Deuteronomy 11:1-12:32
Obedience. It doesn’t sound as sexy as “miracle-working” but, flipping heck, is it important to the Lord. Israel has heard and rejoiced in the call to love their God. Now they see what love looks like. Love is obeying every command of the Lord, particularly those relating to worship. Love is bringing the offerings to the Lord that he requires, in the way that he requires, when he requires them. Those of us who love and follow Jesus have signed up to the very same thing. We may not practice such ritualized worship or live under such detailed law but our need to obey is just as strong as Israel’s. The mandate to protect worship and to fervently reject anything that starts to stain it should still fire every church. What could stain worship? Well for Israel it was a longing to be like those around them, to emulate their practices or to believe that power lies outside of the Lord’s commands. In essence worship is stained when we lose sight of our wretchedness and of God’s merciful love. If we are so flawed and God is so good, then what could make more sense that to seek God’s will in each and every thing.
Luke 12:35-59
A final distinctive of Jesus followers is laid out here in the parable of the master returning from the wedding banquet. The distinctive is that followers of Jesus do stuff. They are ready for service, they are faithful and wise managers, they do what their master wants. This is the major point Jesus is making - just to be around faith or to understand faith is not enough. Jesus followers act, they obey, they attempt. I don’t think we need to get too caught up on the ‘food allowance” or the ‘many blows’ - these are not the major thrust of the story. The major thrust is to shove a piece of paper under the noses of the Jews and to challenge them to write down what they are actually doing for the Kingdom. The massive theme of Matthew’s gospel begins bouncing around here as well - that God’s desire is not just to bless Israel but to see Israel benefit the whole world. We’ve been called into a missionary people, we have joined a movement that is charged with doing stuff that advance the kingdom - praying, preaching, serving, healing etc. Jesus’ desire is to see the whole world redeemed. Let’s pray that our church, that our people manifest that distinctive of doing stuff to benefit and redeem our world.
Psalm 43:1-5
Joy and delight seem to come from actually seeing that God has got your back.
