Introduction
1. The people of Israel were near the end of a long journey. For almost 40 years they had been wandering about in the desert on their way to the promised land. There they would be in a land filled with milk and honey. Their own land in which they could settle down and rest from their travels. It had been a long journey.
2. Those of us reading through the Year Of The Bible may feel the same way. As the people wandered through the desert, the journey through our readings may have seemed long. We have been reading long passages about offerings and sacrifices, regulations, details about how to build the tabernacle, detailed ceremonial laws, lists of people and allocations of land. We also may be glad theat this journey is soon over and we can start reading about the events of God and His people in the promised land. Just like when we read a novel, we cannot wait to get through all the descriptive pages to the action.
3. Moses has been speaking to the people. He is preparing them for his departure and for their entry into the promised land. Telling them how they are to live their lives as God’s covenant people.
4. And as he does, he teaches us also how we are to live our lives as God’s chosen people.
5. If there is one thing that Moses wants to impress upon them and upon us is that they and we are to fear the Lord. He mentions that they are to fear the Lord 7 times in Deuteronomy.
Teaching
6. He has been telling them what God has done. vs. 12 begins with "and now, O Israel, what does the Lord ask of you?" How does the Lord ask us to respond to Him and what he has done for us? The response is to be one of attitude. We are to have a proper attitude toward God. An attitude that will affect all that we do.
7. We can work at becoming more loving, holy, and righteous. We can study God’s word and of all kinds of things to know Him more. But all these will fall short unless we have a right attitude to God. If we have the wrong attitude, we will not remain true to God and will consider His word to be a burden rather than a joy.
8. This morning I ask you to consider your attitude. How you look upon God. How you respond to Him.
9. The attitude we are to have is to fear the Lord our God. I ask you, do you fear the Lord? Is it the fear of the Lord that is the motivation of all that you think, say and do?
10. First we need to understand what it means to fear the Lord. All people, whether chosen or not, are to fear the Lord. Because God is a holy God and when we are in His presence we cannot live. That is why the people of Israel could not go upon Sinai. It a holy ground upon which they could not stand . That is why Isaiah would later be filled with fear when God came before him:
Isa 6:5 "Woe to me!" I cried. "I am ruined! For I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen the King, the LORD Almighty."
And as we see how God’s wrath will be poured out on the earth in Revelation, we see that people have a reason to fear God
11. But as God’s chosen people, this fear takes on whole new dimension. Yes there is this fear of a holy God, but the fear we have is more a fear of which leads us to stand in awe before God. To honour and respect and revere God. To stand in wonder before God.
12. When we see the majestic Rocky Mountains or the grandeur of the Grand canyon, there is an overwhelming, all-encompassing sense of greatness, of seeing or experiencing more than our senses will allow us to take in. So it is as we think on God and look upon Him. We are overwhelmed and stand in awe.
13. Why? Because we see that He is an awesome God.
Deu 10:17 For the LORD your God is God of gods and Lord of lords, the great God, mighty and awesome,
And what He does is awesome.
Deu 10:21 He is your praise; he is your God, who performed for you those great and awesome wonders you saw with your own eyes.
14. Moses gives some reasons why do we stand in fear or awe before God?
a. Deu 10:14 To the LORD your God belong the heavens, even the highest heavens, the earth and everything in it.
When we stop and consider creation - how complex, orderly and great it is, we cannot help but be moved. David says "when I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place," - I cannot help but praise you
b. Or when we think of God choosing us to be His people.
Deu 10:15 Yet the LORD set his affection on your forefathers and loved them, and he chose you, their descendants, above all the nations, as it is today.
To think that, for no reason of your doing, the creator of all things, not only created you, but from eternity had decided that He would take your hard, evil heart and change it into a heart that would want to glorify God.
c. And how He leads and guides His people. Over and over again in Deuteronomy Moses reminds the people of that which God had done for them. Freeing them from the Egyptians and providing for them in the desert, despite their rebelliousness.
