Witnesses, Judges, and Kings

Deuteronomy 17 and the Need for Careful Inquiry

If you'll turn your Bibles with me, please, to Deuteronomy chapter 17, the book of Deuteronomy chapter 17. As we continue our study of God's law, let us ask him to bless our time together. Our gracious Heavenly Father, we do thank you once again for the opportunity to open your word, to handle your truth.

We know that all scripture is breathed out by God and is profitable, and therefore we ask that it would be profitable in our lives this day, that you would give us understanding, that you would give us recollection, and Lord, that we would indeed honor and glorify your name this day in the handling of your word and how we respond to it.

We pray in Christ's name. Amen. For those of you who have been with us for a while, you know that we have been working through what we call the Holiness Code. We're technically not in the Holiness Code any longer, but we certainly are still in the same frame of study, looking at God's law, specifically if you're visiting for the first time.

It has been our intention to be amongst those who are not caused to cower by the world when they say, well, you people, you're inconsistent. You eat shellfish and you don't look at the tags on your shirts to see whether there's any mixture of fibers, and you are just picking and choosing what you will and will not believe out of the word of God.

And so we do not want to be amongst those people. We want to be amongst those who are able to give an answer for the hope that lies within us. We want to be amongst those who can with a level of confidence and, shall we say, integrity, respond to individuals and say, no, I think you need to look a little bit closer at what the word of God actually says.

Now, we were a little bit earlier on in Deuteronomy. I did not see that there would be, as I mentioned, we're not going to be looking at every verse in Deuteronomy, just as we didn't look at every verse in Leviticus.

We want to try to cover the major sections and the major topics as they are presented to us. And so I wanted to move down to Deuteronomy chapters 17 and 18, and I'll be perfectly honest with you, I'm rather excited about this section.

I am because it lays out some extremely important concepts for us, especially at this time in our nation's history, because I know that probably none of you have noticed, and this is very well-kept news, but a little over a year from now there's going to be a presidential election.

And I know that no one's talking about that, and of course I'm being facetious. I don't know if I can survive 12 more months of this personally. It does seem like an all-out assault, and I would be one who would be willing, if there would be someone who would offer a law, to vote for a law wherein we would do it a little bit more like it's done other places, and actually maybe do the election, what, three months?

I think three months is good. I mean, that'd be very intense, three months, but I think that'd be good. I think that'd be a good thing. This 18-month thing just is wearing on me personally, but it certainly causes us to think about the relationship of God's law and civil government and all sorts of things like that.

And I realize that we have different views even expressed within the congregation here. It was interesting that this morning we read, for our opening before Sunday school, we read the section from the London Baptist Confession that specifically dealt with the oaths and service in government and things like that, which was providentially appropriate, I think, for our study this morning.

The Prophet Like Moses and the Challenge of Islam

But we will get into what the King of Israel was to be like, and what the relationship between God's revealed law and man's law was to be. And I think we will be able to make some interesting applications and at least ask some important questions as to various understandings that are available to us today in regards to God's law and man's law and how these things relate to one another as we look at Deuteronomy 17 and 18.

And then Deuteronomy 18 will introduce us to this prophet who is to come like Moses. And I think as most of you know, that prophet of Deuteronomy 18, according to the book of Acts, is Jesus Christ himself.

Some of you might know that there is another world religion that likewise points to Deuteronomy chapter 18 and says that it is fulfilled in the leader of their religion. And that is, of course, the religion of Islam.

And the Muslims believe that Muhammad is actually the one that is prophesied in Deuteronomy chapter 18. So for some strange and odd reason, I might point out some of the problems with that understanding of Deuteronomy chapter 18 as we work through it as well.

Two or Three Witnesses and the Purging of Evil

But starting in chapter 17, you shall not sacrifice to Yahweh your God an ox or a sheep which has a blemish or any defect, for that is a detestable thing to Yahweh your God. If there is found in your midst in any of your towns which Yahweh your God is giving you, a man or a woman who does what is evil in the sight of Yahweh your God by transgressing His covenant and has gone and served other gods and worshipped them, or the sun or the moon or any of the heavenly hosts which I have not commanded, and if it is told you and you have heard of it, then you shall inquire thoroughly.

