Feast: Deuteronomy: Being Careful
#FT22-08-PM
Richard T. Ritenbaugh
Given 17-Oct-22; 69 minutes
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transcript:
I have a question for you today. It is pretty important, at least from the standpoint of this sermon. Are you a careful person? Do you take care with things or are you the kind of person who lives like you do not have a care in the world and things just happen to you and you blunder through them because you do not really care about what goes on. Whichever you are, careful or careless, you are probably not alone in making you the way you are in this regard. We could probably descend into a very long debate about nature versus nurture on this topic, but we do not have the time to do that. But we would probably agree, essentially, that nurture, how our parents raised us, what child rearing methods that they used on you, had a good deal to do with whether we tend to be careful or careless.
When my children were young, I think the command "be careful" may have been one of my most used commands. Now I am using it with my granddaughters. It probably right ranks right after "No!" and "clean up." Kids have this just natural proclivity for plunging in where angels fear to tread and they need constant warnings about being careful because they are all over the place. They are constantly either heading into danger to themselves or barreling down the path that will hurt somebody else. Kids, especially young ones, have no boundaries. Kids do not know boundaries when they come out of the womb and are first into the world, and it is a parent's responsibility to put them up, to erect those boundaries, to give their children a reasonable area in which they can act and all the rest of that space outside those walls that you put around them are no-no's, do not go there, you are going to get hurt, or that is for later. You can go there when you are old enough to understand.
Infants and toddlers do not know at first that they are not to poke others in the eye. They do not know what happens when they pull a cat's tail or more tragically, they do not know what can happen when you play with the pull string on the blinds. I mean that one can end in death and has in many cases, and the manufacturers have had to do something about that to make sure that they do not hang themselves. Slightly older kids than that do not realize the speed that their wagon picks up going down a hill, or that kicking a ball inside the house will likely smash something, or that rough housing around the brick hearth is not a good idea, or that letting the sink or the bath overflow could cost dad and mom a whole lot of money.
They need to be told to be careful repeatedly. They are not going to get it just the first time. They do not even know what being careful is. They need to understand what "be careful" means and what is expected of them when they hear it. They need to know that when they hear a parent say "be careful" he or she should stop and think about what they are about to do. They are to learn after hearing that that they should keep a sharp eye out for trouble or for risk because an adult knows better about those things and can point them out.
They should understand that if they have been going 300 mph in whatever activity that they are doing that they should take it easy, take it slow, so they do not run into trouble. They should know that what you are telling them is, do not be foolish and put you or others in danger. Be careful means stay out of trouble, keep an eye out, stay away from the edge of the cliff. It means stop and take a look around and evaluate. Now, they do not know big words like evaluate, they do not know how to do that. But it is one of the things that they are to learn over time.
So what is the essence of being careful? Well, it is vigilant observation first and then, once you understand the lay of the land, it is thought, and the word I just used, evaluation, leading, we hope after some time of practicing this, to wise decision making. We want to get our children to the point when we say "be careful," that they do stop and they look at what they are doing and they look at what is going on around them. Especially if they are about to dash off into the street or do something quite dangerous and maybe fatal. That would just be terrible.
But children, especially early on, do not know how to do any of these things very well. They are not good at vigilant observation. They usually see a whole lot more than we do at certain times and places. And then they repeat what they see and hear, which is not nice sometimes. But they are not known for careful thinking and they are especially not known for wise decision making. Children do not know how to do these things. It is not part of their DNA. It has to be trained in them. And that is the reason why your kids are getting into scrapes and doing stupid things on a regular basis. They do not scope out the area where they are playing. They play. They do not think through a situation before doing something. They do it. They do not turn to each other and say, Well Tommy, what do you think? This hill has a 9% downgrade. If we ride our tricycles to the bottom, how well do you calculate our survival chances?
They do not say that! It never crosses their mind. All they think is, Whoa, this is going to be fun. They do not say perhaps we should consult an adult or a scientist about the advisability of this rapid descent. No, they just do it. They hop onto their tricycles and they go for all they are worth. They do not think about what may be at the bottom. They do not think about the cross street that may be there or many other dangers. We all know the proverb, "Foolishness is bound in the heart of a child, but the rod of correction [or discipline or teaching] will drive it far from him." That is Proverbs 22:15 (and Bill, that is a memory scripture. He just reminded me the other day at the Bible study that I used to do that. So I thought I would pick it up again.)
