Intro to Blessings and Cursings

Deuteronomy, the Holiness Code, and the Need to Understand God’s Law

If you'll turn your Bibles with me, please, to the book of Deuteronomy, chapter 26. As most of you know, who have attended fairly regularly over the course of about the last two years, when I've had opportunity of speaking from the pulpit, we have been looking at the subject of God's law.

We initially titled the series, The Holiness Code, and if you wish to access that on sermonaudio .com, that is the sermon series title that you would look for, is The Holiness Code. And The Holiness Code, technically, is only found in the book of Leviticus, and so we laid a foundation, we laid a foundation of why we as Christians in the modern day would need to know something about God's law, why we'd need to know about these particular texts.

They're particularly difficult texts, hard texts to work with. We worked through The Holiness Code itself, and then we continued on from there because one of the things that we discussed and we realized was that on an apologetic level, and certainly to be involved in evangelism today, to be involved in giving a Christian witness in our land today, we will be required to engage in a defense of the faith.

If we are to address certain issues that have become absolutely central in our culture, then we must be aware of the fact that those within our culture will have an answer, they will have objections, and very often those objections will be surface level, very often they will be internet derived, they will not be due to in-depth study of the Bible on the part of the person with whom we are speaking, but that does not change the fact that they will be objections based upon the quotation of certain passages of Scripture, especially passages of Scripture derived from God's law, especially in Leviticus and Deuteronomy.

The reality is the vast majority of Christians in the United States, if they have ever read all of Leviticus and Deuteronomy, did so in a very surface level fashion, possibly as part of a through-the-year reading the Bible program, which is a fine thing to do, but it is not sufficient in and of itself to be able to engage in any type of meaningful discussion of the backgrounds of the book of Leviticus and Deuteronomy, the religions of the day, the religious practices, and it's certainly not enough to be able to derive a consistent understanding of how we are to handle the Old Testament law and how it has application to us today, and so we are liable to be attacked.

We are liable for people to look at us and say, I bet you're wearing mixed fibers. That shirt you're wearing looks like it's made out of polyester, and therefore you're violating God's law. Have you touched a pigskin recently?

Have you done this, that, or the other thing? We even played, a very memorable, memorable Sunday morning, we actually played over the loud speaker system in this very room, a clip from the West Wing. I can guarantee you, I have told this story a number of times now, that that is the only time in any Reformed Baptist church ever that that clip has been played in a public worship service.

We have definitely set a record, maybe not one that we will want to look back upon, but we did in playing that particular clip where a mockery was made of a person for daring to quote what the Old Testament text said concerning the sin of homosexuality, and basically said, look, this is what the world is saying.

We do not want to be caught in this trap. That means you and I need to do the work to understand what the scriptures say, why they say what they say, and how we will be able to give an answer. And so in the many months since that period of time, we have been looking at, sometimes texts that have been a great blessing, sometimes texts that have been very encouraging, but let's be honest with ourselves.

We have dealt with some very difficult and trying texts. Texts that are almost never preached upon. Texts that, to be honest with you, a large portion of evangelicals in our land, whatever again that term means, evangelicals in our land have never even been exposed to, do not want to think about.

And many have come to the point of just simply saying, well, you know, that was just simply the thoughts of an ancient people about God. They're not really God's words, what God did in that place, what he commanded his people to do in that situation.

It just, it's just too difficult. It's too hard for me to believe that a loving God, the God whose love is shown in the cross of Calvary, could ever command his people to do this kind of thing. And we have said over and over again that anyone who adopts that perspective ends up with a decrepit, shallow view of what the cross was all about.

For if all you see at the cross of Calvary is a demonstration of love, you do not see the depth of that love. Because first and foremost, what you should see in the cross of Calvary is God's holiness, God's wrath against sin, the seriousness with which he takes his own nature as the holy God.

And if you do not see that as the background, if you do not see that as what drives Christ to that cross, then the view of the love that you will see there will end up devolving into sticky sentimentality.

It can never remain true and abiding love over time. And so this has been our goal, our desire, and we have come to the end of that study. We have, I think, tackled pretty much everything there was to tackle.

You may recall the last sermon. We dealt with some tough texts, some of the toughest materials in the Old Testament. We've come to the end of the book of Deuteronomy. And in a very fitting fashion, I've chosen to complete this series by looking at more tough texts, specifically looking at the blessings and the cursings.

