SPEAKER_02: Good evening.
SPEAKER_02: Would you open your Bibles to Deuteronomy chapter 32 as we continue our study through the Song of Moses, our second week studying this incredible song written by God to his people this week, considering Israel's rebellion against God.
SPEAKER_02: Deuteronomy chapter 32, looking at verses 5 through 18, and I will read them for us to set our minds on the text before we study it.
SPEAKER_02: Deuteronomy 32, 5.
SPEAKER_02: They, that is Israel, have dealt corruptly with him.
SPEAKER_02: They are no longer his children because they are blemished.
SPEAKER_02: They are a crooked and twisted generation.
SPEAKER_02: Do you thus repay Yahweh, you foolish and senseless people?
SPEAKER_02: Is not he your father who created you, who made you and established you?
SPEAKER_02: Remember the days of old and consider the years of many generations.
SPEAKER_02: Ask your father, and he'll show you.
SPEAKER_02: Your elders, and they'll tell you.
SPEAKER_02: When the Most High gave to the nations their inheritance, when he divided mankind, he fixed the borders of the peoples according to the number of the sons of God.
SPEAKER_02: But Yahweh's portion is his people.
SPEAKER_02: Jacob, his allotted heritage.
SPEAKER_02: He found him in a desert land, in the howling waste of the wilderness.
SPEAKER_02: He encircled him, he cared for him, he kept him as the apple of his eye.
SPEAKER_02: Like an eagle that stirs up its nest that flutters over its young, spreading out its wings, catching them, bearing them on its pinions.
SPEAKER_02: Yahweh alone guided him.
SPEAKER_02: No foreign God was with him.
SPEAKER_02: He made him ride on the high places of the land, and he ate the produce of the field, and he suckled him with honey out of the rock and oil out of the flinty rock, curds from the herd, and milk from the flock, with fat of lambs, rams of Bashan, and goats with the very finest of the wheat, and you drank foaming wine made from the blood of the grape.
SPEAKER_02: But Yeshurun grew fat and kicked.
SPEAKER_02: You grew fat, stout and sleek.
SPEAKER_02: Then he forsook God who made him and scoffed at the rock of his salvation.
SPEAKER_02: They stirred him to jealousy with strange gods, with abominations, they provoked him to anger.
SPEAKER_02: They sacrificed to demons that were no gods, to gods they had never known, to new gods that had come recently whom your fathers had never dreaded.
SPEAKER_01: You were unmindful of the rock that bore you, and you forgot the God who gave you birth.
SPEAKER_01: So reads the word of the living God.
SPEAKER_02: The problem was that things were going so well for Rehoboam.
SPEAKER_02: Rehoboam, the son of Solomon, you probably think of him because he's the one who split the kingdom in two.
SPEAKER_02: But 2 Chronicles chapter 12 tells us that actually after he split the kingdom, things were still going pretty well for him.
SPEAKER_02: He had prospered, he had military might, he had strength.
SPEAKER_02: And then it says in 2 Chronicles chapter 12, verse 1, when the rule of Rehoboam was established and he was strong, he abandoned the law of Yahweh and all Israel with him.
SPEAKER_02: Likewise, King Uzziah.
SPEAKER_02: Things were going swimmingly.
SPEAKER_02: 52 years on the throne, a boy king who followed God and obeyed his law, and who also prospered, who had all kinds of sheep and goats, who had a massive army, who created siege weaponry, and who prospered Israel because of it.
SPEAKER_02: But then all the same, Second Chronicles chapter 26, verse 15, in Israel he made machines invented by skillful men to be on the towers and the corners to shoot arrows and great stones, and his fame spread far, for he was marvelously helped till he was strong.
SPEAKER_02: But when he was strong, he grew proud to his destruction, for he was unfaithful to Yahweh his God, and entered the temple of Yahweh to burn incense on the altar of incense.
SPEAKER_02: Sadly, it was the same for good King Hezekiah as well.
SPEAKER_02: Hezekiah also believed in God and followed him and obeyed him and prospered because of it.
SPEAKER_02: His kingdom was safe from the Assyrians because he had prayed to God and asked for deliverance, and God granted it.
SPEAKER_02: And so all of the nations started bringing gifts, it says, and precious things to Hezekiah, king of Judah, so that he was exalted in the sight of all nations from that time onward.
SPEAKER_02: But then 2 Chronicles 32 tells us that he became sick, and Yahweh saved him.
SPEAKER_02: But verse 25, Hezekiah did not make return according to the benefit done to him, for his heart was proud.
