an I pray for you in any way?
Send any prayer requests to TheChristianWalkPrayers@gmail.com.
In Christ, Mark
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
** Follow The Christian Walk on Twitter @ThChristianWalk
** Like posts and send friend requests to the author of The Christian
Walk, Mark Cummings on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/mark.cummings.733?ref=tn_tnmn
** Become a Follower of The Christian Walk at http://the-christian-walk.blogspot.com
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The scriptures. May God bless the reading of His holy word.
“When men have a dispute, they are to take it to court and the judges will
decide the case, acquitting the innocent and condemning the guilty. If the
guilty man deserves to be beaten, the judge shall make him lie down and have
him flogged in his presence with the number of lashes his crime deserves, but
he must not give him more than forty lashes. If he is flogged more than that,
your brother will be degraded in your eyes.”
“Do not muzzle an ox
while it is treading out the grain.”
“If brothers are living
together and one of them dies without a son, his widow must not marry outside
the family. Her husband's brother shall take her and marry her and fulfill the
duty of a brother-in-law to her. The first son she bears shall carry on the
name of the dead brother so that his name will not be blotted out from Israel.
However, if a man does not want to marry his brother's wife, she shall go to
the elders at the town gate and say, ‘My husband's brother refuses to carry on
his brother's name in Israel. He will not fulfill the duty of a brother-in-law
to me.’ Then the elders of his town shall summon him and talk to him. If he
persists in saying, ‘I do not want to marry her,’ his brother's widow shall go
up to him in the presence of the elders, take off one of his sandals, spit in
his face and say, ‘This is what is done to the man who will not build up his
brother's family line.’ That man's line shall be known in Israel as The Family
of the Unsandaled.”
“If two men are fighting
and the wife of one of them comes to rescue her husband from his assailant, and
she reaches out and seizes him by his private parts, you shall cut off her
hand. Show her no pity.”
“Do not have two
differing weights in your bag - one heavy, one light. Do not have two differing
measures in your house - one large, one small. You must have accurate and
honest weights and measures, so that you may live long in the land the Lord
your God is giving you. For the Lord your God detests anyone who does these
things, anyone who deals dishonestly.”
“Remember what the
Amalekites did to you along the way when you came out of Egypt. When you were
weary and worn out, they met you on your journey and cut off all who were
lagging behind; they had no fear of God. When the Lord your God gives you rest
from all the enemies around you in the land he is giving you to possess as an
inheritance, you shall blot out the memory of Amalek from under heaven. Do not
forget!”
Deuteronomy 25
This ends our reading from God's holy word. Thanks be to God.
Like chapters 23 and 24
of the Book of Deuteronomy, chapter 25 is a collection of various laws and
commands that the Israelites were to follow as they entered Canaan. As we read
these laws, it’s important to remember that they were being given to an
entirely new generation. Their ancestors had been given most of these
instructions before but you’ll remember that God ensured they all would die in
the wilderness after sinfully showing no faith in Him when attempting to enter
the Promised Land the first time. Now, Moses was educating their children
before they would cross the Jordan under the leadership of Joshua.
As we have in the last
two messages, let’s look at each of these commands:
1. “When men have a
dispute, they are to take it to court and the judges will decide the case,
acquitting the innocent and condemning the guilty. If the guilty man deserves
to be beaten, the judge shall make him lie down and have him flogged in his
presence with the number of lashes his crime deserves, but he must not give him
more than forty lashes. If he is flogged more than that, your brother will be
degraded in your eyes.”
In Old Testament times,
disputes weren’t to be handled between individuals but in the courts where judges
were appointed to hear cases and render the appropriate verdicts, always
ensuring that justice was served. We need to note that when the penalty of
lashing was imposed, there was a limit. No one was to receive more than forty
lashes and anything beyond that would be considered inhumane in God’s sight.
2. “Do not muzzle an
ox while it is treading out the grain.”
Here, we see that human
beings weren’t the only ones allotted humane treatment.
Oxen were used to tread
on stalks of grain thrown on the threshing floor. As they walked on the stalks,
the grain kernels would be separated for collection. If the ox was muzzled,
then it would be unable to eat some of the grain when hungry and this would be
cruel, depriving them of their need for food. This is the reason for this
command from God.
3. “If brothers are
living together and one of them dies without a son, his widow must not marry
outside the family. Her husband's brother shall take her and marry her and
fulfill the duty of a brother-in-law to her. The first son she bears shall
carry on the name of the dead brother so that his name will not be blotted out
from Israel. However, if a man does not want to marry his brother's wife, she
shall go to the elders at the town gate and say, ‘My husband's brother refuses
to carry on his brother's name in Israel. He will not fulfill the duty of a
brother-in-law to me.’ Then the elders of his town shall summon him and talk to
him. If he persists in saying, ‘I do not want to marry her,’ his brother's
widow shall go up to him in the presence of the elders, take off one of his
sandals, spit in his face and say, ‘This is what is done to the man who will
not build up his brother's family line.’ That man's line shall be known in
Israel as The Family of the Unsandaled.”
As we have seen prior in
the Old Testament, it was very important for a son to be born into any family.
This is because society was very patriarchal and so any son would be able to carry
on the family name, inheriting any position their father might hold.
But what if a man dies
before he has a chance to have a son?
In those cases, the brother
of the deceased was to marry the widowed sister-in-law so she could bear a son
who would “carry on the name of the dead brother” so that “his name (would) not
be blotted out from Israel”.
Now, this was what God
commanded but there was no guarantee that the dead man’s brother would agree to
marry the widow. If this happened, we read where the refusal would be met with
great scorn and disapproval. For in this scenario, the widow was to take the
matter “to the elders at the town gate and say:
“My husband's brother
refuses to carry on his brother's name in Israel. He will not fulfill the duty
of a brother-in-law to me.”