Reading Deuteronomy 26–28 in the Context of Covenant Faithfulness

Now, it was only a matter of months ago. If you're new to us, we sort of follow a fairly well-known tradition amongst Reformed Baptists and conservative Presbyterian congregations. Many of us read through an Old Testament text in the morning and, I'm sorry, a New Testament text in the morning, an Old Testament text in the evening.

And so we've been doing that for many, many years. And so I can recall elders, two elders of this congregation who are no longer living, no longer even with us, reading through the Old Testament texts on a Sunday evening.

And sometimes I will skip a chapter, not because of what's in it, but because I do not want to spend approximately six or seven minutes attempting to pronounce extremely difficult Hebrew names. Because that's what the entire chapter is, is a list of extremely difficult Hebrew names.

And I especially don't want to do that for two reasons. A, it would be better if I had the Hebrew text and was actually reading it in Hebrew because then they'd be the actual Hebrew names. But secondly, Roxy is normally sitting there with her self-pronouncing Bible.

And though she tries not to do this, there is a look of condemnation from right over there when I do not follow the same self-pronouncing guide of her self-pronouncing Bible. And so we'll skip over a couple of those.

But we do read through the entirety of that Old Testament text. And it wasn't that long ago that we read through the blessings and the cursings. I think Brother Callahan, it fell upon him to read most of the blessings and cursings in Deuteronomy 27 and 28.

In fact, I think I was gone for a part of it. And Deuteronomy 28 is a very long chapter. And I think it had been divided in half. And so there are some very difficult curses, very difficult things in that particular text of Scripture.

We will need to look at them. But I think it is appropriate that we finish with the blessings and the cursings because they show how incredibly serious God takes the revelation of his law given to his covenant people.

And today I'd like to look at Deuteronomy 26, beginning at verse 16, as an introduction to that material. Deuteronomy 26, 16. This day, Yahweh your God commands you to do these statues and ordinances.

You shall therefore be careful to do them with all your heart and with all your soul. You have today declared Yahweh to be your God, and that you would walk in his ways and keep his statutes, his commandments and his ordinances, and listen to his voice.

Yahweh has today declared you to be his people, a treasured possession, as he promised you, and that you should keep all his commandments, and that he will set you high above all nations, which he has made for praise, fame and honor, and that you shall be a consecrated people to the Lord your God, as he has spoken.

Loving God With All Your Heart and Soul

And so here is the introduction. Here is a section where this is why we need to hear the blessings and the cursings. Because here, God says, you are my people. And if you are to be my people, these laws I have given you will describe both positively and negatively what you are to be, how you are to act, how you are to think.

If you are to live in my presence, if you are to live with me as your God, this is how you are to live, this is how you are to behave. And so this day, Yahweh your God, and I know that none of your English translations say Yahweh, but once again, just in passing, I note, if you've not heard someone use the Tetragrammaton before, that's not something that you generally do in the presence of Jewish people who do not believe that you should ever pronounce the divine name.

But the reality is, this is God's covenant name. And it was used by the people of God for many, many, many centuries until a tradition developed that it was too holy to pronounce. But very clearly, the people of God did pronounce it.

And when you see L-O-R-D in all caps, that is the covenant God's name. And so I use it so we can see that it wasn't just simply some vague Lord your God. It was Yahweh your God commands you to do these statutes and ordinances.

Why? Because you are to be his people. And please note, it caught my attention in looking at this. Note what is said about how people are to do these commands and ordinances. You shall therefore be careful to do them with all your heart and with all your soul.

With all your heart and with all your soul. Where have you heard that before? Where have you heard that phraseology before? It's primarily in the book of Deuteronomy. But we are commanded to love God with the exact same Hebrew phrase.

And I think that I am saying something that is not going to be overly controversial. But I think there is a tremendous amount of struggle on the part of most Christian people to understand the relationship between loving God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, with all your strength.

That's the commandment that God identifies as the first commandment. You are to love the Lord your God by your heart, soul, mind, and strength. It is to be a commitment of the whole being of the covenant follower of God to love him.

But I'm not making an unusual statement to say that I think that people struggle to see what the relationship is between loving God and then doing the commandments of God with all your heart and with all your soul.

But I want you to understand there is an absolutely necessary and important relationship between those two things. And that to say on the one hand, oh, I love God, I love God fully, I love God wholly with my whole heart and mind, and then turn around and say, but so much of what he says, it grates upon me.