SPEAKER_02: Therefore wrath came upon him and Judah and Jerusalem.
SPEAKER_02: All three kings counted their blessings and named them one by one.
SPEAKER_02: And that was precisely the problem.
SPEAKER_02: Their blessings became their boast.
SPEAKER_02: God's gifts became their God.
SPEAKER_02: What should have been a prompt for thanksgiving became a pedestal for idol worship.
SPEAKER_02: And it's the same for us.
SPEAKER_02: Often your greatest test is when you are blessed.
SPEAKER_02: God's goodness itself can become a trap.
SPEAKER_02: The Song of Moses, Deuteronomy 32, tells us the story of the rise and the fall and the redemption of Israel, written around 1406 BC by Moses at the direction of God.
SPEAKER_02: God apparently dictates this song to Moses as a warning to the people of Israel.
SPEAKER_02: They're on the edge of the promised land and the plains of Moab, about to enter into Canaan, which God is going to give them, a land flowing with milk and honey, a land full of blessing.
SPEAKER_02: And so God gives them this witness, this warning to live unforgotten in their mouths as a rebuke against their future rebellion.
SPEAKER_02: And this song we saw last week begins with a reminder about the character of this rock, who is going to be there for them through every age.
SPEAKER_02: The rock, it says, verse 4, his work is perfect, all his ways are justice, a God of faithfulness and without iniquity, just and upright is he.
SPEAKER_02: That's the first reminder that they needed was the character of their God.
SPEAKER_02: But now in verses 5 through 18, we begin to hear the history of Israel as they relate to this rock.
SPEAKER_02: And it's a fascinating tale because, in part, some of the events that are described in Deuteronomy 32 have not happened to the people of Israel when they are first said.
SPEAKER_02: Some of them have already occurred, but it speaks also of the conquering of the land and what will happen to them when they take the land, a future generation and their own relationship with the rock.
SPEAKER_02: And why is that?
SPEAKER_02: Well, it's because this song was meant to be a timeless warning.
SPEAKER_02: It wasn't just for the immediate audience, it was for coming generations of Israelites, and it's for us today.
SPEAKER_02: This is a timeless song about the rock, our God, and his people.
SPEAKER_02: And in verses five through six, God tells them, before they ever walk away from him, about their apostasy and how wicked they will be.
SPEAKER_02: Look at verse five.
SPEAKER_02: It says, They have dealt corruptly with him.
SPEAKER_02: They are no longer his children, because they are blemished.
SPEAKER_02: They are a crooked and twisted generation.
SPEAKER_02: These three phrases meant to parallel the three phrases in verse four as a contrast.
SPEAKER_02: God is perfect, they the opposite.
SPEAKER_02: He is holy, they are defiled and corrupt.
SPEAKER_02: He is perfect, they are blemished.
SPEAKER_02: He is straight, morally upright, they are morally bent and crooked.
SPEAKER_02: The glory of Israel is what their God does, says, and is.
SPEAKER_02: And the shame of Israel is what they do, say, and are.
SPEAKER_02: Speaking to a future generation, God goes on then to question their apostasy, their turning away from him and to idols.
SPEAKER_02: He says this in verse 6 Do you thus repay Yahweh, you foolish and senseless people?
SPEAKER_02: Meaning, this makes absolutely no sense what you have done.
SPEAKER_02: That you have given back to God rebellion and apostasy and idolatry when he has only given you blessing.
SPEAKER_02: Based on who God is to you, what he's said to you, and what he's done for you, forsaking God is the most foolish thing that you could do, Israel.
SPEAKER_02: You are returning evil for good.
SPEAKER_02: This is the behavior, he says, of a madman.
SPEAKER_02: And what good has God done to them?
SPEAKER_02: Well, look at the second part of verse 6.
SPEAKER_02: Is not he your father who created you, who made you, and established you?
SPEAKER_02: He says he's his father.
SPEAKER_02: He called them in Exodus chapter 4, his son.
SPEAKER_02: He related to them like a father, meaning that he created them.
SPEAKER_02: It's a mercantile word.
SPEAKER_02: It means he purchased them, he bought them, he made them, he fashioned them, he crafted them at Sinai by the law, and then he established them, he made them ready, he prepared them for the glories that were to be theirs.
SPEAKER_02: And the sad story of Israel is that in response to all that grace from God, they spurned him.
SPEAKER_02: They forsook him, they left him, and instead started worshiping idols, practicing necromancing, murdering, raping, worse.
SPEAKER_02: They forsook their generous God.
