The Book of Deuteronomy

Hebrew Study

Explanation

After urging Israel to fear the LORD and keep His statutes so that it might be well with them in the land, Moses gives the confession that gathers up the whole faith: "Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God is one LORD." There is one God, undivided, and He alone is Israel's God. From this flows the first and greatest command: "thou shalt love the LORD thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might," love that holds nothing back and engages the whole person. These words were to be kept in the heart, taught diligently to the children, spoken of at home and on the road, at lying down and rising up, bound on the hand and set before the eyes, and written on the doorposts. The confession of the one God was to saturate the whole of life.

Gospel Focus

The Shema is the heartbeat of the Apostolic faith. "The LORD our God is one LORD," there is one God, single and undivided, and this is the truth on which everything else rests. When a scribe asked Jesus which was the first commandment of all, He answered by quoting this very verse: "Hear, O Israel; The Lord our God is one Lord: and thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart" (Mark 12:29-30). Jesus did not correct or expand the confession of the one God; He affirmed it as the greatest truth of all. James adds, "Thou believest that there is one God; thou doest well" (James 2:19). This one God is the God who was made flesh in Jesus Christ, and it is in Him that the one God is fully revealed and known. And notice the command that flows from the confession: because God is one, our love must be undivided too, "with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might." A divided heart is a contradiction of the one God. The proper response to the one LORD is not lukewarm, partial devotion but the total love of the whole person. Confess the one God, love Him with everything you are, and let that confession fill your home and shape your children.

Hebrew Study

Explanation

Moses warns of a subtle danger, not persecution but prosperity. When God brings them into the land and gives them "great and goodly cities, which thou buildedst not, and houses full of all good things, which thou filledst not," wells they did not dig and vineyards they did not plant, then, satisfied and full, "beware lest thou forget the LORD, which brought thee forth out of the land of Egypt." They were to fear the LORD, serve Him, and not go after other gods, "for the LORD thy God is a jealous God among you." Twice in this passage stand words the Lord Jesus would later quote: "Thou shalt fear the LORD thy God, and serve him," and "Ye shall not tempt the LORD your God, as ye tempted him in Massah." Instead of forgetting, they were to keep His commandments diligently and do what was right in His sight.

Gospel Focus

It is a searching warning: the danger to faith is often not the furnace of affliction but the comfort of plenty. When the cities are built, the houses full, and the wells dug, the heart is tempted to forget the God who gave it all and to lean on the gift instead of the Giver. Full barns have shipwrecked more souls than empty ones. So the command is to remember, to keep fearing and serving the LORD in the day of abundance as truly as in the day of need. And here shines a beautiful thing: these are the very Scriptures Jesus used to defeat the tempter in His own wilderness. To the offer of all the kingdoms He answered from this chapter, "Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve" (Matthew 4:10, drawing on Deuteronomy 6:13), and He answered the tempter again with "Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God" (from Deuteronomy 6:16). The Word hidden in the heart is the sword that overcomes temptation. Where Israel so often forgot and fell, Jesus remembered and stood, and by His Word we too can stand. Do not let plenty make you forget; serve and worship the one Lord only, and keep His Word ready in your heart.

Hebrew Study

Explanation

Moses knows a day will come when a child, seeing the commandments kept, will ask, "What mean the testimonies, and the statutes, and the judgments, which the LORD our God hath commanded you?" The answer the father is to give is not a lecture on rules but the story of salvation: "We were Pharaoh's bondmen in Egypt; and the LORD brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand." God showed signs and wonders, brought them out to bring them into the promised land, and commanded these statutes "for our good always, that he might preserve us alive." The commandments are explained by redemption: we obey because God first delivered us.

Gospel Focus

The faith is never more than one generation from being lost, and so God commands that it be told to the children. Notice how the father answers the child's question about the commandments: not merely "these are the rules," but "we were bondmen, and the LORD brought us out." The law is explained by the gospel of deliverance. This is how we are to raise the next generation, not with bare rules but with the story of redemption, so that they understand obedience as the grateful response of a rescued people. And every Christian home tells a greater version of the same story: we were slaves to sin, and the Lord brought us out with a mighty hand through Jesus Christ. Tell your children where you came from and what God has done, that they may love and serve the same Lord who saved you. A living faith, rooted in the memory of God's salvation and passed on with joy, is the inheritance we owe our children.