Now if a certain thing is something that a child really wants to do that he thinks will be super fun(!), give him a thrill that he will remember forever, he will stubbornly do it. Kids are headstrong that way. They often do what they are going to do. Most of you parents probably have a story about the daredevil in your family who, in spite of your pleas for him or her to be careful, went ahead and did whatever he or she pleased. One of our boys had no problem being a crash test dummy for our neighbor boys rickety-wheeled contraptions that they sent helter-skelter down our steep drive. But we can only hope that he learned valuable lessons that he can use to navigate adulthood because it is all downhill, Jarod. Hope you still have your helmet.
Today we are going to consider the third theme of Deuteronomy 31, verse 12. It completes a trio of actions that almost ensures success in God's way. It is the proverbial "turn neither to the right hand nor to the left." But this step among the three cannot be ignored or skipped. We can hear God's Words and we can fear Him. But if we are not careful, we can find ourselves prone to frequent mistakes and troubles and neglecting things vital to our salvation.
Let us just pick that up in in Deuteronomy 31. I know we have read it several times this Feast, but I want to make sure we read it. I just want verse 12. We do not have to go through the whole thing.
Deuteronomy 31:12 [Moses says] Gather the people together [here you are], men and women and little ones, and the stranger who is within your gates, that they may hear and that they may learn to fear the Lord your God and carefully observe all the words of this law.
So that is what I have done with these sermons. This is number three—about being careful.
Let us go back to Deuteronomy 4. We have been here quite a lot throughout this Feast because it is a fundamental chapter for getting across to us what God wants us to learn from the book. But here in chapter 4 we are going to hop, skip, and jump through this chapter.
Deuteronomy 4:5-6 "Surely I have taught you statutes and judgments, just as the Lord my God commanded me, that you should act according to them in the land which you go to possess. Therefore [this is a concluding statement about what we should do because of being taught] be careful to observe them; for this is your wisdom and your understanding in the sight of the peoples who will hear all these statutes, and say, 'Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people.'"
Deuteronomy 4:9 "Only take heed to yourself, and diligently keep yourself, lest you forget the things your eyes have seen, and lest they depart from your heart all the days of your life. And teach them to your children and your grandchildren."
Deuteronomy 4:15 "Take careful heed to yourselves, for you saw no form when the Lord spoke to you at Horeb out of the midst of the fire."
Deuteronomy 4:23-24 "Take heed to yourselves, lest you forget the covenant of the Lord your God which He made with you, and make for yourselves a carved image in the form of anything which the Lord your God has forbidden you. For the Lord your God is a consuming fire, a jealous God."
Be careful, take heed, and take careful heed are all variations of the same Hebrew root word. It is the three consonants S M R. It is often pronounced shamar, samar (the "S" being pronounced like an sh). It is Strong's number 8104 and it means "to keep, to watch, to observe, to guard, and to be careful and to beware." And it has other meanings that we could also mention like "to cling to," "to keep oneself" and that sort of thing.
I do not know how much you know about Hebrew but Hebrew words come in what they call stems and they essentially are, you might call them, cases or various verb forms that tell a translator just by the way the word is written how to translate it. Is it going to be passive, is it going to be active, is it going to be this way or another, present, past, future, that sort of thing. Well, there is a stem called the Q A L, qal, the qal stem, and it is the simple verb form. This is the one you see most often in most cases and the qal stem of this S M R, or samar, connotes to keep watch or to observe, while another stem, this one is called niphal stem, is the passive form or reflexive verb form. Reflexive being back to oneself. So in this case, samar means "to be careful" or "to be aware."
Let me just repeat those. The qal stem means "to keep, to watch, to observe" whereas the niphal stem means "to be careful" or "to beware."
Now I know you did not need a Hebrew lesson, but it is important in this particular word because it is found in these verses that I have just read to you in both. One time in the qal stem and three times in the niphal stem.
In verse 6 is where we find the qal stem of samar. That means "to keep, to watch, to observe." Let us read that in verse 6. "Therefore keep watch or observe" and here it says also to observe them. So it is telling us to keep God's words, His statutes, and His judgments, observe them, to watch them, to keep an eye on them, to guard them.
The other three are in the niphal, as in "be careful or beware." So we have in verse 9, "Only be careful to yourself." It does not quite go in there. Now you understand why they use the form "take heed to yourself" because in this case it is reflexive. Be careful about yourself to observe these things. Verse 15, take careful heed, very much the same. It is also in the reflexive. "Take careful heed to yourselves." Same thing in verse 23, "Take heed to yourselves."