SPEAKER_02: And what we need to see in this text this evening is that this is not just a song for a nation in the 1400s BC.
SPEAKER_02: This is a song that is for you and I, who have also been richly blessed by a generous God.
SPEAKER_02: It's the same warning to us.
SPEAKER_02: Because God is the same, and sin, though its trappings may change, is basically the same.
SPEAKER_02: We need the same category of warning.
SPEAKER_02: It might look different for us than it did for Israel, but blessings are blessings, aren't they?
SPEAKER_02: God blesses you with a house, God blesses you with a spouse, a family, an education, wealth.
SPEAKER_02: And God blesses you with spiritual growth, maturity, sobriety, love, grace, his own very spirit.
SPEAKER_02: The tokens of God's favor for you are all over your life.
SPEAKER_02: And Moses' point here is that they can become the very snare that leads you away from God.
SPEAKER_02: Apostasy, forsaking God to worship another, is always the same.
SPEAKER_02: And so Deuteronomy 32 is just giving us a glimpse into the heart that forsakes God in order to warn us against it.
SPEAKER_02: I don't know where you are this evening in your relationship with God, but I do know that at any moment you could fall victim to this very same temptation.
SPEAKER_02: That you too have been blessed by God in some way.
SPEAKER_02: You have received richly from the hand of God.
SPEAKER_02: And you also need to hear that apostasy is only two steps away from you.
SPEAKER_02: The first is that you get from God.
SPEAKER_02: You get from God, meaning you get good things from God.
SPEAKER_02: Look at verse 7.
SPEAKER_02: Moses says, Remember the days of old.
SPEAKER_02: Consider the years of many generations.
SPEAKER_02: Ask your father, and he'll show you your elders.
SPEAKER_02: And they'll tell you.
SPEAKER_02: This word, remember, it's a very common word in the Old Testament, and particularly in Deuteronomy 13 times.
SPEAKER_02: God says, remember, remember, remember.
SPEAKER_02: That's part of how Israel stays faithful to God, is that they don't forget the goodness of God to them.
SPEAKER_02: And what he's about to describe for them spans Genesis 10 all the way to at least Judges 20.
SPEAKER_02: So some of the first hearers of this very oracle would actually be the elders one day, retelling this to their children, reminding them about the kindness that they got from God.
SPEAKER_02: And it begins in verse 8.
SPEAKER_02: What are these blessings, this generosity that they, the nation of Israel, have received from God?
SPEAKER_02: Verse 8.
SPEAKER_02: Jacob, his allotted heritage.
SPEAKER_02: This word most high, it refers to God as he is exalted over all of the kings of the other nations.
SPEAKER_02: He's not just high, he's the most high.
SPEAKER_02: He has sovereignty not just over Israel, but over the whole world.
SPEAKER_02: And because of that, he's able to apportion out for the nations whatever their allotment of land is.
SPEAKER_02: This is going all the way back to Genesis chapter 10, what's usually called the table of nations in Genesis 11 as well, the Tower of Babel, where God divides people into different language groups, and he sets them up in different places on planet Earth.
SPEAKER_02: He separates out the nations.
SPEAKER_02: It says in Acts chapter 17, verse 26, that he fixed boundaries for the peoples in their dwelling places.
SPEAKER_02: Now, there is a textual issue here where it says, according to the number of the sons of God, and you'll probably see it if you look at the ESV, there's a footnote, it says it could be sons of Israel.
SPEAKER_02: There's a whole long debate here.
SPEAKER_02: I'm not going to bug you down in it, but the summary of it is that I think probably the best reading is sons of Israel.
SPEAKER_02: The one that's in the footnote.
SPEAKER_02: I think that's probably the better way to understand this.
SPEAKER_02: That what he's saying is that when the Most High God divided up mankind amongst his different nations, he had Israel in his mind.
SPEAKER_02: That he knew that he was going to plant a people named Israel in a land called Canaan.
SPEAKER_02: And so he fixed the borders of it just so, knowing exactly who he would put there, even the number of them.
SPEAKER_02: This is saying that God, before there ever was a Jacob or an Isaac or even an Abraham, had set his heart on them.
SPEAKER_02: He had chosen them.
SPEAKER_02: They were his.
SPEAKER_02: That's one of those Tyndale translations.
SPEAKER_02: Apple of his eye, literally just the pupil.
SPEAKER_02: He was constantly in God's sight.
SPEAKER_02: God would not stop looking at him.
SPEAKER_02: He had fixed his affection on this people.
SPEAKER_02: And so, like an eagle, it says verse 11, that stirs up its nest, that flutters over its young, he guided them.
