Introduction and Review
In the last lesson, Curses
and God’s Glory (part 1), we recalled God’s blessings for the Israelites’
faithfulness to Him affected every part of their lives. Those blessings promised
them prolonged life and possession of the land God gave them in Canaan. We
learned, too, that blessings and curses were a normal part of any covenant or
contract in the Near East at that time. Finally, we learned that verses fifteen
through sixty-eight contain three sections of curses. We recognize them at
verses fifteen, forty-five through forty-seven, and fifty-eight. In these three
sets of verses that begin the sections of curses, Moses reminded the Israelites
of their covenant with God in a negative way as a prelude for the succeeding
curses from God for their lack of faithfulness to Him.
In this Bible study, we will understand that the second
section of God’s curses occur through other nations against the Israelites. God
used foreign nations to enact His curses of death on the Israelites for
breaking covenant with Him. In the third and final section of curses, which
begins with verse fifty-eight, we hear again how the LORD would actively strike
the Israelites Himself, not through other people. In verses fifty-nine through
sixty-eight, we read the LORD would bring plagues, bring back diseases, scatter
them, and give them trembling. The LORD would apply His curses in this last
section of curses. The biggest area in which God would affect the Israelites in
this third section was in their bodies – physical and mental. Let us now get
into our study for today.
Section 2
In the first section of curses, God actively struck the
Israelites bodies, prosperity, families, and international relationships. In
this current section, comprised of verses forty-five through fifty-seven, God’s
curses against the Israelites occur through a third party, enemies of Israel,
via siege warfare. As stated earlier, each section of curses begins with a
reminder that the Israelites’ disobedience to their covenant with God would
bring about His curses. The reminder in this section of curses is in verses forty-five
through forty-seven.
Comparison.
In comparing verse fifteen to verses forty-five through forty-seven,
we note the extended length of the latter. Verse 15 is brief and does not use
the legal format of the if/then statement. Moses developed how the curses would
occur in the latter. He reiterated God would curse the Israelites until their
enemies overtook and destroyed them. Compared to verse fifteen, verses forty-five
through forty-seven give greater depth as a reminder of the covenant they
pledged with God - the curses for unfaithfulness, the extent of the curses, and
the reality they, as unfaithful people, would be an example of scorn and horror.
The Preamble.
Moses said the Israelites would be an example to other
nations. He said twice in verses forty-five through forty-seven the curses would
occur because of the Israelites’ disobedience (vs. 45 “because you would not
obey the LORD your God” and vs. 47 “Because you did not serve the LORD your
God”). In verse 45, we must note again that God would send the curses until the
overtaking and destruction of the Israelites occurred. The ultimate purpose of
the curses, as Moses said many times in verses fifteen through sixty-eight, was
the destroying and perishing of the Israelites. Added to this, Moses said these
curses and their resultant destruction would be proof of their disobedience for
themselves and their descendents forever. He said this in verse 46a when he
said, “They ([the curses] shall become a sign and a wonder on you and your
descendents forever.” We recall Moses said God did mighty things in the
presence of the Israelites as signs and wonders (Numbers 26:10). Isaiah said God
gave him and the Israelites as signs and wonders in Isaiah 8:18. Ezekiel, too, used
this same wording when he prophesied about Israel being taken into captivity because
of their unfaithfulness to God (Ezekiel 5:15 & 14:8). As a final thought,
in verses forty-five through forty-seven, Moses reminded the Israelites of
their first encounter with the LORD found in Deuteronomy 4:25-26. They agreed
to the covenant and the resultant blessings and curses from God for their
faithfulness or unfaithfulness.
From verses forty-seven and forty-eight’s interplay using a
“because…therefore” statement (similar to an if/then statement), the Israelites
heard they would serve their enemies that the LORD would send against them. In
this section of curses, the Israelites learned God would not actively go against
them, but He would send their enemies. Those enemies would bring the curses
against their bodies, families, land, livestock (prosperity and food). Because their
enemies did this through siege warfare, the warfare we cannot separate the
curses of God against body, property, family, prosperity from the results of
warfare. They intertwine. The curse of ruptured international relationships –
battle with their enemies - would cause the others. Overall though, God caused
each of the curses and they each caused mental anguish to the Israelites. Because
of this, we will look in this section at the verses as a whole, not as
individual types of curses.
