deuteronomy 29-30

Read Deuteronomy 29-30 at Bible Gateway.

The theme of the last speech that we read yesterday was admonition. Today’s speech is a prophecy of repentance and return. We will find, as we continue reading through the Old Testament, that Israel did forsake their covenant with the LORD, they did go after other gods and serve them, and the curses and devastation which Moses promised would come upon them, came upon them. The LORD uprooted them from their land, and they were scattered to the nations, to the four winds under heaven.

Chapter 30 verse 1 begins with, “Now it shall come to pass …”; the prophecy continues. Moses did not just prophesy the apostasy, the wrath, and the devastation of the land. Those bad things are not the end. God will cause His people Israel to call to mind, when they are scattered to the four corners of the earth, that all the blessings and all the curses written in this book came to pass upon them for forsaking the LORD their God, and they will repent of their idolatry, and they will return to worship the LORD God only with a circumcised heart, and obey all His commandments again. When they do, God will gather them from the four corners where they have been driven, and He will return them to their land, and pour out His blessing upon them.

We are living in the days of the fulfillment of this prophecy. The Jews yes, are returning to their land. The Jews are composed mainly of two tribes of the twelve tribes of Israel: Judah and Benjamin. We will see this as we continue through the Old Testament. This prophecy applies to the other ten tribes, who are not Jews, as well. God’s word will come to pass in every particular!

Are you seeing any of the curses come to pass in your life? One of the biggest that God’s people face today, is the children of God’s people who grow up and do not have circumcised hearts toward YHVH, to love Him, serve Him only, and obey Him with all their heart! This curse came to pass in our lives. I learned from this very passage (Deu 30:6), that if that is the case, the remedy for it, is not more prayer, more fasting, nor more taking authority over the enemy, nor more standing on the Word of God in faith. All those things are good, and we did all of them, but none of them changed the root problem of our children, who did not have circumcised hearts toward YHVH!

I saw this curse come upon me, here in the land of my exile. I called it to mind. I repented – I lived just like a Gentile. I did not rest on the 7th day in honor of my Creator who rested on the 7th day. I celebrated man made holidays but not the LORD’s commanded feast days. I ate BBQ pork ribs and shrimp. I was in fact ignorant of the Law, because Christians, if they read the Old Testament at all, skip over these obsolete books, right? A short four months after I began learning what God commandments were, and putting them into practice in my life, my children started coming home with circumcised hearts toward the LORD. I had prayed and fasted and stood on the Word and everything else without ceasing for five years without avail! And your children will too. God’s Word is true in every particular!

For further study: Can you find the chiastic structure we saw might be forming yesterday, which would continue in today’s reading? The blessings of Deu 28:1-14, we thought might be the central axis. Please post it in the comments if you do happen to work it out!

Finding Messiah:

“But the word is very near you, in your mouth and in your heart, that you may do it.” Deu 30:14

These words of YHVH, and these commandments which He spoke with His own voice before Israel, became flesh and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth. The Word is Messiah. He is very near us, even in our hearts, that we may do His Word, all His commandments!