Deuteronomy 7:1-11 - For You Are A Holy People
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Introduction
Introduction
[READING - Deuteronomy 7:1-11]
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. 7 “The Lord did not set His love on you nor choose you because you were more in number than any of the peoples, for you were the fewest of all peoples, 8 but because the Lord loved you and kept the oath which He swore to your forefathers, the Lord brought you out by a mighty hand and redeemed you from the house of slavery, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt. 9 “Know therefore that the Lord your God, He is God, the faithful God, who keeps His covenant and His lovingkindness to a thousandth generation with those who love Him and keep His commandments; 10 but repays those who hate Him to their faces, to destroy them; He will not delay with him who hates Him, He will repay him to his face. 11 “Therefore, you shall keep the commandment and the statutes and the judgments which I am commanding you today, to do them.
[PRAYER]
God is holy.
11 “Who is like You among the gods, O Lord? Who is like You, majestic in holiness, Awesome in praises, working wonders?
3 And one called out to another and said, “Holy, Holy, Holy, is the Lord of hosts, The whole earth is full of His glory.”
8 And the four living creatures, each one of them having six wings, are full of eyes around and within; and day and night they do not cease to say, “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God, the Almighty, who was and who is and who is to come.”
God is holy. And holiness was His plan for His people.
2 “Speak to all the congregation of the sons of Israel and say to them, ‘You shall be holy, for I the Lord your God am holy.
13 “You shall be blameless before the Lord your God.
And if holiness was His plan for His people under the Old Covenant, how much more so now that His people of God are under the New Covenant in Christ’s blood.
1 Therefore, having these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all defilement of flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God.
4 just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we would be holy and blameless before Him. In love
24 and put on the new self, which in the likeness of God has been created in righteousness and holiness of the truth.
15 but like the Holy One who called you, be holy yourselves also in all your behavior; 16 because it is written, “You shall be holy, for I am holy.”
Holiness is the theme of our passage tonight. You can see that in its central verse, Deuteronomy 7:6…
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.
We can define holiness as being and living set apart to God.
Holiness is not just required of God’s people in ages past.
It is required of God’s people today.
Holiness is not just required of a select group of God’s people—pastors, missionaries, evangelists, etc.
It is required of all God’s people today.
Having been made holy through the imputation of Christ’s holiness, we are to put on holiness in all we do.
[TS] So, tonight in this passage I think we will be encouraged toward holiness as we consider…
…the reality of holiness…
…the pursuit of holiness…
…and the LORD of holiness.
Major Ideas
Major Ideas
#1: The Reality of Holiness (Deuteronomy 7:6-8)
#1: The Reality of Holiness (Deuteronomy 7:6-8)
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. 7 “The Lord did not set His love on you nor choose you because you were more in number than any of the peoples, for you were the fewest of all peoples, 8 but because the Lord loved you and kept the oath which He swore to your forefathers, the Lord brought you out by a mighty hand and redeemed you from the house of slavery, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt.
[EXP] As I said, v. 6 is the heart of this passage. It is the heart of the covenant that God has made and is making once again with His people. Because He is holy and He is there God and they are His people, they must be holy.
Notice that they are a holy people.
They weren’t becoming a holy people. They were a holy people by issue of their covenant relationship to the LORD.
Notice that they are a holy people to the Lord their God.
This is the direction of Israel’s holiness; Israel is holy to the LORD.
Notice that they are a holy people because of God.
It wasn’t because of Israel’s greatness that were chosen to be the holy people of God.
You see that in v. 7.
It was because of God’s love toward this Joshua and Caleb generation of Israelites.
You see that in the first part of v. 8.
It was because of God’s faithfulness to His promise or oath that He made to Israel’s forefathers—Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
You see that in the second part of v. 8.
In other words, Israel wasn’t the holy people of God because of Israel.
Israel was the holy people of God because of God—because of His choice, because of His love, because of His faithfulness.
[ILLUS] After church this morning, Bro. James and I talked briefly about Paul’s letters—how Paul always gives us the theological before the practical—i.e., Paul tells us who we are in Christ and then tells us how we should live as followers of Christ.
Now, as I said, we sometimes call this the theological and the practical—but we might also say Paul gives us ‘who we are’ before he tells us ‘what to do.’
But in every letter, Paul tells gives us the reality of our holiness in Christ and then he tells us how we are to pursue holiness.
[APP] Through faith in Jesus Christ crucified, buried, and resurrect, we are a holy people to the Lord our God.
That is our reality.
And that is our reality because of God.
We weren’t great. But because of God’s choice and because of His love and because of His faithfulness, we are His holy people.
Listen to how this is put in 1 Corinthians 1:26-31…
26 For consider your calling, brethren, that there were not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble; 27 but God has chosen the foolish things of the world to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to shame the things which are strong, 28 and the base things of the world and the despised God has chosen, the things that are not, so that He may nullify the things that are, 29 so that no man may boast before God. 30 But by His doing you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, and righteousness and sanctification, and redemption, 31 so that, just as it is written, “Let him who boasts, boast in the Lord.”
Because of God, the reality is that we are holy.
[TS] Now, as I’ve already said, the reality of holiness leads to the pursuit of holiness…
…and that’s our second point tonight…
#2: The Pursuit of Holiness (Deuteronomy 7:1-6)
#2: The Pursuit of Holiness (Deuteronomy 7:1-6)
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.
