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Intro:
-how many of you are “why” kind of people?
-Something happens, or someone explains something to you, and your question is: why?
My older brother Ben was a lot more that way growing up than I was
-Ben is pretty smart, pretty logical, and so he’d want to know why?
-I didn’t really care, and sometimes I was just frustrated that we now had to sit there an listen to an explanation when I didn’t really care
The reason I ask this is because Moses gives the Israelites an important command
-But there’s a reason for it
-There’s a why to it, and I want you to be thinking about the question “why” as we work our way through this passage tonight
Background:
Remember, when we interpret the Pentateuch (the first 5 books of the Bible), it’s important that we keep it within the context of the metanarrative (the storyline) that occurs within these 5 books
-So God creates the world and everything is good
-He creates man and woman in perfect fellowship with Himself
-And yet, the man and woman are tempted by Satan, choose to sin, and the whole human race is plunged into sin
-But, in their moment of greatest failure, God promises the man and the woman a Descendant
-This Descendant would crush the Adversary
So the whole over-arching storyline of the Pentateuch is that of tracing this line of descendants from the woman, looking in hope for the Promised Descendant
And so many times in the Pentateuch, this line of descendants is on the brink of ruin
-But God always steps in and preserves this line of descendants
-So when God destroys the earth with a flood, He steps in a graciously preserves Noah and his family
-God singles out Abram as the one that this descendant will come from
-But Abraham is a coward, and allows his wife to be taken by a foreign king twice!
-But God steps in each time to preserve this line of descendants
-When a famine ravages the known world, God sovereignly places Joseph as second in command in Egypt to preserve this line of descendants and give them a safe place to multiply
-When Pharaoh enslaves this line of descendants, now known as the Israelites, God steps in and frees them with a mighty arm
-When Pharaoh changes his mind and wants them back, God opens up the Sea to let His people through, while drowning the Egyptian army
God leads His people to Mount Sinai and there makes a covenant with them
-God will give them the land that He promised to their fathers and will be their God
-And they, in turn, will be obedient to Him and worship Him alone
God desires a special, marked-off people
-This doesn’t get off to a very good start, as God’s people quickly show themselves to be an idolatrous, stiff-necked people
-Yet God graciously brings them to the Promised Land despite their wickedness
-But the people rebel against God, desiring instead to return to the slavery of Egypt instead of the bountiful land God has provided
-God does not allow this, but instead sentences them to wandering around in the wilderness until all of the Israelites over 20 years old are dead
This is exactly what happens, as God’s people languish in the wilderness for 40 years until all the people over 40 die
-Now once again, the people are at the brink of the Promised Land
Deuteronomy then, is a collection of sermons by Moses to the Israelites as they prepare to go into the Land
Last week we looked at the Shema, which is Deuteronomy 6:4-5
-We noted that really, all of Deuteronomy is a commentary on Vs. 5, which Jesus Himself calls the greatest command
-To love God with all your heart, soul and strength is the greatest of all God’s commandments
-That brings us to our text today, which we’ll start with verse 4 and go through verse 9, then we’ll get the verses 10-12 in a few minutes
**READ PASSAGE**
Vs. 6-9
Vs. 6
“These words” refer to really all of the commands of God found in the Law
-These are found in the 10 Commandments in the previous chapter
-These are many of the other laws given in chapters 12-26
-And they are especially encapsulated in the Shema of 6:4-5
-God’s words, His revelation to His people, are to be in their hearts
-Now remember, in our culture and language, when we refer to the heart, we are referring to the emotions
-When someone says “I love you with all my heart” or “follow your heart” (bad advice, by the way), we understand that to be the emotional side of us
-But that’s why it’s important when we seek to understand the Bible, we go across the bridge, so to speak, and understand the Bible how the original audience would have understood it
-For the Hebrews, the heart wasn’t about the emotions, but about the mind
-So this command to have the words of God in their heart was a command for them to be thinking about His words constantly!
-They ought always to be in their consciousness
Let me ask you, when you put your mind in neutral, so to speak, what does it go to?
-What is it you’re constantly thinking about?
-Is it sports?
-Is it your favorite TV show?
-Is it your kids?
-Is it how angry the other political party makes you?
What is it?
-I remember as a young teenager, I was so into football!
-I daydreamed about football
-I played football video games
-Every chance I got, I went outside and played football with my friends
-When the Panthers played on Sundays, it took me about 3 days to get over the game
-I’m serious! it took me from Sunday till about Wednesday to really move on after a game
-If they won, I was ecstatic!
I would think about their victory, the awesome plays, I would read sports articles about it
-And when they lost, I was so disappointed, and all week I dissected what it was that went wrong, what they should have done differently
What is it you think about when you let your mind wander?
-What do you love to dwell on?
And for the Israelites, they were to constantly dwell on God’s Words, His commandments
Now, you might be saying, “that doesn’t sound like an easy task!
How could someone make sure that they are thinking on God’s Words, His Commandments, constantly like that?
-That’s a legitimate question
-How would the Israelites be able to train themselves to do this?
I think it’s this line of reasoning that leads Moses to give these instructions in verses 7-9
Vs. 7
One of the ways that the Israelites could ensure that they were constantly keeping God’s commands at the forefront of their mind and heart was to teach them to their children
-As their kids were growing up, the parents were to faithfully teach their children God’s Words
-This probably involved a lot of memorization
-Helping their children memorize the Words of God
-but more than just that, this probably also involved talking through the Words of God and their implications
-You can imagine a little 9 year old Jewish girl asking her father why they celebrated Passover, or why they had to bring the tithes, her father explaining these things to her
As a matter of fact, verses 20-25 seem to indicate this very thing:
You can see that the Israelite parents were responsible to make sure that God’s Words were learned, but also that they were understood by their children
As a matter of fact, this task was to be so consuming that they were to talk of God’s Words when they sat down in the house or when they walked by the way
-Now, what does that mean?
-sitting in your house and walking by the way really encompasses all aspects of life
-Whether the Israelite parents were trying to entertain their kids on a rainy day
-Or whether they were taking them to the local market for food shopping
-Whether they were at home making clothes
-Or whether they were out helping to take care of the livestock
-In all kinds of daily and normal routines of life, they were to talk of God’s Words and teach them to their children
-They were to do this when they lay down and when they rose up
-In other words, from sun-up to sun-down, the Israelites were to teach their children God’s Words and His commands
Now, as we think about us today, what are things that children in our culture are learning all the time?
-Video games, movies, TV shows, YouTube, sports
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