Behold, if it is true and the thing certain that this detestable thing has been done in Israel, then you shall bring out that man or that woman who has done this evil deed to your gates, that is the man or the woman, and you shall stone them to death.

On the evidence of two witnesses or three witnesses, he who is to die shall be put to death. He shall not be put to death on the evidence of one witness. The hand of the witnesses shall be first against him to put him to death, and afterward the hand of all the people.

So you shall purge the evil from your midst. If any case is too difficult for you to decide between one kind of homicide or another, between one kind of lawsuit or another, and between one kind of assault or another, being cases of dispute in your courts, then you shall arise and go up to the place which Yahweh your God chooses.

So you shall come to the Levitical priest or the judge who is in office in those days, and you shall inquire of them, and they will declare to you the verdict in the case. You shall do according to the terms of the verdict which they declare to you from that place which Yahweh chooses, and you shall be careful to observe according to all that they teach you.

According to the terms of the law which they teach you, and according to the verdict which they tell you you shall do, you shall not turn aside from the word which they declare to you to the right or to the left.

The man who acts presumptuously by not listening to the priest who stands there to serve Yahweh your God, nor to the judge, that man shall die. Thus you shall purge the evil from Israel. Then all the people will hear and be afraid and will not act presumptuously again.

When you enter the land which Yahweh your God gives you, and you possess it and live in it, and you say, I will set a king over me like all the nations who are around me, you shall surely set a king over you whom Yahweh your God chooses, one from among your countrymen you shall set as king over yourselves.

You may not put a foreigner over yourselves who is not your countryman. Moreover, he shall not multiply horses for himself, nor shall he cause the people to return to Egypt to multiply horses, since Yahweh has said to you, you shall never again return that way.

He shall not multiply wives for himself, or else his heart will turn away, nor shall he greatly increase silver and gold for himself. Now it shall come about when he sits on the throne of his kingdom, he shall write for himself a copy of this law on a scroll in the presence of the Levitical priests.

It shall be with him, and he shall read it all the days of his life, that he may learn to fear Yahweh his God by carefully observing all the words of this law and these statutes, that his heart may not be lifted up above his countrymen, and that he may not turn aside from the commandment to the right or the left, so that he and his sons may continue long in his kingdom in the midst of Israel.

Amen. So here is Deuteronomy chapter 17. And obviously it does seem that there is somewhat of an unfortunate chapter division. It would seem that verse 1 would probably go better with chapter 16 in regards to sundry laws, in regards to sacrifice, and so we will actually be starting with verse 2.

And what we encounter here is once again a warning that we have seen elsewhere. And in fact it was interesting that one of the texts that we dealt with on a Sunday evening only a few months ago, specifically that commandment from Deuteronomy, where we are told that if even one who is close to you, the wife whom you love, the son whom you love, the daughter, the close relative, the friend whose soul is like unto your own, remember that terminology?

If that one secretly says to you, I have inquired of the nations around and this is how they worship their gods, come let us worship these gods, come worship with me. What is the requirement that the law of God placed upon the people of Israel?

That you are not to spare that one, no matter how close they are to you. That you are to expose that one and that that one is to be purged from the people of Israel. Well interestingly enough that very text ended up in one of the debates that I did in Durban, South Africa just a few weeks ago.

We were discussing issues of violence and war in the Quran and in the Bible. And that was one of the texts that appeared on the screen, not with much in the way of context, but it did appear on the screen in regards to what the Bible teaches on these matters.

Here you have a similar restatement of that concept, not so much the emphasis upon the closeness of the person. This is just a much more general statement, but notice that a number of the same elements are repeated.

That is, once you are in the land, in the towns, in the place that Yahweh your God is giving you, then you have the discussion of transgressing His covenant. And how do they do this? They transgress His covenant by going and serving other gods and worshipping them or worshipping the sun or the moon or any of the heavenly hosts which they have not been commanded to do.

And of course we know now much about the worship that took place in that day in the lands around Israel. And of course all of these things, all of the heavenly hosts, all the sun, moon, stars, planets, doesn't matter what they were, they were worshipped in some form within these lands.

