Remember God's Care
Deuteronomy: Changing Times and Our Unchanging God • Sermon • Submitted • Presented • 43:43
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Remember God’s Care
Remember God’s Care
These past few weeks I’ve been reading up on church history in preparation for Sunday school. And as you might find if you ever studied church history for yourself, there are so many testimonies of Christians who have faithfully served the Lord that are inspiring for your life here and now. Indeed, our God is the same yesterday today and tomorrow. And it’s his unchanging nature that makes him so reliable for us here and now. If he was able to support his followers in the past, he’s able to support you and me here and now. Last week I shared a tale of a believer who stepped out in boldness for the Lord. But this week I’d like to share a story of another believer who stayed faithful to the Lord’s calling because he remembered the Lord’s care.
John Willfinger was a missionary in Borneo during the time of World War II.
For those of you who don’t know where Borneo is, I put a picture up here on the screen for you. But essentially it’s a big Island in the chain of Indonesia, between Australia and Southeast Asia. John Willfinger had moved to Borneo and was working with another missionary couple to translate the scriptures into the native Murut language. All was fine and well until the Japanese invaded. Seeking to eliminate all Western influence, the Japanese forces captured missionaries to the south and placed all remaining missionaries on the “most wanted” list. Anyone harboring or aiding the remaining missionaries would be severely punished, most likely with torture and then death. Of course, this was worrisome for John Willfinger and his fellow missionaries. And yet, the Murut people were confident they could secretly hide the missionaries, much like the Eastern European Christians were hiding Jews from the Nazis. But rather than putting their friends in danger, John Willfinger and his fellow missionaries decided to surrender themselves to the Japanese, trusting God for whatever lay ahead. While the other missionaries headed north to the nearest Japanese encampment, Willfinger headed east and visited several tribal churches in eastern Borneo before he surrendered himself. Eventually he encountered his captors and surrendered himself. They sent him to a prisoner camp where he would be executed for his faith three days after Christmas. Later, after the war was over his body would be recovered. And on his body his Bible was also found. On the inside cover John had written this poem:
No mere man is the Christ I know
But greater far than all below.
Day by day his love enfolds me
Day by day his power upholds me.
All that God could ever be
The man of Nazareth is to me.
No mere man can my strength sustain
And drive away all fear and pain.
Holding me close in his embrace
When death and I stand face to face.
Then all that God could ever be
The unseen Christ will be to me.
It is clear from Willfinger’s life that he trusted in the Lord’s care and providence. Whether that meant for life or for death. He knew the Lord would sustain, and help him through any conflict. It was this trust in God’s care and in Christ’s providence that carried him forth through his death.
And the challenge remains for us today— to remember God’s care and providence, to remember how he holds us close even when we are looking death in the face— and to remain steadfast in faithfulness to him because he cares for you.
That leads us to the main idea for our text today:
Main Idea: Remembering God’s care will point you toward obedience.
Main Idea: Remembering God’s blessings toward us (and yes, even his discipline is a blessing) should point us toward obedience in the Lord.
Today we’ll be reading about the Lord’s blessing toward Israel, and how that was meant to direct them back toward a love of the Lord so they could follow after him in obedience. If you have your bibles, please turn with me to Deuteronomy 8, verses 1 through 10.
“The whole commandment that I command you today you shall be careful to do, that you may live and multiply, and go in and possess the land that the Lord swore to give to your fathers.
And you shall remember the whole way that the Lord your God has led you these forty years in the wilderness, that he might humble you, testing you to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep his commandments or not.
And he humbled you and let you hunger and fed you with manna, which you did not know, nor did your fathers know, that he might make you know that man does not live by bread alone, but man lives by every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord.
Your clothing did not wear out on you and your foot did not swell these forty years.
Know then in your heart that, as a man disciplines his son, the Lord your God disciplines you.
So you shall keep the commandments of the Lord your God by walking in his ways and by fearing him.