The Body.
As introduced in the prior paragraph, the breakdown of international
relations would cause their destruction. Verse 48 gives us the method God said
He would use to bring His curses upon the unfaithful Israelites. It says, “Therefore
you shall serve your enemies whom the LORD will send against you, in hunger, in
thirst, in nakedness, and in the lack of all things; and He will put an iron
yoke on your neck until He has destroyed you.” Moses said God would use the
Israelites enemies to inflict His curses. He explained the enemies would affect
their bodies, prosperity, freedom, and their lives. These covered each of the
areas mention in the blessings of verses one through fourteen and the curses thus
far studied. Lamentations 4:4-6 and Jeremiah 28:13-14 testify to the time God
enacted these curses against Israel for disobedience.
From verse 49, Moses expanded the teaching of verse forty-eight
to the Israelites. He said, “The LORD will bring a nation against you from
afar, from the end of the earth as the eagle swoops down, a nation whose
language you shall not understand.” The nation God would use to curse them would
possibly be unknown to the Israelites. It would arrive suddenly like an eagle,
swift to fly in and overtake. The distant nation would surprise the Israelites
and confound them because of the language barrier. They would be foreign to the
Israelites, which would give its own element of uncertainty. Isaiah, Jeremiah,
and Hosea recorded the northern and southern kingdoms’ defeats in Isaiah
5:26-30 & 7:18-20, Jeremiah 5:15, 6:22-23, 48:40, & 49:22, Lamentations
4:19, and Hosea 8:21. Besides fear, surprise, and uncertainty, the Israelites would
be hungry, thirsty, naked, lack all things, and be enslaved as Moses said in
verse forty-eight.
Besides surprising the Israelites and confounding them with
their foreign language, we read the enemy would do many other things. They would
not have respect for the old or favor the young. The enemy would eat the
Israelites’ herds and produce while leaving no wine or oil (vs. 50-51). This
alone made the Israelites destitute and hungry. Yet, Moses added, the
Israelites’ enemy would show them the faith they had in their high walls and
fortifications throughout the land was unfounded (vs. 52). They would learn
they should have put complete their trust in the LORD. The Israelites did not
consider that the LORD, who gave them the land, was the sole one who could save
their land, and in contrast, take it away. Jeremiah and Zephaniah foretold
these events of God’s wrath/curses in Jeremiah 10:17-18 and Zephaniah 1:15-16.
The prophets of God reminded the Israelites many times of God’s curses and
pleaded with them to return to God.
When the Israelites had no food left in their cities and towns,
while their enemy besieged them, they would become cannibals of their own
families. In graphic detail, Moses told them they would eat their own
offspring, their children whom the LORD gave them. The enemy would oppress them
so thoroughly even the refined and delicate man and woman would become hostile
toward his and her brother, spouse, and children so that he and/or she would
eat their bodies (vs. 53-57). The woman would eat her placenta. Consuming flesh
meant killing their family. God forbade human sacrifice and killing of innocent
people. That made the eating of people wrong. By putting dead human flesh into
their bodies, the Israelites defiled the dead and their own bodies. Remember if
anyone touched a dead person, that person would be ritually unclean until he or
she performed ritual cleansing and the priest approved him or her to enter the
town/city and temple again. By consuming another person, which God disapproved
in the Garden of Eden, the Israelite sinned against God, themselves, and other
humans. On top of these things, by removing their children, they ended the
family line. The land God gave them would not be kept in the family.
Descendents would not survive to inherit the land. The Israelite’s life would
not be prolonged by descendents. Arriving at the point of desperation and
eating human flesh became the only way to survive. That shows the level of
despair the Israelites would feel. Their desperation during the siege was so
great it affected the peoples’ bodies, their families, their spiritual state,
their mental state, their property, and, their international relations. The
Israelites would feel a vast separation from God. Their bodies, minds, and
souls would be in distress.
