1. Deuteronomy - Friday Night Genesis May 4, 2012
Intro to the book
The name of the book pretty much describes what you get. Deuteronomy is the retelling
of the law, or “the second law“. In spite of that there are a number of reasons why I really
enjoyed this book. First off, you get the history of the last 40 years in a neat little
summary, and it also has a personal feel to it as you get to hear Moses’ own perspective
on the events of those years, even his personal feelings as he freely and frequently lays
it on the conscience of the Israelites that it was because of their behavior that he will not
get to enter the promised land. And finally there is the tenderness of this elderly leader of
the nation, as he imparts the last words of advice and wisdom to the people he has led
in the hopes that they will heed his advice, live long and prosper in the promised land.
Historically we are pausing once again at the end of the 40 years of wandering through
the wilderness putting us somewhere in the 1400‘s B.C. Last month I had a map to show
the journey, so we’ll quickly review this. (show map). So in Deuteronomy we have ended
up here on the north side of the Dead Sea on the eastern shores of river Jordan. In 1997
I had the privilege of visiting today’s Jordan. Of course for the 9 years after that I also
had the privilege of explaining to every customs official I encountered why I had a visa to
the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan plastered across the entire first page of my passport!
During that trip I had the opportunity to go to the top of Mount Nebo from where Moses
viewed the promised land. Before I show you the pictures I’d just like to say that this was
in the days before digital cameras when you had your 24 exposures that you used
sparingly and hoped the pictures came out OK.
Reading: Deuteronomy 30:15-20
Blessings and curses
This reading is a good sample of the flavor we find in much of the book of Deuteronomy.
The blessings and curses. And it gives rise to some interesting theology later in the Bible
and even to the present day. If you were healthy and wealthy you must have been doing
the right thing and so won God’s favor and blessing. That’s why when Job lost
everything his friends were sure that Job must have upset God something fierce to have
lost everything in such dramatic fashion. You may also remember the disciples asking
about a blind man “who sinned - this man or his parents?” (John 9:2). In their minds, and
based on texts like this from the book of Deuteronomy, someone must have sinned for
that guy to have been cursed with blindness.
There are two words that will be our words of the month as we explore the blessings and
the curses in the book of Deuteronomy: intrinsic and imposed. If a child of say 5 years of
age is running around the house at full tilt and you say to them “stop running or I will tan
your hide”, and the child continues running, assuming you carry through with your threat,
will there be pain involved? Yes. Is it intrinsic or imposed? It is imposed - you imposed
the pain. If the child is running around the house and you say to them “stop running or
you might hurt yourself” and the child continues running, slips and crashes into the side
of the wardrobe, will there be pain involved? Yes. Will it be intrinsic or imposed? This
would be intrinsic - because the pain was a natural consequence of the actions they
engaged in. As a parent you may decide to opt for the imposed model, simply because
you can impart the lesson in a controlled manner by warming up their bottom, rather

2. than having them uncontrollably crash into something and learning about the intrinsic
consequences through an injury that may require a visit to the ER. Now if a 35 year old
was running around the house, which method would you use? You’d just hope that by
the age of 35 they have learned not to run around the house!
I believe this illustration helps us to understand God’s dealings with the Israelites when
He gave them the blessings and the curses. The book of Deuteronomy reveals the heart
of Moses as he councils the people he has led for all these year, but it also reveals the
heart of God. As the Israelites contemplated with trepidation going into the promised
land where they will be opposed by giants, this is what Moses says: “Do not be terrified;
do not be afraid of them. The Lord your God, who is going before you, will fight for you,
as he did for you in Egypt, before your very eyes, and in the wilderness. There you saw
how the Lord your God carried you, as a father carries his son, all the way you went until
you reached this place.” (Deut. 1:29-31) What a beautiful picture Moses paints of God’s
care for the people He called His children! But as we all know the last 3 books were
hardly all warm fuzzies between God and His children. Moses acknowledges this, but
still portrays it as another aspect of parenting: “Know then in your heart that as a man
disciplines his son, so the Lord your God disciplines you.” (Deut 8:5)
So OK, God adopted the nation of Israel as His children and both loved them and
disciplined them as such. But why did God opt for the imposed model of parenting rather
than the intrinsic? After all, was He not dealing with adults? Yes and no. Physically yes,
but on many other levels not so much. You may have noticed that one of the biggest
struggles that the Israelites had was with following other “gods”. If you are dealing with
people who see it as entirely sensible, even desirable to worship a chunk of wood, metal
or stone as a god, may I suggest that you are not dealing with people who are mature
enough yet to move on to the intrinsic method of parenting which does require some
reasoning skills. People who could exalt animals and defer to them as deities, have not
reasoned things through.
Also up for consideration is an incident back in the book of Numbers. As spies returned
from the promised land with reports of giants living in the land, the people were afraid.
Even though God said “Go, take the land, this is my fight” the people said “heck no!”.
God deferred to them and said “OK, you don’t want to go, you can just stay here in the
wilderness.” Suddenly the people decided that they didn’t like that solution, so they
quickly changed their minds, grabbed their swords and headed off all gung-ho to take
the promised land on their own. Now, does that whole scenario not look like a toddler
throwing a tantrum?! And in that case God let them experience some intrinsic discipline.
The Amorites came out against them and gave them a good whipping.
It is this that gives us a bit of a glimpse into why God is using a good deal of imposed
discipline. Here’s how Moses spells it out for them: “You were shown these things so that
you might know that the Lord is God; besides him there is no other. From heaven he
made you hear his voice to discipline you. On earth he showed you his great fire, and
you heard his words from out of the fire. Because he loved your ancestors and chose
their descendants after them, he brought you out of Egypt by his Presence and his great
strength, to drive out before you nations greater and stronger than you and to bring you
into their land to give it to you for your inheritance, as it is today.“ (Deut. 4:35-38) The
Israelites had every reason to be afraid - they were going up against nations that were
bigger and stronger than they were. They were totally dependent on God. Had God used
only intrinsic discipline they would have been completely annihilated! Some of the

