Pastor's Corner: New generation, new opportunities

The Biblical account of Israel wandering in the wilderness for 40 years provides us an opportunity to understand how Israel was to love and please God. The books of Exodus, Leviticus and Numbers reveal their failures due to complaining and disbelief after crossing of the Red Sea, traveling to Mount Sinai (Horeb), then to the Kadesh region, to the city of Barnea, failing test after test.

It was God’s will for them to take the land of Canaan, but 10 of the spies feared the giants and high walled cities. Only Joshua and Caleb wanted to attack and follow God’s will. The majority of the people listened to the 10 weak spies and rebelled against God and Moses. The Lord then changed His will and sentenced them to die in the wilderness! The people refused to acknowledge God’s change of will, so they offered a false confession of sin and disobeyed the Lord by mounting an attack on Canaan. They were horribly defeated. That rebellious generation died in the wilderness over a period of 38 years.

The Book of Deuteronomy picks up when the new generation is camped at the northeast end of the Dead Sea beside the Jordan River. They are ready to take the land under Joshua’s leadership. Moses gives five last messages to Israel as they are poised to either repeat the rebellion of their parents or forge ahead, trusting in the Lord to give them victory over their enemies. Moses will give them the key verse for personal and national victory: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might” (Deuteronomy 6:5).

In order for Israel to be blessed they had to LOVE their God in all areas of their lives. The key nature of this verse, loving God with all your heart, means that you love God with all of that which is on the inside, i.e. your mind, your volition and your emotions. “Heart” includes the mind. The proof of this is that when the Alexandrian Jews translated the Old Testament into Greek (Septuagint) they used NOUS (mind) which means intellect or mind. This means there is no difference in the Bible between heart knowledge and mind knowledge.

The “Soul” is used in Deuteronomy to refer to your personal life and your children.

Under the laws of kidnapping in Deuteronomy, if you kidnap a child then you are stealing a man’s NEHPHESH, or soul, and you must die.

In other words, the soul of a man was conceived not only to extend to himself but to his children, to his job or livelihood.

There is another passage on financial policies of loaning money, and Moses says you will never take for pledge the man’s tools that he earns a living with because a man should never indebt himself to the point where he can never eat or take care of himself.

Deuteronomy says, “you shall not deprive this man of his soul.” So the inner soul in Hebrew means a man’s life experiences.

Moses is reminding the new generation that loving God with all their heart (Deut. 5-11) and with all their soul (Deut. 12-26) refers to the inner mental attitude as well as the details on the outside. Notice the order; you love God first on the inside, but the normal result of loving God on the inside will result in a behavior pattern in every area. This is why Deut. 12-26 is detailed to show them how to love God in every area of human life. This was the Old Testament means of spirituality.

Deut. 6:5 is crucial because it presents the means of spirituality for the Old Testament believer, which is loving God on the inside and on the outside. The old generation under Moses failed to do this and died. The new generation under Joshua has the opportunity to love God by obeying His laws and experiencing victory under His command.

Chaplain Ron McMurray

Grace Bible Church of Pullman