"Passing the Baton (Deuteronomy 31:1-32:47)", Austin Gooch | 6/21/26
Deuteronomy 31:1-32:47 | 6/21/26 | Austin Gooch
In 1642, the mission statement of Harvard University read as follows: “Everyone shall consider as the main end of his life and studies, to know God and Jesus Christ, which is eternal life.” Their motto was “For the Glory of Christ.” But in 1707, John Leverett was appointed as President of Harvard, and the primacy and authority of scripture was curtailed. By the early 19th century, the hallmarks of theological liberalism: the denial of the virgin birth, bodily resurrection of Jesus, and the centrality of the atonement had been gutted from the Divinity School.
This failure of earlier leadership within Harvard to pass the baton of the orthodox faith from one generation to the next had dramatic consequences for mainline Protestantism and America as a whole.
We the church, undergoing leadership changes of our own amid an ever transforming world are also at risk of not passing the baton of the faith from generation to generation.
But we see in our text this morning, Deuteronomy 31-32, that in spite of our waywardness, we can pass the baton from one generation to the next because of all that God has provided.
We can pass God’s instruction from generation to generation:
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Reading of the Word.
Joshua to Succeed Moses
31 So Moses continued to speak these words to all Israel.2And he said to them, “I am 120 years old today. I am no longer able to go out and come in. The Lord has said to me, ‘You shall not go over this Jordan.’3 The Lord
your God himself will go over before you. He will destroy these nations before you, so that you shall dispossess them, and Joshua will go over at your head, as the Lord has spoken.4And the Lord will do to them as he did to Sihon and Og, the kings of the Amorites, and to their land, when he destroyed them.5And the Lord will give them over to you, and you shall do to them according to the whole commandment that I have commanded you. 6Be strong and courageous. Do not fear or be in dread of them, for it is the Lord your God who goes with you. He will not leave you or forsake you.”
7 Then Moses summoned Joshua and said to him in the sight of all Israel, “Be strong and courageous, for you shall go with this people into the land that the Lord has sworn to their fathers to give them, and you shall put them in possession of it.8It is the Lord who goes before you. He will be with you; he will not leave you or forsake you. Do not fear or be dismayed.”
The Reading of the Law
9 Then Moses wrote this law and gave it to the priests, the sons of Levi, who carried the ark of the covenant of the Lord, and to all the elders of Israel.10And Moses commanded them, “At the end of every seven years, at the set time in the year of release, at the Feast of Booths,11 when all Israel comes to appear before the Lord your God at the place that he will choose, you shall read this law before all Israel in their hearing.12Assemble the people, men, women, and little ones, and the sojourner within your towns, that they may hear and learn to fear the Lord your God, and be careful to do all the words of this law,13 and that their children, who have not known it, may hear and learn to fear the Lord your God, as long as you live in the land that you are going over the Jordan to possess.”
Joshua Commissioned to Lead Israel
14And the Lord said to Moses, “Behold, the days approach when you must die. Call Joshua and present yourselves in the tent of meeting, that I may commission him.” And Moses and Joshua went and presented themselves in the tent of meeting.15And the Lord appeared in the tent in a pillar of cloud. And the pillar of cloud stood over the entrance of the tent.
16And the Lord said to Moses, “Behold, you are about to lie down with your fathers. Then this people will rise and whore after the foreign gods among them in the land that they are entering, and they will forsake me and break my covenant that I have made with them.17 Then my anger will be kindled
against them in that day, and I will forsake them and hide my face from them, and they will be devoured. And many evils and troubles will come upon them, so that they will say in that day, ‘Have not these evils come upon us because our God is not among us?’18And I will surely hide my
face in that day because of all the evil that they have done, because they have turned to other gods.
19“Now therefore write this song and teach it to the people of Israel. Put it in their mouths, that this song may be a witness for me against the people of Israel.20 For when I have brought them into the land flowing with milk and honey, which I swore to give to their fathers, and they have eaten and are full and grown fat, they will turn to other gods and serve them, and despise me and break my covenant.21And when many evils and troubles have come upon them, this song shall confront them as a witness (for it will live unforgotten in the mouths of their offspring). For I know what they are inclined to do even today, before I have brought them into the land that I swore to give.”22So Moses wrote this song the same day and taught it to the people of Israel.