For the Lord your God is bringing you into a good land, a land of brooks of water, of fountains and springs, flowing out in the valleys and hills,
a land of wheat and barley, of vines and fig trees and pomegranates, a land of olive trees and honey,
a land in which you will eat bread without scarcity, in which you will lack nothing, a land whose stones are iron, and out of whose hills you can dig copper.
And you shall eat and be full, and you shall bless the Lord your God for the good land he has given you.
Let’s pray. (prays)
Let’s take a closer look at the text. These first two verses really do a lot of the heavy lifting for us.
“The whole commandment that I command you today you shall be careful to do, that you may live and multiply, and go in and possess the land that the Lord swore to give to your fathers.
So we’re looking at the whole commandment - all of the laws and rules and statutes which God is giving, that the people should be careful to do. Remember, what is the whole commandment? It’s a covenant- a dedicated agreement reached by two parties that know each other to maintain a special relationship together. Israel’s covenant with the Lord is conditional upon their personal obedience and dedication. Tied to the obedience with the Lord is blessing, that they may live and multiply. Part of God’s covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob was the promise that their descendants would be fruitful and multiply, but the Lord also promised the land of Israel. This point of this verse is to guide Israel to obedience of the Lord so that they may enjoy the blessings of the covenant which they made with God. That’s the goal.
The second verse shows us how.
And you shall remember the whole way that the Lord your God has led you these forty years in the wilderness, that he might humble you, testing you to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep his commandments or not.
The key to following after the Lord is to remember his faithfulness … is to remember the trials which the Lord led Israel through to test their heart and how God provided for them through the thick and thin. Was this a people that was willing to follow after the Lord? Well, not initially. It took trials and tribulations to refine Israel in the wilderness, to purge the unbelief from their hearts. There were times when the people were so disobedient that God said to Moses, “stand back that I may destroy this entire people and I will make a new nation from your descendants”. But the Lord relented because of the witness of his great name. If the nations saw that he had destroyed Israel, the people whom he had chosen from out of Egypt, then what kind of God would that show him to be? Rather than being seen as a vengeful and angry God, the Lord is a God of restoration and healing, patient toward those who sin against him but calling forth humanity into righteousness. So he led Israel through the wilderness. He disciplined them and corrected them that they may learn to follow after the Lord with their heart. And what Moses is doing here is calling Israel to remember what they experienced: how the Lord has worked throughout this entire time, and Moses is showing them the importance of the dedication which Israel had developed in their love for the Lord. Look at the last part of that verse- “testing you to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep your commandments or not.”
So the goal of what Moses is saying is to be careful to do the commandments of the Lord from the heart- that means loving the Lord your God before all else, having no other Gods before Him— and the primary means of accomplishing this is through remembering. Remember his faithful blessing throughout the wilderness and look forward to the future land which the Lord is leading Israel into.
The distinct flavor of our passage this morning relates to God’s special love and care for his people. And that’s the first point we’ll take a look at, is the Lord’s Love.
The Lord’s Love (vv.3-5)
The Lord’s Love (vv.3-5)
And he humbled you and let you hunger and fed you with manna, which you did not know, nor did your fathers know, that he might make you know that man does not live by bread alone, but man lives by every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord.
The Lord works all things for the good of those who live according to his purpose. That includes difficult times too. He sends the difficult times to that we may learn to follow him more.
Firstly, God humbled Israel. He brought them to a place where they would hunger and thirst. They were used to the flooding of the Nile and for farming to receive their food. The Lord wanted to show Israel that they shouldn’t pray to a river or a river God, nor to a rain God due to dependency upon food, but he wanted to show them the Lord is God. So, the Lord fed his people with manna. Manna was a special food given to Israel that they neither toiled for nor did they expect. Rather, it was a special gift given for the people of Israel so that they can see god’s care for them, that he will sustain them not according to earthly means, but according to God’s steadfastness and his faithfulness.