Section 3
Overview and Preamble.
We arrive now at the last section of curses. The verses from
fifty-eight through sixty-eight show the magnitude of the results from the
curses God would perform or would allow occur. Verse fifty-eight is very similar
to verse fifteen. They both remind the Israelites that curses would occur if
they did not observe the whole Law of God – His commandments and statutes. “Observe”
comes from the Hebrew word ‘anah,
which means to do. Moses told them in verse fifteen, “To observe to do His
commandments.” In verse fifty-eight he said, “Be careful to observe all the
words of this law.” In both verses, the Israelites were to do what God said.
Notice, too, that in verse fifteen and fifty-eight, the words “obey” and
“careful” come from the Hebrew word shama’,
which means to hear, listen, and obey. Moses did this to stress his point. He
told the Israelites in these verses carefully do them - to do them and make
sure you do them. Moses wanted to make sure they got the seriousness of this
message. He meant, “Do what God commands; your life depends upon it.” Moses repeated
twice within each of these verses to obey/do what God’s laws said. He reminded
them of this command in verses one, nine, and thirteen, when he said to “obey”
(vs. 1), “keep” (vs. 9), and “listen to” (vs. 13) the commandments of the LORD.
He tied the results for faithfulness and unfaithfulness to the same thing -
obedience/disobedience to their covenant with God.
Moses added one other part to his restatement of their
covenant. He told the Israelites to obey God because they fear “the honored and
awesome name, that is the LORD God” (vs. 58). For the first time in this
chapter, in verse fifty-eight, we read something extra. Moses told the
Israelites a new reason they should obey God and His commandments. He told them
to do it because of their reverence of the honorable, glorious, and awesome LORD
God. “Honor” comes from the Hebrew word kabad,
which means honorable and glorious. The Israelites were to obey God because He
was worthy of their reverence, not just because they feared for their lives. In
each of the other five verses, section preambles, (vs. 1, 9, 13, 15, &
45-47) of this chapter where Moses spoke to the Israelites about obeying God,
he told them to be faithful and receive God’s blessings, not curses due to
unfaithfulness. While we ponder that thought, keep it in mind as we look at the
remaining ten verses of this chapter.
The Body.
Notice that verse fifty-nine begins with the word “then.”
That means it is a conditional statement and we should read the prior section
to see the condition. Moses often used this legal format when speaking to teach
the Israelites. As we learned in the preamble, he told them, “If the Israelites
were not careful to observe all the words of this law.” Their obedience was the
condition of the Mount Horeb covenant. Verses 59 through 68 continue this legal
format with the word “then.” The “then”
Moses told them was God’s curses He would bring upon unfaithful Israelites.
Notice in the second section of curses God used other nations to destroy Israel
and bring His curses upon them. In this third section of curses, God Himself
brought the curses against the Israelites, just as He did in the first section
of curses. These verses say, “The LORD will bring,” “The LORD will delight in
their destruction,” “The LORD will scatter,” and “The LORD will give.”
God first directed His curse against the Israelites’ bodies.
Verse 59 says, “The LORD will bring extraordinary plagues on you and your
descendents, even severe and lasting plagues and miserable and chronic
sicknesses.” This provides the “then” to the earlier “if.” When looking at the
words of this verse, we find the word “extraordinary” comes from the Hebrew
word pala’ and means surpassing.
These plagues Moses told the Israelites about would be so great it would
surpass any knowledge of plagues they had from previous times. The plagues and
illnesses would ravage their bodies and stun their minds. Moses said its
surpassing nature would be severe, lasting, miserable, and chronic. Only a
great and everlasting God could create such great, lasting, and severe plagues
and sicknesses.
On top of this, Moses told the Israelites, “He [God] will
bring back on you all the diseases of Egypt of which you were afraid, and they
will cling to you.” He spoke of these Egyptian diseases before in verse
twenty-seven. From research of mummies, skeletons, hieroglyphs, and pictures of
healing in art, researchers conclude there were eye diseases, tuberculosis, polio,
and parasitic diseases. (Disease in
Ancient Egypt, University College London, http://www.ucl.ac.uk/museums-static/digitalegypt/age/disease.html.)
