What Does the Lord Require?
Notes
Transcript
What Does the Lord Require?
What Does the Lord Require?
10:12–13 And now marks a transition from history to exhortation.
what does the Lord your God require of you. Cf. Mic. 6:8.
- Five commands follow, the central one of which is love. (see Deut. 4:37; 6:5; and note on 4:37–39; also 11:1, 13, 22).
- fear. See note on 6:1–2.
- walk in all his ways. See 5:33 and note on 5:32–33.
- serve. See 6:13; 10:20; 11:13; 13:4.
- keep. See 4:40; 5:29; 6:24. for your good. Obedience is for the people’s benefit in the end.
The ESV Study Bible Chapter 10
10:14–15 The contrast between heaven of heavens, the earth with all that is in it and Israel’s fathers heightens the sense of astonishment at election and grace. love on your fathers. See 4:37 and 7:7–8; note on 4:37–39; cf. 10:12.
10:16 Circumcise therefore the foreskin of your heart.
The mention of “offspring” (v. 15) recalls Genesis 17, where God instituted circumcision as his covenant sign for Abraham and his descendants (cf. Gen. 17:9–14).
This verse explicitly recognizes Israel’s need to change its heart (cf. Deut. 29:4;
Circumcision was (1) an identification of God’s covenant people, an outward sign of what was to be an inward reality; and (2) an illustration of God’s dealing with the flesh. In the Old Testament, God defined how the illustration of circumcision was intended to work.
• Exodus 6:12 speaks of the circumcision of the lips.
12 But Moses spoke before the Lord, saying, “Behold, the sons of Israel have not listened to me; how then will Pharaoh listen to me, for I am unskilled in speech?”
• Jeremiah 6:10 speaks of the circumcision of the ears.
10 To whom shall I speak and give warning
That they may hear?
Behold, their ears are closed
And they cannot listen.
Behold, the word of the Lord has become a reproach to them;
They have no delight in it.
• Ezekiel 44 speaks of the circumcision of the heart.
God’s people were to speak with tenderness, hear with sensitivity, feel with compassion.
Circumcision was meant to be a picture externally of the transformation that takes place internally.
Yet although the Jews were outwardly circumcised, they were far from where they should have been internally.
Courson, Jon. Jon Courson’s Application Commentary. Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson, 2003.
Here, circumcision symbolizes removing the stubbornness that prevents the heart from properly loving God (cf. Ex. 6:12, where “uncircumcised lips” do not speak well; Jer. 6:10, where “uncircumcised ears” do not hear clearly).
This is a command beyond any human’s competence to fulfill (see Deut. 30:6). stubborn. See 9:6 and note.
THE ROUTE TO REPENTANCE
A Topical Study of
Romans 2:4
They caught her in the very act of adultery and brought her still naked before the Rabbi of Galilee. “Master,” they said, “Moses said she should be stoned. What sayest thou?”
What would the Rabbi say?
If He said, “Let her go,” they would accuse Him of violating the Law of Moses.
But if He said, “Stone her,” He would no longer be known as the Friend of Sinners. Surely they had Him cornered.
Jesus stooped down as though He heard them not, and with His finger began to write in the dust something that must have hit them like a bolt of lightning.
“Let he who is without sin—literally in Greek, the same sin—cast the first stone,” He said. What a scene it must have been as, one by one, each man dropped his stone and went his way (John 8:3–9).
What did Jesus write in the dust that day? The Greek word translated “wrote” in John 8:6 is a word that means “to write against.” Therefore, I suggest Jesus wrote the names of the woman’s accusers, and beside each one, the name of a woman, a place, or a time that would remind them of something they had done or some fantasy they had entertained. In so doing, Jesus showed us very pointedly that we had better not be too quick to throw a rock at someone, for we are guilty of the same sin. Oh, our sin might not manifest itself in the flesh, but Jesus said, “If you’ve even looked at a woman with lust in your heart you are guilty of adultery. If you’re even angry with your brother, you’re guilty of murder” (see Matthew 5:22, 28). In other words, we’re all guilty.