SPEAKER_02: This is probably an image taken from Exodus chapter 19, verses 4 to 5, where God protects his people and calls them his own like an eagle.
SPEAKER_02: It stirs up its nest, it's fluttering over its young, meaning it's it's caring for it, it's protecting it.
SPEAKER_02: Words and images of a great parent eagle doing what it must to provide for its young.
SPEAKER_02: That's the image here.
SPEAKER_02: It's emphasizing both that Israel is very young and that it can't do anything for itself, and that God is providing for it in every way.
SPEAKER_02: God does everything.
SPEAKER_02: It feeds Israel.
SPEAKER_02: He feeds Israel, he cares for Israel, he protects Israel all the way through the wilderness.
SPEAKER_02: Now it's speaking about in their wilderness wanderings that God himself was there with him as a pillar of cloud and a pillar of fire.
SPEAKER_02: It's not like he farmed this out to some angel.
SPEAKER_02: He himself was there.
SPEAKER_02: As Israel wanders through the desert, God leads them as a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night.
SPEAKER_02: And notice he emphasizes, Yahweh alone guided him, no foreign God was with him.
SPEAKER_02: I mean, where was Baal when you guys were wandering around in the wilderness?
SPEAKER_02: Where was Molech?
SPEAKER_02: Were they on vacation?
SPEAKER_02: What was happening with them at that point?
SPEAKER_02: Did they help you at all?
SPEAKER_02: No, it was only God.
SPEAKER_02: Only God who blessed them.
SPEAKER_02: And then verse 13, it transitions now to a yet future occurrence of them going into the land, taking ownership of it, and being blessed by God there in the promised land.
SPEAKER_02: Verse 13, he made him ride on the High places of the land, and he ate the produce of the field, ride like ride on a horse.
SPEAKER_02: It's a rich military kind of imagery.
SPEAKER_02: They're in charge.
SPEAKER_02: They have conquest of this land.
SPEAKER_02: And then he just piles up these rhyming images about abundant wealth, the land flowing with milk and honey, how God blessed Israel beyond imagining.
SPEAKER_02: He says they got honey from the rock.
SPEAKER_02: When was the last time you got honey out of a rock?
SPEAKER_02: That's how rich this land is.
SPEAKER_02: There's honey everywhere.
SPEAKER_02: Not even just in the honey pot.
SPEAKER_02: It's coming out of the rocks.
SPEAKER_02: Same with oil.
SPEAKER_02: Remember, in the wilderness they got water out of the rocks.
SPEAKER_02: Now there's oil coming out of it.
SPEAKER_02: It's even greater than that.
SPEAKER_02: Curds and milk.
SPEAKER_02: They have dairy production.
SPEAKER_02: Probably making some cheese.
SPEAKER_02: They got fat of lambs.
SPEAKER_02: This word fat is used multiple times.
SPEAKER_02: Fat of lambs and rams, they have delicious barbecue.
SPEAKER_02: Enjoying some animals.
SPEAKER_02: They have the finest of wheat, literally the fat of the wheat, the foaming wine.
SPEAKER_02: I mean, this is just rich agriculture.
SPEAKER_02: When they get into the land, they don't even work for it.
SPEAKER_02: God just starts feeding them.
SPEAKER_02: It's a banquet, it's a feast.
SPEAKER_02: This is like a buffet, and they didn't even pay for it.
SPEAKER_02: In short, God made them rich.
SPEAKER_02: Look at all that they got from God.
SPEAKER_02: And initially that really went pretty well.
SPEAKER_02: Nehemiah chapter 9, verse 25 is just kind of recounting this.
SPEAKER_02: It says, and they captured fortified cities and a rich land, and they took possession of houses full of all good things, cisterns already hewn, vineyards, olive orchards, and fruit trees in abundance.
SPEAKER_02: So they ate and were filled and became fat and delighted themselves in your great goodness.
SPEAKER_02: That was how it should have been.
SPEAKER_02: That's what God intended to do.
SPEAKER_02: He wanted to bless these people.
SPEAKER_02: And he wanted them to enjoy it.
SPEAKER_02: You say, well, that's all right for Israel, but their blessings are different than mine.
SPEAKER_02: Might be nice for them to have some fat rams and whatever, but that's not my life.
SPEAKER_02: My life is different from theirs.
SPEAKER_02: Paul would beg to differ.
SPEAKER_02: He says in 1 Corinthians chapter 10 that your spiritual privileges are more similar to theirs than you realize.
