How many times have you, as a parent, told your children once to do something, and they never needed you to tell them again? Even after forty years of preparation in the wilderness school, God’s children needed to hear once again their responsibilities as God’s representatives.
Moses had seen how back and forth their devotion to God had been. And unfortunately, their future would be just as rocky. The people of God would swing back and forth from total idolatry and cruelty to strict legalistic worship, which also lacked the love necessary to preserve their covenant relationship with God.
Our world right now is seeing some rocky times as well. There is much polarization and division in the world economically, politically, and socially. Even the religious world is divided, with some estimates of over 40,000 Christian denominations across the globe. It does indeed seem that there is very little we can agree on when it comes to our faith.
But it doesn’t have to be that way. God has revealed to us the particulars of how to worship Him and how to love others through the only part of the Bible that was written with His own finger. The Ten Commandments tell us most definitively what love looks like.
We find in Deuteronomy a repeating of that Law, but this time Moses expands on the need for love. Love is mentioned multiple times in his farewell speeches. Moses, at the end of his life, emphasizes the keeping of the Law through love, by loving Him with all our heart, soul, and strength (Deuteronomy 6:5).
We can’t keep the Law without knowing what it is, but neither can we keep it without first having at least some of God’s love to help us obey and to keep the love growing. No matter where you fall on the spectrum of knowing and loving God, you will find Moses’ repetition of the Law, the embodiment of God’s love, most helpful in your spiritual journey.
Our Sabbath School lessons this quarter focus on Deuteronomy and the present truth found there. Don’t miss a chance to learn more through these valuable, weekly lessons. https://absg.adventist.org/current-quarter