23And the Lord commissioned Joshua the son of Nun and said, “Be strong and courageous, for you shall bring the people of Israel into the land that I swore to give them. I will be with you.”
24 When Moses had finished writing the words of this law in a book to the very end,25 Moses commanded the Levites who carried the ark of the covenant of the Lord,26“Take this Book of the Law and put it by the side of the ark of the covenant of the Lord your God, that it may be there for a witness against you.27 For I know how rebellious and stubborn you are. Behold, even today while I am yet alive with you, you have been rebellious against the Lord. How much more after my death!28Assemble to me all the elders of your tribes and your officers, that I may speak these words in their
ears and call heaven and earth to witness against them.29 For I know that after my death you will surely act corruptly and turn aside from the way that I have commanded you. And in the days to come evil will befall you, because you will do what is evil in the sight of the Lord, provoking him to anger through the work of your hands.”
The Song of Moses
30 Then Moses spoke the words of this song until they were finished, in the ears of all the assembly of Israel:
32 “Give ear, O heavens, and I will speak,
and let the earth hear the words of my mouth.
2 May my teaching drop as the rain,
my speech distill as the dew,
like gentle rain upon the tender grass,
and like showers upon the herb.
3 For I will proclaim the name of the Lord;
ascribe greatness to our God!
4“The Rock, his work is perfect,
for all his ways are justice.
A God of faithfulness and without iniquity,
just and upright is he.
5 They have dealt corruptly with him;
they are no longer his children because they are blemished; they are a crooked and twisted generation.
6 Do you thus repay the Lord,
you foolish and senseless people?
Is not he your father, who created you,
who made you and established you?
7 Remember the days of old;
consider the years of many generations;
ask your father, and he will show you,
your elders, and they will tell you.
8 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.
9 But the Lord’s portion is his people,
Jacob his allotted heritage.
10“He found him in a desert land,
and in the howling waste of the wilderness;
he encircled him, he cared for him,
he kept him as the apple of his eye.
11 Like an eagle that stirs up its nest,
that flutters over its young,
spreading out its wings, catching them,
bearing them on its pinions,
12the Lord alone guided him,
no foreign god was with him.
13 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.
14 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. 15“But Jeshurun grew fat, and kicked;
you grew fat, stout, and sleek;
then he forsook God who made him
and scoffed at the Rock of his salvation.
16 They stirred him to jealousy with strange gods;
with abominations they provoked him to anger.
17 They sacrificed to demons that were not God,
to gods they had never known,
to new gods that had come recently,
whom your fathers had never dreaded.
18 You were unmindful of the Rock that bore you,
and you forgot the God who gave you birth.
19“The Lord saw it and spurned them,
because of the provocation of his sons and his daughters. 20 And he said, ‘I will hide my face from them;
I will see what their end will be,
for they are a perverse generation,
children in whom is no faithfulness.
21 They have made me jealous with what is no god;
they have provoked me to anger with their idols.
So I will make them jealous with those who are no people; I will provoke them to anger with a foolish nation.
22 For a fire is kindled by my anger,
and it burns to the depths of Sheol,
devours the earth and its increase,
and sets on fire the foundations of the mountains.
23“ ‘And I will heap disasters upon them;
I will spend my arrows on them;
24they shall be wasted with hunger,
and devoured by plague
and poisonous pestilence;
I will send the teeth of beasts against them,
with the venom of things that crawl in the dust.
25 Outdoors the sword shall bereave,
and indoors terror,
for young man and woman alike,
the nursing child with the man of gray hairs.
26I would have said, “I will cut them to pieces;
I will wipe them from human memory,”
27 had I not feared provocation by the enemy,
lest their adversaries should misunderstand,
lest they should say, “Our hand is triumphant,
it was not the Lord who did all this.” ’
28“For they are a nation void of counsel,
and there is no understanding in them.
29If they were wise, they would understand this;
they would discern their latter end!
30 How could one have chased a thousand,
and two have put ten thousand to flight,
unless their Rock had sold them,
and the Lord had given them up?