Let’s look back at the gift of manna as recorded in Exodus:
Then Moses said to Aaron, “Say to the whole congregation of the people of Israel, ‘Come near before the Lord, for he has heard your grumbling.’ ”
And as soon as Aaron spoke to the whole congregation of the people of Israel, they looked toward the wilderness, and behold, the glory of the Lord appeared in the cloud.
And the Lord said to Moses,
“I have heard the grumbling of the people of Israel. Say to them, ‘At twilight you shall eat meat, and in the morning you shall be filled with bread. Then you shall know that I am the Lord your God.’ ”
In the evening quail came up and covered the camp, and in the morning dew lay around the camp.
And when the dew had gone up, there was on the face of the wilderness a fine, flake-like thing, fine as frost on the ground.
When the people of Israel saw it, they said to one another, “What is it?” For they did not know what it was. And Moses said to them, “It is the bread that the Lord has given you to eat.
Now the house of Israel called its name manna. It was like coriander seed, white, and the taste of it was like wafers made with honey.
Moses said, “This is what the Lord has commanded: ‘Let an omer of it be kept throughout your generations, so that they may see the bread with which I fed you in the wilderness, when I brought you out of the land of Egypt.’ ”
And Moses said to Aaron, “Take a jar, and put an omer of manna in it, and place it before the Lord to be kept throughout your generations.”
As the Lord commanded Moses, so Aaron placed it before the testimony to be kept.
A jar of this very special gift of food was placed before the testimony. What is it a testimony to? It’s hard evidence for God’s care and provision for his people. When they grumbled, the Lord sustained them and gave them life. If the Lord had not humbled them first, then they would not have been in a place to receive God’s special blessing and promise. Rather than letting them die in the wilderness, God made a way for the people to live through miraculous means. “Man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of the LORD.” This jar of manna shows the Lord’s dedication and faithfulness within the covenant. So looking back at verse 3, what else do we see?
And he humbled you and let you hunger and fed you with manna, which you did not know, nor did your fathers know, that he might make you know that man does not live by bread alone, but man lives by every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord.
Well, we see the verse that Jesus quoted when he was facing temptation in the wilderness. Just as Israel was led through the wilderness for a period of 40 days, Jesus was led into testing in the wilderness for a period of 40 days. And when he’s tempted by Satan to turn rocks into bread, what is Jesus’ response?
But he answered, “It is written, “ ‘Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.’ ”
Jesus, in keeping step with the Lord’s faithfulness, replies as Israel ought to have throughout their history. He relies upon the Lord and lays witness to the Lord’s testimony to provide for his people beyond what is thought to be humanly possible. He remembered the Lord’s care and trusted wholly upon him, and his faith kept him from the path of temptation.
It’s definitely a challenge for us, yes? To rest wholly upon faith in the Lord, even if we hunger and thirst, even when we feel weak. I’ve been studying up on church history, and boy did our Christian brothers and sisters of the past feel that way. But the Lord sustained them. In fact, God has a promise of care for you:
Revelation 2:17 (ESV)
He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To the one who conquers I will give some of the hidden manna, and I will give him a white stone, with a new name written on the stone that no one knows except the one who receives it.’
To the one who conquers … to the one who holds on to God’s promises in faith and endures with perseverance and trust in the Lord … he will give some of the hidden manna. He will give a special spiritual blessing that none other than God’s people will experience.
That’s the challenge for you and I- to hold on to the testimony of God’s faithful care toward his people and to remember his provision during the time of testing, that we may have full trust and faith in him and obey him beyond what happens here in our present time.
But the Lord’s blessing for Israel was not limited to manna. Let’s take a look further.
Your clothing did not wear out on you and your foot did not swell these forty years.
Not only did God provide food, but he provided sustained clothing and health. This reminds me of what Jesus taught in the sermon on the mount:
“Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing?
Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they?
And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life?
And why are you anxious about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin,
yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.
But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is alive and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith?
Therefore do not be anxious, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’
For the Gentiles seek after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them all.
But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.
Seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you. Food, clothing, home. When your focus is on loving the Lord, he will provide for you. How can we trust his promise? Well, he takes care of the birds. He clothes the grass of the field. He took care of Israel in the wilderness. Jesus says that the Gentiles seek after all these things … the unbelievers. That’s what part of their focus is on, maintaining the means to life because they do not depend upon the Lord nor do they trust in him to sustain them. But the believer knows that the Father cares for you. He sees when you are suffering or are doing with very little, and he will provide for you, just as he provided for Israel.
Not only did the Lord provide food and clothing and health for Israel, but he also provided another helpful thing- discipline.
Know then in your heart that, as a man disciplines his son, the Lord your God disciplines you.
When we wander from the path, when we begin to show others around us that we do not trust in the Lord or we are not holy unto the Lord, God sends discipline in our life to bring us back into his holiness.
This wisdom is conveyed to us through the wisdom proverbs-
My son, do not despise the Lord’s discipline or be weary of his reproof,
for the Lord reproves him whom he loves, as a father the son in whom he delights.
God is caring toward you. He loves you enough to show you when you are wrong and to redirect you onto the right path. And let’s face it, sometimes we are stubborn and obstinate enough where we need more than just a gentle prod in the right direction. We need to be corrected and to learn how to walk in the correct way. The point of discipline is restorative and sustained- that it doesn’t just correct a one time behavior and is forgotten, but that it allows for one to remember the discipline and continue on in faithfulness and steadfastness.
Which brings us to our second point: Meditate on the Lord’s Faithfulness.
Remember the Lord’s Faithfulness (v.6)
Remember the Lord’s Faithfulness (v.6)
The goal of remembering God’s faithfulness is that you might learn to walk in obedience.
So you shall keep the commandments of the Lord your God by walking in his ways and by fearing him.
The point of reminding Israel of all of God’s provisions for them throughout the wilderness is that they might have faith in their present circumstance.
That’s what Jesus did in the wilderness. It’s what Jesus did when he went to the cross and trusted that the Lord would raise him up on the third day. And it’s the same trust and faith that we can live in today.
God is faithful to sustain you and to take care of you. Just think back to the times when God has provided for you, and he will lead you out of temptation and set your eyes upon him.
Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.
What you don’t want to focus on is your past failures. Through Jesus, you are forgiven. That part of you has died. And your life, the way in which you now live, is hidden with Christ in God. That means when God looks at you, he only sees the faithfulness of Christ. Because of that, because of God’s promised forgiveness of sins through Jesus, we are now able to live as those who have been provided for and taken care of.
I can’t tell you how many times these verses have helped me take my mind off of myself or my wants and lifted my eyes up to focus upon God’s greater plan. If you sit down and you set your mind on things that are above-- on the tangible things which God has done for you that are a testimony to his faithfulness, whether that’s through restored relationships, forgiveness of your own sins, the provision he gives you in food, clothing, and shelter— then your heart will be lifted up to behold the wonder of God and not become as infatuated with lesser things.
Remembering the Lord’s faithfulness goes a long way. Remember that he cares for you.
casting all your anxieties on him, because he cares for you.
We can unload our heavy emotional and spiritual burdens upon the Lord because he is always there. He knows what we’re going through and what we deal with and he cares for us the entire way through.
What an amazing blessing it is to have that relationship with the Lord, to be united with him and to share in his presence!
Certainly, walking with the Lord leads to spiritual blessing.
There’s an old hymn that many of you might know called “Trust and Obey”. This hymn speaks to the faithfulness of God and his blessing, and how because of that we ought to walk in obedience. The hymn starts like this:
“When we walk with the Lord in the light of His Word
What a glory He sheds on our way!
While we do His good will, He abides with us still
And with all who will trust and obey”
God’s faithfulness and and care is steadfast and constant for us because we have Jesus, the one who trusted and obeyed the Father perfectly. Through him we have every spiritual blessing that is in heaven, and the blessing which God gives to us on earth.
The goal of this blessing is meant to point us back to the Lord and his love for us, and to direct us in loving obedience, so that we may learn how to walk in the correct way.