It's unnatural for me. I cannot find it within me to desire to do these things. That's an unnatural situation. It's not a situation that the writers of scripture could begin to really understand. Because it posits the idea that you can love God, but not love what he says is lovely to him.

He says, this is the way that my covenant people are to reflect who I am. You see, when you're in covenant with God, you are to reflect who he is. You're to reflect his character, his priorities, not your own.

See, the modern idea is God is out there and God is really hoping that folks will sort of take him up on his offer to be their God. And he's sort of lonely without us. And he'll just be so happy if you come along and make him happy by becoming one of his followers.

Isn't that normally how things are presented? And yet the biblical teaching is God is your creator. He is the only source of life. And if you are separated from him, you will never truly experience life.

And so God is eternally blessed and good in of himself. He's not missing anything without you. And you are actually commanded to come and to believe and to repent and to follow. It's you that's lacking something, not him.

And so when we have the wrong way of presenting this, we have the wrong way of thinking about God. And so it's very easy to think that, well, you know, we've been taught here in the West that, well, love, you know, I get to define what love is for myself.

There are certain foods I love and there are certain foods I don't love. And it's perfectly right for me to, you know, to be arbitrary about that. In fact, we can't use this term anymore, even legally in some places, but we discriminate.

That's what discrimination means, by the way. It means to make choices between things. I know I discriminate when it comes to food. I really, really do. And some of you know this. I love Mexican food.

Chips and salsa. Oh, man. Good chips and salsa. I shouldn't be saying this right before lunch, should I? I'm sorry. I apologize. I just lost half the congregation. It's now gone. And some strange noises are now going to start filtering across the room.

I very much apologize for that. But there are other kinds of food that some of you I know love. And if you invite me over to eat and you serve that, I will try to be nice. But if it's anything Chinese, I'm not eating it.

I'm sorry. It smells good to me. But once it goes in the mouth, I just, I want to run and scream and do something. I just can't do it. I discriminate. I make, you see, we go, that's fine. We have the, we have the right to choose the objects of our love.

We get to be as arbitrary as we want along those lines. The problem is we take that Western idea of creaturely freedom and we transport it into our love of God. And mankind in his arrogance actually thinks we sort of get to edit God.

Edit God. Determine what kind of God I'm going to love. God has to fulfill my requirements before I will love him. What we don't realize is when God has given us his law, this reflects his character. And if our hearts have been changed to where we truly love God as he is, then we will want to reflect his character.

And his law gives us the light to understand what that character is. Because of this, many people struggle on this very, very issue. And they see a distinction, a disjunction between keeping his commandments, obeying his law, and loving those commandments as they have come from God.

Many, many people in their honesty of their hearts will admit, I don't love God's law. I want to love God, but some of the stuff he says, I just, I just don't buy it. And so notice, you shall therefore be careful to do them.

But it's a vast difference between doing something out of a sense of dread, a sense of mere obligation. Duty is actually a nice word, but sometimes it can be used in a negative way. Well, I've got to do it.

And anybody in the military knows there's some people that do their duty because that's what they want to do. And then there's people who do their duty because it's what they have to do. And they get by with the absolute minimum.

And you can just tell by their attitude. It's not something they want to, their heart is not in it. That's not just the case in the military. It's the case in the workplace and the family and every place else.

That's not how God's people are to be. With all your heart, with all your soul, that requires an understanding of the character of God and the definition of what it means to be in covenant with him. And that is why so many of those down to the history of Israel rebelled against God because their hearts were not changed.

Your heart has to be changed. The prophets talk about the need to take out that heart of stone and give a heart of flesh because a heart of stone will not be careful to do the commandments of God. As clearly as they may know them, there will not be a desire to perform those things with your heart and with all your soul.

Covenant Allegiance, the Tetragrammaton, and the Treasured Possession

Verse 17, you have today declared Yahweh to be your God. Again, the flippant way in which western people today change their allegiances. You know, this past football season, the hometown team here, which actually carpet bagged in from someplace else and could easily go anyplace else at some time in the future, but the hometown team here did pretty well.

Now, I have said many, many times if they ever announced they are going to move someplace else that I will show up to help pack the bags. So it was a little hard for me. They're doing really good. Because, you know, I can't really get all excited.

You know, it's just like, well, that's nice. I'm glad to see them doing well, but I don't want to be a bandwagon fan, you know, because if they're true to form, it won't be long till they're back to about a 500 level team because that's just sort of how they've always been.