31 For their rock is not as our Rock;
our enemies are by themselves.
32 For their vine comes from the vine of Sodom
and from the fields of Gomorrah;
their grapes are grapes of poison;
their clusters are bitter;
33their wine is the poison of serpents
and the cruel venom of asps.
34“ ‘Is not this laid up in store with me,
sealed up in my treasuries?
35 Vengeance is mine, and recompense,
for the time when their foot shall slip;
for the day of their calamity is at hand,
and their doom comes swiftly.’
36 For the Lord will vindicate his people
and have compassion on his servants,
when he sees that their power is gone
and there is none remaining, bond or free.
37 Then he will say, ‘Where are their gods,
the rock in which they took refuge,
38 who ate the fat of their sacrifices
and drank the wine of their drink offering?
Let them rise up and help you;
let them be your protection!
39“ ‘See now that I, even I, am he,
and there is no god beside me;
I kill and I make alive;
I wound and I heal;
and there is none that can deliver out of my hand.
40 For I lift up my hand to heaven
and swear, As I live forever,
41if I sharpen my flashing sword
and my hand takes hold on judgment,
I will take vengeance on my adversaries
and will repay those who hate me.
42I will make my arrows drunk with blood,
and my sword shall devour flesh—
with the blood of the slain and the captives,
from the long-haired heads of the enemy.’
43“Rejoice with him, O heavens;
bow down to him, all gods,
for he avenges the blood of his children
and takes vengeance on his adversaries.
He repays those who hate him
and cleanses his people’s land.”
44 Moses came and recited all the words of this song in the hearing of the people, he and Joshua the son of Nun.45And when Moses had finished speaking all these words to all Israel,46 he said to them, “Take to heart all the words by which I am warning you today, that you may command them to your children, that they may be careful to do all the words of this law. 47 For it is no empty word for you, but your very life, and by this word you shall live long in the land that you are going over the Jordan to possess.”
[Transition]
This is the word of the Lord. Thanks be to God.
And there are a lot of words this morning, so let’s not waste any time. We see in the beginning that Point 1: We can pass God’s instruction from generation to generation because God provides leaders.
[Point 1]: Because God provides leaders. (Deut. 31.1-8).
[Explanation]
[Bond back] Allow me to remind us where we are in the story. After 30 chapters of moral, ceremonial, and civil law, case law, general ethical instruction and blessings and curses in Deuteronomy, we dive back in to some narrative. The second generation of the people of God are about to cross the river Jordan.
It’s the second generation, because the first generation rebelled against the Lord way back in Numbers 14. Yahweh, the God of Israel, did not break his promises to deliver the land to his people; nevertheless, the generation that was rescued out of Egypt would never see the promised land of Canaan.
Instead, it was their children, who are now aged an additional 40 years while wandering through the wilderness. God tells Moses that he is unable to enter the land because of his disobedience which is recorded for us in Numbers 20:12.
This is a big deal for the people of God. In all the Old Testament, never was there another mediator between Yahweh and the people of God quite like Moses. Over and over we read about Moses speaking with God face to face – whether at Mount Sinai or in the tent of meeting. And after meeting with God face to face, he would then deliver God’s word to God’s people. The first 5 books of our Bible are attributed to Moses as the primary author.
If you’re an ancient Israelite, about to enter the land that your spies – 40 years earlier – alleged was full of really tall, mean bad guys, you’re asking yourself – how is this going to go? We know what it’s like under Moses’s leadership, he’s super old now, but he’s pretty great overall. What’s it going to be like without Moses?
Well, we see in verse 3, “The LORD your God himself will go over before you.”
When God entered into a permanent relationship with Isreal, what Scripture calls a covenant – back in Exodus 24, he promised to remain with his people. Furthermore, we see in verse 7, that Joshua – now a much older
and wiser man than back in Numbers 14 – is charged to be the new leader of the people of God:
“Then Moses summoned Joshua and said to him in the sight of all Israel, ‘Be strong and courageous, for you shall go with this people into the land that the LORD has sworn to their fathers to give them, and you shall put them in possession of it.”
[Illustration] Back in 2016, I was 26 years old and had been working for my now employer for only about a year. We had been owned by the Yamaguchi family in Japan for two generations, when I got an email that all of us sales managers needed to join a conference call for a major announcement. Never good news in corporate America.
