“For it was indeed fitting that we should have such a high priest, holy, innocent, unstained, separated from sins, and exalted above the heavens. He has no need, like those high priests, to offer sacrifices daily, first for his own sins and then for those of the people, since he did this once for all when he offered up himself.” That’s a quotation from Hebrews 7:26-27. As we hear it read, we’re reminded of Christ’s work as our high priest: representing us, being the perfect sacrifice, and offering up himself for us. All of that makes sense to us, doesn’t it? In fact, it not only makes sense, but it moves us to rejoice, doesn’t it? There’s a reason why our hearts were uplifted earlier as we sang, “Before the throne of God above, I have strong and perfect plea, a great high priest whose name is love, who ever lives and pleads for me.” It’s because we understand the meaning of that imagery and what it means for our standing before God.
But imagine for one second that we didn’t have the Old Testament. Imagine we were ignorant of Exodus and Leviticus, for example. What would these words mean then? Would this imagery of Christ as our great high priest, living and interceding for us move us then? How could it? After all, we wouldn’t understand it, would we?
The Old Testament sacrificial system, where the high priest would take two goats, sending one out into the wilderness while shedding the blood of another, is not our final hope. We don’t look to Aaron or his sons as our savior. We don’t trust in the sufficiency of the shed blood of any goat as the reason why our sins are forgiven. We know these are but types and shadows of Christ and the work he has done for us. He is our Savior. He is our hope for the forgiveness of sins. But apart from these types and shadows of the priesthood and the sacrificial system we can’t make sense of what he’s done for us. The categories and framework of Christ’s work are given to us in the priesthood, the tabernacle, and the sacrificial system, aren’t they? This is one key reason why we must commit ourselves to the study and understanding of the Old Testament Scriptures, for apart from them the rest of the Bible makes little sense. That’s one reason why, for example, we’re studying the book of Deuteronomy right now.
But it’s not just the nature of who Christ is and what he has done that is foreshadowed for us in the pages of the Old Testament. Some aspects of the nature of the people of God are foreshadowed as well. And one place we some of these aspects of who we are as God’s people (i.e. the church) are foreshadowed is in Deuteronomy 12-26. In these chapters in which Moses lays out a series of specific laws pertaining to Israel under the Old Covenant, we get a picture – a form and shadow – of what and who we are to be as God’s people. Therefore, I want us to see these from the text this morning and then pray that the Lord might shape us into being this kind of people here at Cornerstone.
The first of these aspects concerning the nature of God’s people that I want us to see is that:
Now, as we walk through these chapters, which deal with everything from specific places to worship to cities of refuge to abominable practices to instructions to marrying female captives and more, one element that continues throughout is the Lord’s exhortation to his people to remember that they were redeemed from slavery out of Egypt.
Let me show this to you in the text with a brief overview of some verses. At least ten times throughout these chapters, the Lord reminds them that he is the one who delivered them from Egypt and that they are a people who have been delivered from Egypt. We see this in 13:5; 13:10; 15:15; 16:1, 3, 12; 20:1; 24:18, 22, and 26:8. Look at 15:15 in particular (though it is representative of the rest). It reads: “You shall remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and the LORD your God redeemed you; therefore I command you this today.”
Sometimes the reminder of their redemption from Egypt serves to remind them why they shouldn’t tolerate rebellion against God, why they shouldn’t fear when they go to war, why they should show justice, why they should have compassion, or why they should give offerings. So, the result or goal may be different with each repetition of the phrase, but the commonality is that Israel is to remember what the Lord did for them when he redeemed them from Egypt, freeing them from their slavery.
This is most clear in 16:1-8, where the Lord provides instructions through Moses for the celebration of the Passover meal. Everything about the meal is to remind them of when, how, and what God did when he redeemed them from Egypt.
But why? Why is the Lord so intent that they think of themselves as those who have been redeemed and of him as the one who has redeemed them? The answer is because this act of the Lord’s redeeming work is what shapes the entire relationship between the Lord and his people. This is why so many different commandments throughout these chapters can be based on the foundation of reminding them of their redemption from Egypt. There is nothing more important for Israel than to remember that the Lord their God redeemed them from Egypt. Remembering this will remind them why they should love him, devote their lives to him, trust him, obey him, and not fear others.
