Reading: Deuteronomy 12:1-14

What is God doing in his people here? Forming them into a nation,

• a nation to show he’s a compassionate and gracious God

• to show he’s a powerful and authoritative God

• an impressive nation that God desired should be a bright light in a dark place

• a nation that people will admire and want to emulate / copy / be part of.

<ppt> So the main purpose of the nation of Israel was to proclaim the wonder of God to surrounding nations

Let me introduce you to a phrase we were using on our preparation and research for this series.

Missional hermeneutic <ppt>

(hermeneutic – sounds like a nasty parasite!) A classic bit of theobabble!

BUT …

Your hermeneutic is that way you interpret and apply the Bible.

• Started with Hermes – Greek mythology – he was messenger of the gods. So if the gods wanted to get a message across they’d rope in Hermes.

• How is God going to convey his message from the scriptures – through our hermeneutic – the way we interpret and apply the Bible.

Now for this series we’re adopting a missional hermeneutic as we look at Deuteronomy –

Question: how is it that God gets his love and his grace out there? Answer: Through ordinary people like them – and therefore through ordinary people like us.

Basically it means this: <ppt> That which God called Israel to in history, he calls the church to today.

• How is he going to proclaim his wonder to the (nearby) world? Through the local church.

I say the ‘nearby world’ deliberately because in the OT we repeatedly hear God saying that the purpose of Israel was to declare his greatness ‘to the surrounding nations’.

• These nations weren’t well defined geopolitical entities as we understand them, they were more likely to be individual cities or groups of towns that had a local leader, usually called a Melech – king.

• It was their next-door neighbours, the people who saw the most of them, the people they networked with most easily, who were God’s centre of concern when it came to Israel’s witness.

• So Deuteronomy has a ‘missional hermeneutic’ (i.e. a declaring God’s greatness) agenda all of its own.

Reach people next door

My desire is to unpack that for us.

• That’s why I am so keen on regular, systematic, expository preaching – expository means ‘exposing’ the impact of the text for today. (revealing, making it clear etc.)

So how was God going to help the people of Israel do that?

Hear the voice of God (v1)

Chapter 12 is the start of a new section in the book of Deuteronomy. (1-11, 12-26, 27-end)

• In this section we find God going over the law for the children of Israel, God’s voice, Moses’ voice-box.

• These are not new laws, they’re a re-working of the laws they’ve already received. Why?

Because the Children of Israel are on the verge of a massive change – from a dynasty roaming through the desert to a nation dwelling in their land.

and that’s where the chapter starts.

Deuteronomy 12:1 These are the decrees and laws you must be careful to follow in the land that the Lord, the God of your ancestors, has given you to possess – as long as you live in the land.

No equivocating here, then.

• <ppt> God is asserting his authority. (these are the decrees and laws)

• He’s asserting his identity (I’m the God of your ancestors – that means I am the one who rescued you from Egypt)

• He’s asserting his generosity (I’ve given you this land to possess)

• He’s asserting his jurisdiction (you must live like this ‘as long as you are in the land’) Why? Because my vision for the land and its people (you) is that my name will be seen for the glorious person that I am!

• You carry my reputation!

And it is just the same today – We carry His reputation

So God is addressing his people (through Moses) so they know how he wants them to live in the land. So what is he going to major on in their national life? Where is he going to start?

• Their politics? their economics? Their governmental system?

• None of the above (although he will talk about these later)

• He starts with probably the most important thing in their national life

• their worship.

Worship the Lord (v2)

Now you may come to me and say ‘that’s all very well, but we live in a different era, a different kind of society and a completely different culture.’ How we worship is of almost no importance to the vast majority of the population.

In terms of religious ritual you’re sadly right. But we all worship something or someone.

• The thing I worship is that which comes top of my personal agenda

• When you have two competing appointments coming up, which one do you choose – that choice may point out what you worship

• If you look at your bank account and see how you use discretionary money (i.e. not the stuff you use to pay for the basics – that may highlight what you worship.

• If you think back to time that is free and unallocated – how do you use it? That can indicate what you worship.

In two week time a massive worship event will start in Brazil! (the world cup)

Their worship was t be transformational >>>

It was to be the vehicle that God used to speak to them, to convince them of his love and his grace.

By removing the competition (v2)

2 Destroy completely all the places on the high mountains, on the hills and under every spreading tree, where the nations you are dispossessing worship their gods. 3 Break down their altars, smash their sacred stones and burn their Asherah poles in the fire; cut down the idols of their gods

Background:

Caananite worship often took place at the tops of hills and mountains.

• They would bring offerings to their gods and go through rituals to appease the gods and stay on the right side of them

• They would evoke the power of their gods to bring about results on earth – particularly having children – and there were elaborate fertility rituals they observed

• all in a vain attempt to persuade their gods (Baal, for example) that he or she should take notice of them

• You can get some idea of what went on at these ‘high places’ from v33 “You must not worship the Lord your God in their way, because in worshipping their gods, they do all kinds of detestable things the Lord hates. They even burn their sons and daughters in the fire as sacrifices to their gods.

God did not say ‘leave them there and ignore them’ we are to deal radically with them.

>>>

By using his name (v3)

There’s a very telling phrase in v3

and wipe out their names from those places.

The name identified the person of the god

To excise their name was to get rid of the personality of this little god-let.

Now when we look at what happened in Israel’s we know Israel did not “wipe out” all the names of gods known in Canaanite religion;

• they even accepted a few of their names as legitimate titles for the Lord! We find them elsewhere in the Bible.

By doing it his way (v4)

I’m not for one minute saying there is a right and a wrong way to worship the Lord. We engage with him in a huge variety of different ways, and that is influenced by our background, our musical taste, and (more than you might think) our personality.