The self-righteous man is just as guilty, if not more so, than the unrighteous individual. In the story of the prodigal son, who was guiltier? Was it the prodigal who spent time in the pigpen and came back repenting, or the elder son who complained and murmured because his father never killed a fatted calf for him? The heathen and the Hebrew alike are without excuse. One might sin in the flesh, the other in the spirit—but both sin.
Because only God sees what’s going on internally, only He can judge righteously.
A woman ran through the airport. On her way to the gate, she grabbed a magazine and a little package of cookies. Boarding the plane, she sat in an aisle seat, one seat away from a man in the window seat. A few minutes later, hungry from her race to catch her flight, she opened her bag of cookies and took one. To her astonishment, the man in the window seat also reached into the bag, which was setting in the middle seat, and grabbed a cookie. Utterly amazed at his audacity, she stared at him, reached for a second cookie, and ate it. He looked at her and took another cookie as well. That left only one cookie, which the man took and broke in half, before giving half to her. The lady was dumbfounded. The behavior of her seatmate left her puzzled, angry, and hungry throughout the entire flight. But her greatest surprise came when she opened her purse upon landing—and found her bag of cookies inside.
That’s the way it always is! We’re so sure we’re right—when in reality we don’t have all of the facts. In the Day of Judgment, we will be shocked at how wrong we were and how little we knew when the handbags are opened and all things will be judged truthfully.
Watch out, self-righteous person. You are he who perhaps is most vulnerable to despising the goodness of God.
How? I suggest three ways.…
We Can Despise the Goodness of God When It Is Extolled by Others
As David brought the ark of the covenant back to Jerusalem, he danced before the Lord. Watching him from her window, his wife despised him. “Didn’t the king behave himself seemly?” she said mockingly.
“ve done, I have done as unto the Lord,” David replied. “And I will become even more base in thy sight, for I’ll continue to extol Him with all of my might. As for you,” he continued, “you will be barren all the days of your life” (see 2 Samuel 6:20–23).
Want to be barren? Want to be spiritually unproductive and impotent? Here’s how: Despise the goodness of God when it is extolled by others. Mock it. Make fun of it. Don’t participate in it. And I guarantee there will be a barrenness in your soul and a fruitlessness in your life just as there was in Michal’s.
We Can Despise the Goodness of God When It Is Extended to Others
This is tricky. This happens very frequently in my own heart. “How can they go on in that sin, Lord?” I ask. “They’re not walking with You. They don’t even have time for You. They’re living contrary to Your plan. Sic ’em, Lord.”
David voiced this same sentiment in Psalm 73 when he wrote, “Truly God is good. But as for me, my feet had well nigh slipped when I saw the prosperity of the wicked. Their eyes stand out in fatness. They’re not in trouble like other men. They have more than they could wish for. Their mouths are filled to the brim. When I thought upon this it was too painful for me.”
It’s crazy how indignant I am with the sins of others and how indulgent I am with the sin in my own life. The result? I begin to despise the goodness of God when He shows the same goodness and mercy to others that He shows to me.
We Despise the Goodness of God When It Is Exploited Within Ourselves
God’s goodness can be exploited. He’s forbearing. He’s patient. He’s incredibly good—so much so that the Anglo-Saxon word for God is literally “the Good One.”
In the days of Genesis, people sinned exceedingly. So God sent Noah to preach to a world that was carnal, sinful, and rebellious. As Noah hammered away on the ark for one hundred twenty years, God waited forbearingly, patiently, all the while providing graciously.
While His people were in Egypt, God gave the Canaanites four hundred years to turn from their sin.
Israel was carried into captivity because of iniquity. But eight hundred years later, God was still working with her, dwelling in her midst in the Person of Jesus Christ.
God is so patient. Yet I despise His goodness whenever I think, Well, I’m getting away with my sin. Nothing negative is happening to me. So I’ll just keep sinning because either God doesn’t care about it, or maybe He even approves of it. Maybe I’m an exception.
Not so. His goodness should lead you not to excuses of rationalization, but to the about-face of repentance.