February 3, 2014 - Monday

Start Time: 5:18 A.M.

End Time: 6:04 A.M.

Title: The Song of Moses

Scripture: Deuteronomy 32:1 – 52

God’s Message / God’s Promise / God’s Commands:

→And Moses recited the words of this song from beginning to end in the hearing of the whole assembly of Israel:

Listen, you heavens, and I will speak; hear, you earth, the words of my mouth. Let my teaching fall like rain and my words descend like dew, like showers on new grass, like abundant rain on tender plants. I will proclaim the name of the Lord.  Oh, praise the greatness of our God!  He is the Rock, his works are perfect, and all his ways are just.  A faithful God who does no wrong, upright and just is he.  They are corrupt and not his children; to their shame they are a warped and crooked generation.  Is this the way you repay the Lord, you foolish and unwise people?  Is he not your Father, your Creator, who made you and formed you? Remember the days of old; consider the generations long past.  Ask your father and he will tell you, your elders, and they will explain to you.  When the Most High gave the nations their inheritance, when he divided all mankind, he set up boundaries for the peoples according to the number of the sons of Israel.  For the Lord’s portion is his people, Jacob his allotted inheritance.  In a desert land he found him, in a barren and howling waste.  He shielded him and cared for him; he guarded him as the apple of his eye, like an eagle that stirs up its nest and hovers over its young, that spreads its wings to catch them and carries them aloft.  The Lord alone led him; no foreign god was with him.  He made him ride on the heights of the land and fed him with the fruit of the fields.  He nourished him with honey from the rock, and with oil from the flinty crag, with curds and milk from herd and flock and with fattened lambs and goats, with choice rams of Bashan and the finest kernels of wheat.  You drank the foaming blood of the grape. Jeshurun grew fat and kicked; filled with food, they became heavy and sleek.  They abandoned the God who made them and rejected the Rock their Savior.  They made him jealous with their foreign gods and angered him with their detestable idols.  They sacrificed to false gods, which are not God—gods they had not known, gods that recently appeared, gods your ancestors did not fear.  You deserted the Rock, who fathered you; you forgot the God who gave you birth.  The Lord saw this and rejected them because he was angered by his sons and daughters.  “I will hide my face from them,” he said, “and see what their end will be; for they are a perverse generation, children who are unfaithful.  They made me jealous by what is no god and angered me with their worthless idols. I will make them envious by those who are not a people; I will make them angry by a nation that has no understanding.  For a fire will be kindled by my wrath, one that burns down to the realm of the dead below.  It will devour the earth and its harvests and set afire the foundations of the mountains.  “I will heap calamities on them and spend my arrows against them.  I will send wasting famine against them, consuming pestilence and deadly plague; I will send against them the fangs of wild beasts, the venom of vipers that glide in the dust.  In the street the sword will make them childless; in their homes terror will reign.  The young men and young women will perish, the infants and those with gray hair.  I said I would scatter them and erase their name from human memory, but I dreaded the taunt of the enemy, lest the adversary misunderstand and say, ‘Our hand has triumphed; the Lord has not done all this.’”  They are a nation without sense, there is no discernment in them.  If only they were wise and would understand this and discern what their end will be!  How could one man chase a thousand, or two put ten thousand to flight, unless their Rock had sold them, unless the Lord had given them up?  For their rock is not like our Rock, as even our enemies concede.  Their vine comes from the vine of Sodom and from the fields of Gomorrah.  Their grapes are filled with poison, and their clusters with bitterness.  Their wine is the venom of serpents, the deadly poison of cobras.  “Have I not kept this in reserve and sealed it in my vaults?  It is mine to avenge; I will repay.  In due time their foot will slip; their day of disaster is near and their doom rushes upon them.”   The Lord will vindicate his people and relent concerning his servants when he sees their strength is gone and no one is left, slave or free.  He will say: “Now where are their gods, the rock they took refuge in,  the gods who ate the fat of their sacrifices and drank the wine of their drink offerings?  Let them rise up to help you!  Let them give you shelter!  “See now that I myself am he!  There is no god besides me.  I put to death and I bring to life, I have wounded and I will heal, and no one can deliver out of my hand.  I lift my hand to heaven and solemnly swear: As surely as I live forever, when I sharpen my flashing sword and my hand grasps it in judgment, I will take vengeance on my adversaries and repay those who hate me.  I will make my arrows drunk with blood, while my sword devours flesh: the blood of the slain and the captives, the heads of the enemy leaders.”  Rejoice, you nations, with his people, for he will avenge the blood of his servants; he will take vengeance on his enemies and make atonement for his land and people.

Moses came with Joshua son of Nun and spoke all the words of this song in the hearing of the people. When Moses finished reciting all these words to all Israel, he said to them, “Take to heart all the words I have solemnly declared to you this day, so that you may command your children to obey carefully all the words of this law. They are not just idle words for you—they are your life. By them you will live long in the land you are crossing the Jordan to possess.”

NOTES:

Ø God’s words are life to us!  God is a God who wants and makes sure that we remember His love and goodness!  God have Moses wrote all the law and compiled it as books and then gave him a song to teach His people so that they may remember Him, His love, and His goodness.  But in all this, God said to them to obey all His law and take to heart all His words for they are not just idle words for them, they are life!  Everything He says in the word is sustenance to us, so we continue on living.  Without it, we slowly deteriorate and die.  So we must always medidate in His words daily and take it to heart and always remember His love and goodness which brings us strength as we receive joy in remembering everything He did for us.    Let us never forget and keep reminding ourselves of God’s love and goodness for it is our life.  We need it to walk and live. 

→On that same day the Lord told Moses,  “Go up into the Abarim Range to Mount Nebo in Moab, across from Jericho, and view Canaan, the land I am giving the Israelites as their own possession. There on the mountain that you have climbed you will die and be gathered to your people, just as your brother Aaron died on Mount Hor and was gathered to his people. This is because both of you broke faith with me in the presence of the Israelites at the waters of Meribah Kadesh in the Desert of Zin and because you did not uphold my holiness among the Israelites. Therefore, you will see the land only from a distance; you will not enter the land I am giving to the people of Israel.”

NOTES:

Ø God’s way of making Himself visible to us is thru our faith!  Our faith in Him gives Him the chance to do what He loves doing – Bless us!  Why do I say that faith makes God visible and allows us to experience His promises?  Because the above passage shows that Moses was not able to enter the Promise land because “he broke faith with God and did not uphold His holiness among the Israelites”.  So they broke faith with God which then results to not upholding His holiness.  God is a Spirit and faith opens our spiritual eyes and allows our spiritual being to experience and hear Him.  We need to increase our faith to increase our knowledge of Him!  When we remember His love and goodness, our faith increases and as our faith increases, God’s works in our lives becomes visible and we experience His love and goodness again which then gives us memories to remember His love all the time!

Prayer:

Lord Jesus, great is Your love for me and I thank You for that.  Thank Lord for You make me remember.  You make me remember Your love, Your goodness and upon remembering, my faith increases which allows me to experience more of Your love and goodness, creating good and great memories to remember in the future when things aren’t looking good.  Thank You Lord because You have thought of everything.  You have made everything right and You ensured that we will not forget…when we do, You remind us!  Holy Spirit, help me to always remember and never forget.  And when I’m in times where everything is prosperous and everything looks good, I pray that You will open my memory and allow me to think back of Your love and goodness that I may continue to worship and praise You Lord.  Thank You Father, Thank You Lord, Thank You Jesus.  In Jesus’ Name, Amen!