The Israelites were familiar with these diseases since they lived in Egypt for
400 years.
Because of these illnesses, not to mention the war sieges,
the Israelites would be left fewer in number (vs. 62). Remember, one promise to
Abraham was that God would make of him many nations which would be as great as
the stars in heaven and the sands of the sea. Moses reminded the Israelites of
God’s faithfulness to His promise to Abraham in Deuteronomy 1:10. After God’s
curses, the Israelites would be few in number. This would show God removed His
hand of blessing from them. The Israelites would continue experiencing the
curses to the point of destruction and perishing from the diseases because they
did not obey the LORD God. Later in history, when the Israelites returned from
captivity, Nehemiah led them in confession of their sins to God. In his prayer
with and for them, as he spoke to God, he reminded the people and God of how
God made them as numerous as the stars and that He was the one who brought them
into the Promised Land (Nehemiah 9:23). From Nehemiah’s account in the Bible,
we learn the Israelites were unfaithful to God, but He was faithful to the
covenant and cursed them by making them become fewer and become captives.
Lest we get sidetracked, let us continue to verse
sixty-three. In this verse, Moses used an interesting mix of words. He said,
“It shall come about that as the LORD delighted over you to prosper you and
multiply you, so the LORD will delight over you to make you perish and destroy
you; and you will be torn from the land where you are entering to possess it.”
The LORD will delight over them to make them perish and destroy them? Does that
seem odd to you? We must look at it in context with the verse and passage. Why
did the LORD delight over the Israelites before when He prospered them? He
rejoiced over them because of their obedience to Him and His laws. The
Israelites obeyed the LORD because of who He is and what He did for them. They
saw His might and power. The Israelites feared/reverenced Him. When the LORD
placed His hand upon them with curses, they felt His might and power and they feared
Him again. The Israelites and the nations around them re-experienced the might
and power of God. They recalled His
greatness and revered Him again. That is why the LORD delighted in
making them perish and be destroyed. He received reverence again. The LORD did
not delight in hurting the Israelites. Their unfaithfulness/sinfulness required
discipline and punishment. They agreed to the punishment when they agreed to
the covenant. When God enacted the curses and the Israelites felt the curses,
they remembered God’s power, might, and worthiness of praise. In human terms,
we can say they respected God again. Would receiving respect give you delight? How
much more would the God of all creation delight in that respect whether He
received it the preferable way, by honor and love, or by the judgment that His
righteousness requires. Let me say this straight: God does not want to judge
and apply justice to return things to their rightful balance. He is like a
loving parent who sets boundaries and rejoices when a child thrives within
those boundaries. Yet, like a loving parent, sometimes a child steps outside
the boundary and consequences arise, either as natural results of overstepping
bounds (erring/sinning) or as discipline/punishment for not respecting
boundaries and the parents who instituted them for the safety and wellbeing of
the child. Just as those parents love their children and established boundaries
with consequences, God loves His creation, humans, and established boundaries
with positive and negative consequences. They are to bring us back into a right
relationship with Him.
Along with striking the Israelites with plagues and leaving
them few in number, Moses said. “Moreover, the LORD will scatter you from among
all peoples, from one end of the earth to the other end of the earth; and there
you shall serve other gods, wood and stone, which you or your fathers have not
known” (vs. 64). The people would be sick and fewer in number; those are physical
things. They affect a person’s/nation’s psyche, too, when they realize an army
could overtake them and make them slaves because they are so few in number.
Moses added to that fear when he told the Israelites they would not live among
their own kind, but among strangers of a different language and gods. The
Israelites would not understand the captor people because of a language
barrier. Those nations would make them worship gods who were powerless,
foreign, and unknown to them. The curses of God would affect their spiritual selves,
too. Yahweh God, whom the Israelites knew was all-powerful, was not the god the
foreign nations worshipped. Their captors would make them worship an inferior
god.