And these other gods, and this is called transgressing His covenant. You specifically have the reference to the covenant of God that is placed before the people at this particular point. And so these are the covenant people of God, and since they have been given the parameters and the necessary elements of that covenant, and central to that is the worship of God, then obviously to give that worship, which is to be given only to God, to anything or anyone else, is a tremendous sin in God's sight.

And here it is described as a transgression of the covenant that He has made with the people. But then notice, if it is told you and you have heard of it, then you shall inquire thoroughly. I hope you hear that in this text, yes, there is capital punishment.

Yes, amongst the people of God in Israel, idolatry could not possibly be allowed. And in fact we know, in the history of the people of Israel, what was the constant, constant temptation, and the constant thing that brought destruction to the people and brought the curses of God upon them, was syncretism and idolatry.

Going after the gods, the high places, the Asherim, the Baals, and it makes perfect sense to us, because we know that that old covenant was a mixed covenant. It was a mixed covenant. There were people who had had their hearts changed, who bore the covenant signs, and there were people who had not had their hearts changed, who likewise bore the covenant signs.

And as a result, you have the command of the prophets, circumcise your hearts. It can't just be in the outer man, it has to be an inward thing. But still, the unregenerate heart is not going to remain under that law of God and be pure in its devotion to God.

It can't. And we have evidence over and over again through the history of the people of Israel that this is what took place. But notice that there is to be careful inquiry made. Sometimes because we're talking about something that has a tremendous penalty attached, we miss the fact that it says, you shall inquire thoroughly.

Multiple witnesses are required. If only one person observed this behavior, if only one person had access to this information, there could be no bringing about of this penalty. There was to be a thorough inquiry.

And even then, I hope you noted that when the penalty was to be carried out, who were the first people to be involved in bringing about the carrying out of that penalty? The witnesses themselves. And so you could not have a situation where someone was not bold enough, brave enough to testify and to then live with the consequences of their testimony.

And as I've said before, in my study of Islam, I have seen stonings. Sadly, they're visible on the Internet. You can track them down if you know where to look. And it is a horrible thing to see. It is a troubling thing to see.

And so the idea is that you would have to have, in essence, a conspiracy of multiple people working together to bring false witness, and then they would have to have the gall to then publicly put themselves forward as being righteous and blameless in being the first ones to bring their hands against this individual in regards to bringing about this final punishment.

And of course, this is one of those texts where you have the Gospel of John drawing from these things, where Jesus says, if my testimony of myself, if it was alone, if the Father were not testifying, if the works themselves were not testifying, then my testimony would not be sufficient in and of itself, but because there are two or three witnesses, then you should believe the testimony that I am giving.

It harkens back to this concept that is found in God's law, that there must be a multiplicity of testimony and a thorough investigation because God knows the hearts of men. Because God knows the hearts of men.

And He knows that there must be boundaries. He knows that there must be limitations. Because man will do with law those things that are inappropriate and improper to promote himself. Man's heart is a cesspool of darkness.

And mankind, his entire history, is a history of how to outwardly look like you're honoring what is good and right, honoring law, while at the same time seeking to subvert it. And if that isn't something we're seeing pretty much daily in our own land, I don't know what else to call it.

It's happening all the time. And so the hand of the witnesses shall be first against him to put him to death, and afterward the hand of all the people, so you shall purge the evil from your midst. Now obviously it couldn't be all the people.

You couldn't bring the entire population of Israel to a particular point and have each one of them throw a single rock or something like that. The point was that the witnesses go first and then those who are representing the rest of the people.

Likewise, it was to be an action of all of the people. And it was to be a purging of the evil from the midst. So obviously all of these severe penalties presume a people who desire to be in covenant with their God and desire to see evil purged.

We don't see this happening in the days of the prophets and the judges. Why? Because the prophets and the judges are speaking to a people who as a whole are themselves evil. I mean, yes, there's always that remnant, but there comes a point in time where it is very clear that the godly in the land perish.

Remember Psalm 12? The faithful man is disappearing from the people. And so the very context of bringing about these penalties disappears because the people themselves, the land would be filled with those who are being stoned, but there wouldn't be enough people left to stone them.