Come to find out, the Yamaguchi’s decided to sell the machine company in which I was employed and focus on their canning companies instead (which is where they made all their money anyways).
We had been bought by one guy named Mr. Chu and another guy named Mr. Cho that none of us had ever heard of. (True story). To this day I distinctly remember the sense of dread I felt when the announcement was made and watching almost all of our company’s leadership walk out the door with no certainty about the future: are we going to stay in this same general business? What will our customers think, especially since all my competitors were running around saying we’d been bought by the Communist Chines party? Do I still have a job?
[Transition] Church, we as the people of God neither then in Deuteronomy 31 nor now in 2026 need to dread.
[Application] We can and in fact must, pass the baton of faith, because God provides leadership for his people. Most importantly, he provides his covenant presence. Jesus said in Matt. 28:20, “Behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”
Furthermore, he provides the Holy Spirit, which gives spiritual gifts to the people of God so that we may move forward to our promised land. The
apostle Paul writes in Ephesians 4, “He gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds [or elders] and teachers to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ.”
Two weeks ago, praise God, we installed a whole new batch of deacons across various ministries. On behalf the elders, let me just say that we thank God for you and are so grateful for your service. But we also kind of need you to work yourself out of a job. Who in your ministry can you be pouring into now? God will provide the leadership. He did it Moses, and he did it with Joshua.
Parents, you are the leaders over your children. And although we collectively through our children’s and youth ministries will labor to teach your children the whole counsel of God, the primary responsibility lies with you.
Fathers, I’m going to especially address you this Father’s day. In the early 1990s, several Swiss researchers investigated the importance of the Father to the churchgoing of their children. The results are staggering.
“In short”, I’m quoting Robbie Low here who reported on their findings: “if a father does not go to church, no matter how faithful his wife’s devotions, only one child in 50 will be come a regular worshipper. If a father DOES go regularly, regardless of the practice of the mother, between two-thirds and three-quarters of their children will become church goers.” 1 in 50 (2%) verses 66—75%. Put another way, no other group of people in this church have a greater impact on passing the faith from one generation to the next than the fathers in the room. Second place isn’t even close.
For everything outside the ministry of the church, this principle still applies. Paul states in Colossians 1 beginning in verse 15: “He [that is Christ Jesus] is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. For by him all
things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities – all things were created through him and for him. And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together.”
Christ Jesus is no less king over the marketplace, the academy, healthcare, entertainment, and so forth than over the church. If God has graciously placed you in a position of influence in your work no matter how large or small to steward, then insofar as it is possible with you raise up successors who can take your place when you move on.
Not only does God provide leadership for the people of God, he also, Point 2, provides his word.
[Point 2] God provides his word.
Explanation
[Bond back] Look with me in verse 10: “And Moses commanded them, ‘At the end of every seven years, at the set time in the year of release, at the Feast of Booths, when all Israel comes to appear before the LORD your God at the place that he will choose, you shsall read this law before all Israel in their hearing.” The word law there comes from the Hebrew word “torah”. It shows up throughout the 5 books of Moses, but it can be translated more than one way. In some cases, it clearly means “law” as in, if you break this law then you go to jail. In other instances in means “instruction” as in, here is the right and wise way to live in the land.
The torah – most likely this entire book of Deuteronomy – was to be read all at once every 7 years, why? See in verse 12 “that [the people, men, women, and little ones, and the sojourner] may hear [that is obey] and learn to fear the LORD your God, and to be careful to do all the words of this law [or instruction].” I want you to put a pin in this instruction of the word to be read every 7 sears at the Feast of Booths, we’ll come back to it near the end.
The point of these verses for our purposes today – understanding how we can pass the baton – is the importance the preaching and teaching of God’s word for the church. I am very grateful that in the very early days of Covid, churches like ours implemented livestream. I am grateful still that such technology exists for those who are sick and unable to gather
together, but there is no substitute for the embodied, gathered assembly of brothers and sisters in Christ to hear the preaching of God.
[Application] I’m so grateful for West Hils Church that places such a high priority on the ministry, that is the preaching and teaching of God’s word.
