Category: Deuteronomy

Take a moment to read Deuteronomy 20 before reading the devotional below.

When I was a young teenager, one of my first chores was mowing the lawn.  One day, when I’d been mowing the lawn for an entire summer, we ran out of gas.  Rather than having to get gas, I decided to use the weed wacker to mow the lawn. When I was done, the lawn was an uneven, jagged mess.  Some areas were cut so low you could see the dirt. Other areas were so long that it looked like they hadn’t been cut at all. When my dad got home, he took one look at the lawn and made me do it again.  This time, I had to get gas and use the lawnmower. “Sometimes you can do the right job in the wrong way,” he said as he sent me on my way.

In Deuteronomy 20, God gives the Israelites instructions on how to do war properly.  He gives three basic rules. First, when going to war, trust in God. He wants to make sure that the Israelites don’t trust in their armies, or their generals.  If they win, they will win because God is on their side. Second, he tells them to try and make peace with any town before they attack it. War is a last resort.  Finally, he tells them that if they do have to go to war with a town, they are to execute all the men in the town. That’s a heavy command, and many people have wondered why God would command such a thing.  Once again, God does not explain. One principle that God often refers to is the obvious fact that any enemy has the potential to be a future temptation. Any enemy town that is left in the middle of Israelite territory might eventually tempt God’s people away from God’s leadership.  God commands his people to go to any lengths necessary to prevent that from happening.  Perhaps that is what God is thinking here.

As surely as he knew that his people would eventually have to go to war, he knows the complications that are coming up in your future.  God’s wisdom is enough to guide you through those difficult times. God’s word offers wise principles that can help you navigate those complicated moments of life.  The challenge is to make sure that we devote ourselves to knowing God’s word before things become difficult, so that when they do we know what God would say to us.

Take a moment to read the entire chapter of Deuteronomy 21 before reading the devotional below.

Reading the law book of an ancient civilization is an odd thing to do. Yet here we are, reading Deuteronomy and understanding it to be the inspired word of God. Today is a good reminder that the Bible is not like any other book. It is not even like other ancient civilization’s law books (if we even had access to others…). No, the Bible is the way that God has chosen to reveal himself. As such, we need to read it with this question in mind: “What is God trying to tell us about himself?”

If you read today’s passage as you would a regular book, it would probably be off-putting to your modern sensibilities. If you read it asking about the character of God, you get something much deeper: God demands human decency. There are four examples in this chapter — finding a dead body, taking in a prisoner of war, having a firstborn son who’s not your favorite, and having a rebellious son. Interestingly, the first three are offered protection. God makes them honor the dead, the female prisoners of war, and the less-than-favored firstborn son. All of them have rights in God’s book. However, the rebellious son gets stoned to death. Evil requires no protection.

No one is perfect, so receiving God’s protection does not mean you are sinless. However, there are some situations in which you are innocent, such as being a victim of murder, war, or an unloving father. Some of you have been victimized as well, and in that place God is 100% interested in restoring your dignity and worth. The evil you invite into your life, on the other hand, God will not allow to fester. Sin will always take you down and cause you to forfeit the good God has given you. Following God isn’t about being perfect, but it is always in our best interest to stay lined up with God’s ways. We are always protected when we stay near to him.

Take a moment to read the entire chapter of Deuteronomy 22 before reading the devotional below.

“What’s the most important part of your relationship with Jesus?” I asked.  I was leading a Wednesday night Bible study in a garage the church owned. We were stuffed between shelves of food for the church’s food pantry and the band equipment the Worship Team used for practice.  The answers were unsurprising: prayer, reading the Bible and going to church came up a lot. While I agree that these are important, the answers hinted at an unspoken assumption: there’s the “spiritual stuff” and the “non-spiritual stuff.”  Praying is spiritual, changing the oil in your car isn’t. Church is spiritual, stopping at Walmart isn’t.

