loaning things to people. And basically, he says, if I could sum it up in two words, you need to show them respect, and you need to show them love. Just because one has found themselves in a place of needing a little bit of a hand, needing a loan to be helped out, doesn't mean that they should lose their self-respect. It doesn't mean they should lose your respect. And it also doesn't give them the

right to treat them unkindly, to treat them without love. So treat with love and respect those who need a hand. He goes on from there in verse 15 to say, You shall give a poor man his wages on his day before the sun sets, for he is poor and he sets his heart on it, so that he will not cry out against you to the Lord, and it become a sin to you. Pay a guy that works for you and pay him the same day. Verse 16,

Verse 16, Fathers shall not be put to death for their sons, nor shall sons be put to death for their fathers. Everyone shall be put to death for their own sin. You shall not pervert the justice due an alien or an orphan, nor take a widow's garment in pledge. But you shall remember that you were a slave in Egypt, and that the Lord your God redeemed you from there. Therefore, I am commanding you to

do this thing. He goes on to give one more command when it comes to the poor. Notice what he says in verse 19, When you reap your harvest in your field, and have forgotten a sheaf in the field, you shall not go back to get it. It shall be for the alien, for the orphan, and for the widow, in order that the Lord your God may bless you in all the work of your hands. When you beat your olive tree, you

shall not go over the boughs again. It is for the alien, for the orphan, and for the widow. When you gather the grapes of your vineyard, you shall not go over it again. It shall be, therefore, the alien, for the orphan, and the widow. You shall remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt. Therefore, I am commanding you to do this thing. God had a very interesting

welfare system in the nation of Israel at that point in time. It was his purpose to do this, because as Jesus mentioned, you will always have the poor with you. There will always be someone who is in need, unfortunately, because of the world that we live in. Therefore, there were two principles that were supposed to be followed. One was just the principle of the Lord your God,

generosity. Two was hard work. If you were the landowner, you were to be an individual of generosity. If while harvesting, you forget some of the produce in the field, or you miss some the first time through, don't go back to get more. Have a generosity, have generosity in your heart to say, I'm going to leave that for those that really need it. I'm going to leave that behind

for those who might need it. But while there was a heart of generosity on the part of those who had, there should be a heart of hard work on the part of those that have not. You see, they were not just supposed to expect a handout. They were not just supposed to expect that the landowner in his generosity would bring them all of their food and lay it at their doorstep.

No, they had responsibility. And their responsibility was this. When the landowner was done harvesting the field, they had the opportunity then to go in and get everything that he missed. And brothers and sisters, may I say again in the world that we live in today, one of the things that we need to do is to be a part of the work that we do. And that's what we

do. One of those two things usually needs to take place in our heart. Some of us need to learn that lesson of generosity because we can have a tendency to look at those who don't have and think that's their fault. They need to figure their own way out of it. Well, maybe God wants to use a generous heart on your part to help them out a little bit. But if you're the one in need,

we're not to just expect a handout everywhere that we go. We can expect that God requires hard work of us as human beings. We talked about that a little bit earlier. We can expect that this Sunday. Paul in the book of Thessalonians says, if a man doesn't work, he shouldn't eat. And so there should be both of those things that take place in our hearts. And whichever one you

struggle with, well, hopefully the Holy Spirit's doing that work in you right now. But I found something else to be interesting in chapter 24. There's a verse that was repeated twice. And the second one was in verse 22. And it says, you shall remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt. Therefore, I am commanding you to do this thing. As I mentioned in chapter 24,

the various laws that he gives, I would encapsulate with the idea of loving your neighbor. But it's interesting what he uses as motivation for loving your neighbor in the way that you handle yourself in business, as well as in personal dealings. And that's that you were a slave in the land of Egypt and God redeemed you. And because he redeemed you from your slavery in Egypt, I'm now commanding you to do this thing.

