One In Jesus

This brings us to a passage frequently alluded to in the NT —

(Deu 30:6-8 ESV) 6 And the LORD your God will circumcise your heart and the heart of your offspring, so that you will love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul, that you may live.  7 And the LORD your God will put all these curses on your foes and enemies who persecuted you.  8 And you shall again obey the voice of the LORD and keep all his commandments that I command you today. 

God says, through Moses, that even after all the curses are suffered by Israel, if they will return to him, he will “circumcise your heart and the heart of your offspring, so that you will love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul, that you may live.” Continue reading →

We saw in Deu 28 that the curses and blessing were conditioned on obedience to all of God’s commands, but most especially to refraining from idolatry. This bring us
to —

(Deu 29:1-9 ESV) These are the words of the covenant that the LORD commanded Moses to make with the people of Israel in the land of Moab, besides the covenant that he had made with them at Horeb.  

2 And Moses summoned all Israel and said to them: “You have seen all that the LORD did before your eyes in the land of Egypt, to Pharaoh and to all his servants and to all his land,  3 the great trials that your eyes saw, the signs, and those great wonders.  4 But to this day the LORD has not given you a heart to understand or eyes to see or ears to hear.  5 I have led you forty years in the wilderness. Your clothes have not worn out on you, and your sandals have not worn off your feet.  6 You have not eaten bread, and you have not drunk wine or strong drink, that you may know that I am the LORD your God.  7 And when you came to this place, Sihon the king of Heshbon and Og the king of Bashan came out against us to battle, but we defeated them.  8 We took their land and gave it for an inheritance to the Reubenites, the Gadites, and the half-tribe of the Manassites.  9 Therefore keep the words of this covenant and do them, that you may prosper in all that you do. 

Moses offers a reflection on the preceding 29 chapters, reminding the Israelites that God had taken them out of Egypt, defeated their enemies, and then he describes Deuteronomy as a covenant in addition to the covenant made at Horeb (Mt. Sinai). This new generation (the children of the Israelites who’d died in the desert) is being asked to re-covenant with God. Continue reading →

So what is the sin that led to the destruction of Jerusalem in AD 70? Obviously, the rejection by the Jews of Jesus as Messiah. Right?

Well, to get the full historical implications, we need to turn to (believe it or not) Deu 28-30, a passage we rarely study in Sunday school class — but it is a major underlying theme of the NT — frequently alluded to by Paul especially. The First Century Jews believed that they were living in days of Exile predicted in these chapters. So to read the NT as a First Century Jew would have read it, you have to be familiar with these chapters.

Recall that Deu is written in the form of an Ancient Near East treaty. And these treaties concluded with a list of blessings and curses — blessings for obedience by the subservient party and curses for disobedience. Continue reading →

I have no idea where I’m going with this, except that I want to answer questions posed in the comments several days ago regarding the meaning of “repent.”

To be clear —

1. I am NOT arguing that people do not have to “repent” when converted to Jesus in the sense of adopting the moral standards of Christianity. No one here is taking the antinomian (no rules!) position. “Repent” could mean “unicorns and griffins” and it would still be true that Christians must adhere to the Christian virtues. Countless verses say this without using “repent.”

2. I am NOT arguing that “repent” takes on one and only one meaning in the NT. In fact, I think “repent” is a rather flexible term and so the meaning ALWAYS has to be taken from the context.

In fact, there are places in the NT where “repent” plainly means “turn away from your life of sin” or “turn away from this particular sin.” This is not in dispute. Rather, my challenge is whether “repent” ALWAYS means “turn away from this sin” or “turn away from sins in general.” I don’t think it does. And I think it matter, a lot, for reasons we’ll be getting to. Continue reading →