Once you have this level of apostasy amongst the people, you can see the problem that arises. Because notice, later on, when you have the discussion that takes up the next few verses about the difficult cases, at the end, the person who presumptuously rejects the verdict given by what in essence is the supreme court, and the supreme court is centered not in civil authority in the sense of a secular government or a king, but is centered in the place that Yahweh chooses for his own worship.

The person who rejects that, who presumptuously acts by not listening to the priest, that man shall die, thus you shall purge the evil from Israel. Then look at verse 13, then all the people will hear and be afraid and will not act presumptuously again.

Well, what does that assume? I mean, there comes a day, as we read through the Old Testament, there comes a day when the people have become so accustomed to evil that they can't even recognize good any longer.

And these capital crimes and capital laws, they teach us much about a people who are in covenant with God and desire to be holy in His sight, but what about a people who detest any of that? Who do not want to be in covenant with God, who do not want to be holy in His sight, who love their evil?

It's a different context. And it says much about the people. It says much about the people. Now, notice that we are told that if any case is too difficult for you to decide between one kind of homicide or another, between one kind of lawsuit or another, between one kind of assault or another, and we know because of the deceitfulness of the heart of man, we know because of how man engages in dishonesty and covering up his or her activities, that this happens all the time, that there are great difficulties involved in making just decisions.

So what are you supposed to do? Well, then you shall arise and go up to the place which the Lord Yahweh your God chooses. This will eventually be Jerusalem. And so you shall come to whom? To the Levitical priest or the judge who is in office in those days.

And so we know that there were certain judges like Samuel. We know that there were certain Levitical priests who ministered before the Lord, who had great knowledge of God's Word and God's truth. And so where are they to go?

They are not to go to the people around them. They are not to go to the nations around them. Instead, they are to go to the place of worship and the place where the Word of God is being ministered to the people.

And so what do we learn from this? We learn from this that this justice that is being spoken of in the book of Deuteronomy is to be focused and found in its purest essence amongst those people who have the greatest respect for, knowledge of, who dwell in the presence of God's divine revelation.

You shall inquire of them and they will declare to you the verdict in the case. You shall do according to the terms the verdict which they declare to you from that place which Yahweh chooses and you shall be careful to observe according to all that they teach you.

There was no place here for the arising of a secular authority that could subjugate the priesthood and God's law to external authorities. This would have been disastrous and yet this is exactly what ends up happening.

What do we end up seeing amongst the prophets especially? Well, not only do you get the king, but the king begins to be influenced by other nations and begins to organize his court according to what he sees in other nations and then what do you have?

Then you have false prophets. You have false prophets. In fact, in some instances, God sends the false prophets as judgment to bring confusion into the mind of the king so that he can bring judgment upon the people and there is an overthrowing of the centrality of the word of God so that eventually you have the word of God being found while cleaning the temple rather than it holding its central place in all of the life of Israel.

I don't know about you, but one thing I hear loud and clear as I consider these words is that the unregenerate heart will not long remain enamored and in love with the word of God. It may profess it at one point.

The people stood and said Amen to everything that Moses said, but the unregenerate heart will chafe in the presence of God's truth and will seek to see it replaced with something else that will not search out the heart and will not bring conviction of sin.

You shall do according to the verdict which they give you. You shall not turn aside to the right or left. And as we saw, the man who acts presumptuously, who acts outside of the God-ordained parameters of authority says no, I will not submit to the ultimate authority that God has placed within this nation of Israel, a covenant nation with God.

That person is evil and that person is to be purged from Israel and then the people are to, as a result, fear and remain faithful. That all assumes certain things that as Israel descends further and further into darkness and further and further into ignorance of God's truth.

Those things are no longer the case amongst the people. This becomes especially true when we look at what is said about the king. Now, you may be going, don't I remember over in Samuel that when the people asked for a king, God said, well, it's in 1 Samuel 8.

They said to Samuel, Behold, you have grown old and your sons not walk in your ways. Now, appoint a king for us to judge us like all the nations. Did you catch that? To judge us like all the nations. And even here in Deuteronomy 17, we want to have a king like all the nations around us.