[Transition] Because this is an area, I believe, of relative maturity for us, and because we have over 70 verses to cover today, we’re going to praise God and keep it moving to point number 3.
[Point 3] We can pass the baton, because God provides his songs. [Explanation]
[Bond Back] Jump down with me to verse 19 once Moses and Joshua go into the tent of meeting to hear from Yahweh: “Now therefore write this song and teach it to the people of Israel. Put it in their mouths, that this song may be a witness for me against the people of Israel.”
Why a song?
We’ve just concluded 30 chapters of moral law – the ten commandments. Ceremonial law – when to have the Feast of Booths and how to decorate your hut. Case law – how to place a fence around your roof so that the village idiot can’t go up, fall down and kill himself by mistake.
Now, I’ve read the U. S. Constitution, I don’t remember “The Star Spangled Banner” getting tacked on as an amendment. So why a song in a law book?
It’s because songs do something to us in a way that ordinary language does not.
[Illustration]
Consider these two examples.
One of the incommunicable attributes of God is his omnipotence. 15
True statement, right? And helpful, no less. God is all powerful and being able to say so in technical and theological language is right and true and good. But how about this.
“The voice of the LORD is over the waters; the God of glory thunders, the LORD, over many waters. The voice of the LORD is powerful; the voice of the LORD is full of majesty; The LORD is enthroned over the flood; the LORD sites enthroned as king forever. May the LORD give strength to his people! May the LORD bless his people with peace!” Psalm 29.
Example 2: one of the incommunicable attributes of God is his omnipresence. True statement, right? God is everywhere and being able to say so in technical and theological language is right and true and good.
But how about this.
“Where shall I go from your Spirit? Or where shall I flee from your presence? If I ascend to heaven, you are there! If make my bed in Sheol [deep darkness], you are there! If I take the wings of the morning and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there your hand shall lead me, and your right hand shall hold me.” Psalm 139.
[Explanation]
Now which of these two ways of speaking – ordinary or poetic what is used in the Psalms, the Hymnbook of the Bible – did something to you?
It’s the poetry, the song, right? This is not to minimize the importance of theological language, that’s what the last point in the sermon was all about. But it’s to underscore this: ordinary language especially shapes our mind, poetic language sung in community shapes our hearts.
[Application]
They – the people of God standing at the banks of the Jordan River – needed hearts that beat after Yahweh. We – the people of God standing between Christ’s resurrection and his return – need hearts that beat for love of God and neighbor. If we’re going to pass the baton from one generation
to the next, we don’t need less than creeds and catechisms, but we do need more.
We need to sing songs in corporate worship that shape our hearts so that we can pass those songs and the effect they have to the next generation.
God has graciously given a Hymnbook to us in the book of Psalms, and Lord willing, we will spend some time in just a few weeks preaching through some of them. But just consider for a moment, a partial list of the types of Psalms:
● Praise: Ps. 145. “Great is the LORD, and greatly to be praised, and his greatness is unsearchable.”
● Lament: Ps. 13. “How long, O LORD? Will you forget me forever?” As an aside, we the modern church would do well to write and sing more songs of lament. In the lineup of songs we sing at West Hills, I can think of one: “Lord, from sorrows deep I call.” Would you like to know how often we come upon a psalm of lament? About 1 in 3. 1 in 3! That is telling. God is big enough to hear our anger, grief, and fear. If you can’t come up with the words on your own, look to the psalms. Moving on:
● Thanksgiving: Ps. 9. “I will give thanks to the LORD with my whole heart; I will recount all of your wonderful deeds.”
● Psalms of confidence: Ps. 23. “Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me.”
● Psalms of Wisdom: Ps. 1. “Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked, nor stands in the way of sinners, not sits in the seat of scoffers; but his delight is in the law of the LORD, and on his law he meditates day and night.”
Church, we can pass the baton from generation to generation because God has provided – not our songs – but his songs.
[Bond back] Now you may have noticed a particular feature of this song in Deuteronomy. It is to be a “witness” against the people. We’ll better
understand this once we work through the song itself. For now, let’s continue our main theme about passing the baton, and see that one of the ways we can do this is because:
[Point 4] God provides knowledge of himself.
