Deuteronomy is a book that recounts the history of the people of God as they progress into the promised land. It is a book commonly referred to as covenant ratification; where the Lord, through Moses, reiterates the stipulations and promises of the covenant between God and His people. They are going into the land the Lord has promised them and, as such, they need to be reminded of the lifestyle they would need to keep when they take the land over.
Chapter 1 involves Moses highlighting the history of Israel in broad strokes, reminding some of why they would not be able to enter the promised land due to their previous rebellion against the Lord. The Lord told them that He was giving the land to them and that they should simply go and take possession of it (Deuteronomy 1:8, 21). Instead, Moses writes
26 “Yet you would not go up but rebelled against the command of the Lord your God. 27 And
you murmured in your tents and said, ‘Because the Lord hated us he has brought us out of the
land of Egypt, to give us into the hand of the Amorites, to destroy us. 28 Where are we going up?
Our brothers have made our hearts melt, saying, “The people are greater and taller than we. The
cities are great and fortified up to heaven. And besides, we have seen the sons of the Anakim
there.” ’ (Deuteronomy 1:26-28).
In these verses there are two aspects to their rebellion against the Lord. First, they rebelled in actions and feelings of ungodliness because they had forgotten the character of God. They refused to go into the land because they believed that the Lord was leading them, intentionally, into doom and certain death. Disobedience always begins with a reassessment of who God is so that our ungodly actions seem justifiable and warranted. They stood firm in their rebellion because they had assigned a false character to the Lord that made Him to be the unjust one and they, the just ones.
Obedience begins and ends with the character of God. Those who would blame God for the injustices in the world or those who would charge God with wrong because of the calamities in their life are those who are seeking a justifiable reason to go against His command and His Christ. The problem here, in Deuteronomy at least, is that the Lord has promised them the land. He had promised that they would inherit it. he had promised that they would be a numerous people for generations to come in the land. He was not leading them to death. he was leading them to life. So, God, after all, was not the real issue.
The real issue behind their rebellion was their fear in what or who they saw (v28). They were afraid of the Anakim who out-numbered them and were bigger (stronger) than Israel was. They saw the occupants of the land that the Lord had promised to them and they trembled and, as such, they rebelled, refusing to believe that they could take the land.
What struck me this morning was the contrast Moses puts to what they "saw." They said "we have seen the sons of the Anakim there (v28). To that Moses reminds them of what they had previously seen in the Lord:
30 The Lord your God who goes before you will himself fight for you, just as he did for you in
Egypt before your eyes, 31 and in the wilderness, where you have seen how the Lord your God
carried you, as a man carries his son, all the way that you went until you came to this place’
(emphasis added).
Do you see what Moses is doing? He is making their fear foolish by saying they were afraid of what they saw in the land because they had forgotten what they had seen in the Lord in Egypt and in the wilderness. Their rebellion was one in which they failed to see and remember the power of the Lord.
In the moment where fear is present Moses is teaching them that they had a present power in the Lord that was based on historical precedent. In other words, they feared in the present what they should never have feared because of the history they had with the Lord and power with which He rescued them, again and again. Yes, what was in front of them was scary and intimidating. It may have warped their strength a bit as they viewed the massive numbers before them. But they had the Lord! They forgot this history and, because fear dominated their passion and their practice, they rebelled against the Lord.
You and I are no different than Israel. We are faced with challenges and difficulties that are not only above our proverbial pay grade, but that take the life out of us as we face them. Yet, in Christ, we have a historical precedent that becomes our present power in the face of breathtaking circumstances. We have a Savior whose love has rescued us from the jaws of Satan and from the bowels of hell. We have a Lord who, in our own lives, has demonstrated a care, provision and deliverance that been on point without fail. We know the power of bowing the knee. We know the power of confession. We know the power of community. We know the power of the indwelling Holy Spirit. Israel knew, too, yet they rebelled (v32).
We counter rebellion, not by being bigger than our circumstances or stronger than our enemy. We counter rebellion in the powerful weakness of trusting the Lord's character and Word at all times. We counter rebellion by not allowing ourselves to see our problems from our vantage point. This will only produce fear, uncertainty and anxiety. Instead, we counter rebellion by seeing all of life from the vantage point of the Lord so that we can see it clearly, as he sees it. We need to allow the Lord to put us on His shoulders that we might be able to see above the giants that, from our perspective, hid His face, purposes and glory.
Comments