But the thing, according to 1 Samuel, was displeasing in the sight of Samuel when they said, give us a king to judge us. Seemingly, there was an element here where there was a rejection of God's standards in judgment.

Now, there may have been a fear that Samuel's sons weren't going to do that either, that they weren't going to be just judges. But the Lord Yahweh said to Samuel, Listen to the voice of the people in regard to all they say to you, for they have not rejected you, but they have rejected me from being king over them.

Now, some might say, well, there's two stories here On the one hand, you have God saying that providing for law in regards to the establishment of a king, but then when they finally get around to doing this, God says, well, they're not rejecting you, they're rejecting me.

Well, it seems in 1 Samuel 15 that the way to understand this is that they do not desire to have God as judge over them. They do not desire to have His word. And they want the kind of judging that the kings of the nations provide, not a king who would fulfill the law we're going to see in Deuteronomy 17.

What do I mean by that? Well, what does he say? How is this king to be chosen? Well, first of all, God chooses. Not man. It is not an electoral process. God is to be the one who chooses and anoints this king, and that's exactly what we see once this takes place in regards to Saul and David, so on and so forth.

He is to be among your countrymen, and that is actually your ahi, your brothers. Your brothers. Now, this will be even more clearly established as we get into chapter 18, but I want you to note the term, because the prophet that God is going to give, who is prophesied in Deuteronomy chapter 18, is said to arise from your countrymen, your brethren.

In other words, he's Jewish. He's one from amongst the 12 tribes. So, the king is not to be a foreigner, and the prophet of Deuteronomy chapter 18 is not an Ishmaelite or an Arab. It's Jewish. Very clear.

This is a contextual thing. Just establishing it because it's rather important when we get to it eventually. So, one from among your countrymen you shall set as king over yourselves. You may not put a foreigner over yourselves who is not your countrymen.

Now, you might go, well, that seems almost second nature, doesn't it? No, not in those days. Not in those lands. Even in modern days, modern in the sense of the past 500 -600 years, you know how often alliances in Europe were organized and cemented by intermarriage of the royal houses.

So, you know, Britain wants to be at peace with France, and so you marry the king's daughter to the British king's son, and allegedly that's going to keep war from breaking out. Didn't work very well, but that was the theory.

The theory was not always overly functional, but that's how it happened. This is not to happen, and part of this is because this nation is covenanted with God, and the person who is then to rule over that nation must be one who likewise is covenanted with God to serve God, and hence would be subject to the laws of God.

And so you shall not put a foreigner over yourselves who is not your countrymen. Moreover, there are moral, ethical requirements and warnings. He shall not multiply horses for himself, nor shall he cause the people to return to Egypt to multiply horses, since Yahweh has said to you, you shall never again return that way.

In other words, there is to be a willingness on the part of the king to be content with that which God gives him. And for us, again, this seems second nature, but you've got to understand, one of the ways in which you showed your grandeur as a king in that day was through the authority that you had over your people and through the physical possessions that you had.

And God is saying, no, this is not what the king of my people is to look like. He shall not multiply wives for himself, or else his heart will turn away. Will turn away from what? Will turn away from dedicated service to his God.

Dedicated service that takes into consideration what a godly man will be, nor shall he greatly increase silver and gold for himself. Obviously, the entire history of Israel is a fulfillment of what happens when you break God's law in regards to these very things.

For over and over and over again, the kings of Israel and Judah ignored these things. They multiplied for themselves horses. They looked to Egypt. They multiplied wives, even men who had been given great wisdom by God.

Even men who had been given supernatural wisdom by God. Over time, the multiplication of wives, the involvement in that kind of harem-like activity, which is a step down from God's created intention, as Jesus himself teaches us in Matthew chapter 19, it's going to result in his heart turning away, and that's exactly what happens with Solomon, in turning away after other gods because of the women, the foreign women that he brought into his life.

The King's Scroll and Daily Exposure to God's Law

Now, it shall come about, verse 18. This is very important. Those of you who know something about the history of the church, the history of the rise of the papacy, for example, Boniface and Innocent and Gregory and all these popes and their clashes and wars with kings and nations and everything that took place from the 10th century all the way up to modern times, really, knows how important this section is.