I'm sorry if you're a Cardinals fan, but that's just, you know, history is history. Let's not have an argument about that. There's a fickleness. You know, there are a bunch of people who became Golden State Warrior fans this year.

And next year, they're going to be the fans of somebody else. And they go from here to there and so on. And that's just, I don't know, it's just sort of the way our culture is. When it comes to religion, especially, our culture says, ah, hey, if you want to be a Buddhist today and a Hindu tomorrow and a Baptist the next day, that's an interesting combination.

But hey, why not? If you can be a male today and a female tomorrow and something else the next day, who cares, right? There isn't any truth or falsity about things. You see, in this context, to declare Yahweh to be your God was not something that the next day you could go, yeah, you know, I just did some reading about one of these Canaanite gods over here.

So I've decided to change my mind. That's not how things were. That's not how people thought. There was a declaration being made and that's the foundation of the blessings and cursings. So important was this declaration that what's going to happen is that the people are going to come into the land.

They're going to line up on Mount Ebal. They're going to line up on the mountain across. They're going to pronounce blessings and cursings. And if you've looked at it, and I'd like to encourage you to read Deuteronomy 26, 27, and 28 as you have time over the next, you know, if you have some time this afternoon or by next week, because it's obviously going to take us a little while to work through this, you'll discover something.

There's 14 verses at max of blessing. There's way more than that of cursing. It starts with the curses, blessings, curses. And that bothers us. It's way out of balance. It's not really when you think about it, but at least as far as the descriptive nature, it's tough stuff.

And so you see this declaration that they're making wasn't just some sort of flippant, oh, today my favorite color is chartreuse type thing. It was a declaration that required the covenant makers to accept the conditions of the covenants and God makes those conditions very, very, very well known.

And so when he lays out, here is what you shall do positively. And here's the blessings that will come from that. He then lays out and you shall not do these things. And when you do, there will be a result of the breaking of that covenant.

Now, again, we live in a society where breaking of covenants is not considered to be a serious thing any longer. There was a day when a man's word was his bond. You swore to your own hurt, but no longer.

It's part of the general degradation of how we view law and morality and ethics and our duties to others. There was a time when you said, till death do us part. You actually feared making that statement lightly because you actually meant it.

But when we live in a day of constant broken covenants, then it's easy for us to take our experience and read them backwards rather than read our experience in light of what God's word says. This declaration of Yahweh to be your God was not taken lightly.

It was not something that could be changed overnight. And it carried specific blessings and specific cursings if you were to violate the terms of that covenant. You have today declared Yahweh to be your God in distinction from any other.

There were many, many others. There were lots of options even back then. No, this is an exclusive declaration and exclusive dedication. And that you would walk in his ways and keep his statutes. There is no way to have Yahweh as your God without you behaving in such a way as to reflect his character and attributes.

It has been well said by many people in the reformed world today, you become like that which you worship. What you worship will determine what your character will become. We look around the world around us and we see our fellow citizens worshiping things.

And so their character becomes that of a lover of things. And you use people to obtain position and power and possession. Well, if you're going to love this Yahweh, you're going to reflect him. And he has given reason and revelation as to what his character is and you're to reflect that character.

And that you would walk in his ways and keep his statutes, his commandments and his ordinances and listen to his voice. A view of God's law that views it merely as the ancient reflections of an ignorant people is not only the Bible's view, it's certainly not Jesus's view.

When it says, listen to his voice, that tells us is the people understood this was God speaking, this was God's revelation. This wasn't just Moses sitting around going, well, you know, given the nature of this people, I think it'd be best if we had this set of laws.

Borrow a little bit from this religion over there, borrow a little bit from that. That's the theory that is presented sadly even in most seminaries today. But remember in Matthew chapter 22 when Jesus said to the Sadducees, have you not read what God spoke to you saying?

He had the exact same view of what we have right here. Listen to his voice. When you hear God's law and you listen obediently, expectantly, then you're hearing God speak. You're responding in the way that God would have you to respond and that Jesus taught us to respond.

Yahweh has today declared you to be his people a treasured possession as he promised you and that you should keep all his commandments. So when the people declare you're our God, God declares you're my people.

You are a treasured possession in distinction from any other people. There is a particularity, a peculiarity. And if the language sounds familiar, this is the very language that lies behind the New Testament passages that describe us as a treasured possession to God.