[Illustration] I love my wife, Catherine. I’ll tell you some of the things I love about her. I love her Korean-American heritage, and how she takes special effort to reflect that in everything she does. I love that she makes a great accountant, enjoys St. Louis Blues Hockey and plays the tuba.
Now, if you’re here this morning and you’ve never met me or my wife, welcome, we’d love to meet you. Perhaps you’d like to meet this Korean-American, accounting, hockey loving tuba player; however, you’ll find out that my wife is not Korean-American, she’s Polish-American, she’s not an accountant, she’s a geneticist, she’s knows less about hockey than I do (which isn’t much) and not only can she not play the tuba, I don’t think she knows what a major scale is.
[Transition] For me to communicate right and true knowledge of Dr. Catherine Gooch to you, the information I give about her needs to be correct.
[Explanation] Apart from scripture, we would have no knowledge of God. And sadly, often when I meet those who do not yet know Jesus and I hear how they describe God it sounds a lot like me describing Catherine as a Korean-American accountant who loves hockey and plays the tuba.
Fortunately, God does not leave us guessing. See how he describes himself in this passage:
Verse 1, “Give ear, O heavens, and I will speak, and let the earth heart the words of my mouth.” God is shown here as the Creator and NOT the creature. All of heaven and earth is called to listen to his voice.
Verse 2, “May my teaching drop as the rain, my speech distill as the dew, like gentle rain upon the tender grass, and like shower upon the herb.” Let’s
think for a moment about life in Ancient Israel. If you and I want drops of rain or gentle dew, we turn on the sprinkler.
But if you’re an ancient Israelite, you’re a farmer. Your very life and the life of your family depend upon the rain falling onto the dry ground to nourish and sustain it. God likens his very words to gentle rain upon the thirsty ground..
Verse 3, “For I will proclaim the name of the LORD; ascribe greatness to our God.”
Verse 4 “The Rock” that is, God is our refuge and strength. “For all his ways are justice. A God of faithfulness and without iniquity, just and upright is he.”
[Application] To pass the faith across generations, we need, as in the words of John Calvin, to know this God with whom we have to do.
Speaking of Calvin, in the opening line of his magnum opus, the Institutes of the Christian Religion, Cavlin famously says that true wisdom is found in knowledge of 1) God and 2) of ourselves.
I wonder if Calvin was reflecting on the Song of Moses when he wrote those words. Because the next part of this song shows us that we can pass the baton from generation to generation because:
[Point 5]: God provides knowledge of his people’s waywardness. [Explanation]
Verses 5-18 paint a gloomy portrait of the rebellion of God’s children against Yahweh’s fatherly care. If your Bible is like mine, the heading for Chapter 32 is called “The Song of Moses.” That might be something of a misnomer, because although Moses teaches the Song to the people, the actual words are the words of Yahweh. Perhaps “the Song of Yahweh” is a more fitting title.
I say that to underscore how God understands the hearts of his people.
Just listen to some of the ways the people are to sing OF THEMSELVES: Verse 5: they have dealt corruptly with him; they are no longer his children.
Verse 6: You foolish and senseless people? Is not he your father, who created you, who made you and established you?
Verse 15: But Jeshurun (that is, a childlike term of endearment for Israel; like a nickname for a child) but Jeshurun grew fat, and kicked. . . then he forsook God who made him.
Verses 16-17: “They stirred him to jealousy with strange gods. . . they sacrificed to demons that were no gods. . . you were unmindful of the Rock that bore you, and you forgot the God who gave you birth.”
These lyrics about the people’s unfaithfulness stand side-by-side with Yahweh’s care:
Verse 9: “The Lord’s portion is his people”
Verse 10: He found him in a desert land, he encircled him, he cared for him.
Verse 12: “the LORD alone guided him, no foreign god was with him.” [Application]
To pass the baton, we must pass the knowledge of our waywardness. Centuries after the people sing this song they inevitably turn from the Lord. God sends his messengers, the prophets, to accuse the people of their waywardness and to turn back to him. Listen to the similarities in language in the prophets:
“Hear, O heavens, and give ear, O earth; for the LORD has spoken: ‘Children I have reared and brought up, but they have rebelled against me. The ox knows its owner, and the donkey its master’s crib, but Israel does not know, my people do not understand.” Isa. 1:2-3.