Now, it shall come about when he sits on the throne of his kingdom, he shall write for himself a copy of this law on a scroll in the presence of the Levitical priests. Write for himself. Not have written.

He shall not cause to have written for him by a scribe. He was to write it for himself. And there was to be a Levitical priest there to observe and to check his work. Now, it's so clear as to why this would be necessary and why this would be advantageous.

I mean, let's be honest. If the only Bible you and I had was one we had copied out for ourselves, we might know it a little better. Because there would be no part of it you didn't already know, at least once.

There could be no excuses. Oh, I didn't know you wrote it. I forgot you wrote it. I watched you write it. You wrote it with your own hand. It shall be with him and he shall read it all the days of his life.

It's to be a first priority. Before any other law, before any other activity as king, there is his scroll, the king's scroll. It's not to be passed down to his sons where they go, oh, there's grandpa's scroll.

No. If they're going to be king, they need to write it themselves. And it shall be with him. He doesn't leave it behind. He carries it with him. He shall read it all the days of his life. Not on holy high days.

Not just on the Sabbath day. But he shall read it all the days of his life that he may learn to fear Yahweh his God. Not Yahweh the God, but Yahweh his God. The king is to be a believer in covenant with Yahweh who worships Yahweh, who knows Yahweh's law, and who carefully observes all the words of this law and these statutes so that his heart may not be lifted up above his countrymen, his brothers, and that he may not turn aside from the commandment to the right or the left so that he and his sons may continue long in his kingdom in the midst of Israel.

Here is the formula for God's blessing upon the king and the king's family is fidelity to knowledge of daily exposure to the law of God. And a concern to carefully observe all the words of this law, all these statutes, which would result in a king whose heart would not be lifted up as was the tendency of being a king, but instead he would see his status before God the true king, and as a result would be a good king, one that does not turn aside from the commandment to the right or to the left.

Sadly, how many kings amongst the people of Israel lived up to this commandment? We can think of Josiah, but oh, think of them. Think of the destruction and the death and the degradation that had come to the people of Israel simply because these words were first ignored and then lost until they're discovered while cleaning out the temple.

Look at this. Wow! No wonder things are so bad. A famine for the word of God. And isn't it a tragedy that we live in a day where, well, I wonder how many Bibles are in this room. Printed Bibles. And then how many of us have the electronic version?

I have it on this. I have it on my phone. We have access to it all around us. And yet how often are its precepts and its commands not just for kings, but for you and I ignored? Because you've not even read them.

The king was to read that law. That included Leviticus. That included Leviticus. Every single day. Constant exposure. You think God knows how quickly you and I forget? You think God knows how quickly you and I, our thinking process can be perverted?

Our hearts can be drawn off after other things? You think that when those heads of state from other nations came before Solomon, that he wasn't, even as he was impressing them, he wasn't looking? That there wasn't a temptation to begin to adopt their ways as well?

There needed to be a daily anchoring, a daily exposure. And you might say, well, that was just for them back then. We're Christians. We've got the spirit now. Do you think that we should be less focused upon God's truth?

Less desirous of constant exposure to that truth? Should we not even be more aware of the dangers that the world would present to us than even they were? But final thing. The king's ultimate secular authority subject to his God.

Subject to his God. It's not the divine right of kings. No human authority exists outside of God's authority. And any human authority that thinks that it does and that it will not, that those who exercise that authority will not stand before God as judge, those people are a deceived people.

A deceived people. Let us consider well what God's word has to say. Let us pray together. Our gracious heavenly Father, we do thank you for your word. And we thank you that you know us so well that even as you provided for a king, for Israel, you did so in such a way recognizing the heart of man.

And recognizing the need for those boundaries, for that revelation, that giving of your truth. Father, we ask that as we consider these things, we will have wisdom given to us by the Spirit of God, that we will make proper application.

And Lord, that we will be thankful for the word that you've given to us. We do ask that as we ponder these things, you will make us to be better servants of yours, that we might function as you've called us to function, as salt and light in this world.

We pray in Christ's name. Amen.