Peter makes reference to this text. Paul, in describing the work of our great God and savior in redeeming a people for God's own possession, this is what he's referring to in Titus chapter two, verses 13 and 14.

This is the background language, the very covenant language that is used to describe the result of the sacrificial work of Christ in creating this people for his own possession. Because here in under the old covenant, we have this laid out.

Here, I will be your God. You need to do these things. Well, what do we end up finding out in the declaration of the coming of the new covenant? What do we find out? Well, we're reading through Sunday nights.

We're reading through Joshua and Judges. So again, really tough texts. And our minds sometimes, it's difficult in light of our knowing the rest of the biblical narrative to look at what people did and to see the darkness and the degradation.

They just had the law given to them. How can they not see these things? But what happens when you have an unregenerate heart that has the bright light of God's law shine upon it? Is that enough to change the heart?

No, there needs to be something more. And so you have the promise of the new covenant that is given, a promise of a new heart, writing the law upon the heart of true forgiveness of sins. And we know how that then becomes fulfilled in having that better mediator and that better covenant in the coming of Jesus Christ.

And so there is a fulfillment. There will be a time when the proper relationship exists between God and his people so that they are truly a treasured possession to him and he delights in them. That's the true fulfillment of the covenant that is being made here.

But there needs to be a spiritual aspect. Otherwise, that law just becomes something that we chafe against, something that we find to be a burden rather than a joy. Really, we have to ask ourselves the question, how much do I want to be God's treasured possession?

Or how much do I simply want to treasure? My possessions. Only you can answer that question. On a Sunday morning, you can look at me and you can, I don't know your heart, and you can say all the right words to me and I can't see within you.

But I want to ask every single one of you, which is more important to you, your treasured possessions or being God's treasured possession? Think about it. Think about what you normally are thinking about in the quiet times.

What are you focused upon? Your relationship with God? Your redemption? The forgiveness of your sins? Or how are you going to be able to get enough money to get that next thing? Because if you just get that next thing, you'll truly be happy.

Despite the fact that through your entire life, every time you've gotten that next thing, it becomes old the next week and you need the next, next thing. And we all know it. We all know it. How much do we want to be his treasured possession?

Then there's a promise, verse 19, and that he will set you high above all nations, which he has made for praise, fame, and honor, and that you shall be a consecrated people to Yahweh your God as he has spoken.

This is the promise that he has made. If you are my covenant people, you will be set high above all nations, which he has made, praise, fame, and honor. You'll be a consecrated people, a holy people. Again, this is the very language that Peter uses over and over again in his first epistle to describe this holy temple being built to God, made up of Jews and Gentiles, being drawn together by their common confession in Jesus Christ, their common bowing the knee in repentance and faith, their being made into the very fulfillment of what Israel never became, because the purpose of the law, the purpose of the giving of the law, was to reveal God's holy character, and as a result, reveal what?

Our need. That we cannot, by some act of our almighty will, make ourselves, other than what we are, the fallen sons and daughters of Adam. The law says, do this and live. Do not do this and you will be cursed.

And it then becomes the very foundation of our being able to understand how the gospel itself transcends, does not violate, transcends strict categories of justice, and introduces us to those wonderful words of mercy, love, grace, and forgiveness.

The Stone Tablets, the Altar, and the First Act in the Land

This is the proclamation that is made to the people of God. Today, you've made these words. You've made this declaration. In chapter 27, then Moses and the elders of Israel charged the people saying, keep all the commandments which I command you today, so it shall be on the day when you cross the Jordan, the land which Yahweh your God gives you, that you shall set up for yourself large stones and coat them with lime, and write on them all the words of this law when you cross over, so that you may enter the land which Yahweh your God gives you, a land flowing with milk and honey, as Yahweh the God of your fathers promised you.

So it shall be when you cross the Jordan, you shall set up on Mount Ebal, these stones, as I am commanding you today, and you shall coat them with lime. Moreover, you shall build there an altar to Yahweh your God, an altar of stones.

You shall not wield an iron tool on them. You shall build the altar of Yahweh your God of uncut stones. You shall offer on it burnt offerings to Yahweh your God, and you shall sacrifice peace offerings and eat there and rejoice before Yahweh your God.

You shall write on the stones all the words of this law very distinctly. And so here's the commandment. When you go over, when you enter into the land, the very first thing you are to do is you are to set up these stones, and you are to coat them with lime so that evidently the idea is once you carve the words of this law into them, they will last for generation to generation.