But there are things the children of Israel were to avoid.

4 You must not worship the Lord your God in their way.

Some people today use this idea to say that Christians can have a greater openness to other religions in our surrounding culture. They say there is some biblical justification for a more syncretistic (or mix and amtch) approach to other faith traditions in our own day.

I spoke to one minister of a church who, in the name of establishing good reputation, allowed people from the local mosque to use the hall in his church. They had the Moslem artifacts at one end of the room and that Christian artefacts at the other. So ‘all we have to do (he said) is to turn the chairs round’!

Surely that’s OK, isn’t it?’

Actually this is precisely what God tells the Israelites not to do here. If we mix our worship with little bits of other religions and other gods we lose the uniqueness of the God who made this cosmos and who has redeemed and rescued real people.

I know this is unpopular today, because it undercuts pluralism – the idea that there are many faiths and they all witness to the same ultimate divine reality. (i.e. we’ll all get to God in the end)

For pluralism, the possibility of one true revelation by one true God known by one saving name through one particular people is a non-starter. They say this idea of there being one God is chauvinistic or imperialistic. They say ‘everything in history is relative’ ‘there are no absolutes’ – But actually that statement is itself an absolute claim! For the pluralist, then, all of the names of God in the religions of humanity have some validity, but, none of them is allowed to be the real name or final revelation of the ultimate reality.

So there is an unavoidable clash between pluralism and the agenda of this biblical text. According to Deuteronomy, there are some god-names that cannot be tolerated alongside the name of the Lord (Yahweh).

• And at least part of the reason lies in the depravity associated with those names— the phallic and fertility allusions to the Baal cult (v. 3) and the callous horror of child sacrifice (probably of children born to cult prostitutes, v. 31).

So the Children of Israel were to remove the other god-names and replace them with Yahweh – the living God.

Then in the NT the title of ‘name above all names’ is given to Jesus Christ. One day every tongue will confess his as Lord

(Isaiah 45:22-24, Phil 2:9)

By going to the right place (v5)

V5 BUT – in contrast – here’s what to do instead

5 But you are to seek the place the Lord your God will choose from among all your tribes to put his Name there for his dwelling. To that place you must go;

Significance of ‘place’ (Wright 3184)

The place matters. Canaanite worship could take place almost anywhere so the Lord wants his people to worship in particular places that are consecrated, set apart for that purpose.

That was where God’s name was to reside.

By giving generously (v6)

6 there bring your burnt offerings and sacrifices, your tithes and special gifts, what you have vowed to give and your freewill offerings, and the firstborn of your herds and flocks.

Transformational worship has giving high on its heart

>>>

Their giving was described in three pairs

• offerings and sacrifices – offerings are gifts I bring voluntarily because God’s been good and gracious, sacrifices are an act of obedience

• tithes and special gifts – tithes were expected of the children of Israel, God’s tenth was to support the work of the people who had spiritual responsibility and God’s work in the community and special gifts were an additional releasing of resources to the Lord.

• What you have vowed and your free-will offerings – same idea they giviing I’ve vowed is a promise (I’d be breaking a promise if I defaulted) and free-will offerings are things that I’d bring because I desire to honour God in the giving.

Wasn’t their worship sacrificial! It’s not worship for its own sake or my personal entertainment

By being together (v7)

7 There, in the presence of the Lord your God, you and your families shall eat and rejoice in everything you have put your hand to, because the Lord your God has blessed you.

So there was to be a combination of eating (provided by all the gifts of food and produce) and rejoicing! I expect one produced the other!

The beating heart of your worship

7 There, in the presence of the Lord your God, you and your families shall eat and shall rejoice in everything you have put your hand to, because the Lord your God has blessed you.

>>>

Things to avoid in worship

v8 You are not to do as we do here today,

So what was wrong with their worship?

8 … everyone doing as they see fit,

This is <ppt> anarchy

And it highlights a very contemporary matter – people who said “I want to worship this way” another “no, I want to worship that way”

And this is a sign of restlessness –

9 since you have not yet reached the resting place and the inheritance the Lord your God is giving you.

10 But you will cross the Jordan and settle in the land the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance, and he will give you rest from all your enemies around you so that you will live in safety.

13 Be careful not to sacrifice your burnt offerings anywhere you please. 14 Offer them only at the place the Lord will choose in one of your tribes, and there observe everything I command you.

Now here’s a principle

1 Peter 2:9

9 But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special possession, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light.

Will you pray with me for a new spirit of renewal and worship in our church.

A new intensity of worship that will speak volumes to people who are only on the edge of spiritual reality and a new sense of God’s presence that will draw people to him.

• Not to Victoria as an organisation

• not to our worship style, because it tickles their fancy

• not to Ian White as a preacher or worship leader (heaven forbid!)

But draw people to the Lord! >>>

Let me share with you one of the motivating forces in my own ministry – something that really matters to me and drives what I do personally

My vision is to bring the Word and the Spirit together in our ministry.

I believe that what the Lord desires of us is to know His word; to be an understanding people (with the Word alive and active and understood)

I believe he also desire us to be consciously and observably filled with his spirit. To be a charismatic people (where the Spirit of God and the spirit’s of people beat in time with each other)

Where there is clarity of preaching and intensity of praising

where our heads are filled with his word and our hearts are fired with his spirit.

Because when these two are genuinely brought together, the church of Jesus Christ is an intense beacon of light in a dark world

And when people start to hook up with us they, at some point, have the experience that Jacob had when he resisted God, but finally gave in. He reeled back in amazement and said “Surely, God is in this place!”

Pray.