Ten Minute Bible Talks Devotional Bible Study - Does Obedience Matter? | Torah | Deuteronomy 30:11-20

Episode Date: November 14, 2022

Is it possible to follow all of God's laws? Why should Christians be obedient to God? What does it take to live a faithful life to Jesus? In today's episode, Keith discusses Deuteronomy 30:11-20. and the importance of obedience to Jesus. Like this content? Make sure to leave us a rating and share it with others, so others can find it too. Use #asktmbt to connect with us, ask questions, and suggest topics. We'd love to hear from you! To learn more, visit our website and follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter @TenMinuteBibleTalks. Don't forget to subscribe to the TMBT Newsletter here. Passages: Deuteronomy 30:11-20 Your support makes TMBT possible. Ten Minute Bible Talks is a crowd-funded project. Join the TMBTeam to reach more people with the Bible. Give now.

Welcome to 10-minute Bible Talks, where we connect the Bible to your life. In the time it takes to get to work. I'm Keith Simon. Jesus and the disciples and the first century church, they never read the New Testament. I mean, think about it for a second. They never read the New Testament as a whole book. Sure, if you lived in one of the cities that Paul wrote to, say you were a part of the church in Colossae or Philippi or Thessalonica, then you received a letter from Paul that would eventually become part of the New Testament.

But you wouldn't have called it that. You would have never have thought of something as the New Testament because you would have never even thought you had something called the Old Testament to compare it to. See, when Jesus and his disciples read their Bible, they were reading what we now call the Old Testament. But that's where they learned about God, who he is, what he's like, what he's called us to, what he loves, what he values, what he hates, everything. that's where they learned it. And what we call the Old Testament, they would have just maybe called the scriptures. In light of our passage today,

I want to make the point that the Old Testament is where they learned to live a life faithful to Yahweh. When you want to know how to live a life faithful to Jesus, do you turn to the Old Testament and the New Testament? I think you should turn to both. Here's what Deuteronomy 30 says. We'll pick it up in verse 11.

Remember, this isn't what we call the Old Testament. Moses writes, now what I am commanding you today is not too difficult for you or beyond your reach. It's not up in heaven so that you have to ask who will ascend into heaven to get it and proclaim it to us so that we may obey it. Nor is it beyond the sea so that you have to ask who will cross the sea to get it and proclaim it to us so that we may obey it. No, the word is very near you. It is in your mouth and in your heart so that you may obey it. The focus of these verses is on obeying God. I'm sure you heard it.

He mentions obedience three times in these four verses. But notice what he says about obeying God. First, he says, it's not too difficult or beyond your reach. In other words, God's laws are not impossibly idealistic, impractical, unachievable. I think that might surprise some people who grew up in church and heard a message that no one can obey God's commands. But listen to the opening verses of Psalm 119. Blessed are those whose ways are blameless, who walk according to the law of the Lord. Blessed are those who keep his statues and seek him with all their heart.

There are lots of verses in the Old Testament that say something similar. Ordinary believers can live lives that please God and faithfully obey him. This is not a claim to sinless perfection, because over and over in the Psalms and the rest of the Penitook, which of course is the first five books of the Bible, people are quick to confess their sin, and God is quick to forgive those who repent. God is known as one who forgives sin. So obedience to the law was never intended to require perfection, and neither was ever intended to be a means of salvation. Not in the Old Testament, not in the New Testament, not ever. Obedience was always the response to salvation that had already been experienced.

Let me read those verses again. Now what I am commanding you today is not too difficult for you or beyond your reach. It is not up in heaven so that you have to ask, who will ascend to heaven to get it and proclaim it to us so that we may obey it? Nor is it beyond the sea so that you have to ask, who will cross the sea to get it and proclaim it to us so that we may obey it? No, the word is very near you. It is in your mouth and in your heart so that you may obey it.

So you heard the two spatial metaphors, up in heaven and beyond the sea. Those two metaphors, they rule out the idea that the law is only for those who are capable of rising to great heights of understanding, or that it is only attainable after some great struggle or journey. Once again, we have to notice how Israel's faith rejected elitism. Like, this is just for the smart people, for the private school kids. And it rejects asceticism. This is just for the disciplined people. Now, what it says is that the law of God, the word of God, the teaching of God, the commands of God, the instruction of God is intelligible to everyone and accessible to everyone. So to say that the law is not too difficult does not mean that obedience is easy, but rather that it is simple. It's not complicated by obscure philosophies, complex rules, or religious rituals. It's not only accessible to the the privileged few. All those who are in covenant relationship with God are capable of trusting him to understand and obey the law. So it says all this positively when it says the word is near you.

The word is in your mouth. It's in your heart so that you may obey it. The idea that for Israel, the Old Testament law was some external code that only concerned their behavior and was outside of them is completely wrong. It's as if we want to exalt the New Testament and feel like we have to denigrate the Old Testament to do it, or we want to somehow prove Christianity is superior by misrepresenting Judaism. But here, in the Pentateuch, in the book of Deuteronomy, it says that the word is near you and it is in your heart so that you can obey it. Let me keep reading. Moses says, see, I have said before you today, life and prosperity, death and destruction.

for I command you today to love the Lord your God to walk in obedience to him and to keep his commands, decrees, and laws. Then you will live and increase, and the Lord your God will bless you in the land you are entering to possess. But if your heart turns away and you are not obedient, and if you are drawn away to bow down to other gods and worship them, I declare to you this day that you will certainly be destroyed. You will not live long in the land you are crossing the Jordan to enter and possess. This day I call the heavens and the earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses.

Now choose life so that you and your children may live and that you may love the Lord your God. Listen to his voice, hold fast to him. For the Lord is your life and he will give you many years in the land he swore to give. to your fathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Man, I love those verses. Moses sets the choice before us. You and I have to choose if we want to take the path of life and prosperity or death and destruction. This sounds similar to the choice that Joshua gave the people when he said, choose this day whom you will serve. Or it sounds similar to when Jesus told people, look, there are two roads, a narrow road that leads to life and a broad road that leads to, to destruction. Or it sounds like when Jesus says everybody is going to build a house, either you're

going to build it on the foundation of rock or the foundation of sand. The choice in front of each person is incredibly important. And the decision we make has both immediate and eternal consequences. Everyone is making a choice. I mean, you can't really put off this choice because you're living every day of your life. You can't hit pause on your life until you figure this question out. Every day, every moment you're choosing whom you will serve. And I'm sure you're noticing that this comes down to obedience. Ultimately, the fruit of a tree reveals the roots of the tree. And if at your roots you love Jesus, if at your roots you're putting your hope and trust in him,

then that's going to get worked out in your life, never perfectly, but get worked out in your life so that more and more over time you and I are living obedient lives. Listen to how Moses defines loving God. He says, for I command you to love the Lord your God, to walk in obedience to him, and to keep His commands, decrees, and laws. To love God is to obey God. 1 John 5.3, let's close with this. Loving God means keeping His commandments.

I pray that today you and I would love God and obey Him. Hey, thanks for listening. If you want to go deeper, sign up for the 10-minute Bible Talk newsletter. You'll get a short email once a week. It'll challenge you to grow in your faith, give you interesting background on today's passage, and a lot, lot more. Just click the link in the show notes to sign up. It'll help you deepen your journey with Jesus.