It reminded me of a principle that I think that we should live by. And that's this, remembering who you were should have an impact on who you are. Too many times we forget where we came from. And when we forget where we came from, when we forget what God saved us from, that's when that judgment will come. And that's when we forget where we came from. That's when that heart starts to creep in. That's when that heart that is hard towards the people

around us, it doesn't want to show love and compassion. That's when that sort of a heart starts to creep in. When we forgot that we were slaves in Egypt. Paul says a very similar thing in the book of first Corinthians, when he names all of those horrific sins. And then he says, and such were some of you, but you have been redeemed. And the more that we can remember

that we have been redeemed, the more that we can remember that we have been redeemed. But that's who I was. And by the grace of God, this is who I am. The more it changes the way that I not only live my life in relationship to Jesus Christ, but the way that I live my life in relationship to other people. Chapter 25, he continues on with a section that I have so

creatively titled more laws. 25 verse one, if there is a dispute between men and they go to court and the judges decide their case, then it shall be if the wicked man deserves to be beaten, the judge shall make him lie down and be beaten in his presence with the number of stripes, according to his guilt. He may be beaten 40 times, but no more so that he does not beat him with many more stripes than these. And your brother is not degraded in your eyes. So when dealing with justice,

it should always be tempered with mercy. Again, most of us tend to go to one side or the other. Sometimes we're more of a justice person. And we're like, man, let's just meet some justice out there because what they did was wrong and it needs to be dealt with. And we forget to temper that justice with a little bit of mercy. Some of us are more merciful by nature. And when wrongs

are done, we have a tendency to just say, oh, well, I'll just let that go. No, the two have to work together. God requires justice. God requires that that take place because when wrongs go unpunished, lessons are never going to be learned. God requires justice. God requires that never learned. But in that punishment, may we be reminded that mercy is always in God's heart.

There's a verse in the book of Jeremiah, and it says this, Lord, correct me, but gently. That's the idea. Lord, I know that I need justice, but be merciful while you do it. He goes on from there in verse four to say, you shall not muzzle the ox while he is threshing. Why? Because you should treat your livestock. Well, you should treat those who provide for you. Well, it goes on in verse five to say,

when brothers live together and one of them dies and has no son, the wife of the deceased shall not be married outside the family to a strange man. Her husband's brother shall go into her and take, uh, take her to himself as a wife and perform the duty of a husband's brother to her. It shall be that the firstborn of whom she bears shall assume the name of his dead brother. So that his name will not be blotted out from Israel. If the man does not desire to take his

brother's wife, then his brother's wife shall go to the gate to the elders and say, my husband's brother refuses to establish a name for his brother in Israel. He's not willing to perform the duty of a husband's brother to me. Then the elders of his city shall summon him and shall speak to him. And he, if he persists and says, I do not desire to take her, then his brother's wife shall come to him in the sight of the elders, pull his sandal off his foot and spit in his face.

And she shall declare, thus it is done to the man who does not build up his brother's house in Israel. His name shall be called the house of him whose sandal is removed. Now, I'm not going to go into a great deal of detail on this, but if you're a person who likes to take notes in your Bible over to the side in the margin, right? The book of Ruth, because if you want to see this exact scenario played out, then you'll read the book of Ruth because everything that was just mentioned here plays out in that book, including the whole guy without the sandal thing, all plays out there. So for more information on that, go read the book of Ruth

and you're going to love it. It's a fascinating story. Verse 11, one of the stranger sections in the book of Deuteronomy right here. If two men, a man and his countrymen are struggling together, the wife of the one, comes near to deliver his, her husband from the hand of the one who is striking him and puts out her hand and seizes his genitals. Man, sometimes I just want to export, although this is a good part

right here. It's important. Then you shall cut off her hand and you shall show no pity. I really got nothing on that, right? A few commentators tried to be like, well, you see, it's going to ruin his ability to reproduce. And so listen, just leave his junk alone. Anyway, so we go on from there. Verse 13, You shall not have in your bag differing weights, a large and a small. You shall not have in your

