Western Hills bulletin article 29Jan12

I write bulletin articles for the Western Hills Church of Christ, so I thought I'd go ahead and add here what I write each week.

Have you ever read the book of Deuteronomy?  I'll admit, it can be a fairly daunting task.  Deuteronomy has long sections of laws, and some of them don't even seem to make sense (Don't boil a baby goat in its mother's milk?  Never even thought of that one).  But I think you'll find that, if you read through Deuteronomy, there are several important lessons to be learned.

One of them relates to a phrase that God says over and over.  In various forms, the admonition to "be careful to follow every command" is given to Israel, such as in Deuteronomy 8:1.  That seems like a terribly difficult task for Israel, though in general it's much simpler than it appears on first glance.  The Torah, which is usually translated as "Law" but is more properly understood as "Instruction," sets forth for Israel a way of living that will set her apart from other people.

But why?  Why does Israel need to be separate?  There are a couple of reasons.  First of all, Israel is to keep herself from impurity.  Rather than take her cues from the people around her, Israel is to take her cues from the mouth of God.  YHWH recognizes that, if his people do not take care, then they will naturally begin to think and act in the same ways as those around them, with disastrous consequences.  Do we as Christians take our cues from the word of God, or do we live by the pattern of our culture?  Do we even recognize a difference?

The second reason for this separation is so that Israel can be a witness to something better.  The people who live all around Israel can look to her and see a model society, a blessed society.  In looking to Israel, the world should have seen a people living in harmony, materially blessed because of their faith, trusting fully in the Lord.  Instead, because Israel often failed to "take care (Deut. 7:11)," not only did Israel fail to be a witness to the world, she was swallowed up and carried off into captivity.  Let us always "take care" to look at our own society and culture the way God looks at it, and be the witness to the world we are called to be.