Wednesday, March 04, 2009

Day 7/Chapter 7


Introduction
I keep pressing on towards the goal. I’m on my seventh day of reading and reflecting on Deuteronomy. It has been a blessing. So far, reading these seven chapters of Deuteronomy has been kind of like a re-cap of the book of Exodus. You get this feeling God is sitting down in a chair telling this story to a new generation of followers. There has been a lot more excitement to this book than anticipated.

Chapter 7 observations
- The conquering of the Promise Land is going to be some work. They must completely destroy the groups of people totally. These different groups of people must be completely given over to the LORD.
- The Israelites are a treasured possession to God (v.6).
- Establishing Israel in the Promise Land is going to be a process. It is going to happen little by little. Would I have the patience for this?
- God’s plan for them is very smart and thought out. He isn’t driving all of the different groups out because wild animals would move in and take over parts of the Promise Land if He did (v.22).
- You see towards the end of this chapter that things can be “set apart” for destruction as much as they can for God. We talk of holiness as a person being “set apart” for God, but here you see and hear something a little different. Here the talk is of idols and what those idols will do if the Israelites do not completely destroy them.

2 comments:

Jon Howery said...

I heard a great comparison to the church from verse 22 by Book of Hope founder, Bob Hoskins; he said that God will not send more people to us if we are not ready to handle those people. If we are not ready to minister to those people, God will not let them come.
Just a thought.

Tim Sheets said...

Jon, my friend from the sunny land.

That is a really good point about not having more people come because we are not ready for them. I guess I haven't considered that.

Thanks for stopping by.