house differing measures, a large and a small. You shall have a full and just weight. You shall have a full and just measure that your days may be prolonged in the land which the Lord your God gives you. For everyone who does these things, everyone who acts unjustly is an abomination to the Lord your God. Let me sum that up. Have integrity. Have integrity in your business dealings. Again, I think many a businessman would have saved

themselves a lawsuit, would have saved themselves a hearing, would have saved themselves getting fired if they would just remember to be honest in all of their dealings. Even if it costs you in the short run, it's better off to be honest in your business dealings. You see, swindlers are not a new thing. They're not a new thing. They're not a new thing. They're not a new thing.

People that take advantage of others is not a new thing. It was taking place even in the land of Israel, even in ancient times. And God desires for there to be honesty in our business dealings. And our nation would be in so much of a better place if people would live according to this. And I'm not just talking people outside the church. I'm saying it needs to start

inside the church. You should ask yourself, am I honest in all of the things that I do? Are you honest in all of your tax dealings? Do you report the things you're supposed to report? Are you honest in the business dealings of things like your time card? Are you honest on your time card? Are you honest in every aspect of it? Because brothers and sisters, we're to be separate,

even in the small ways of life, like our business dealings. Far too long, people have used a phrase to excuse bad business dealings with this phrase. Oh, you just have to understand, it's just business. Business. No, it's not just business. It's your witness. And many an individual's witness has been ruined because they've not been honest in their business dealings.

And so he says there should be integrity in the way that that's handled. I heard a guy teach on integrity one time, a long time ago. I was just after my senior year of high school, but what he said always stuck out to me. And he said, you can define integrity like this. Integrity is defined as doing the same thing, whether anyone's watching or not. Because sometimes it's easy to have integrity when people are watching you, right?

When you know beyond a shadow of a doubt, someone's going to check up on you. It's easy to have integrity, but it's a whole lot harder to have integrity when you think you can get away with it. When nobody's watching and maybe nobody will ever watch. And this guy went on to say, because here's what we have to understand. Even when no one's watching God, is always watching. And he sees it all. Because he sees not only the things that I do outwardly

with my hands, he sees the things that I do inwardly with my heart. And one day it will all get laid bare. He says there should be integrity in your business dealings. He goes on to say, remember what Amalek did, verse 17. Remember what Amalek did to you along the way. The way when you came out from Egypt. How he met you along the way and attacked among you all the

stragglers at your rear when you were faint and weary. And he did not fear God. Therefore it shall come about when the Lord your God has given you rest from all your surrounding enemies and the land which the Lord your God gives you as an inheritance to possess. You shall blot out the memory of Amalek from under heaven. You must not forget. This is an interesting,

little section that's included here amongst some of these laws. And I have questioned myself personally, why was God so intense about them destroying Amalek? They were not one of the members of the Canaanite land that they were going to take over and destroy. This is something that they were supposed to do after they had come into the land, after they had taken over the land. They

were supposed to remember to go and destroy the people of Amalek. So I have found myself asking, why was God so serious about this? I mean, he's so serious that he ends this section with, you must not forget. Matter of fact, he was so serious that if you remember King Saul, King Saul was given a job at one point in time. When King Saul was king, God told him, I want you to go to war against the

Amalekites and don't leave any of them alive. That was when Samuel showed up. Remember when Samuel showed up? Because he wasn't supposed to leave man, woman, child, animal, nothing alive. Samuel shows up and says, what's that that I hear? I hear the bleeding of sheep. Because you see, Saul had decided he would keep the king alive. And Saul decided he should keep

some of the sheep alive. He said, oh, I know that's what you said, but I decided to keep the king alive to prove that God was greater. And I decided to keep the sheep alive to make sacrifices. And do you remember what Samuel told him? It's better to obey than sacrifice, right? And so that's how intent, matter of fact, this is, that was one of the things that caused him to get knocked off the

pedestal of being the king. So why was God so intense about it? Well, I want you to look and see what the people of Amalek did. Verse 18, they met you along the way and attacked among you all the stragglers at your rear when you were faint and weary, and he did not fear God. Why was God so upset with Amalek? Because the Amalekites took out the weak ones. The Amalekites took out the ones that couldn't fight for themselves.