So he is telling us throughout this section beyond verse 6 that we need to watch ourselves. We need to be very careful. We need to beware of our human nature because it is going to probably try to lead us astray. We need to beware of this tendency and make sure that we do not fall for the tricks of human nature and end up, like it says in verse 23, making a carved image, finding ourselves in an idolatry because we were not careful about the way we were thinking, and eventually, about the way we were going. We were not watching ourselves well enough. We need to understand here that this form of samar, take careful heed, has a sense of conforming one's behavior, to being careful to conform one's behavior, obviously toward God, to what we have heard.
What he is saying essentially is, so God taught them His statutes and judgments and He commands the people to watch out and be careful to conform their behavior to practice them just as He gave them. That is the essence of this. That He wants us to be very strict with ourselves, watch over ourselves, and conform to what we have heard from God. We can trust Him that what He has said is is true and right. But we have to keep a watch on ourselves because we can easily go out of the way, for various reasons.
Let us turn to Joshua 23. The King James has here that this is Joshua's farewell address. He was getting old and he wanted to leave the nation in as good a situation as he could, especially spiritually. So he says this to them:
Joshua 23:1-4 Now it came to pass, a long time after the Lord had given rest to Israel from all their enemies round about, that Joshua was old, advanced in age. And Joshua called for all Israel, for their elders, for their heads [He did not call for their elders heads but for their head men.], for their judges, and for their officers, and said to them: "I am old, advanced in age. You have seen all that the Lord your God has done to all these nations because of you, for the Lord your God is He who has fought for you. See, I have divided to you by lot these nations that remain, to be an inheritance for your tribes, from the Jordan, with all the nations that I have cut off, as far as the Great Sea westward."
He is reminding them about all of God's great works that He had done for them. He had fought for them. He had given them the land. He had fulfilled His promises that He had made many, many times over many generations, that He would give them the land, and He had. There it was. They had fought for it and won it. So what is the conclusion now that we have reached this point where the land is Israel's?
Joshua 23:5-6 "And the Lord your God will expel them from before you and drive them out of your sight. [so what remains will be taken care of] So you shall possess their land, as the Lord your God has promised you. [This is another promise of God, that they would be in possession of the land just as He had said.] Therefore [he says] be very courageous to keep and to do all that is written in the Book of the Law of Moses, lest you turn aside from it to the right hand or to the left."
What did he say? Now that God has fulfilled His promises and done everything that He said He would do, what is the charge? He says, ensure that you observe God's instructions precisely. The job was not done, not really. He had actually fought all their enemies and now He would commence to fight Israel, if you will, because Israel was not tamed. Israel was not conforming to Him. I mean, they were in a small way, in a very human way, but he would have his struggles. If we go through the book of Judges, just beyond these pages, we find out that they went through this terrible cycle of falling away and God having to raise up a judge, and he would bring them back, win their battles for them, and then they would, as long as the judge was around, kind of keep the law, do the surface-y things, seem like they were righteous, and as soon as he was gone, they were back to their old wicked ways and would need to repent again.
That is what Joshua foresees here. He is trying to forestall it a bit. And he says, you guys need to be very courageous. That is kind of a strange word there. But you have to have a great deal of courage and strength to keep and do all that is written in the book of the law, which we have been studying all Feast. So now that they were in this position, their main job was to fight their carnal human nature. They were to keep on the straight line, if you will, of God's instructions. And so God was looking for strict conformity to what He had said. They needed to be careful to observe, to keep, as it says here in Joshua 23:6, all that He had instructed them so that they would be on His good side. That they would do all the right things, that He would bless them, and give them prosperity and rest from their enemies.
He is also saying, if we want to put it in the negative here, that any personal interpretations, or as we see what happened in the book of Judges by the time we get to the last verse of the book of Judges, what does it say? "There was no king in Israel; everybody did what was right in his own eyes." So they did not follow Joshua's instruction. So if they had just not tried to interpret God's way personally, they would not have gotten into all that mess. I mean, by the time you get to the end of the book of Judges, Israel is just in a state. Down here in the South, they would say bless them, bless their heart.
But they they were in a terrible state by the time they got to the book of Judges because they had not done what Joshua had said: they had turned to the left hand, they had turned to the right hand, they turned to every hand there is—each person doing what was right in his own eyes. So they did not inherit blessings anymore. They inherited curses because that is part of the covenant. The covenant says, do what is right, you get blessings; do what is wrong, do what you want to do, do what is right in your own eyes, you are going to get a curse. And that is what happened. In this way, what Joshua is saying here, ensuring adherence to the law, observing God's instructions without personal interpretation, he is implying to them to take great care, that is, concentrating, focusing, paying attention to the straight and narrow way, trying to make them to be diligent in the way they followed God and His way.
