“Set Apart - Chosen by God - Part 1

INTRODUCTION.

Deuteronomy 7:1–6 NASB95

1 “When the Lord your God brings you into the land where you are entering to possess it, and clears away many nations before you, the Hittites and the Girgashites and the Amorites and the Canaanites and the Perizzites and the Hivites and the Jebusites, seven nations greater and stronger than you, 2 and when the Lord your God delivers them before you and you defeat them, then you shall utterly destroy them. You shall make no covenant with them and show no favor to them. 3 “Furthermore, you shall not intermarry with them; you shall not give your daughters to their sons, nor shall you take their daughters for your sons. 4 “For they will turn your sons away from following Me to serve other gods; then the anger of the Lord will be kindled against you and He will quickly destroy you. 5 “But thus you shall do to them: you shall tear down their altars, and smash their sacred pillars, and hew down their Asherim, and burn their graven images with fire. 6 “For you are a holy people to the Lord your God; the Lord your God has chosen you to be a people for His own possession out of all the peoples who are on the face of the earth.

MESSAGE.

I. Destruction unto God.

Hyperbole - exaggerated statements or claims not meant to be taken literally. (oxford languages)

In Paul Copan’s, a Christian Apologist, book Is God a Vindictive Bully

Copan explained that that language was just the “ancient version of modern-day ‘trash talk’ in sports.” (200). This language was used to express the great victory or even be used after to inflate the victory. Copan’s explanation of the hard-to-understand scriptures that are dealing with, God and His apparent command of genocide, as hyperbole helped the reader.

vv.1-2

Not total annihilation.

next verse talks about intermarrying.

roughly 500 - 700 years earlier.

Genesis 15:16–21 “16 “Then in the fourth generation they will return here, for the iniquity of the Amorite is not yet complete.” 17 It came about when the sun had set, that it was very dark, and behold, there appeared a smoking oven and a flaming torch which passed between these pieces. 18 On that day the Lord made a covenant with Abram, saying, “To your descendants I have given this land, From the river of Egypt as far as the great river, the river Euphrates: 19 the Kenite and the Kenizzite and the Kadmonite 20 and the Hittite and the Perizzite and the Rephaim 21 and the Amorite and the Canaanite and the Girgashite and the Jebusite.””

II. Relationship unto God.

vv.3-5.

1. No intermarriage. - v3.

2. Turn you away from God. - v4.

violation of the first and seconded commandment.

3. Remove forms of worship. - v5.

Altars

Pillars - Good and Bad

symbol - pile of rocks

Marker of something significant.

Genesis 28 - Jacob took rock pillow and stood it up and poured oil over it.

Burial marker

Jacob set up pillar for Rachel.

Symbols carved on them.

Asherim

wood pole or tree.

named after Canaanite goddess Asherah.

III. Set Apart unto God.

v.6

1. Holy people unto the LORD.

used as an adjective to describe the nature of God’s people.

The root idea of holiness is the idea of “separation” or “withdrawal.” Eerdmans Dictionary of the Bible.

Consecrated

Set apart for a purpose

“holy to the LORD”

2. Chosen people unto the LORD.

3. Special people unto the LORD.

any possession that is highly valued by its owner.

CONCLUSION.