365 Reflections

Deuteronomy 24:1–4 (ESV) 1 “When a man takes a wife and marries her, if then she finds no favor in his eyes because he has found some indecency in her, and he writes her a certificate of divorce and puts it in her hand and sends her out of his house, and she departs out of his house, 2 and if she goes and becomes another man’s wife, 3 and the latter man hates her and writes her a certificate of divorce and puts it in her hand and sends her out of his house, or if the latter man dies, who took her to be his wife, 4 then her former husband, who sent her away, may not take her again to be his wife, after she has been defiled, for that is an abomination before the Lord . And you shall not bring sin upon the land that the Lord your God is giving you for an inheritance. This is one of the few laws that Jesus directly addresses for us in the New Testament. A question is brought to Him about divorce and Moses' allowance for a certificate to be written in the case of a man desiring t

The last half of Deuteronomy 23 refers to economic mandates God instilled into the lives of Israel to make sure fairness, freedom, and brotherly kindness was consistent among His people. These laws deal with how they were to make money - not through sacred prostitution, how to loan money - without interest to one another, fulfilling vows made to God - following through for His honor, and sharing one's crop in a reasonable manner - no bagging a ton of freebies while walking through his vineyard. But the first law really catches the idea. For all the talk about how the Bible condones slavery, consider God's Word on the matter to an ancient context: Deuteronomy 23:15–16 (ESV)  “You shall not give up to his master a slave who has escaped from his master to you. 16 He shall dwell with you, in your midst, in the place that he shall choose within one of your towns, wherever it suits him. You shall not wrong him. This is an amazing passage. Every commentator I read notes that

Deuteronomy 23:9–13 (ESV) “When you are encamped against your enemies, then you shall keep yourself from every evil thing. 10 “If any man among you becomes unclean because of a nocturnal emission, then he shall go outside the camp. He shall not come inside the camp, 11 but when evening comes, he shall bathe himself in water, and as the sun sets, he may come inside the camp. 12 “You shall have a place outside the camp, and you shall go out to it. 13 And you shall have a trowel with your tools, and when you sit down outside, you shall dig a hole with it and turn back and cover up your excrement. These two laws are incredibly important to an ancient culture far removed from the obsessive sanitize-everything-you-can culture of our day. The Israelites were to keep their military camps clean in the midst of warfare. These stipulations concerning what to do with semen and feces would have enormous health benefits to the nation's fighting men. The bottom line, in this case, is cl

Deuteronomy 23:3–6 (ESV)   “No Ammonite or Moabite may enter the assembly of the Lord . Even to the tenth generation, none of them may enter the assembly of the Lord forever, 4 because they did not meet you with bread and with water on the way, when you came out of Egypt, and because they hired against you Balaam the son of Beor from Pethor of Mesopotamia, to curse you. 5 But the Lord your God would not listen to Balaam; instead the Lord your God turned the curse into a blessing for you, because the Lord your God loved you. 6 You shall not seek their peace or their prosperity all your days forever. The key theme in these verses is "the assembly of the Lord". Now this refers to the gathering of God's people in the Temple. The people of God were to bear witness to the other nations that only those who were pure could enter the Assembly. No one who may have mutilated their genitals in pagan ritual (Deuteronomy 23:1), nor anyone born of forbidden unions (Deuteronom

Deuteronomy 22 has a lot to say about sex and death. When there was adultery in Israel, people were to die. When a woman "whored in her father's house" she was to die. When a man raped a woman, he was to die. When a man slept with a virgin to whom he was not married, his singlehood was to die - that woman became his wife for life. All in all, this is a fun bit of text! First, we learn, sex is a matter of life and death to God. In our culture, we couldn't be further away from God on this very point. Sex in the minds of many in the West is a "non-issue". Though we still take rape very seriously, sex outside of marriage is basically considered a right of passage for many young people in America. How very different than what we hear from God on these matters from the Law. Sex is serious. God says illicit sex can cost you your life and bring shame upon your whole family. The question the West is grappling with belligerently today is this: On the matter of sex