SPEAKER_02: For I do not want you to be unaware, brothers, that our fathers were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea, and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea, meaning they identified with their leader, Moses, and all ate the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink, meaning the source of it was the Spirit of God.
SPEAKER_02: For they drank from the spiritual rock that followed them, and the rock was Christ.
SPEAKER_02: I think an intentional reference to Deuteronomy 32.
SPEAKER_02: You get what Paul is saying here.
SPEAKER_02: Listen, the same God that was blessing them is blessing you.
SPEAKER_02: They had baptism, or at least something like it.
SPEAKER_02: They had communion, or at least something like it.
SPEAKER_02: They were blessed spiritually, and so are you.
SPEAKER_02: God has given you rich blessing.
SPEAKER_02: The problem is what it says in verse 5 of 1 Corinthians 10.
SPEAKER_02: Nevertheless, with most of them God was not pleased.
SPEAKER_02: For they were overthrown in the wilderness.
SPEAKER_02: Same God, same Christ.
SPEAKER_02: We have also received a bounty far greater than what we deserve, have we not?
SPEAKER_02: So what are you supposed to be doing with those blessings?
SPEAKER_02: Like if God were to give you the finest of wheat, if God were to give you foaming wine, what are you supposed to do with all that?
SPEAKER_02: Well, actually, it's a lot simpler than you think.
SPEAKER_02: You're supposed to enjoy it.
SPEAKER_02: This is how Solomon says it in Ecclesiastes 9.
SPEAKER_02: Go, eat your bread with joy, and drink your wine with a merry heart, for God has already approved what you do.
SPEAKER_02: Let your garments be always white, let not oil be lacking on your head.
SPEAKER_02: Enjoy life with the wife whom you love all the days of your vain life that He's given you under the sun, because that's your portion in life, and in your toil at which you toil under the sun.
SPEAKER_02: You're supposed to enjoy the blessings that God gives you.
SPEAKER_02: That's why he gives them.
SPEAKER_02: But they're not supposed to terminate there.
SPEAKER_02: Your enjoyment of those blessings is a conduit of joy.
SPEAKER_02: It's not the terminus of joy.
SPEAKER_02: And here's just the New Testament version of this.
SPEAKER_02: Paul says this in 1 Timothy chapter 4, writing to his beloved child in the faith, Timothy, against the false teachers.
SPEAKER_02: He says, For everything created by God is good, and nothing is to be rejected, here's the if, if it is received with thanksgiving.
SPEAKER_02: For it is made holy by the word of God in prayer.
SPEAKER_02: Why does God feed you so that you will give God thanks?
SPEAKER_02: Why does God bless his people so that they will worship him?
SPEAKER_02: So that they will enjoy those good riches that he gives, and in return give him the praise that he is due.
SPEAKER_02: That's why God is a generous God.
SPEAKER_02: He's looking for the worship, he's looking for the praise, he's overflowing with his love and bounty because he wants you to see how good he is and worship him for it.
SPEAKER_02: Appreciate that up until this point in Deuteronomy 32, Israel's biography of blessing has very little to do with them.
SPEAKER_02: They didn't work for all of those rams.
SPEAKER_02: They didn't conquer Canaan by themselves.
SPEAKER_02: No, that was God.
SPEAKER_02: He did that for them.
SPEAKER_02: So it is in the Christian life.
SPEAKER_02: God blesses you.
SPEAKER_02: Our part then is to respond in loyal love, in praise, to say thank you to God, to look through the good gifts to the giver, who is greater than the gift.
SPEAKER_02: Which means, I think, that when you pray at meals, that is a far more holy moment than you probably realize.
SPEAKER_02: I hope it's not just a perfunctor rub-a-dub-dub, thanks for the grub.
SPEAKER_02: I hope that when you sit down to eat, you actually give a heartfelt thank you to God, because that's why that food's there.
SPEAKER_02: That's why God blesses you in all the ways that He does.
SPEAKER_02: It's so that you will worship Him.
SPEAKER_02: You'll recognize He's the one who gave it, and you return back to Him praise.
SPEAKER_02: But for Israel, this blessing from God becomes a snare.
SPEAKER_02: So how do you forsake God?
SPEAKER_02: Well, first you get from God and then you just forget it.
SPEAKER_02: You forget God.
SPEAKER_02: The major turn in this passage is verse 15.
SPEAKER_02: But Jeshurun grew fat and kicked.
SPEAKER_02: It's a turn from God's provision to Israel's rebellion.
SPEAKER_02: And what a phrase that sums it up.