This chapter of Deuteronomy challenges us to look past this spiritual/non-spiritual perspective that many of us see the world through.  In talking about faithfulness to God, this chapter uses “non-spiritual” words like “sheep” and “owner” and “tree” and “house.” In a society that was based on cattle and farming, God gave some solid, down-to-earth rules about how to choose to love God through everyday living.  The section is capped off with an extended conversation about adultery. God cares a lot about sexuality – He designed it to be a living reminder of his own love for humanity. It, too, is a practical, down-to-earth issue, and God offers wise counsel that reveals both God’s passion for healthy sexuality and his ongoing passion for justice.

Just as the Israelites could encounter God and his leadership in everyday events like farming and herding, you can encounter God through following his leadership in everyday events.  You can encounter God by how you choose to care for your family and your belongings. You can encounter God through your choices as an employee or a neighbor. In life every moment holds choices, and each choice is an opportunity to engage with God’s leadership in your life.  Every choice to follow God’s leadership leads you closer to him. Every admission of failure opens a road back to him. Either way, it is in the context of daily choices that the true experience of God can be found.

Take a moment to read the entire chapter of Deuteronomy 23 before reading the devotional below.

I remember the first time we had a babysitter watch our kids.  We left a note with lots of directions. There was a box of pasta on the kitchen counter that the babysitter could make for dinner.  She could tell the kids one story before they went to bed. The kids needed to make sure their teeth were brushed. The list went on and on.  Even so, as we left to go out on our date, we gave the babysitter a handful of other directions as well. We were explaining little details about what each of our children needed.  She needed to make sure our son actually ate his food. She needed to make sure that our daughter actually changed before bed. Looking back, I think it took us twenty-five minutes to get out of the house that night because we wanted to make sure everything was just right for our kids.

In this chapter of Deuteronomy, God wants to make sure that everything is just right for his people because he loves them.  He wants to make sure that he has covered every possible situation so that his people know what to do and how to do it and when to do it.  There are directions about how to deal with the nations that have intentionally rejected God, for example. There are also directions about charging interest on loans and proper hygiene.  All of these directions come from the same place as my directions to the babysitter. God loves his people. In his incredible wisdom he foresees many complicated situations in which they will need guidance.

It is tempting to assume that God’s rules are arbitrary or random. It is easy to assume that God is being callous or difficult.  In fact he loves you deeply. His rules are the wise guidance of a tender and loving father. That father often understand much that we do not, so it is at times difficult to trust.  However, if we have the courage to trust, we will find that God’s wisdom and love weave together to offer us the greatest possible future we could hope for.

Take a moment to read the entire chapter of Deuteronomy 24 before reading the devotional below.

“What is justice?” began one of my favorite college classes.  I was taking an ethics class with a group of pastors in Boston.  The professor did an amazing job in drawing out opinions and fostering a lively discussion.  By the end of the conversation, my mind was spinning with new and challenging thoughts. I began, for example, to think of justice in systemic ways for the first time – how society creates constructs that either promote or obstruct justice.  One thing was missing in my understanding of justice, however: action. Justice had become an idea to talk about or a concept to read and write about. It was an abstraction.

For God justice is never abstract; it is always practical.  As Deuteronomy 24 continues on through a series of seemingly disconnected rules, one major theme continues to emerge.  God cares about justice. He cares about justice for the divorced woman and the newly married man. He cares about justice for those giving loans and for those being kidnapped.  He cares about justice for day laborers and for foreigners. Note that on some level, each of these groups of people are disempowered. Somehow they need extra help to be sure they get the justice they deserve.  They don’t need extra help because they are somehow inherently less competent, however. They need extra help because systems of justice are most likely to fail them. They are the powerless, the disenfranchised, the disinherited.  

For some of us, some situations in our lives have left us as the victims of injustice. You may have been taken advantage of or abused or scammed.  If you have, God is passionate about restoring the balance of justice. He created you. He declares that you deserve justice. For some of us, however, some situations in our lives have left us as the perpetrators of injustice.  God’s law shines a clear light on our actions. We have no wiggle room to excuse or explain our actions. This could be a deeply disturbing realization, and we are fortunate to know the the love of God always offers mercy to the lawbreaker.  So if you are the victim: God promises you justice. If you are the perpetrator, God offers you mercy. In either situation you have a choice: will you trust the God of justice to care for you?