And interestingly, this theme continues throughout the Bible. As the storyline of the Bible progresses, we find Israel, years later, in the promised land and settled. Yet they’ve rebelled against the Lord repeatedly. Therefore the Lord brings judgment on the land and scatters his people all over the face of the earth. But he promises that he’ll bring them back to himself one day. He’ll gather them from all over the face of the earth. Like sheep that have been scattered, he himself will come and gather them to himself. And when he makes that promise, he declares that they’ll remember him as the one who redeemed them from all over the earth. He says in Jeremiah 23:7-8, “Therefore, behold, the days are coming, declares the LORD, when they shall no longer say, ‘As the LORD lives who brought up the people of Israel out of the land of Egypt’, but ‘As the LORD lives who brought up and led the offspring of the house of Israel out of the north country and out of all the countries where he had driven them.’”
So, we see two things in this statement. One, the Lord predicts a time when his people will no longer think of their relationship with the Lord as the one who redeemed them from Egypt and themselves as the redeemed from Egypt. Rather, they will think of him as the one who delivered them from all over the face of the earth. But, second, God’s people are still expected to remember him as the one who brought them to himself. And, when we look to the pages of the New Testament, we find not only that the Lord continues to speak of gathering his sheep to himself from all over the face of the earth (John 10) but that he takes the Passover meal (originally meant to help them remember the Lord’s redeeming work out of the land of Egypt) and reinterprets this meal to be a reminder that the Lord has redeemed us from our sins by giving his body and shedding his blood. Then, he told us to eat of this meal in remembrance of him.
So, let’s ask the same question: Why? Why are we to remember repeatedly that the Lord redeemed us from our sins by shedding his blood? And isn’t the answer the same? It’s because this is the key component in our relationship with the Lord. We are his people because he’s redeemed us from sin. He is the redeemer. We’re to love him, obey him, trust him, and devote our lives to him because we have been redeemed. This one truth – that our Lord has redeemed us from our sins – shapes every single thing in our lives, and everything we do stems from this fundamental and foundational truth. This is why our corporate worship is shaped all around this reality and culminates with us coming to the table.
Therefore, if you’re an unbeliever and are visiting with us this morning, let me make something clear to you. We, believers, may be odd to you. We no doubt do much that is out of line with how others in the culture think and live. However, the dominating particularity of us is not that we do this a certain way or that a certain way. The fundamental identity we have as the Lord’s people is that we have placed our hope for salvation in the one who lived, died, and was raised so that we might be redeemed from our sins and made his own. Yes, we try to trust, obey, and love the Lord in all that we do. But all of those things are rooted in the fact that we have been redeemed. This is why we talk so much about the gospel and long for you to hear and believe the gospel as well. We consider ourselves the most blessed people on the planet because we are the redeemed of the Lord.
And to believers, let me urge you never to lose sight of this truth. May you go to bed, wake up, and go through your day with the reminder on the forefront of your mind that the Lord Jesus Christ has redeemed you by his life, death, and resurrection. Remembering this truth will keep you from legalism and from licentiousness. And this brings us to a second aspect concerning the Lord’s people.
One clear note throughout these chapters is that Israel was to be a holy people. That is, they were to show themselves wholly devoted to the Lord, which included obeying him in all things. And, as they obeyed him in all things, this would show them to be distinct in a number of ways from the people around them.
A survey of these chapters will show a number of particular ways in which Israel was to be a holy people. They had specific food laws concerning what they should eat, according to chapter 14. But why? We read in 14:21, “For you are a people holy to the LORD your God.” Other peoples set up Asherah poles, but the Lord’s people were forbidden from worshipping as the other nations, according to 16:21-22. If they wanted a king, like the other nations, that was okay, but the king had to be different, refusing for himself excessive wealth or acquiring many wives (17:14-20). They couldn’t offer their children as sacrifices, as the other nations did (18:9-14). When they went to war against another people, they had to devote them to complete destruction, so “that they may not teach you to do according to all their abominable practices that they have done for their gods, and so you sin against the LORD your God” (20:18). Their garments were particular. Men were forbidden from wearing women’s garments and women from wearing men’s garments – which seems wise in all times and places (22:5). They were to act in honesty at all times (25:16). And, finally, we read in 26:19, the Lord declares, “You shall be a people holy to the LORD your God.”