Now, the other three occurrences of samar in Deuteronomy 4, verses 9, 15, and 23, are in the niphal stem and they connote more obviously the idea of being careful. Samar in the niphal stem implies attentiveness, paying attention, watching, observing with focused attention. That is probably a good one to remember: observing with focused attention, really concentrating on what is said. This particular form, samar in the niphal stem, is used a dozen times in the 34 chapters of Deuteronomy. And actually, the niphal stem contains the actual basic idea of the root in the passive or reflexive sense there, to take great care over or to exercise great care over oneself. So when it is said like this in verse 15, "Take careful heed to yourselves," or verse 9, "Take heed to yourself," "take heed to yourselves" in verse 23, that is essentially what the root means. God is trying to get across here that we need to look at number one. We need to be very careful about the way we think and we speak and we act. We always have to keep a watch on the way we do things.
I did tell you that this is about a dozen times in the book of Deuteronomy. We will not look at them all. But I do want you to see some of the context in which they are written. Let us go to chapter 6. We were just in verse 9. We are going to be in verses 10 through 13 here. After the instructions on child rearing, he says,
Deuteronomy 6:10-13 "And it shall be, when the Lord your God brings you into the land which He swore to your fathers, to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, to give you large and beautiful cities which you did not build, houses full of all good things which you did not fill, hewn out wells, which you did not dig, vineyards and olive trees which you did not plant—when you have eaten and are full—then beware, lest you forget the Lord who brought you out of the land of Egypt, from the house of bondage. You shall fear the Lord and serve Him, and shall take oaths in His name."
That beware is take heed to yourself, samar. Be careful—be careful when you are prosperous. Be careful when God gives you what you ask for, because that is the perfect scenario, the perfect setting for you to begin to forget and to slide to the right hand or to the left. So we cannot let down when things are good, we cannot rest on the oars or on our laurels. We need to make sure that when that happens that we take careful heed to ourselves because at that point is when we are most likely to slip, because we relax.
Let us go to chapter 8, verse 11, just over one page in my Bible.
Deuteronomy 8:11 "Beware [he says] that you do not forget the Lord your God by not keeping His commandments, His judgments, and His statutes, which I command you today."
Boy, did the Protestant world get this one wrong. The Catholic world too. We could add them too because they both have done it. They have both become really antinomian. They did not beware when they thought about the idea of not keeping God's law and they are going to find that it is going to come back to bite them. Because when you do not keep God's law, you incur the curses of the law, of the covenant.
Let us go on to the next one in chapter 12. There is a lot in chapter 12 here.
Deuteronomy 12:13-14 "Take heed to yourself that you do not offer your burnt offerings in every place that you see; but in the place which the Lord chooses, in one of your tribes, there you shall offer your burnt offerings, and there you should do what I command you."
It seems like a simple detail. Seems like something that might get lost in obscurity, and it has because it is such a simple detail, but it is important. It is very important. He says, we could use this term, Beware that you do not give these offerings anywhere else, but only before the Lord in the place that He names. It was important, important to the nation, important to keep each family and person centered on where God was, in His presence.
But what does human nature tend to do? It wants to do things conveniently. So why do we need to go up to Jerusalem? That is such a hard slog. We have to go up more than 5,000 feet. Can you believe that? We have to go up nearly a mile and where the air is thin and we have to do this three times a year! We have to leave our animals, our farm—everything—back behind, and we have to pack up all our stuff, put them on the burro, and take it up there. Why do not we just stay here? It is so much more convenient.
But that is not what God said. He did not say you shall make your feast as convenient as possible because I am tired of keeping your sandals for all these years without wearing out. No. He tells them go to one place every holy day, holy time, every pilgrimage festival, walk up there and be with God's people and hear the messages that the priests teach you and do the offerings and those things. Be one. But many did not do that. And we still find that today, people wanting to do things conveniently.
Deuteronomy 12:19 "Take heed to yourself that you do not forsake the Levite as long as you live in your land."
Here is a little story about this from the history of Israel. They were conquered by the Babylonians, carted off to Babylon, had 70 years there where they had to serve the Chaldeans, and Ezra is called, and Zerubbabel as well. And they said, "Hey, we're getting together a caravan, we are going back to Jerusalem. We are going to resettle the home country, we are going to build a new temple to God. We need as many people to come." And so people started coming and somebody, a very smart person, decided to do a census of those that have come So they went through, put everybody's names down: this priestly family, 92 people. What do you know? This is another priestly family, 75 people. There is a Jew and his family, another Jew, a Benjamite, Okay, put him down. Let us go to Jerusalem. Where all the Levites? All we have are priests and Jews and Benjamites.
