Warnings

Why do we need warnings?

Imagine you are driving to your best friends house! You are excited to go visit them but there has been a storm. Unbeknownst to you, the road has been washed out. As you get closer to your destination you speed up a bit in anticipation. What’s that? A warning sign? The road is washed out ahead.

At this moment you have choices to make.

Will you listen to the warning and turn around.

Will you slow down and see how much further you can get?

Will you trust in how things have always been and keep charging forward?

A warning is only helpful when we listen to it.

There is a path that we will all travel. Along that path are pitfalls and unexpected turns. God always provides a way through these obstacles if we listen and obey.

It’s typically not in the big moments that we forget about God, it’s in the day-to-day moments.

Today’s message is about warnings that God gave the people of Israel as the prepared to enter the promise land.

PRAY

Warning: God is a Jealous God.

Deuteronomy 4:15–24 ESV

15 “Therefore watch yourselves very carefully. Since you saw no form on the day that the Lord spoke to you at Horeb out of the midst of the fire, 16 beware lest you act corruptly by making a carved image for yourselves, in the form of any figure, the likeness of male or female, 17 the likeness of any animal that is on the earth, the likeness of any winged bird that flies in the air, 18 the likeness of anything that creeps on the ground, the likeness of any fish that is in the water under the earth. 19 And beware lest you raise your eyes to heaven, and when you see the sun and the moon and the stars, all the host of heaven, you be drawn away and bow down to them and serve them, things that the Lord your God has allotted to all the peoples under the whole heaven. 20 But the Lord has taken you and brought you out of the iron furnace, out of Egypt, to be a people of his own inheritance, as you are this day. 21 Furthermore, the Lord was angry with me because of you, and he swore that I should not cross the Jordan, and that I should not enter the good land that the Lord your God is giving you for an inheritance. 22 For I must die in this land; I must not go over the Jordan. But you shall go over and take possession of that good land. 23 Take care, lest you forget the covenant of the Lord your God, which he made with you, and make a carved image, the form of anything that the Lord your God has forbidden you. 24 For the Lord your God is a consuming fire, a jealous God.

What do idols have to do with us in our modern western society?

We create these images of God because we it is easier for us to grab hold of what we understand. If we can set the rules about how a relationship with God works then what kind of God is he? When we lessen God, we end up looking for the solutions to our lives in the world. We begin to hold the world in higher esteem than we do God.

What are the ways that we lessen God?

A Genie or Magic Vending Machine

A Cheerleader

An angry kid with a magnifying glass

A disconnected sky fairy

A crutch

But we are to love God above all else.

Love God above all else

1 John 2:15–17 ESV

15 Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. 16 For all that is in the world—the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride of life—is not from the Father but is from the world. 17 And the world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does the will of God abides forever.

So the warning is:

God is a Jealous God.

Deuteronomy 4:24 ESV

24 For the Lord your God is a consuming fire, a jealous God.

Warning: God will Discipline His People.

Deuteronomy 4:25–31 ESV

25 “When you father children and children’s children, and have grown old in the land, if you act corruptly by making a carved image in the form of anything, and by doing what is evil in the sight of the Lord your God, so as to provoke him to anger, 26 I call heaven and earth to witness against you today, that you will soon utterly perish from the land that you are going over the Jordan to possess. You will not live long in it, but will be utterly destroyed. 27 And the Lord will scatter you among the peoples, and you will be left few in number among the nations where the Lord will drive you. 28 And there you will serve gods of wood and stone, the work of human hands, that neither see, nor hear, nor eat, nor smell. 29 But from there you will seek the Lord your God and you will find him, if you search after him with all your heart and with all your soul. 30 When you are in tribulation, and all these things come upon you in the latter days, you will return to the Lord your God and obey his voice. 31 For the Lord your God is a merciful God. He will not leave you or destroy you or forget the covenant with your fathers that he swore to them.

God is the point of unity that draws all people together.

Proverbs 3:12 ESV

12 for the Lord reproves him whom he loves, as a father the son in whom he delights.

1 Corinthians 11:27–32 ESV

27 Whoever, therefore, eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty concerning the body and blood of the Lord. 28 Let a person examine himself, then, and so eat of the bread and drink of the cup. 29 For anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the body eats and drinks judgment on himself. 30 That is why many of you are weak and ill, and some have died. 31 But if we judged ourselves truly, we would not be judged. 32 But when we are judged by the Lord, we are disciplined so that we may not be condemned along with the world.

Warning: There is no other God!

Deuteronomy 4:32–40 ESV

32 “For ask now of the days that are past, which were before you, since the day that God created man on the earth, and ask from one end of heaven to the other, whether such a great thing as this has ever happened or was ever heard of. 33 Did any people ever hear the voice of a god speaking out of the midst of the fire, as you have heard, and still live? 34 Or has any god ever attempted to go and take a nation for himself from the midst of another nation, by trials, by signs, by wonders, and by war, by a mighty hand and an outstretched arm, and by great deeds of terror, all of which the Lord your God did for you in Egypt before your eyes? 35 To you it was shown, that you might know that the Lord is God; there is no other besides him. 36 Out of heaven he let you hear his voice, that he might discipline you. And on earth he let you see his great fire, and you heard his words out of the midst of the fire. 37 And because he loved your fathers and chose their offspring after them and brought you out of Egypt with his own presence, by his great power, 38 driving out before you nations greater and mightier than you, to bring you in, to give you their land for an inheritance, as it is this day, 39 know therefore today, and lay it to your heart, that the Lord is God in heaven above and on the earth beneath; there is no other. 40 Therefore you shall keep his statutes and his commandments, which I command you today, that it may go well with you and with your children after you, and that you may prolong your days in the land that the Lord your God is giving you for all time.”

Warning: There is no other God!

Warning: Walk with God Daily.