SPEAKER_02: Jeshurun grew fat and kicked.
SPEAKER_02: It's only used four times.
SPEAKER_02: It means the upright one.
SPEAKER_02: There's an irony to it.
SPEAKER_02: And it says he grew fat.
SPEAKER_02: Goes on to say he grew fat, stout, and sleek.
SPEAKER_02: Those are words that mean swollen, gorged, obese, and stubborn because of it.
SPEAKER_02: And there's an intimate connection in this verse between the growing fat and the kicking.
SPEAKER_02: He grows fat, and that's why he kicks.
SPEAKER_02: The image is of an animal, like a horse that's just been gorged, and then its owner comes to it to try to ride it or use it, and it bucks against him and says, no.
SPEAKER_02: Because it grew fat, it kicked.
SPEAKER_02: And the consequence is that it forsook God who made him and scoffed at the rock of his salvation.
SPEAKER_02: Once he was fat and happy, he thought, what do I need God for?
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, sure, I needed him in the wilderness.
SPEAKER_02: How else was I going to eat?
SPEAKER_02: But now that my belly is full, how badly do I really need this God?
SPEAKER_02: When things are going well, in some ways that's the greatest temptation.
SPEAKER_02: What do you need God for?
SPEAKER_02: But what that mindset fails to recognize is that the calm and the peace and the full feeling that you enjoy is itself a gift from God to begin with.
SPEAKER_02: He's the one who fed you.
SPEAKER_02: And so it makes no sense.
SPEAKER_02: That's the idea in this text.
SPEAKER_02: It just makes no sense to forsake a God who made you.
SPEAKER_02: The God who's saving you, to scoff at him, to laugh at him, to mock him.
SPEAKER_02: It's the height of folly.
SPEAKER_02: And that's how apostasy always is.
SPEAKER_02: It's always, well, God's given me what I need, so I don't need God anymore.
SPEAKER_02: What is it that Israel actually did?
SPEAKER_02: Verses 16 and 17 sum it up as basically idolatry, that they turned to idols.
SPEAKER_02: They broke the first and the second commandments.
SPEAKER_02: It describes these idols in six different ways.
SPEAKER_02: It describes them as strange ones.
SPEAKER_02: They stirred him to jealousy with strange gods, and we'll talk about that jealousy next week.
SPEAKER_02: It calls them abominations.
SPEAKER_02: They are abominations that provoked him to anger.
SPEAKER_02: Abominations, one of the strongest words you could use for something defiled and evil in the Old Testament.
SPEAKER_02: They sacrificed to demons that were not gods.
SPEAKER_02: We find out as we continue reading the Bible, anytime someone's worshiping an idol, they're not just worshiping a statue.
SPEAKER_02: They're actually worshiping a demon who has inspired that false religion.
SPEAKER_02: They're worshiping the minions of Satan.
SPEAKER_02: But he says there are no gods to gods that they had never known.
SPEAKER_02: What does that mean?
SPEAKER_02: They're not gods or they're gods?
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
SPEAKER_02: They're not actually gods, but people certainly consider them to be gods, don't they?
SPEAKER_02: To gods they had never known.
SPEAKER_02: These are Johnny come lately.
SPEAKER_02: Where were they in the wilderness?
SPEAKER_02: To new gods who had come recently, it says, whom your fathers had never dreaded.
SPEAKER_02: Why are you starting to worship this God?
SPEAKER_02: He was never here before.
SPEAKER_02: He had nothing to do with you getting full to begin with.
SPEAKER_02: Now, why are you turning around to worship him to try to get more full?
SPEAKER_02: It doesn't make sense.
SPEAKER_02: So idols are described as strange abominations, demons, unknown gods, new gods, unfeared gods.
SPEAKER_02: And because of that, Israel's described as unfaithful, deceived, and foolish.
SPEAKER_02: This is a little bit like for those of you who have real little kids, when you have a baby and you're trying to feed it, you take the food and just throw it right back in your face.
SPEAKER_02: That's this.
SPEAKER_02: You say, God, thank you for blessing me.
SPEAKER_02: Forget you.
SPEAKER_02: I don't want to have anything to do with you.
SPEAKER_02: Also, I would still like some money, please.
SPEAKER_02: The consequence, verse 18, you were unmindful of the rock that bore you.
SPEAKER_02: You wouldn't even exist without this God.
SPEAKER_02: And you can't give him half a second's thought.
SPEAKER_02: The word unmindful it has to do with intentional neglect.
SPEAKER_02: This wasn't just like it didn't make it on the calendar.
SPEAKER_02: Oops.