They took out the ones that had no defense. And all throughout scripture, we read something about who God is, that God is the defender of the fatherless and the widow, that he is the defender of the weak. And the Amalekites were the very opposite of that. See, I believe that when the weak ones are taken out by the strong, God takes note of it. And when God takes note of it,

God promises, Sometimes we ask ourself, Lord, when are you going to deal with some of these things that take place? When are you going to deal with the fact that abortion on demand is still taking place and the weakest ones of our culture are being taken out? Lord, when are you going to deal with the fact that the sex trade is still taking place and the weakest of the young ladies are the ones who are being affected the most? We need to know and understand something. God sees

and he does not forget. And vengeance is his, and he will repay. We can rest in that. And when counseling those that have dealt with situations like that, I think it's a wonderful thing to remind them of, God is now your defender. And when God's your defender, pity anyone who stands against you. And so he says, do not forget. Now, as we move into chapter 26, we see the first fruit offering. There it is.

In chapter 26, verse 1, it says this,

This day to the Lord, my God, that I have entered the land, which the Lord swore to our fathers to give us. Then the priest shall take the basket from your hand and set it down before the altar of the Lord, your God. You shall answer and say before the Lord, your God, my father was a wandering Aramean. And he went down to Egypt and sojourned there few in number, but there he became a great, mighty, and populous nation. And the Egyptians,

treated us harshly and afflicted us and imposed hard labor on us. Then we cried to the Lord, the God of our fathers. And the Lord heard our voice and saw our affliction and our toil and our oppression. And the Lord brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm and with great terror and with signs and wonders. And he has brought us to this place and has given

us this land, a land flowing with milk and honey. Now behold, I have brought the first of the produce of the ground, which you, O Lord, have given me. And you shall set it down before the Lord, your God, and worship before the Lord, your God. And you and the Levite and the alien who is among you shall rejoice in all the good, which the Lord, your God has given you and your household. When you have finished paying all the tithe of your increase in the third year,

the year of tithing, you shall give it to the Levite, to the stranger, to the orphan, and to the orphan. And you shall give it to the Levite, to the stranger, to the orphan, to the widow, that they may eat it in your towns and be satisfied. You shall say before the Lord, your God, I have removed the sacred portion from my house and also have given it to the Levite and the alien, the orphan and the widow, according to all your commandments, which you have commanded me. I have not transgressed or forgotten any of your commandments. I have not eaten it while

mourning, nor have I removed any of it while I was unclean, nor offered any of it to the dead. I have not eaten it while mourning, nor have I removed any of it while I was unclean, nor have I removed any of it while I was unclean, nor have I removed any of it while I was unclean, nor have I removed any of it while I was unclean, nor have I removed any of it while I was unclean. I have listened to the voice of the Lord, my God, and have done according to all that you've commanded me. Look down from your holy habitation from heaven and bless your people Israel and the ground which you have given us, a land flowing with milk and honey, as you swore to our fathers.

Now, in this offering of first fruit, there seems to be something a little bit different about the other offerings of first fruits that are mentioned. Earlier in the book of Numbers, and then back in the book of Leviticus, we saw that there was to be an offering, something that came about every year, and then there was also an offering that was to take place on the third year. But this seems to be something that is separate from those. What's mentioned here seems to be something that's supposed to take place specifically upon their entrance into the land. This seems to be a little bit of a different offering, because this offering is a commemoration

of the fact that God had preserved them through the wilderness, set them free from the land of Egypt, and had now established them in the land. I love that it starts off with the phrase, when you enter the land, because as so many of the times in the book of Deuteronomy, we've seen that, because where are they right now? Not in the land. What do they still have to face to get there?