To this point, the curses would affect the Israelites’
bodies, minds, spirits, properties, income, families, and international
relations. From verse 65 through 67, the curses would affect almost exclusively
their mental wellbeing. Moses said,
Among those nations, you shall find no rest and there will be
no resting place for the sole of your foot, but there the LORD will give you a
trembling heart, failing of eyes, and despair of soul. So your life shall hang
in doubt before you; and you will be in dread night and day, and shall have no
assurance of your life. In the morning you shall say, “Would that it were
evening!” and at evening you shall say, “Would that it were morning!” because
of the dread of your heart which you dread, and for the sight of your eyes
which you will see. (Deut. 28:65-67, [NASB])
The word “rest” in these verses comes
from the Hebrew word raga’ and means
to be quiet and not disturbed or stirred up. When the Israelites went to other
nations as captives, they would be disturbed and stirred up within their minds
and hearts. The writer of Lamentations confirmed this in Lamentations 1:3. On
top of being disturbed, Moses said the LORD would give the Israelites trembling
hearts, failing eyes, and despair of soul. They would be afraid of what would
happen to them. The Israelites, shaken by much sickness, privations, death, and
capturing, would not know the land or people in which they were to live. “They
were afraid of their shadows,” we might say. The Israelites would wish for
familiar things – home. The Israelites would think they did not have a God upon
whom to call. Heaviness would overcome their souls. They would despair death at
first. In this last section of the chapter, they would despair of what life
might bring them as captives in a new land. Moses told them in verse sixty-six
their life would hang in doubt. The Israelites did not know what to do or who
to trust. They did not know what today, much less tomorrow, would bring. Dread
and fear would pervade throughout the day into the night. The Israelites would
have no assurance of life – death or life, fear or trust. They would hope the
night would bring relief from fear and dread then get there and find it did not
so wish for day to arrive. We, as human as the Israelites, understand this fear
and dread. When a loved one has a terminal illness or when a child goes astray
into a dangerous lifestyle, we live in dread of what the next phone call might
tell us. We pray with each breath hoping God will hear and intervene with
blessings. We know and understand the dread and anguish that would befall the
Israelites.
As
the final nail in the coffin - the last dreaded part of the curses - Moses told
the Israelites the LORD would take them back to Egypt and they would find no
one to buy them as servants. no (vs. 68). Even their old lord, the Egyptians,
to whom they threatened to return if the LORD did not give them food and drink
during the exodus, would not buy them. The Israelites would become so low their
old slave drivers and masters would not deign to look at and hire them. They
could not even become the lowest in society when they disobeyed God and
received their due judgment, His curses. The Israelites were lower than the
lowest person of society. They were dead.
Recap
In Deuteronomy 28, Moses reminded the Israelites of their
covenant with God at Mount Horeb (Sinai). In the first fourteen verses, he told
them the blessings God promised to give them if they diligently obeyed the LORD
and carefully did His commands. These blessings covered their bodies, nation,
families, property (animal, land, and business), prosperity, and international
relations. Just as the blessings covered these areas, so too did the curses. In
the first section of curses, Moses related one to one the curse to the earlier
expressed blessing saying God would actively apply the curse Himself. In the
second section of curses, each part of the Israelites’ lives to receive
blessing in the first fourteen verses God would curse by using a foreign enemy
nation to enact them on the Israelites. Their implementation occurred during
siege warfare. By that curse, the Israelites’ minds and spirits would begin to be
affected so they would fear what would happen to them. In the final section of
curses, God would actively enact the curses on the Israelites. The curses of
this section would affect their mental and physical wellbeing. By the last
curse, the Israelites would be lower than the lowest rung on the social ladder.
They would not be able to sell themselves into slavery. This would show in how
little regard other nations would hold the Israelites. International relations would
not be profitable for them.
Relevance and Conclusion
Moses spent twenty-eight chapters and many days speaking to
the Israelites on the border of Canaan. Before crossing the Jordan River, God had
Moses remind them of their covenant with Him - what was required of them, and
what He promised to do for or against them for their faithfulness or unfaithness.