“What wrong did your fathers find in me that they want far from me, and went after worthlessness, and became worthless? They did not say, ‘Where
is the LORD who brought us up from the land of Egypt, who led us in the wilderness, in a land of deserts and pits.” Jer. 2.5-6.
“When Israel was a child, I loved him, and out of Egypt I called my son. The more they were called, the more they went away; they kept sacrificing to the Baals and burning offerings to idols.” – Hosea 11.1-2.
Notice that the prophets don’t merely remind the people of their sin. As in the Song of Moses, they contrast idolatry and wickedness with the wonderful works of Yahweh. The problem with the waywardness of the people of God is not less than sin. But it is more.
The problem is that they forget the story of which they are apart. When ancient Israel years and years later mixed the religions of the surrounding nations with worship of Yahweh, they not only betrayed Yahweh, they betrayed their very mission to be a light to the nations.
[Illustration]
Has anyone every driven through Atlanta, GA? God have mercy on your soul. There’s a spot in Atlanta called Spaghetti junction. It is not a pasta stand. It’s a place where 98 interstates all intersect with one another. If you want a billboard to advertise to as many folks in Atlanta as possible, you choose Spaghetti junction.
[Bond Back]
The promised land of Canaan was the Spaghetti Junction of the Ancient Near East. Every other nation had to pass through Israel to get where they were going. They were to pass through Jerusalem, see the Temple of God and see the way the people of God (now the church) lived with one another and the way they treated the foreigner and ask, “who is your God?” The waywardness of the people compromised the very mission that God had for them.
Instead of living out their story, they rebelled instead. We rebel instead when we forget that their story becomes our story. If we’re going to pass
the baton of the saving grace, mercy and victory of the Lord Jesus we must pass along the knowledge of our waywardness.
Because, after all, what good is salvation for those who don’t think they need saving in the first place? But “all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.” Rom. 3:23. And it is sin that requires God’s punishment. Thankfully, Point 6: We can pass the baton of faith because:
[Point 6] God provides punishment.
[Explanation]
First, we see how God will bring punishment against his people.
Verse 19: “The LORD saw it and spurned them, because of his sons and his daughters. And he said ‘I will hid my face from them; I will see what their end will be, for they are a perverse generation, children in whom is no faithfulness.”
Verse 23: “And I will heap disasters upon them; I will spend my arrows on them; they shall be wasted with hunger, and devoured by plague and poisonous pestilence.”
Second, we see how God will bring punishment against the nations.
Verse 28: “For they [that is, enemy nations of Israel] are a nation void of counsel, and there is no understanding in them.”
Verse 35: “Vengeance is mine, and recompense, for the time when their foot shall slip; for the day of their calamity is at hand, and their doom comes quickly.”
I wish time would allow for us to map in detail Deuteronomy 32 against the historical and prophetic books of the Old Testament to see how the pattern of rebellion, punishment, purification and ultimately vindication unfold over
the next 700-900 years. We’re going to have to do the 2-minute version instead. See the slide on the screen. Advance slide.
1010 to 970 Reign of King David.
970-930 the Reign of King Solomon.
930 the kingdom divides. False worship in the North and dry ritualism in the South.
Advance slide.
God sends the prophets to the Northern Kingdoms: Jonah, Amos and Hosea to call the people: turn back from idols! Be faithful to the covenant! Listen and obey the words of this law! They do not turn back and in 721 Assyria invades and obliterates the Northern Kingdom.
Advance slide.
God sends the prophets to the Southern Kingdom: Micah, Isaiah, Nahum, Zephaniah, Habakkuk, Jeremiah, and Ezekeil: turn back from idols! Be faithful to the covenant! Listen and obey the words of this law! They do not turn back. So, God raises up Babylon.
Babylon invades Jerusalem in 610 and take away the upper class into exile. In 597, Babylon returns and takes away the artisan class.