Do you know why the Levite did not come? One guess. They were the ones that had to do all the hard work and got paid little. Zilch. Why do you think God says time and again in the Bible, do not forget the Levite? Because the people of Israel forgot the Levites! They forgot to give them the 10 percent that they were due. It went to the Temple and they were supposed to divvy it up among all the Levites throughout the land. But the people did not tithe. And the poor Levite, he needed God to keep his sandals because he was not going to be able to buy any. He was poor.
So God tells them, "Hey, when you go to the Feast, do not forget the Levite. He might not have enough to eat because he was not allowed to have any land." He could not grow things for himself. He could not raise animals for himself. He was a worker that needed to be supported through the tithes and offerings of the people. But they forgot him. People forgot their duty to their brother. And God says, "Beware that you do not forget those who serve you, who are doing God's duties, doing the teaching of God's law in your cities. But they did because they did not take careful heed to many of these instructions.
Deuteronomy 12:29-32 "When the Lord your God cuts off from before you the nations which you go to dispossess, and you displace them and dwell on their their land, take heed to yourself that you are not ensnared to follow them after they are destroyed from before you, and that you do not inquire after their gods, saying, 'How did these nations serve their gods. I will also do likewise.' You shall not worship the Lord your God in that way; for every abomination to the Lord which He hates they have done to their gods; for they burn even their sons and daughters in the fire to their gods. Whatever I command you, be careful to observe it; you shall not add to it nor take away from it.
Another classic Israelite blunder. "Oh, I'm curious. This is such a good land. How did they ensure that they kept up all the productivity and the bounty of this land? I'm going to ask Joe Canaanite over here, see what they did." And Joe Canaanite tells him, "Oh well, we sacrificed to Baal. Great guy, Baal. Brings a storm every once in a while, but you know we get rain out of it. And Ashtoreth, the women like her. She's a fertility goddess. But you know all the offerings that we give to Ashtoreth and I won't tell you about the other part of it yet. But the secret mysteries of Ashtoreth, they ensure that our land is fertile." And the guy gets curious and says, "That sounds pretty good. You guys lasted a long time around here, didn't you?" "Oh yeah, we've been here since Noah. You know, father Canaan came down, grandfather Ham came through every once in a while. It's great. We've been here a long time and Baal and Ashtoreth, they have done us good, until you guys came along." And the Israelite gets more curious and more curious and soon he is forgetting the law of God and doing the things that the people of the land did in order to worship and honor their gods.
It happens innocently. A little question or whatever, but pretty soon they get ensnared in it. And finally, after a good long time, when they finally get into the rhythm of these idolatrous cults, they are passing their sons and daughters through the fire. See how it works? If they were just more careful, if they had just taken more heed to what they were doing and what God had instructed them to do, they would have not been ensnared in these things. But they were. They were because they were not careful.
Deuteronomy 15:9 "Beware lest there be a wicked thought in your heart [does that not get down to the nitty gritty, and every day], saying, 'The seventh year, the year of release, is at hand,' and your eye be evil against your poor brother and you give him nothing, and he cry out to the Lord against you, and it become sin among you."
The evil thought that He is talking about here is taking advantage of one's brother and the way the law is set up so that you basically cheat your fellow Israelite out of what he is due, playing the system, finding loopholes, trying to get the best for yourself at another person's expense, trying to climb the ladder while you knife the guy you are trying to get over. All these ways in which we can work the system. He calls these "evil thoughts in your heart." You had better beware that you do not do that and try to take advantage for yourself by taking advantage of one of your brethren.
Deuteronomy 24:8 "Take heed [this is great for Covid and what we have been going through and the sicknesses we have been having] in an outbreak of leprosy, that you diligently observe and do according to all that the priests, the Levites, shall teach you; just as I commanded them, so you shall be careful to do."
He is talking about quarantine laws and all the instructions that they had to go through if they had an infectious disease. Take heed, listen, be careful, watch, pay focused attention. Do not skip steps because it is the life of your brother that may be at stake.
Now, this final verse here in chapter 24, verse 8, heightens the sense of the initial "take heed," the main definition. Using different words, God emphasizes how attentive we must be, especially that you diligently observe and do according to all that you have been taught, just as I commanded them, so you shall be careful to do. It is really heightened here. He says two or three times in the same verse: Be careful, observe, watch, have focused attention, do what you are supposed to do. That is what He wants us to do in all of these matters, not just in the leprosy case.
So our conformity to instruction must be done diligently. It must be done fully and completely. And we have to be extra careful, our care in following God's instructions has to be thorough. There is no place for inattention, there is no place for shortcuts or multitasking, or any kind of sloppy reasoning or negligence, or doing only enough to get by.