Well, they have to cross the river Jordan, and they have to defeat a lot of enemies, and yet God states it as if it's already happened. When you enter the land, they were supposed to bring a specific offering. And then in the third year, they were supposed to bring a specific offering, because all of these things were representative of everything that God had done for them. And as I thought about this, I thought, really, there's two reasons why he wants them to bring this offering. Number one, because it's an offering of thanksgiving. Number two, because

it's a recognition of their dependence upon the Lord. And so I want to spend just a couple of moments talking about those things, and I want to take them in order. Number one, this was to be a an offering of thanksgiving. Did you take note of the things that they were supposed to say? My father was a wandering Aramean. He went down to Egypt, and he was very few in number. And then

we got treated harshly while we were down there. And yet while we were there, the Lord what? The Lord heard our cry, and he redeemed us from the land of Egypt, and now he's brought us into this land. This was a time of giving thanks in this first year for everything that God had provided for them. And I thought, what a wonderful thing for us to remember as we move on. And I thought,

what a wonderful thing for us to remember as we move on. And I thought, what a wonderful thing for us to remember as we move into the month of November. Now, contrary to popular belief, the month of November is not the first month of Christmas, right? I've seen so many people say, Halloween's done, my Christmas tree is up now. Listen, you do what you want to with your Christmas tree, okay? But let's not forget the

holiday that we celebrate in the month of November, the holiday of thanksgiving. Do you know why it's so easy to skip over Thanksgiving? And go straight to Christmas? It's not because we're all so excited about Jesus. It's because all of the stores are so excited about making money. And usually it's because most of our culture is pretty excited about getting things. You ever notice on Christmas or on Thanksgiving, there's

really no receiving of gifts. Why? Because you're going to go out on Black Friday and buy all of the gifts that you're going to give to yourself and to everybody else. Thanksgiving is for one thing and one thing only, giving of thanks. Now, I don't know if you've ever seen any of these things on social media. This is maybe the first year I've not seen this pop up. Usually people take the Thanksgiving challenge and they try to

come up with something that they're thankful for every single day. It's mildly cheesy, but I kind of like it. The reason why I like it is this. We live in a culture that is so self-focused and that's so focused on not what God has given me, but what the next thing I can get is. But I think the best thing that we can do is to truly think about what we're going to get. And I think that's

what we're thankful for. I'll make you a guarantee. Ask somebody tomorrow what they're thankful for. They'll probably say their family, right? That's always the blanket answer. What are you thankful for? I'm thankful for my family. But get a little bit creative. What exactly are you thankful for? You see, the children of Israel were so thankful because God had redeemed

them from the land of Egypt, a land of slavery. The children of Israel could be thankful because they had survived the wilderness. The children of Israel could be thankful because once they started making this offering of first fruits, it meant that God has defeated their enemies and they were living securely in the land. They could be thankful because they had started over in a brand new land and actually had an offering to bring to the Lord. They could be thankful because God had been patient with them

all of that time. They could be thankful because God was still their God. And brothers and sisters, as we come into this month, as we start this time of Thanksgiving, I want to challenge you to do something. I want to challenge you to start getting creative about the things that you're thankful for. Because we can't even begin to describe what we have, not only in our culture, but what we have as believers in Jesus

Christ. Sometimes I think we're way too Western culture in the way that we're thankful, right? Well, I'm thankful that I have a house to live in. I'm thankful that I have clothes to wear, and I'm thankful that I have food to eat. Those are wonderful things to be thankful for. What if you lived in a country where you were a Christian? What if you lived in a country where

those weren't a reality? At least not to the level that we think of them as reality. Would you still be able to be thankful for things? What if you woke up tomorrow and you lost everything? Would you still have things to be thankful for? I would challenge you with this. You do. Because you still have a God that loves you. You still have a God that promises to provide for you.