And not only is that the case, but they were to treat any threat against their holiness seriously. We already read about how other nations were to be devoted to complete destruction so that they might not teach Israel to do things in rebellion against the Lord. But we also see that even in Israel’s own camp, they were to eliminate sin. In 12:2-3, we’re told they were to tear down altars and chop down carved images once they came into the land. But they were also to execute anyone, even among their own people, who was tempting them to sin. Multiple times they’re instructed to execute individuals, and the phrase, “So shall you purge the evil from your midst” is mentioned repeatedly (17:2-7; 19:11-13, 18-21; 21:8-9, 21; 22:20-24; 24:7).
Now, when we read that, much of it could seem odd to us. Under the New Covenant there are no prescriptions against what we can eat. We don’t have a king (outside of Christ) as the Lord’s people. And we’re not to go about killing people, even if they tempt us to sin. But there is some strong continuity between these laws and the law of Christ in the New Covenant as well.
We too as the Lord’s people, are to be holy. We’re to be wholly devoted to the Lord, obeying all that he says, even things that make us distinct from our neighbors. The command to be holy as our Lord is holy is repeated explicitly in 1 Peter 1:15-16. And Christ has clearly commanded us in the great commission to do everything that he has commanded and teach others to do the same.
This means we’ll be distinct. In a world with loose (at best) sexual morals, we believe that sex should only occur between a man and a woman in the context of marriage. In a world where people try to build themselves and their lifestyles up, we give, care for the orphan and widow, and look to the need of others above our own. In a world where people need the culture to tell them what their opinion should be, we take our cues directly from God’s Word and stand there unswervingly. And we do all of this because our Lord has commanded this as part of being holy.
In fact, not only are we like Israel under the Old Covenant in that we are to be holy, but we’re also to take the threat of sin seriously. If one among our covenant community is walking in sin and refuses to repent, we’re not to kill the person (thankfully), but we are to remove the person from our midst. In 1 Corinthians 5, when Paul is commanding church discipline he actually ends the chapter saying, “Purge the evil person from among you,” which is at least an allusion to the repeated refrain in Deuteronomy 12-26.
We’re to be a holy people and treat any temptation to sin seriously. And we’re to do this because the Lord who redeemed us commands us to be holy, as he is holy. But there’s more. We also see that:
Throughout Deuteronomy 12-26 we see another consistent theme of loving and caring for the covenant community. The Levite came into the promised land with no inheritance, but that didn’t mean he wouldn’t be provided for among the people. Rather, Israel was commanded again and again to care for the Levite (e.g. 12:19). But it didn’t stop with the Levite. In 14:28 the Lord declares, “And the Levite, because he has no portion or inheritance with you, and the sojourner, the fatherless, and the widow, who are within your towns, shall come and eat and be filled, that the LORD your God may bless you in all the work of your hands that you do.”
The other groups listed there (the sojourner, widow, and fatherless) were all people who were at need. They had no one familiar to care for them, or no husband to care for them, or no parents to care for them. But they were to be cared for. By whom? By the people of Israel. This was God’s design. And we could point out many more laws of compassion, like caring for your brother who becomes poor (15:7-8), making sure the son of the wife you may not love as much gets an inheritance (21:15-17), putting a barrier on your roof so that no one will fall off of it (22:8), not keeping your neighbor’s cloak overnight as collateral for the loan (24:10-13), and on and on.
Law after law was put in place to be a picture of how we are to love one another. And this call to love the body of Christ is abundantly clear in the pages of the New Testament. In the New Covenant, we don’t seem to have so many explicit laws such as these, but we have something more. We’re to be so dominated by love that even if I have the liberty to do something but it might lead my neighbor to violate his conscience (seeing me and wanting to do likewise), then I should abstain from it.
We might think of the multiple laws revolving around loving our neighbors in the Old Covenant as if they are training wheels, helping us understand how to love. Now they’ve come off because our hearts have been changed to the point that we should be moved to explore how we might love our brothers and sisters more, knowing that even as we do so, it’s like doing it unto Christ.
We’re to be a people who love one another and care for one another. Caring for one another’s needs, serving one another, praying for one another, and seeking out ways in which we might edify one another should be the heartbeat of the people of God. Even our corporate worship should be dominated by the thought of how we might edify our brothers and sisters. That’s what makes corporate worship better than the rest of my worship throughout the week – it gives me an opportunity to edify so many. We must be a people who love one another.
And, finally, I want to mention one more:
Now, if I were to tell you that the people of Israel were to come and bring offerings to the Lord as their act of worship, how would you imagine their mood should be? Before you answer, let me remind you that the Lord is holy. He is awesome. The people couldn’t even listen to his voice on the mountain because they thought they would die. Multiple times in these chapters disobedience is met with an order of execution. Think about Uzzah. He simply touched the ark of the Lord, and the Lord put him to death. So, what do you think should be the mood and demeanor of one who comes to give an offering as an act of worship before that God?