In response to this, the
elders would “summon (the brother) and talk to him. If he persisted in saying, “I
do not want to marry her,” then he faced the following consequences:
“His brother's widow
(would) go up to him in the presence of the elders, take off one of his sandals,
spit in his face, and say, ‘This is what is done to the man who will not build
up his brother's family line.’ That man's line shall be known in Israel as The
Family of the Unsandaled.”
In other words, the
brother would be released from his duty to provide a son for his dead brother’s
widow but that liberation would come through a ceremony of shame, a ceremony
that would tarnish his reputation that point on in the community where it would
be well known how he intentionally disrespected his dead brother and widowed
sister-in-law.
Of special interest here
is the matter of being unsandaled. Remember that Jesus, providing instructions
on how they were to go out and evangelize, said that if a town refused to
receive them and the Gospel message they shared, then they were to leave the
town and shake the dust from their sandals (Matthew 10:11-15). The unsandaling
action in the New Testament was meant to heap shame on the rejecting town and
its people. It was an extension of what we see here in Deuteronomy, chapter 25.
4. “If two men are
fighting and the wife of one of them comes to rescue her husband from his
assailant, and she reaches out and seizes him by his private parts, you shall
cut off her hand. Show her no pity.”
We have seen other
places in the scriptures that speak about decency in dealing with sexual situations
as well as parts of the body used for sex and reproduction. Here, we find the
Law is given so to serve as a deterrent for anyone who might seek to severely
injure a person (in this case a man) by grabbing him by his private parts.
How serious was the
offense?
So much so that the woman’s
hand was to be cut off.We shouldn’t read this
as being that a woman was prevented to come to the aid of her husband. Rather,
it placed a limit as to how she acted if she did.
5. “Remember what the
Amalekites did to you along the way when you came out of Egypt. When you were
weary and worn out, they met you on your journey and cut off all who were
lagging behind; they had no fear of God. When the Lord your God gives you rest
from all the enemies around you in the land he is giving you to possess as an
inheritance, you shall blot out the memory of Amalek from under heaven. Do not forget!”
You’ll recall that when God
delivered His people from their captivity in Egypt, they embarked on an exodus
across the Sinai Peninsula toward Mount Sinai where the Lord would give Moses
instruction to pass onto the Israelites. This included what we know as the Ten
Commandments.
Well, the journey to Mount
Sinai was far from easy and the people of God found themselves “weary and worn
out”. In this state of lowered readiness, we saw where the Amalekites, the
descendants of Esau, attacked Israel. In that battle, God delivered the
Israelites into victory, something He didn’t want them to forget because He
definitely hadn’t.
For as we see in this
command, God ordered the Israelites to “blot out the memory of Amalek from
under heaven”. In other words, God was going to hand Amelek over to Israel for utter
annihilation.
6. “Do not have two
differing weights in your bag - one heavy, one light. Do not have two differing
measures in your house - one large, one small. You must have accurate and
honest weights and measures, so that you may live long in the land the Lord
your God is giving you. For the Lord your God detests anyone who does these
things, anyone who deals dishonestly.”
In biblical times, commerce
was often done by using weights and measures. One of the ways to determine the
cost of a purchase was to weigh it against a known standard weight to determine
the weight of what was being bought and subsequently the cost of that purchase.
Unfortunately, like
today, people figured out how to do unscrupulous, sinful things in order to
profit financially. In the context of this command, differing weights and
measures were often used to dishonestly weigh and measure items in the broker’s
favor. Completely lacking in integrity, it was a common practice that ripped
off a lot of people.
Then, as it is now, God
expects people to conduct their business matters honestly and above board.
Okay, that covers the
commands in Deuteronomy 25 and for the purpose of this message, I would like to
focus on an aspect of the sixth and final one. For as we deal with others on a day-by-day
basis, isn’t integrity one of the most important things we covet from those
serving us? I think I can say with absolute certainty that no one likes to be
deceived, especially when that deceit comes from someone you are placing your
trust in.
Well, it doesn’t take
too much time reading around the Bible to know that God hates dishonesty. And
just as we have seen harsh penalties for other sins in today’s passage, none of
them are as severe as what we find in the Book of Revelation in regard to those
who swindle or mislead others. Look at these verses from the 21st chapter:
“I did not see a
temple in the city, because the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are its temple.
The city does not need the sun or the moon to shine on it, for the glory of God
gives it light, and the Lamb is its lamp. The nations will walk by its light,
and the kings of the earth will bring their splendor into it. On no day will
its gates ever be shut, for there will be no night there. The glory and honor
of the nations will be brought into it. Nothing impure will ever enter it, nor
will anyone who does what is shameful or deceitful, but only those whose names
are written in the Lamb's Book of Life.” Revelation 21:22-27
Note here how deceitfulness
is a disqualifier because it makes a person impure and the scriptures clearly
state that “nothing impure will enter” through the gates of the New Jerusalem.
Only the “glory and honor of the nations will be brought into it” and this
includes those whose “names are written in the Lamb’s Book of Life”.
Now, I don’t know about
you but I want my name to be found in Jesus’ book and this comes by believing
and accepting Jesus as Savior. For it’s only in and through Him, committing
ourselves to live as He lived, that we can ensure that we will live a life free
from shameful, deceitful behavior. Doing so will earn us a place with Him for
all eternity and save us from the alternative, the everlasting suffering and
torment of Hell.
Amen.
In Christ,
Mark
PS: Feel free to leave a comment and please share this with anyone you
feel might be blessed by it. Send any prayer requests to TheChristianWalkPrayers@gmail.com.