They will remain legible. They will remain readable. I think the reason for the building of the altar of uncut stones is so it wouldn't be like the altars of the nations around that became very, very ornate.

The point was the altar wasn't the issue. It was the sacrifice that was being made. So it was a distinction from the type of cultic ritual that would take place in the lands around them. But they are to build these, this altar, they are to set up these stones, stones of remembrance, and they are to write on the stones all the words of this law very distinctly.

They're not to leave anything out. It is to be the very first thing they do. This is the basis of your remaining faithful to me. You're not to go after the other gods and do the things that I have said are detestable.

Set this up. Make it known. Do not be hidden. And you're also to make that altar and you're to offer burnt offerings and sacrifice peace offerings and eat there and rejoice before Yahweh your God. It wasn't supposed to be a big burdensome thing.

The idea was as soon as you go in as the covenant people, you're entering the land, I'm going to give to you, remember my law, offer the appointed sacrifices and rejoice. Rejoice. We think back upon what happened when Moses was on the mountain.

The people rejoiced and turned very quickly to idolatry. Instead, these people are to go in and they are to rejoice, they are to sacrifice, and they are to write on the stones all the words of this law very distinctly.

Obedience, Witness, and the Invitation to Return for the Cursings

Then Moses, the Levitical priest, spoke to all Israel saying, Be silent and listen, O Israel. This day you have become a people for Yahweh your God. You shall therefore obey Yahweh your God and do his commandments and his statutes which I command you today.

Now we'll pick up this evening with the specifics of the curses that begin with verse 15. There is a brief section of curses which fundamentally reiterates the various categories of the law. And that then becomes, that's then before the blessing and cursing of the next chapter which is a much longer chapter that we'll spend more time in.

But here the people of God once again are spoken to, This day you have become a people for Yahweh your God. And how do they therefore show that? It's not by their dress, it's not by the ornateness of the worship.

It was not the way the people of the land showed their dedication to their God. You shall therefore obey Yahweh your God and do his commandments and his statutes which I command you today. That's how they demonstrated their covenant relationship to him.

That's not how the people of the land did it. It wasn't with symbols, it wasn't with dress, it wasn't with the ornateness of temples. It was with the obedience of the heart. Given how much more we know, given how much we know in regards to God's heart that has been revealed in the redemptive work of Jesus Christ, we just simply have to ask ourselves the question, with all my heart, with all my soul, do I desire to be one of these covenant people of God?

He's made me that, but when I examine my heart, where are my real priorities? Now I realize, of course, when you're talking with someone on a bus, on a train, on a plane, and these issues come up, they don't have this background.

But you see, if you do, if you've thought these things through, if this is something that is a regular part of your thinking, it will come out in your explanation. You may not be able to express it with a great deal of scholarly clarity or something like that, but if it's something you've thought through, then it becomes more natural for you to speak about why you would want to be obedient to God's commands, because since I love him, I want to be like him, and his law reveals his character to me.

And then you can turn around immediately and say, and since you're made in the image of that very same God, his law reflects what your character should be, and that's why you have the guilt that you have when you do the things you do.

And all of a sudden, you're witnessing to somebody. All of a sudden, you're witnessing to somebody. Here's the introduction to the blessings and the cursings. And yeah, I'm thinking about one verse in the cursings.

I don't even like reading it. But you see, if we don't have this part as the foundation, then once we get to that, we're just trying to explain things away rather than having the proper context to be able to really hear what's actually being said.

So this evening, I know this will probably mean that there will be five of us here, but it's because I'm a warning. I'm letting you know ahead of time. We're looking at cursings tonight. What? Come on back this evening for a blessed time in the Lord of talking about cursings.

Yes, indeed. But I invite you back because if you read through them, you will see that what it really functions as is a reiteration of all the categories that we have been talking about for quite some time now as to what is important in God's law.

So it's an important section. I invite you to return this evening as we consider it. Let's pray together. Our holy yet merciful heavenly Father, we do thank you once again for your truth, for your word, for your law.

These words were written so long ago. And yet our Lord and Savior honored them. In fact, he honored them so much that he went to the cross to fulfill what they said. We thank you for that. We ask that you would help us to understand.

And when we have opportunity to honor your truth by its proclamation to others around us, may we do so from a position of ourselves, having thought these things through and found in your truth that which is precious to us.