Deuteronomy 22:9–12 (ESV) “You shall not sow your vineyard with two kinds of seed, lest the whole yield be forfeited, the crop that you have sown and the yield of the vineyard. 10 You shall not plow with an ox and a donkey together. 11 You shall not wear cloth of wool and linen mixed together. 12 “You shall make yourself tassels on the four corners of the garment with which you cover yourself. So aren't we supposed to ignore laws like this as New Testament believers? Not if we are to understand our salvation properly. These laws in Isreal were instructing God's people to be a certain kind of people who lived and dressed a certain kind of way and always remember to maintain a singleness of heart regarding their God.  Sowing seed, the unequal yoking of animals and being clothed all find New Covenant counterparts in the teachings of Jesus, Paul, and the Apostles. Consider: First: Sow the right SEED: Mark 4:14 (ESV) The sower sows the word . We are indeed to sow the

The publisher of my Bible added a heading over Deuteronomy 22. It reads, "Various Law". It's a heading that shouldn't be there. The term "various" implies these are random or somewhat less important laws. The original text did not treat the laws as such, in fact, they were important laws regarding the proper regard for one's neighbor, field, and whole life. In God's economy, your entire LIFE matters to Him. He wants all things to go well with you. There are laws regarding the proper care of livestock and birds. Deuteronomy 22:1 (ESV) “You shall not see your brother’s ox or his sheep going astray and ignore them. You shall take them back to your brother. Deuteronomy 22:3 (ESV) And you shall do the same with his donkey or with his garment, or with any lost thing of your brother’s, which he loses and you find; you may not ignore it. Deuteronomy 22:6 (ESV)  “If you come across a bird’s nest in any tree or on the ground, with young ones or egg

Deuteronomy 21 ends with three obscure laws that have zero meaning to us if not for the Cross of Christ and His work to make us God's people. The first is the law of the firstborn son. Basically, if a man has two wives and prefers one (obviously the second wife as no one would prefer the first wife or the second would not exist!), he is NOT to show preferential treatment to the son of his preferred wife. The firstborn inheritance goes to the firstborn regardless of his emotional state. This law looks strange as it seems to allow polygamy. Of course, this is not promoting polygamy but drawing constraints around it so that Israel would not do as they wished in less-than-godly situations. The point to be drawn from here is that God understands how often we let our emotions do the talking. We get irrational and unfair in these moments. Think for instance of the unloved woman's son. He would have to bear the consequence of something between his father and mother. God will not ha

Christians are people who live in the victory secured by the blood of Christ. This does not mean, however, that Christians are allowed to treat anyone however they please nor live however they please. Christians are still and always accountable to the plan of God for blessing the world He loves through the Gospel of Jesus Christ preached into men's hearts and transmitted into heavenly blessings to the nations. We learn this principle in a most surprising ancient warfare stipulation God gives to His people through Moses. The surface of this text seems out of bounds, but further investigation into the time and context reveal God's regulations upon the people He chose to bless the nations. Deuteronomy 21:10–14 (ESV) “When you go out to war against your enemies, and the LORD your God gives them into your hand and you take them captive, 11 and you see among the captives a beautiful woman, and you desire to take her to be your wife, 12 and you bring her home to your house, she sh

The importance of peace within a community cannot be overstated. Without neighborly peace, life is unbearable. People move from neighborhoods, communities, states and countries when violence is an epidemic to their locale. We inherently know that people must care for one another and respect their neighbors treating each other fairly. This is the basis of God's laws to Israel. In Deuteronomy 21, the whole community was to be involved in working and contributing to the maintenance of peace. We learn this through a strange sacramental practice concerning an unsolved murder within the land. Deuteronomy 21:1–4 (ESV) “If in the land that the LORD your God is giving you to possess someone is found slain, lying in the open country, and it is not known who killed him, 2 then your elders and your judges shall come out, and they shall measure the distance to the surrounding cities. 3 And the elders of the city that is nearest to the slain man shall take a heifer that has never been worked