And then, in 586 B.C., the unthinkable happens. The Babylonians destroy Jerusalem and the temple, and destroy the wicked Israelites who would not turn from worshipping idols. It was meaningful sense does is it possible that Yahweh has kept his promises to Abraham of a land, a nation, and a mission to all people if the land has been conquered, the people of Israel ALMOST completely slaughtered, and the very temple where God dwelt with his people lying in ashes in Jerusalem.
Because of their idolatry, God punished the unfaithful in Israel.
But punishment is not the end of God’s story. It’s not the end of our story. Because far away from Jerusalem deep in the exiled community in Babylon, God preserves a remnant.
That is, a faithful community within Israel that doesn’t abandon Yahweh. A faithful community who WILL pass the baton, who WILL devote themselves
to establishing new leadership, learning God’s word, singing God’s songs, learning about God and themselves.
And he promises them through the words of Jeremiah: “Behold, the days are coming, declares the LORD, when the city shall be rebuilt.” He’s going to send them back. He tells them, “Behold the days are coming when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah. . . I will put my law [this law] within them, and I will write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people.”
And what happens next?
Seventy-years into the exile, God raises up Cyrus the Great of Persia. Cyrus allows Israel to return to Jerusalem.
The remnant goes back.
They begin to rebuild the temple of the LORD. Remember that pin I asked you to place in Deut. 31 about the reading of God’s law every 7 years, well for the first time ever recorded in Israel’s history, they follow through with that instruction.
Here these words from Nehemiah 8:
“So Ezra the priest brought the law before the assembly, both men and women and all who could understand what they heard, on the first day of the seventh month. And he read from it. . . from early morning until midday in the presence of the men and the women and those who could understand.”
And what happens next?
“All the people answered, ‘Amen, amen,’ lifting up their hands. And they bowed their heads and worshiped the LORD with their faces to the ground.”
Something is HAPPENING HERE. God is writing his law – this law – this blessed book that we’ve walked through for the past 6 months – he is writing it upon their hearts so that they pass the faith from one generation to the next.
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Through the wicked nations of Assyria and Babylon and the deportation to exile from the land, God provided the punishment foretold in Deuteronomy 32 that was necessary to rid Israel of her idolatry.
But was it enough?
Yahweh may have cleansed his people of their idol worship.
But the underlying evil. The true root cause – the very power of sin had yet to be dealt a fatal blow.
So the prophet Isaiah foretells of one who would be despised and rejected by men. He would be a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief.
Isaiah 53 beginning in verse 4: “Surely, he has born our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten [that is, punished] by God, and afflicted. But he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his wounds we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned – every one – to his own way; and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all.”
Church, and those who are here who perhaps have no religious affiliation whatsoever, the punishment that our waywardness from God deserves is death, the kind of unimaginable death the Jesus went through on that Roman cross.
That is the punishment we deserved. But thanks be to God, that he gave his only Son in our place to take our punishment so that we may be adopted as sons and daughters of that great High King, King Jesus.
But the benefits of what Christ Jesus accomplished on the cross are of no use if you and I do not believe and trust in Jesus. If we’re going to pass the baton of faith from generation to generation, we must accept that
[Point 7] God provides saving grace:
[Explanation] Here’s our final glance at our text this morning: 25
“Rejoice with him, O heavens, bow down to him, all gods, for he avenges the blood of his children and takes vengeance on his adversaries. He repays those who hate him, and cleanses his people’s land.”
If Moses, that great man of God, only new the degree to which God would avenge his children. It wasn’t just a matter of conquering the land, which we will learn about Lord-willing when we move to Joshua. It wasn’t just a matter of overthrowing Assyria and Babylon. It wasn’t a matter of overthrowing Roman occupation like they were hoping when Jesus came in the first century.
Instead, Yahweh, the God of Israel, has overthrown evil itself according to the plan of God the Father, through the saving work of Christ the Son, in the power of the Holy Spirit. You and I don’t factor into that equation at all except as the ones who screwed up and needed saving in the first place. All we do is receive his saving grace. For those who don’t believe, I invite you to accept that grace for the first time – confess your sins to God, trust in Jesus and be saved. For those who have long believed, I invite you to walk even more deeply in the grace of God today. That way, we can all pass along the faith to the next generation. Amen?
Let’s pray.