Posts from August 2021

Deuteronomy 3:11 (NIV)  …His bed was made of iron and was more than 13 feet long and 6 feet wide…  What is the purpose of this information?  The purpose is to underscore the reality that this man was a real giant.  Knowing this helps us to understand the magnitude of God’s victory.  The older generation was terrified by the size of their enemies.  The new generation would conquer them in the power of a God who was greater.  What is…

Deuteronomy 2:24b (NLT)  “…begin to take possession of it…”   The metaphor of conquering enemies and taking new ground, as described in Israel’s historic entry into Canaan, applies to us today.  Externally, evil finds expression through broken humanity.  We confront and conquer evil by allowing God’s Spirit to find expression through us. I nternally, we war against an inherited force that the Apostle Paul calls the  “old nature,” and it drives us to the lusts of the flesh, lusts of…

Deuteronomy 2:13-15 (focus verse 13 NIV)  “And the Lord said, “Now get up and cross the Zered Valley.” So we crossed the valley.”  It took only eleven days to travel the distance from Kadesh-Barnea to  “this side Jordan” (1:2), but it took 38 more years for the final group of unbelieving Israelites to die.  God would take into the Promised Land only those with firm faith.  The first generation had stood at the border of the Promised Land wailing in…

Deuteronomy 2:7 (NIV)  The Lord your God has blessed you in all the work of your hands.  He has watched over your journey through this vast desert.  These forty years the Lord your God has been with you, and you have not lacked anything.  God knows when we are going through the  “wilderness”  experiences in life.  He is present with us on this long walk to our divine destiny.  When we fail miserably, He can sustain us—even when the wilderness…

Deuteronomy 1:39-46 (NLT focus verse 40) …turn around and set out toward the desert…“  Oh, the tragedy of these words! What must we learn from Israel?  “A later obedience to an earlier command does not necessarily compensate for a prior disobedience.  Presumption is not faith.”

Deuteronomy 1:33 (NIV)  (The Lord your God) went ahead of you on your journey, in fire by night and in a cloud by day, to search out places for you to camp and to show you the way you should go.  Moses reviewed Israel’s history and  “impressed the new generation with the failings of the old in order to induce them to keep God’s laws.”  Their forefathers had failed miserably at Kadesh; and only those who  “wholly followed the Lord,”…

Deuteronomy 1:1-46 (NIV focus verse 29-31)  …”Do not be terrified; do not be afraid of them.  The Lord you God, who is going before you, will fight for you, as He did for you in Egypt, before your very eyes, and in the desert.  There you saw how the Lord your God carried you, as a father carries his son, all the way you went until you reached this place.”   Those of us who have walked with the Lord…

Deuteronomy 4:1 (NLT)  “And now, Israel, listen carefully to these decrees and regulations that I am about to teach you.  Obey them so that you may live, so you may enter and occupy the land that the Lord, the God of your ancestors, is giving you.”  The key word in Deuteronomy is OBEDIENCE.  Moses’  closing appeal to Israel was meant to  “keep inviolate the Covenant of the Lord in order to insure their continued well-being.”  Their ability to live in…

Deuteronomy 1:8 (NIV)  “Look, I am giving all this land to you!  Go in and occupy it, for it is the land the Lord swore to give to your ancestors…”   Here on the cusp of the Promised Land and just one month before entering it, Moses gave the word of the Lord to the Israelites.  It was a series of discourses that repeated the Law to a generation which had been born and had grown up in the wilderness…

Exodus 40:34-38 (compare to Ex. 1:1-22) In all the travels of the Israelites, whenever the cloud lifted from above the tabernacle, they would set out; but if the cloud did not lift, they did not set out—until the day it lifted.  So the cloud of the Lord was over the tabernacle by day, and fire was in the cloud by night, in the sight of all the house of Israel during all their travels.  “The book begins with the gloom…

Exodus 35:1 – 40:33 (NLT focus verse 1) Moses assembled the whole Israelite community and said to them, “These are the things the Lord has commanded you to do…”  “Access to God is obtained only by God’s provision, not by man’s effort.  Acceptable worship must conform to God’s standards, not to man’s ideas (John 4:24).”  Like Cain, do we bring to God what we want to bring to Him or, like Abel, do we simply obey? (Gen. 4).  There is…

Exodus 34:28-35 (NIV focus verse 35)  …and the people of Israel would see the radiant glow of his (Moses’) face.  So, he would put the veil over his face until he returned to speak with the Lord.  Forty days and forty nights of fasting in God’s Presence will have an impact on a person!  Rev. Walter Beutler writes: “Spending time in the presence of God imparts the glory of God which is reflected to others.”  This was true in Jesus’ …

Exodus 33:18-34:17 (NIV focus verse 6)  …The Lord, the Lord, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness, maintaining love to thousands, and forgiving wickedness, rebellion and sin.  Yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished…   What a remarkable glimpse we have of a supernatural interaction between God and a mere man!  Moses received a new revelation of God (which he used in the interest of others – verse 34:9).  Have you experienced anything…

Exodus 33:12-17 (NIV focus verse 16)  “How will anyone know that you are pleased with me and with your people unless you go with us?  What else will distinguish me and your people from all the other people on the face of the earth?”  Moses was  “burdened with the heavy task before Him and felt in need of assistance.  He prayed for a knowledge of God through a revelation of His ways.”  Do we seek to know the Lord and…

Exodus 33:7-11 (NIV focus verse 11)  The Lord would speak to Moses face to face as a man speaks with his friend.  Then Moses would return to the camp, but his young aide Joshua son of Nun did not leave the tent.   God communed with Moses on an intimate basis.  Indeed, the job of getting God’s people from Egypt to the Promised Land was of such importance to God, would impact the future of the Israelites, would change the…

Exodus 32:1-6 (focus verse 2a)I will send an angel before you…   God substituted His personal presence with that of an angel.  The manifest presence of God is for those who walk in holiness.  Revival comes when people repent and choose to live as fully devoted followers of Jesus Christ. 