During these speeches, Moses reminded the Israelites of their past without the LORD
God and since the LORD chose them to be His people. He reminded them of God’s
faithful to their forefathers – Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Throughout these
speeches, Moses spoke of God’s power, might, and omniscience and the
Israelites’ smallness and relative lack of power and might. He reminded them
that God’s gift of the land of Canaan, the Promised Land, occurred because of
His faithfulness to their forefathers, not their faithfulness to Him. The Israelites’
faithfulness to their covenant with God would result in their possessing the land
in perpetuity and having prosperity in the land. Moses distinguished their
covenant with God from Abraham’s so they could recognize God’s faithfulness to
Abraham and separate it from their pledge with Him. He wanted them to realize
two things – God is faithful and they would continue to live in the land if
they were faithful to their covenant with God. Their inheritance ended with sin
against God – unfaithfulness to their covenant.
This fact is important for us today. You may say, “I am not
a Jew and I do not live in Israel, so how does this pertain to me?” Because the
intention of the old covenant at Mount Sinai was to lead people to God, not to
save them from the power of sin and death, God created a new and better covenant.
Because humans are sinful, they needed a better covenant. We have free will, a
gift from God when He created us. When we exercise our will in such a way as to
choose what we want counter to what is best and God’s perfect plan, that is
sin. Because humans cannot ever be sinless since the original sin in the Garden
of Eden, no covenant, promise, or contract is ever guaranteed to be fulfilled.
People may honor their agreements or not. If a covenant with God relied just on
the will of a human to fulfill his or her promises before God would give
blessings, then not every covenant would be fulfilled. Some people would not
receive the blessings and love of God.
God made a better plan. He loves humankind very much. God
planned from the beginning of time to provide the greater covenant, one in
which humans are not required to do anything for God to bless them. God wants
to bless humans because He loves them, us. In Old Testament times when the
Israelites lived by the old covenant, God’s priests led them to recognize their
sin against God and to offer a sacrifice by which to atone for their sin. With
the new covenant, the one where humans do not have to do anything, God provided
the sin sacrifice. This sacrifice was a perfect sacrifice, not a created
animal, but the Son of God, Jesus Christ. The Son of God is a part of the
Godhead and, so was perfect though Satan attempted to tempt Him during His life
on earth. God provided this new covenant when He allowed His Son to be
crucified on a cross though He did nothing wrong. He was sin free. Jesus Christ
beat the power of sin Satan holds over humans. Before we accepted Jesus Christ
as our Lord and Master, Satan was master of us because we are sinful. He held
us in guilt, told us we are not good enough, and God could not love us. By
Jesus’ death, our sins are atoned. God did not leave it there. He resurrected
His Son from death beating the power of sin and death. We each deserve death
because we are sinful. Sin separates us from God because He is pure and good
and cannot be in the presence of sin. When we are not in the presence of God,
we are dead; Satan made sure of that and works hard to keep us that way. God
won though. There was no contest for God against Satan; Satan is a created
being and God is the Creator. God had the plan for the better covenant from day
one in Genesis. Paul spoke of it in Ephesians 1:4. God loves us and made a plan
so we could be free of sin, the power of sin, and the power of death. We can choose
to be with God and let Jesus Christ be our Lord and Master instead of Satan.
What do humans have to do to receive this mercy and forgiveness
from Jesus Christ’s atoning sacrifice? Nothing. Nothing we can do could ever
pay for the blessing of washing away our wrongs against God. Nothing. Because
we can do nothing to wash sin away or to earn or pay for mercy and grace, God
gives it to us freely – because God loves us that much. This great love is
free. God wants us to receive His love and live with Him forever, you see.
There is nothing we can do to earn it, but we must believe. Accept Jesus Christ
is God’s Son and claim Him as your Lord and Master. Believe His death atoned for/washed
away your sins. Confess your sins and receive His forgiveness.
Questions
remain –
Do
you believe?
Will
you accept?
Is
He your Lord and Master?