SPEAKER_02: This is an intentional move.
SPEAKER_02: I did not want this God anymore.
SPEAKER_02: And it says you forgot the God who gave you birth.
SPEAKER_02: The normal word for forget, it's the opposite of remember.
SPEAKER_02: This is exactly what Israel does.
SPEAKER_02: They having been blessed by God, turn those blessings themselves into their idols, start worshiping them, and completely forget where the resources that they used to make their wooden idols came from to begin with.
SPEAKER_02: They came from God.
SPEAKER_02: Tragically, this plays out all over Israel's history.
SPEAKER_02: One of the most striking instances of it we see is in the book of Hosea.
SPEAKER_02: Hosea chapter 10 says this.
SPEAKER_02: The more his fruit increased, the more altars he built.
SPEAKER_02: As his country improved, he improved his pillars.
SPEAKER_02: Pillars is a site of false worship.
SPEAKER_02: The more rich you got, the more idols you bought.
SPEAKER_02: How'd you get rich?
SPEAKER_02: God.
SPEAKER_02: Or it says again in Hosea chapter 13, verse 6.
SPEAKER_02: I'll back up in verse 5.
SPEAKER_02: It says, It was I who knew you in the wilderness in the land of drought, but when they had grazed, they became full.
SPEAKER_02: They were filled, and their heart was lifted up.
SPEAKER_02: Therefore they forgot me.
SPEAKER_02: What I want you to appreciate here is that idolatry is always birthed from blessing.
SPEAKER_02: You would have nothing good to worship unless a good God had given it to you.
SPEAKER_02: That means that the greatest enemies of your blessing to God are quite often your blessings from God.
SPEAKER_02: Like I exist on my own.
SPEAKER_02: I don't need God to continue living to sustain me.
SPEAKER_02: I'm just fine, thanks.
SPEAKER_02: When it's this very God who in his tenderness sustains your every breath.
SPEAKER_02: Even the fist that you use to shake at this God is on loan from him.
SPEAKER_02: Oh, how tempting to worship the creature rather than the creator.
SPEAKER_02: And Moses warned them that this is how this is going to happen.
SPEAKER_02: Back in the earlier part of Deuteronomy, Deuteronomy chapter 8, he says, This take care, lest you forget Yahweh your God by not keeping his commandments and his rules and his statutes, which I command you today, lest when you have eaten and are full and have built good houses and live in them, and when your herds and flocks multiply, and your silver and gold is multiplied, and all that you have is multiplied, then your heart be lifted up, and you forget Yahweh your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.
SPEAKER_02: And then he goes on to say in verse 16 or sorry, 17 beware lest you say in your heart, My power and the might of my hand have gotten me this wealth.
SPEAKER_02: What a short memory we have.
SPEAKER_02: You shall remember Yahweh your God, for it is he who gives you power to get wealth, that he may confirm his covenant that he swore to your fathers as it is this day.
SPEAKER_02: What are you supposed to do then with this perennial danger that blessing presents us?
SPEAKER_02: God has been kind to you, he has been generous to you, you're supposed to enjoy it, and yet you know, on the other hand, you might turn it into an idol any second.
SPEAKER_02: What are you supposed to do?
SPEAKER_02: Well, I don't want you to live in constant fear, but what I do want you to do is what Moses says, Deuteronomy 8, 11, that you take care lest you forget your God.
SPEAKER_02: This is the very same thing that Paul says in 1 Corinthians chapter 10, which we were reading earlier, chapter 10, verse 13, he says, Let anyone who thinks that he stands take heed lest he fall.
SPEAKER_02: Meaning, anytime you receive something good from God, you must be vigilant that your heart does not make it an object of worship.
SPEAKER_02: You just have to know the sinful predisposition of your own heart that you want to take every meal and make it your God, rather than using it as a vehicle for worship to the true God who has fed you.
SPEAKER_02: You have to be watchful.
SPEAKER_02: This is what Jesus said to his disciples who couldn't even stay an hour awake.
SPEAKER_02: He said, Stay awake, be alert, keep on watch.
SPEAKER_02: Know your heart is just like the Israelites.
SPEAKER_02: That you too can grow fat and kick.
SPEAKER_02: If the problem is forgetting, then presumably the solution is remembering.
SPEAKER_02: And that's what the song is meant to do, Deuteronomy 32, to remind us.
SPEAKER_02: You have a good and a gracious God.
SPEAKER_02: And he blesses you with more than you could ever deserve from him.
SPEAKER_02: And he does it so that you will worship him and enjoy him forever, and yet you must know that your own heart will lead you astray.