[EXP] When Israel entered the Promised Land, they were to pursue holiness. As they chased pagans from the Promised Land, that’s what they would be doing—they would be pursuing holiness.
But they would be tempted to abandon this pursuit because of the nations already in the Promised Land. They are listed specifically but what must be understood about them is that they were bigger than the Israelites, there were seven of them, and not one of them worshipped YHWH.
Because they were so great and there were so many of them, perhaps Israel would be tempted to negotiation peace with a few of them instead of fighting them.
To this potential temptation, God says…
“You shall make no covenant with them,” in v. 2.
“You shall show no favor to them,” also in v. 2.
“You shall not intermarry with them,” in vv. 3-4.
Any agreement, favor, or relationship with idol worshippers was certain to influence Israel toward idol worship.
But God also said to them in Deuteronomy 7:5…
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.
Israel wasn’t just to keep itself unstained from the world, it was also to transform the world they were entering—the world of the Promised Land.
This meant that they would have to tear down, smash, hew down, and burn all things pertaining to the worship of idols.
And all of this because...
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.
[ILLUS] Deuteronomy is laid out as a series of sermons, but it is also laid out like an ancient covenant or agreement.
Ancient covenants during the time when Deuteronomy was written had a ‘Suzerain’ (suz-a-rin), a ‘Sovereign Above’.
The suzerain was the more powerful of the two parties making the agreement. He essentially set the terms of the agreement and detailed the good things he would do for the less-powerful party if it kept the agreement and the bad things he would do to the less-powerful party if it broke the agreement.
But the suzerain also governed the less-powerful party’s relationships with other nations.
He told the less-powerful party how it was allowed to relate to other nations…
…whether they could have full association, some association, or no association whatsoever.
As the ‘Suzerain’—as the ‘Sovereign Above’ in His Covenant with His people—God governed Israel’s relationships with other nations listed here in Deuteronomy 7…
…and God told His people that they were to have no association with these idol-worshipping nations.
Israel was in Covenant with YHWH.
They were holy to Him.
As Suzerain, God told them that they wasn’t allowed to be in relationship with anyone else.
[APP] In the New Covenant in Christ’s blood, God is also our Suzerain. He governs the way we relate to the sinful world around us.
We don’t get to decide how we’d like to live in the world. No, He tells us how we are to live in the world.
He says to us that although we are in the world, we are not to be participants in worldliness.
He says that we are not to be unequally yoked with those who are of the world.
He says we are not to participate in the unfruitful deeds of darkness, but instead we are to expose them (Eph. 5:11).
Our God commands us to tear down, smash, hew down, and burn all unfruitful deeds of darkness by proclaiming the Gospel of God’s grace in Jesus.
Because we are in covenant with God by the blood of Jesus, we too are to pursue holiness in the world in which we live.
[TS] …
#3: The LORD of Holiness (Deuteronomy 7:9-11)
#3: The LORD of Holiness (Deuteronomy 7:9-11)
9 “Know therefore that the Lord your God, He is God, the faithful God, who keeps His covenant and His lovingkindness to a thousandth generation with those who love Him and keep His commandments; 10 but repays those who hate Him to their faces, to destroy them; He will not delay with him who hates Him, He will repay him to his face. 11 “Therefore, you shall keep the commandment and the statutes and the judgments which I am commanding you today, to do them.
[EXP] As great as it is to be the holy people of God, the ultimate motivation for Israel’s holiness is not who they are; the ultimate motivation for the holiness is who the LORD is.
He is God.
Verse 9 begins, “Know therefore that the LORD your God, He is God...”
The idea is that Israel is know—to feel deep in their hearts, to feel in their bones, to know by experience, to have decided—that the LORD is God and there is no other.
In fact, in Isaiah 45:5, God says exactly this…
5 “I am the Lord, and there is no other; Besides Me there is no God. I will gird you, though you have not known Me;
He is faithful.
Verse 9 continues, “…the faithful God, who keeps His covenant and His lovingkindness to a thousandth generation with those who love Him and keep His commandments.”
The LORD is faithful.
The LORD is faithful to bless those who love and obey Him.
You see that in the second half of v. 9.
The LORD is faithful to curse those who hate Him.
You see that in v. 10.
Therefore, because God’s people know the LORD—and they know who they are in light of Him—they shall obey and do all that God commands.
[ILLUS] My Granny will soon turn 88 years old.
I was closer to her when I was younger, but when I was growing up, she was so kind. We were always welcome at her house, and she always gave to us even when here and Papa didn’t have much to give.
Because Granny was so faithful in her kindness toward us, I think most of us—her grandchildren—wanted to honor her by obeying her even if our obedience was not perfect.
But on one occasion, I saw another side of my Granny. I had smarted off to my Mom, and Granny wasn’t going to stand for it. Without warning, the kind woman flew at me like a rabid squirrel, and from that moment on…
…because I knew that Granny was also faithful in her severity, I wanted to protect myself by obeying her!
[APP] Because we know the LORD through faith in Jesus, we know that God is God, the only God—and we know that He is faithful to bless us when we obey and faithful to discipline us when we don’t.
Therefore, we shall obey the LORD.
[TS] …
Conclusion
Conclusion
Take in proper order then, this passage tells the people of God, “You shall pursue holiness because of who God has made you and because of who God is.”
In Christ, we would say, “We shall pursue holiness because of who God has made us in Christ and because of who He is.”
Everyone is holy or set apart to something or someone.
Are you holy to the LORD?
Are you pursuing holiness?
Do you know the LORD who is holy?