Now, samar often implies a warning, which is why we saw as we came through those examples, that many times it was translated as beware. Be wary of these things. If we are not careful, if we fail to pay attention, if we fail to cross our T's and dot our I's in conforming to God's instructions, we can be sure that bad fruit and curses are likely to follow. It may be a little further along the line in some of these things, but they are going to come because if you go offline at any point along the way, it is going to drag you to either the right or to the left. You are going to go farther off the straight and narrow.
So take heed, especially in the book of Deuteronomy, but in other places too, means watch out! Be wary, be aware, beware, because you are about to do something stupid. It could come back on you in a deadly way. You have probably heard the illustration about how careful one must be when you are baking a cake. A baker must follow the recipe carefully. From the type of ingredients he uses, the amount of each ingredient, the order of mixing the ingredients, the temperature of the oven, the length of baking time, and so forth. You leave out an ingredient or use too much or too little, you beat it too long or not enough, cook it too long or not enough, and what emerges at the end of the process is not a cake. It might be a disaster and end up in the trash.
What if that is a person who does not follow instructions and does not become what God wants him to be and he ends up a disaster and in the trash because he was not careful?
Perhaps you men can understand a similar illustration from golf a little bit better. I have watched scores of videos and read dozens of articles that Golf Digest and all these other places for tips and exercises to hit that little white pill just a little bit better. And of course each instructor seems to take a different tack on how to do this. This is a surefire way to take six strokes off your handicap. For some, it is about swing planes. You want to get that swing plane just right, you know, or it is a hip rotation or how your shoulders are, or maybe it is your knees and your feet. It is keep your head still or how strong you grip the club, maintain your center of gravity, teach your muscles because they have memory, move your weight here, balance, follow through. This is how you stand in addressing the ball. This is where you need to aim, this is the club you need to use. Oh yeah, you need to aim this way, that way versus it depends on what your yardage or distance is, or whether you are above or below the green, or whether the ball is above or below your feet, or where your ball lies like on the fairway, or maybe you are in the first cut or perhaps you are in the rough or maybe you are in a divot, and well, it is a little muddy or a little sandy, you are in the trees, the water is right in front of you and it is right over there and right over there and right over there too. And oh, you are playing in Arizona? Watch out for the cactus! And not only all that, it is the type of grass that the course is laid with. You have to hit somewhat differently if you are coming out of Bermuda or Zoysia or bent grass or rye or bluegrass or poa annua, or maybe you are in Arizona and you are actually always in the sand, there is no grass.
You get the picture. There are so many elements to focus on during a golf swing, that it is no wonder that the perfect shot is such a rarity. Herbert Armstrong used to say, and I think he was saying it somewhat tongue-in-cheek, that he thought golf would be the only modern sport to continue into the Millennium because it was so good at teaching character, particularly patience, and not to be angry. To be a good golfer one must be very careful to all that professional instructors teach golfers to do. A golfer must be aware of the elements of his golf swing and if he is not, he will end up in the sand or in the water.
Now in a similar way, God's instructions about how to walk in a way that pleases Him requires great care and focus. We have a lot to think about. We have a whole Book of instructions that we have got to essentially commit to memory, and do. So it is a lot, I understand that being careful is tough. Its goal though, is not to put a little white ball in a hole 500 yards away. That is easy. But to become an immortal child of God, that is the goal. That is a worthy goal to be careful, making sure we take all the steps we can to get there.
Let us go to Hebrews 2, verses 1-3. This idea comes through into the New Testament. The author, whether it was Paul or someone else (I personally believe Paul was behind it), is writing to a church that had begun to languish. He calls them spiritually immature. Because, as he says in chapter 5, they had failed to move past the basics—the milk. They were not either learning or practicing the meat of God's instruction and not just knowledge, not just what was seen in the Bible, but also in living it out in their life. If you want to jot that down, that is Hebrews 5:12-14. He says those things—the meat—really only comes to be truly helpful when we exercise it, when we put it into practice and start making it a part of our character. We can have the meat of the Word right up in our head. But if it never comes out in our speech or in our actions, it is really not doing us a whole lot of good.
So, we may be intellectually full of knowledge but if we are not practically putting it to use, we are not going to be producing the fruit that God wants to see. This is what was happening with the Hebrews. They understood a fair amount but they were still, as he calls them, "babes in Christ." They were still needing the milk of the Word. In his terms, their drifting on the current of life was neglecting so great salvation.