SPEAKER_02: Beware each blessing, let it not become a snare for your feet, that you would trip and fall into sin.
SPEAKER_02: And there's countless ways that this remembering happens.
SPEAKER_02: I mean, there's the song in Deuteronomy, we talked about songs last week, like hymns, how they're helpful for us.
SPEAKER_02: They remind us constantly of these kinds of truths that we need.
SPEAKER_02: But I think there's another, really even more simple way to constantly remind yourself of the goodness of this God, of the goodness of the blessings that He's given you, and the need for you to stave off idolatry.
SPEAKER_02: And it's really, really simple.
SPEAKER_02: It's thankfulness.
SPEAKER_02: Thankfulness.
SPEAKER_02: A thankful people is not an idolatrous people.
SPEAKER_02: A thankful people knows where their food comes from.
SPEAKER_02: A thankful people knows who they are.
SPEAKER_02: A thankful people recognizes how unthankful they can be.
SPEAKER_02: And a thankful people knows what they were made for.
SPEAKER_02: This is the primary problem of humanity.
SPEAKER_02: Romans chapter 1, verse 20 says even though that they knew God existed, they did not what?
SPEAKER_02: Honor him as God or give thanks to him as God.
SPEAKER_02: That's what you were made to do.
SPEAKER_02: To receive all of the fullness of the glory of God, both in material blessing that he gives you and in spiritual fullness to enjoy his fellowship forever and eternity and to render back to him praise and worship and thanks.
SPEAKER_02: And so one of the most profound things that you can do to protect your heart, dear Saint, is to thank God for every last blessing.
SPEAKER_02: Maybe it's not such a bad thing after all, to count your blessings and name them one by one.
SPEAKER_02: And in fact, this is precisely what Paul commands us to do in the book that we started studying this morning, Colossians.
SPEAKER_02: Colossians chapter 3, he says in verses 15 to 17, and be thankful.
SPEAKER_02: Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs with thankfulness in your hearts to God.
SPEAKER_02: And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through Him.
SPEAKER_02: This is why you and I exist is to be recipients of God's goodness and then reflections of thankfulness.
SPEAKER_02: Count your blessings.
SPEAKER_02: Name them one by one.
SPEAKER_02: Count your blessings till the work is done.
SPEAKER_02: That should be our motto this week.
SPEAKER_02: What is the finest of wheat that the Lord has given to you?
SPEAKER_02: What is the foaming wine, the rams, the lambs?
SPEAKER_02: What has God blessed you with?
SPEAKER_02: Look around this room.
SPEAKER_02: Do you think the Lord has blessed you?
SPEAKER_02: Look at these people that you get to spend all Sunday with, worshiping and praising God.
SPEAKER_02: Look at your family.
SPEAKER_02: Look at the cross up on the wall.
SPEAKER_02: Do you have anything to be thankful for, believer?
SPEAKER_01: Father, we thank you.
SPEAKER_02: As the God of all grace, because you have so richly given to us, we have gotten far more from you than we could ever deserve.
SPEAKER_02: Chiefly, you have given us Christ.
SPEAKER_02: Your very self.
SPEAKER_02: Your son.
SPEAKER_02: And it is in him and through him and to him that we orient our lives.
SPEAKER_02: Oh God, we pray guard us from the sinister temptation to worship the creature rather than the creator.
SPEAKER_02: And yet at the same time, Father, may we receive from your hand such rich bounty, such great blessing, that we might return back to you the praise you are due.
SPEAKER_02: Shine into our hearts with the light of Christ that we might not be dull or unaware.
SPEAKER_02: Keep us watchful.
SPEAKER_02: Show us each day the glory of Christ so that we might pray back to you thanks.
SPEAKER_02: You are good and you do good.
SPEAKER_02: And so we praise you as the God of all grace, generous, kind, and worthy.
SPEAKER_02: We pray all of this in Jesus' name.
SPEAKER_02: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: And now for a parting word from Pastor Jesse Johnson.
SPEAKER_00: Thanks for joining us.
SPEAKER_00: If you're in the Washington, D.C.
SPEAKER_00: area, I would love to see you at Emanuel Bible Church.
SPEAKER_00: For more information on our church or our current service times, go to IBC.church.
SPEAKER_00: For more information about the Master Seminary and their Washington, D.C.
SPEAKER_00: location, go to TMS.edu.
SPEAKER_00: I hope this resource has been a blessing to you and it helps you seek the Lord daily, serve others around you, and share the gospel with all of us.