Well, let’s read:
12:10-12 – “But when you go over the Jordan and live in the land that the LORD your God is giving you to inherit, and when he gives you rest from all your enemies around, so that you live in safety, then to the place that the LORD your God will choose, to make his name dwell there, there you shall bring all that I command you: your burnt offerings and your sacrifices , your tithes and the contribution that you present, and all your finest vow offerings that you vow to the LORD. And you shall rejoice before the LORD your God, you and your sons and your daughters, your male servants and your female servants, and the Levite who is within your towns, since he has no portion or inheritance with you.”
12:17-18 – “You may not eat within your towns the tithe of your grain or of your win or of your oil, or the firstborn of your herd or of your clock, or any of your vow offerings that you vow, or your freewill offerings or the contribution that you present, but you shall eat them before the LORD your God in the place that het LORD your God will choose, you and your son and your daughter, your male servant and your female servant, and the Levite who is within your towns. And you shall rejoice before the LORD your God in all that you undertake.”
14:24-26 – “And if the way is too long for you, so that you are not able to carry the tithe, when the LORD your God blesses you, because the place is too far from you, which the LORD your God chooses, to set his name there, then you shall turn it into money and bind up the money for whatever you desire—oxen or sheep or wine or strong drink, whatever your appetite craves. And you shall eat there before the LORD your God and rejoice, you and your household.”
16:11 – “And you shall rejoice before the LORD your God . . .”
16:14 – “You shall rejoice in your feast . . .”
26:10-11 – “And behold, now I bring the first of the fruit of the ground, which you, O LORD, have given me. And you shall set it down before the LORD your God. And you shall rejoice in all the good that the LORD your God has given to you and to your house, you, and the Levite, and the sojourner who is among you.”
Notice how consistently the Lord’s people are commanded to rejoice in him when they bring their offering as an act of worship. In fact, it’s so clearly commanded that in 26:13-14, the Israelite is to recount how he has not given in to sin but has obeyed the commandments of the LORD, and one thing he is to say is, “I have not eaten of the tithe while I was mourning” (26:14). This was a time for rejoicing, not mourning.
And this theme is also consistent in the New Testament as well. Twice, in 1 Corinthians 13:11 and in Philippians 3:1, Paul gives some commandments and says, “Finally, my brothers, rejoice in the Lord” (Phil. 3:1). In Philippians 4:4 and 1 Thessalonians 5:16 he commands us to rejoice in the Lord “always.”
This doesn’t mean there isn’t a time for us to mourn. Indeed we can and should. Look at how many individual lament Psalms there are in Scripture. And there are even times when we gather and mourn corporately, aren’t there? There are some corporate lament psalms in the Bible. But I don’t think it’s out of line to suggest that there should be a dominant theme of rejoicing as we gather for worship. Again, this is not to suggest that we ignore our suffering or our trials. But I want us to see two things: 1) we’re told to rejoice in the Lord always, including explicitly being told to rejoice in our sufferings (Rom. 5:3), and 2) that our redemption always towers above every other element in our lives, so that we always have cause for rejoice. In 1 Peter 1:3-6, Peter speaks of God causing us to be born again and now being guarded for our coming salvation, and he then tells us that we rejoice in this, though we have now “been grieved by various trials” (1 Pet. 1:6). That is, even when you’re grieved by trials, you can still look and see that you’ve been born again, that Christ has redeemed you, and you can rejoice.
Therefore, when we gather on Sunday mornings, we do not gather and ignore our trials or act like they’re not difficult. We don’t pretend things aren’t there and hope they’ll go away. But we look to the gospel, realize that our greatest need has been met in Christ, and rejoice. Indeed, if we lose all things this world has to offer but have Christ, we have reason to rejoice for eternity.
And this brings us back to the first element that characterizes God’s people. We consistently set ourselves to remember our redemption in Christ. In fact, this is how we’ll close this service, by coming to the meal that is to serve us in remembering our Lord. Let us now then come to the table, remembering our redemption, asking for grace to be holy, longing to love, edify, and build up our brothers and sisters, and rejoicing in our Lord and what he has done for us. After all, what Christ has done for us is reason for us to rejoice throughout all of eternity. Amen.