Hebrews 2:1-3 Therefore we must give the more earnest heed to the things we have heard, lest we drift away. For if the word spoken through angels proved steadfast, and every transgression and disobedience received a just reward [he is talking about what had happened back at Sinai and through the wilderness trek], how shall we escape if we neglect so great salvation, which at first began to be spoken by the Lord, and was confirmed to us by those who heard Him.
He is saying we cannot drift away, we cannot drift down the river of life. We have to be purposeful. We have to take earnest heed to the things that we have heard and begin to do them. We have to be precise in what we do, we have to think them through and do them. Because if we do not, we are not going to end up at the goal that Christ has established for us. So what we can see, what we can suppose that was happening here reading between the lines, they were giving God's way of life little time and energy. They did not have focused attention on God's way.
Even though the Great Christ had just lived within 30 years or so of this letter being written, and the apostles were still going around teaching this to them (this is to the Jews)—I am sure there were probably still enough people in the area that had seen, had witnessed, Jesus Christ giving the Sermon on the Mount, or maybe had seen the crucifixion, or maybe had been baptized in the hubbub of Pentecost—there were enough people that knew these things and could tell them what they saw and how they felt and what a great boost that had given them, but generally these Hebrews were not giving it focused attention. They had become complacent about what God was doing in their lives despite the glorious future that He, God, had held out in front of them. It was like walking along the street, glancing down, seeing a winning billion dollar lottery ticket lying there, and saying, "Hmm" and moving on. So, his advice in chapter 4 is,
Hebrews 4:1 Therefore, since a promise remains of entering His rest [entering into the Kingdom of God], let us fear lest any of you seem to have come short of it.
That was a nice way to put it. But "Hey, let's generate some godly fear here because there is danger that you won't make it, that you will not be in God's rest."
Hebrews 4:11 Let us therefore be diligent to enter that rest, lest anyone fall after the same example of disobedience.
He is talking about the Israelites in the wilderness. They all died. He says there in verse 17 of Hebrews 3, their corpses were scattered throughout the wilderness. They did not make it to the Promised Land and spiritually, that could be us too. Our corpses could be scattered in the wilderness of this world if we are not diligent. So he says,
Hebrews 4:12 For the word of God is living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the division of soul and spirit, and of joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.
We are dealing with something that is pretty energetic and effective, especially if we think of the Word of God in terms of Jesus Christ Himself. He is watching, He can see what is going on inside of us. He knows directly what your problem is.
Hebrews 4:13 There is no creature hidden from His sight, but all things [think you have ever hidden anything from God?] are naked and open to the eyes of Him to whom we must give account.
We are on the hot seat. Martin was talking about judgment this morning. As he said in I Peter 4:17, "Judgment is now on the house of God." This is make or break time. There is no time to be neglectful. And so the answer to that, the solution to that is pay careful attention. Take heed, be diligent. But what if that scares us? What if we do not feel up to the task?
Hebrews 4:14-16 Seeing then that we have a great High Priest who has passed through the heavens [it can be done], Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. [We agreed to this. We made a vow that we would see this through.] For we do not have a High Priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses [Oh, are we not human.], but was in all points tempted as we are. [Our Archegos has gone through all the problems in principle and He overcame them.] tempted as we are, yet without sin. [we certainly cannot say that] Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need.
You are in this situation. You have been drifting, you have been neglectful. You have not been doing what you should do. Well, that is not the end. You are still kicking, are you not? You are still alive. A couple of brain cells working, right? Then go to the High Priest, hear His instruction. Ask for grace to help, ask for strength. Let us not forget this. Ask for forgiveness for the way we have neglected Him and His Word. That is what "may obtain mercy" means. You will obtain mercy if you go to Him and repent of your neglectful attitude, and He will give you the strength to form new habits, better habits. Kick the old ones to the curb and be diligent and careful in the way we keep the way of God.
So his advice in chapter 4 comes in two commands. Verse 1, "let us fear." Let us have the right attitude of godly fear. In verse 11, "Let us be diligent." Let us be careful. And these are two of the three elements that these sermons have concentrated on: fearing God, and being careful in following God's way. The third one that we went over last holy day, "hear," is embedded in his warning about God's Word being living and sharp and powerful. So we must let ourselves be motivated by what we read and hear in Scripture to strive to follow God's instructions. And remember, if we find ourselves too weak to break our old habits and put on new ones, we have an open invitation to God's throne room for the grace and strength to help us overcome and begin to grow and produce fruit. It is not the end. If you found yourself being neglectful, turn around, repent, change your mind, change your approach. Go to Christ, seek forgiveness, and ask for help, ask for strength.