You still have an eternal salvation that's waiting for you. You still, listen, are blessed with every spiritual blessing in heavenly places. As a matter of fact, I would go so far as to say this. You should start reading the first couple of chapters of the book of Ephesians and look at all of the spiritual blessings that you have, and you should start making your thankful list out of all of those things. Lord, I thank you that you chose me. Listen, I got chosen last

a lot when I was growing up, okay? You can't be this small and get chosen first for the football team, okay? And sometimes I think, and God chose me, right? When we start thinking about those kinds of things, you go, I really am thankful. I'm thankful for everything that God has given to me. And that's what that first fruits offering was to be. It was an offering of thanksgiving for everything

that God had provided for them. But that first fruits offering, both in the first and third year, were also a reminder of their dependence upon the Lord. Because remember what God had already told them. Listen, I didn't choose you because you were the biggest nation. I didn't choose you because you were the toughest nation. I chose you because I love you. That means that they weren't the smartest people

on the face of the earth. They weren't the most industrious people on the face of the earth. They weren't the best army on the face of the earth. The only reason why they could be in the land, the only reason why they could be having produce to give to God is because of complete dependence upon the Lord. Complete and total dependence upon the Lord. And do you know that God has given you the power to do that?

Do you know whether we realize it or not? We're completely dependent upon the Lord. Sometimes we earn some things in our lives and we say, look at what, look at what I did. And God's like, but did you, but did you do that? Remember the story of Nebuchadnezzar? The story of Nebuchadnezzar is kind of like that, right? Nebuchadnezzar had taken over the world basically at that point in time. And he was warned about his pride. Hey bro, you got some serious

pride issues going on. And if you don't deal with it, you're going to be like an animal roaming out in the woods, like growing long. And he was like, I'm going to do this. I'm going to do this. I'm going to grow long claws and eating grass and whatnot. And then for a while he did really good, but pretty soon he goes walking through the castle. And remember what he said? That line was so amazing.

He goes, look at the great Babylon, which I have built. And at that point in time, he goes out into the woods and he's like roaming through the grass and eating and stuff because he had to learn that the only reason he was in the position that he was is because God's the one that did it. Brothers and sisters, we're dependent upon God. We're dependent upon God. We're dependent upon God.

We're dependent upon God. We're dependent upon God. We're dependent upon God. We're dependent upon God. We're dependent upon God. We're dependent upon God for everything. I'm always kind of struck by the fact that we're told in the book of Hebrews that God holds the world in motion by the word of his mouth. That means that the moment that God says, stop, right? We all go blowing off of the world because

he just stops the thing from spinning. I had a kid tell me one time that he didn't believe in God. He believed in science. He didn't believe that that could be true. And all I could think was, have you ever asked yourself, how do your lungs know how to take in exactly the right amount of air and then blow out the right amount of air? Because if they take in too much air, they'll explode. And

if they blow out too much air, they'll collapse. And yet your lungs, without you even thinking about it, know exactly how to do that. Why? Because you're totally dependent upon God because he set you up that way. And when they brought that first fruits offering to God, it was their way of saying, the only reason I have anything, is because of you. And so I just want to give some of it back to say thank you and to show that

I'm fully dependent upon you. Well, as we wrap up chapter 26 and we come to verse 16, we really come to the end of the section. And really verses 16 through 19 are a call to commitment. He has taken us over the past quite a few chapters now. He's taken us through all of what God expects of the nation of Israel. He's recounted the law. He's recounted the feasts. He's recounted the sacrifices. And he's taken us through a whole

bunch of other various laws for living life. And now he tells them, it's time to make a commitment. Because listen, there always comes a point in time when we hear God's word that we have a decision to make. What am I going to do with it? And that's what Moses does with the people. Verse 16, this day, the Lord, our God commands you to do these statutes, and ordinances. What statutes and ordinances? Everything that he's been saying. You shall