Exodus 32:21 (NLT)  “What did these people do to you to make you bring such terrible sin upon them?”  Notice the ridiculous effort to avoid responsibility for guilt.  Notice the individual responsibility for individual guilt (vs. 25-35).  Sin has consequences.  The wages of sin is death (Romans 6:23)—always has been, always will be.  This eternal truth sits heavy on humanity and especially its leadership.  One day each of us will stand before God to give an account for how we…

Exodus 32:15-20 (focus verse 16) (NIV)  These tablets were God’s work;  the words on them were written by God Himself.   Barely had the final etchings been made into those stone tablets by the holy finger of God when Moses descended the mountain into the depravity of humanity.  Man’s violation of divine law resulted in God’s indignation.  Moses felt the sound waves.  Joshua heard the noise (vs 17).  Imagine the impact of leaving a space that was so filled up…

Exodus 32:11-14 (focus verse 11a & 14) (NIV)  But Moses sought the favor of the Lord his God…Then the Lord relented and did not bring on His people the disaster He had threatened.   Can we even begin to understand the power of intercessory prayer by someone who has influence with God?  Read the stories of great prayer warriors like Rees Howells (read: Rees Howells: Intercessor, by Norman Grubb).  His ministry of intercession during the rise of Adolf Hitler and…

Exodus 32:7 (NIV)  Then the Lord said to Moses, “Go down, because your people, whom you brought up out of Egypt, have become corrupt.”  While Moses was sitting with God and receiving the Ten Commandments, the rule of truth that would define good and evil behavior for every generation to come, God’s people were defaulting into idolatry.  Their impatience interrupted Moses’  communion with God Almighty!  And His attitude toward idolatry is uncompromising intolerance.  We live in a world with a…

Exodus 32:4 (NLT)  “He (Aaron) took what they handed him and made it into an idol cast in the shape of a calf…”   While Moses remained (for 40 days) on the mountain receiving the Ten Commandments from God, the people below feared he may have died, so they defaulted to idolatry.  Egypt had many pagan practices that they were familiar with, and they were just beginning to be acquainted with how to worship Jehovah God.  Moses had not yet…

Exodus 32:1 (The Message)  When the people realized that Moses was taking forever in coming down off the mountain, they rallied around Aaron and said, “Do something…”   Observe how humankind is unable to understand the need of spending time with God.  Our hearts are prone to idolatry.  Moses’  communion with God was interrupted by the impatience of the people!  If we are to be God’s empowered, effective Church in the world today who are led by the Holy Spirit…

Exodus 25:1-31:18 (focus verse 8) (NIV)  “Then have them make a sanctuary for me, and I will dwell among them.”   The second session with God lasted 40 days and concerned creating a habitation for God and the manner of worship.  Thus begins a remarkable study in the Tabernacle: our object lesson in how to approach God.  He wants to dwell among us.  Think of it!  What other  “god”  seeks after people?  None but ours.  Let Him draw near to…

Exodus 24:12-18 (focus verse 16b) (NIV)  …For six days the cloud covered the mountain, and on the seventh day the Lord called to Moses from within the cloud.  “Moses was kept waiting at a respectful distance for six days before God called him to draw near.”  This was his second session upon Mt. Sinai, and  “his leaders were present as witnesses to the giving of the Law, but not participants in the receiving of the Law.”  If we want to …

Exodus 20:22 – 23:33 (focus verse 20:22) (NIV)  Then the Lord said to Moses…  God gave to Moses everything recorded here.  It was an exposition of the Law but also described its application to their lives.  We must not read the Bible without inviting the Holy Spirit to give us its proper application.  It is  “God’s breath on a page”  that calls us to be a fully devoted people who love Him first and who also love others.  Jesus told…

Exodus 20:21 (NIV)  The people remained at a distance, while Moses approached the think darkness where God was.  Guilt causes people to stand far away from God.  When God’s Presence begins to settle in around us during a worship service, do you choose to lean into God’s Presence, or do you feel uncomfortable in it?  Guilt is a culprit and always will be.  When we have sinned, guilt takes up residence in our souls.  The Holy Spirit is faithful to…

Exodus 20:18-21 (focus verse 18) (NLT)  When the people heard the thunder and the loud blast of the ram’s horn, and when they saw the flashes of lightning and the smoke billowing from the mountain, they stood at a distance, trembling with fear.   The giving of the Law came with a spectacular display in order to  “disclose God’s awesome majesty and holiness in order to induce man to fear God.”  The people needed a baseline respect and awe established…