I stand amazed that God’s love and mercy is so great that He cares for me and that He chose me to be His child. And that He would send His Son to pay the price for your sin. Is that though not more that we can comprehend?
Does this not boggle our minds and make us stand in awe before God? When we think of all that do our hearts not dance within us and do we not want to dance before the Lord?.
d. And to think of His mercy.
Deu 10:17 For the LORD your God is God of gods and Lord of lords, the great God, mighty and awesome, who shows no partiality and accepts no bribes. He defends the cause of the fatherless and the widow, and loves the alien, giving him food and clothing.
15. But you may say, I believe these things about God but I do not have that sense of awe. That may well be so. Because even as believers we still are stained by sin. Just as the people of Israel were.
16. That is why Moses says to them:
Deu 10:16 Circumcise your hearts, therefore, and do not be stiff-necked any longer.
Even as believers we can be stubborn or stiff-necked. Not only can we but often we are just that. We want to go our own way. We fail to meditate on who God is and what God has done. Moses would warn the people that once in the promised land they would look at all they had, and think it was the work of their own hands that provided it all, rather than the gracious hand of God.
17. We need to circumcise our hearts. To cut off the flesh around the heart so that nothing is hidden. That we see ourselves for who we are and God for who He is. To get rid of that which builds up self and stops us from seeing God and His work. To meditate on Him and be exposed to His word and His presence.
18. To stand in awe, to fear God, will affect how we relate to God and live our lives. Moses tell us how in vs. 12&13.
19. First we walk in all His ways. What does it take to walk in His ways? It takes trust. It means that we trust God so much, that even when the worlds ways seem better, we will still follow His way. When we are mistreated or sinned against, we want to lash out at others. But we have a God who says "turn the other cheek." The world says don’t let them walk all over you. Our pride says hit them back. But we trust that God will take care of the situation and so we turn the cheek. Not easy, but it becomes easier as we fear God and stand in awe at how faithful He is and how sure His ways are.
It means that when we trust Him even when all looks dark. That the storms of life do not take away the peace we have.
20. Moses also says that to fear God means we love Him. When we meditate upon His great love for us, we are filled with love for Him.
1 John 4:19 We love because he first loved us.
And our love for God will lead us love one another. To also care for the poor and the aliens as God’s love provided for them.
1 John 4:7-12 Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.
21. And that love is not just a feeling. Our love for God leads us to serve the Lord our God with all out heart and all our soul. All that we do in life we do for God. We allow Him to be the Lord of our lives. We are but His servants. So often Christians act as if God is there to serve us. God, why did you not answer my prayer or help me in this situation? God, why is life so hard for me? Since I follow you God, are you not obligated to look after me? To fear God means rather to see ourselves as being the ones to serve Him? What can I do to do your will?
When you stand before the Rockies or Grand Canyon you are humbled. You feel small. There is something much greater than you there. So we should be humbled when we stand before God. We realize how small we are and how we are here to serve God and not the other way around.
22. And to serve God will not be a burden. In talking about Jesus, Isaiah says:
Isa 11:2-3 The Spirit of the LORD will rest on him-- the Spirit of wisdom and of understanding, the Spirit of counsel and of power, the Spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the LORD--and he will delight in the fear of the LORD.
As we grow Christlike we also will grow to delight in the fear of the Lord. And to deny ourselves as Christ did.
23. And finally , when we fear the Lord we are to:
Deu 10:13 observe the Lord's commands and decrees that I am giving you today for your own good?
When we consider how great God is, we obey His word. We realize that the law God gives us is for our own good. And we cannot help but obey God because we love Him.
John 15:9-12 "As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. If you obey my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have obeyed my Father's commands and remain in his love. I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete. My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you.
24. Friends we have an awesome God. Fear Him - trust Him, love Him, serve Him and obey Him. May our fear of God, our sense of awe at who He is and what He has done be the basis of all we do. Praise Him, you His people, bring glory to His name.