therefore be careful to do them with all of your heart, with all of your soul. You have today declared the Lord to be your God, and that you would walk in his ways and keep his statutes, his commandments, and his ordinances. Listen to his voice. The Lord has today declared you to be his people, a treasured possession, as he promised you, and that you should keep all of his commandments, and that he will set you high above all the nations, which he has made for praise, fame, and honor, and that you shall be a consecrated people to the Lord, your God. He says, first of all, you are to obey all of the

statutes and commandments. That's your one job, he tells the nation of Israel, is to obey everything I have told you. God's job is that you are his people. You belong to him. You're his own special people, and you've been called to be consecrated unto him. You shall be called a consecrated people or a people that are set apart. And so as I look at this call to commitment, there's two things that

stuck out to me. Number one, I'm reminded of my inability. I'm reminded of the inability that I possess as a human being. I'm reminded of the inability that I possess as a human being. I'm reminded of the inability that I possess as a human being. And the inability that the children of Israel possessed. Because remember, God said, all you have to do is obey. How did they do with that? Spoiler alert, not well, right? They all

struggled with obedience. Why? Because the law was never intended to make them righteous. The law was always intended to be a schoolmaster. It was always intended to teach them that they are not able but God is able. It was always to point them to a savior that that law would be fulfilled by. And so I'm reminded of my own inability. And it's really good for us to look at the law

and see what the law has to say. I was just reading in Psalm 19 earlier this morning, I think it was in Our Daily Bread, where it says, the law of the Lord is perfect converting the soul. You know why the law of the Lord is perfect? Converting the soul? Because the law of the Lord shows me how unable I am to do it. And it converts my soul because I say, Lord Jesus, I need your help.

Because I can't do it. And so I'm reminded in this of my inability to obey in the way that God calls me to. And yet, the second thing that I take note of is I am reminded that there's a blessing in obedience. Ryan, you don't make sense. Trust me, I know half the time I don't, but this time I really do have a point. There is a blessing in obedience. Just because I, in my flesh, am unable to obey what God calls me

to do, listen, is not an excuse for me to live in disobedience. Because now that I have been saved by the blood of Jesus Christ and have been filled with the Spirit of God, His divine power has now given me everything that I need for life and godliness. And as I follow the leading of the Holy Spirit and allow myself to be empowered by the Holy Spirit, I can live in disobedience. And as I follow the leading of the Holy Spirit and abide in the vine, then I have the ability through Jesus Christ to obey what God's word has to say. And there is a distinct blessing in

obedience. As a matter of fact, if I am walking in tune with the Holy Spirit, if I am walking in the Spirit and allowing the Spirit to lead, guide, direct, and empower me, then that obedience leads me to the greatest blessing. Because the greatest peace that I have in my life comes. From obeying what God calls for me to do. Because after all, what did Jesus tell His disciples?

If you love me, you will obey my commandments. But my commandments aren't burdensome. Why aren't they burdensome? Because they come through the power of the Holy Spirit. And so He calls them to this place of commitment. And now as He has called them to the place of commitment, don't worry, we're going to stop here for tonight. As He calls them to this place of

commitment, now verses 20, or chapters 28 through the end of Deuteronomy are the ratification of the covenant. The pronouncing of the blessings and the cursings, the people declaring their obedience, and of course Moses' swan song before he goes up on that mountain to be taken away by the Lord. So let's close in prayer. Father, we come to you and we thank you that you have blessed us with your word. And Lord, as it has become so clear to us, it really can all be done. And we thank you for

this. That this all be summed up, your law can all be summed up with love the Lord your God My daho greeted with all your heart, soul and strength, and love your neighbor as yourself. And Lord, though we lack what it takes in our flesh, we know that through you we can do all things. So Holy Spirit, empower us, I pray, to be the men and women that you've called for us to be, created us a clean heart, fashioning us an obedient heart.

Father, we thank you for being in your presence. We thank you that God stop us. you for who you are. In Jesus' name. Amen. Be blessed.