Let us go to II Timothy 2, just a few pages back. As we have heard about II Timothy, this is the epistle where Paul was giving his final instructions, very emotional instructions to whom he called his son, Timothy. He is telling him various things, bits of advice and whatnot about how to be a good pastor and person. So he says,
II Timothy 2:14 Remind them of these things [meaning what he had said about just a little earlier], charging them before the Lord not to strive about words to no profit, to the ruin of the hearers.
What you need to understand from this is sometimes in seeking the meat of a subject, you get hung up on something, like a meaning of a word or some little detail, and you end up thinking so much about that sort of thing that you forget everything else. All the simple godly things that you should be doing, not just some intellectual exercise and trying to be right, putting yourself above others because you have the answers. So do not get caught in that. He says, do not strive about words to no profit. It does not end there, "to the ruin of the hearers." I think that is a problem across the church of God, that some people are still in the sheep wars, in the doctrinal wars, and they just get caught up on on such little picayune details that they forget to do the real meat of the Word, the heart of the Word.
II Timothy 2:15 Be diligent to present yourself approved of God, a worker who does not need to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.
So for us to get God's approval, we must be diligent. We must put in the hard work. We cannot be lazy or neglectful, or hit and miss in the way we do things. Diligence fits hand-in-glove with being careful because one cannot take proper care without diligent attention and putting in the time to get things right. Try to play a musical instrument. You are doomed if you are not diligent in practicing. Paul self-defines this diligence as being a hard worker whose handiwork brings him no shame. Our craft, the one God has called us to perform, is godliness, and we must become masters of our craft.
Also we must rightly divide the word of truth. We must correctly understand and apply God's Word. This speaks directly to what he had said in verse 14 about getting hung up over words. That is not rightly dividing the word of truth. The imagery here is of a road being constructed straight across the landscape. Over in England, there are Roman roads that are still there and you can see them going straight as an arrow right through the landscape. Whatever the landscape did, they would not, you know, divert to hills and do this and that. They would just power their way straight to where they wanted to go. They did this all over the empire.
God says that is what we are to emulate in terms of how we interpret and understand Scripture. If you want to put it this way, the Romans never got in the weeds. They just went straight into the heart of the matter. They turned neither to the left hand nor to the right.
Doing this takes great care. They had to be meticulous about the way they surveyed the roads. And you know what? Doing that was really hard work because they carved off hills to make sure that their road went straight. They made for themselves a great deal more work than we would think necessary. We get our efficiency engineers around here and well, it will cost $2,000,000 to go through the mountain but it is only going to be $500,000 if we make this little diversion around the foot. Well, they did not care! They wanted to go straight, so they would carve off the hills instead or fill in the low places. And those roads are still navigable—and South Carolina roads still have 15 foot potholes. I probably could have said that about any other state in the union, but it is true. So we need to take a great deal of focused attention and great care in how we plow forward, if you will, through life.
Let us conclude in John 10, and I am going to start in verse 22 to get the context. John writes,
John 10:22-26 Now it was the Feast of Dedication in Jerusalem, and it was winter. And Jesus walked in the temple, in Solomon's porch. Then the Jews surrounded Him and said to Him [they were kind of entrapping Him here physically and wanted to do it spiritually], "How long do you keep us in doubt? If you are the Christ, tell us plainly." [well, He could have done that, but notice how He answered] Jesus answered them, "I told you, and you do not believe. The works that I do in My Father's name, they bear witness of Me. But you do not believe, because you are not of My sheep, as I said to you."
He had told them, so He said, why am I going to tell you again? You are not My sheep. It is not going to do you any good, so I am not going to tell you.
John 10:27-28 "My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me. And I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; neither shall anyone snatch them out of My hand."
Most of you are aware that verse 27 is Church of the Great God's motto. We have it right here. We have had that laser-inscribed on this piece of wood in front of the lectern that we put up every Feast. It says, "My sheep hear My voice. . . and they follow Me." The true sheep of Jesus Christ, the Good Shepherd, hear His voice and they respond by following Him closely as He is leading them to eternal life in the Kingdom of God.
How do they do this? How do the true sheep of God, of Christ, follow Him? The answer is what we have considered over the past eight days. They hear, that is, they listen attentively to God's Word. They respond with godly fear, that is, a deep reverence and submission to God. And they take great care and apply focused attention to follow His instructions. That is, we could put it another way, they apply the lessons of Deuteronomy 31:12 diligently and practically all the days of their lives.
So let me give you my rendition of John 10:27, "His sheep hear His voice, and in the fear of God, they carefully follow Him."
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