The Book of Deuteronomy

Hebrew Study

Explanation

Having reminded Israel of their sin and God's mercy in renewing the tables of the covenant, Moses now sums up the whole of their duty in one memorable sentence: "And now, Israel, what doth the LORD thy God require of thee, but to fear the LORD thy God, to walk in all his ways, and to love him, and to serve the LORD thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul, To keep the commandments of the LORD, and his statutes, which I command thee this day for thy good?" The list is beautifully ordered: reverent fear, a life walking in His ways, love, wholehearted service, and obedience to His commands. And it closes with a phrase that transforms the whole: all of this is "for thy good."

Gospel Focus

This verse gathers the whole of religion into a handful of words, much as the prophet Micah would later ask, "what doth the LORD require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?" (Micah 6:8). God is not seeking mere ritual but the heart: to fear Him, to walk with Him, to love Him, to serve Him with all we are. Jesus caught up the very center of it when He named the great commandment, to love the Lord with all the heart and soul. And notice the word that changes everything: God requires all this "for thy good." His commands are not the whims of a tyrant but the loving direction of a Father who wants what is best for His children. We often imagine obedience as loss, but God frames it as our gain. The path of fearing, loving, and serving Him is the path of life and blessing. What God asks of us, He asks for our good, and to walk in His ways is to walk in the way of true and lasting joy.

Hebrew Study

Explanation

Moses lifts their eyes to the greatness of the God who chose them: "Behold, the heaven and the heaven of heavens is the LORD's thy God, the earth also, with all that therein is." The God who owns everything and needed nothing nevertheless "had a delight in thy fathers to love them, and he chose their seed after them, even you above all people." Such love calls for a response deeper than outward ceremony. Israel bore the mark of circumcision in the flesh as the sign of the covenant, but Moses presses past the sign to the thing signified: "Circumcise therefore the foreskin of your heart, and be no more stiffnecked." The hard, resistant covering over the heart must be cut away; the stubborn neck must bow. God wanted not merely a marked body but a yielded heart.

Gospel Focus

Here, deep in the law, is the truth that true religion is a matter of the heart. Circumcision in the flesh was the outward sign, but God always looked for the inward reality: a heart with its hard covering cut away, soft and yielded to Him, "no more stiffnecked." Paul makes this the very heart of the gospel: "he is a Jew, which is one inwardly; and circumcision is that of the heart, in the spirit, and not in the letter" (Romans 2:29). Outward religion without a changed heart is empty; God has always wanted the heart. And what the law commanded, the gospel supplies: under the new covenant God Himself performs "the circumcision made without hands," cutting away the body of the sins of the flesh by the Spirit when we are born again. He does for us what we could never do for ourselves, giving a new heart in place of the stony one. Do not settle for the outward forms of religion; ask God to circumcise your heart, to cut away all that resists Him, and to make you soft, yielded, and no more stiffnecked before Him.

Hebrew Study

Explanation

Moses sets before Israel the majesty and the mercy of God together. He is "God of gods, and Lord of lords, a great God, a mighty, and a terrible," supreme over all. Yet this exalted God "regardeth not persons, nor taketh reward," that is, He cannot be bribed and shows no favoritism to the rich or powerful. Instead He turns His care to the lowly: "He doth execute the judgment of the fatherless and widow, and loveth the stranger, in giving him food and raiment." And from God's own heart flows the command: "Love ye therefore the stranger: for ye were strangers in the land of Egypt." Israel was to reflect the God they served, loving the outsider because they themselves had once been outsiders whom God loved.

Gospel Focus

Here is a portrait of God that should melt the hardest heart. The highest of all, "God of gods, and Lord of lords," is also the defender of the lowest, the fatherless, the widow, and the stranger. Greatness and gentleness meet in Him. And He "regardeth not persons," a truth Peter came to see in the house of Cornelius: "Of a truth I perceive that God is no respecter of persons" (Acts 10:34). God is not impressed by wealth or status; He looks on the heart and shows a special tenderness to the vulnerable. His people are to mirror this love. James defines true faith in exactly these terms: "Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world" (James 1:27). And the motive is memory: "ye were strangers in the land of Egypt." We love the outsider because we ourselves were once outsiders, strangers to grace, whom God loved and took in. A heart truly circumcised toward God will overflow in compassion toward the weak. Love the stranger, defend the helpless, and show the world the heart of the great God who first loved you.