But not only is there a hope from the past, remembering the Lord’s faithfulness and his care for you from before, but there is also encouragement from the future. God’s promise of care does not stop, but he is steadfast in his commitment toward you, as you should be toward him. And that’s our third point: Look forward to the future promises.
Look Forward to the Future Promises (vv.7-10)
Look Forward to the Future Promises (vv.7-10)
For the Lord your God is bringing you into a good land, a land of brooks of water, of fountains and springs, flowing out in the valleys and hills,
a land of wheat and barley, of vines and fig trees and pomegranates, a land of olive trees and honey,
a land in which you will eat bread without scarcity, in which you will lack nothing, a land whose stones are iron, and out of whose hills you can dig copper.
And you shall eat and be full, and you shall bless the Lord your God for the good land he has given you.
For Israel, this was it. This was the promised land. Finally, a home of their own! A place where they could settle down and enjoy life. They could dig in their heels and grow their crops, build their families, trade with their neighbors, and worship the Lord. This is life as God intended for it to be with humanity- to be fruitful and multiply, to fill the earth and subdue it. To partake in the goodness of God’s creation, living as image-bearers of the Lord, walking rightly with him and doing good to one’s neighbor and maintaining a love for the Lord and a thankfulness toward him. Note that last part, you shall bless the Lord your God for the good land he has given you.
Imagine what it would be like to be in the footsteps of those Israelites who had wandered through the wilderness and were finally able to settle down and experience the blessings of the Lord? After all your toil, you are able to sit back and enjoy the good fruit of the field, a field which you did not plant but you get to experience the blessings of.
This rest, this kind of inheritance, is the same kind of thing we as Christians look forward to in the new creation.
Jesus said,
I tell you I will not drink again of this fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it new with you in my Father’s kingdom.”
Brothers, sisters in Christ, we do not drink of the vine and rest just yet. We are still in the wilderness. We are still across the Jordan. We have not yet traversed the waters of death to enter the promised land, the place in which Jesus is preparing for us. When we get there we will have eternal rest. We will drink of the fruit of the vine, from vineyards we did not plant. And we will drink with the Lord, enjoying life with him. It will be a glorious future in which we will no longer struggle with sin, but the Lord will be faithful to fulfill his promises to us, to cleanse us from all unrighteousness through the blood of Jesus, that we may live upright and holy lives with him.
And this is the future promise we look forward to and trust that God will provide. And because he has given us this promise, we hold on to faith in him here and now. We are drawn to walk after obedience to his teachings and the things he says, trusting his wisdom above our own. Why? Because he has revealed the future kingdom, the future glories. What life with God will be like in the time to come. So for now, we remember God’s promise and we trust and obey.
(pause)
So what principles do we take away from the passage? Well, Firstly we think of the challenge to walk after the Lord in obedience.
Walk after the Lord in Obedience
How well are you doing with that? Jesus said if you love me you will obey my commandments. Obedience to God is tied to our love for him. If we truly love God we will think about what he wants. And if his desire is to be away from sin, then that’s what we should desire.
Secondly, we meditate upon the Lord’s faithfulness
2. Meditate upon the Lord’s faithfulness
- reading through scripture can help with that, as we know that the Lord has been faithful in the past. He was faithful to send his son to take away the sins of the world. Hearing Christian testimony can help with that … the Lord was faithful to his church throughout the years, though they were tested and burned with fire. The Lord has been faithful to you. Which of his promises to you has he left unfulfilled or will he not fulfill at the right time? Thirdly, we look forward to the future home with the loving God.
3. Look forward to your future home with your loving God.
When we are tested (not a matter of if but when), will we look back on God’s faithfulness and look forward to the future hope we have and remain steadfast during the trial?
8:2 tested genuineness of the heart -> 1 Peter 1:7 But the testing is of faith in God (8:3)
so that the tested genuineness of your faith—more precious than gold that perishes though it is tested by fire—may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ.
Transition to communion