3. imposed discipline was not pretty, but it was better than the alternative.
So are the blessings and curses of Deuteronomy intrinsic or imposed? Yes. God initially
did use a good deal of imposed discipline, but there are intrinsic blessings to following
God’s laws. There are also intrinsic consequences to ignoring them. God is willing to
step in and use imposed consequences so that we may learn in a controlled
environment until we are mature enough to understand the reasoning behind them. In
fact, this is a stated goal in the book of Deuteronomy. Check this out: “See, I have taught
you decrees and laws as the Lord my God commanded me, so that you may follow them
in the land you are entering to take possession of it. Observe them carefully, for this will
show your wisdom and understanding to the nations, who will hear about all these
decrees and say, “Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people.” What
other nation is so great as to have their gods near them the way the Lord our God is
near us whenever we pray to him? And what other nation is so great as to have such
righteous decrees and laws as this body of laws I am setting before you today?” (Deut.
4:5-8) In following God’s laws, Israel will come to be perceived by others as a “wise and
understanding” people, because once they were reasoned out and seen in practice they
made sense.
Israel’s king David would later say: “Oh, how I love your law! I meditate on it all day
long. Your commands are always with me and make me wiser than my enemies. I have
more insight than all my teachers, for I meditate on your statutes. I have more
understanding than the elders, for I obey your precepts.” (Psalm 119:97-100)
Many centuries later apostle Paul would come to a revolutionary new understanding: “I
have the right to do anything,” you say—but not everything is beneficial. “I have the right
to do anything”—but not everything is constructive. (1 Cor. 10:23) King James Bible
even translates this verse as “All things are lawful to me”! Have we not over the
centuries proved that we really are free to do anything? God really has given us
complete freedom, and we have used it to its full extent. Unfortunately in our freedom we
have done unspeakable things to one another. We have used our freedom to do a good
deal of harm to both ourselves and others. With freedom comes great responsibility, and
it is the job of parents to teach their children to responsibly use their freedom. As our
heavenly Father, God has also been teaching us how to use our freedom responsibly
and to our benefit. Yes we are free to do anything, but over time we come to understand
as Paul did that not everything is beneficial or constructive. In these days of increased
knowledge and technology we have been able to look back through history and learn
from it. We have also been able to do both scientific and sociological research and
quantify many of the intrinsic benefits of following God’s commandments and the
intrinsic detriments of failing to follow them. God has been much smarter than us all
along - we are only now starting to realize it.
Of course, as any parent does, God too hopes that one day we will grow up into mature
adults and move from the need for imposed discipline to understanding the intrinsic
consequences of our actions. “The days are coming,” declares the Lord, “when I will
make a new covenant with the people of Israel and with the people of Judah. It will not
be like the covenant I made with their ancestors when I took them by the hand to lead
them out of Egypt, because they broke my covenant, though I was a husband to them,”
declares the Lord. “This is the covenant I will make with the people of Israel after that
time,” declares the Lord. “I will put my law in their minds and write it on their hearts. I will
be their God, and they will be my people. No longer will they teach their neighbor, or say

4. to one another, ‘Know the Lord,’ because they will all know me, from the least of them to
the greatest,” declares the Lord. (Jeremiah 31:31-34)
What a privilege to have a parent like our Heavenly Father. He is willing to use the
imposed model of discipline so that we would not do irreparable harm to ourselves
before we come to understand that there are intrinsic benefits in following God’s
commandments. When we understand the intrinsic nature of the blessings and the
curses we will be willing to let God write His laws on our hearts and minds, and begin to
follow God’s laws simply because it is the good and right thing to do. Like king David we
will be yearning for the law, meditating on it and using it as our guide. When we
understand the intrinsic nature of things we no longer see the commandments as a
burden but as a helpful list of what is good and what is bad for us! We will actually
welcome that kind of guidance! What we can learn from the book of Deuteronomy and
subsequent history is that God is a loving, caring parent who will use the necessary and
appropriate methods to teach us what is right, good, beneficial and constructive for us,
so that we may live well and prosper. Like a good parent, in His laws God is imparting to
us His wisdom, so that we may use the freedom that He has given us with wisdom and
understanding.