Deuteronomy 7

We'll certainly pass to Mr. Randy Alessandro. Okay, we want to turn our attention today to Deuteronomy chapter 7. Let's go over there to Deuteronomy chapter 7. As you're turning there, I want to give you a little more background, or to reiterate some background, on the material. And, of course, I've used the Preachers Outline and Sermon Bible commentary, as well as the Bible Knowledge commentary, in preparing for the material today, the sermon today. But one of the reasons I wanted to go through this whole book of Deuteronomy, and we'll see that very much today, is the book of Deuteronomy is a series of sermons given by Moses to a group of people, to Israelites, as they're about to enter the Promised Land.

He's getting them ready to enter the Promised Land. You and I are preparing to enter the Kingdom of God. And so, there is very much an analogy there. The purpose of the book was to show the people in ancient times how they can live with God successfully. Well, you and I today, as believers, we need to know how to live with God, and to live God's way successfully. Also, the book of Deuteronomy, a second major purpose for the book, is that it was a time to rededicate the people's lives to God, to renew a commitment to obey God, just before they go into the Promised Land, and for the rest of their lives.

And, of course, that's something we need to be doing today, as well. Making sure that we are committed, we've renewed that commitment to God, and we've rededicated ourselves to God on an ongoing basis. I made mention that the book of Deuteronomy is a series of sermons, three sermons. We've already covered the first sermon, which is pretty much the first five chapters of the book.

We're into the second sermon. The first sermon was what God had done for Israel. The second sermon that we're into right now, we're just at the very beginning stages of it, is what God expects of Israel. That's where we're at right now. I want to outline the chapters we go through today, so that you can take notes a little more carefully. The first five verses show something, and again, as they discussed earlier today with Ann Arbor, something we don't typically think about when we think about God.

The first five verses God says to the people of Israel, through Moses, that they need to destroy all the enemies that they have in the Promised Land. Destroy all enemies. Let nothing live. We're going to actually read a verse where God says, if it breathes, it doesn't live. Now, of course, the analogy for us today is we are people who need to root out of our life everything that is sinful, everything that is evil. We need to get it out, totally get it out.

We want to be successful with God, that we need to totally root out and destroy and conquer our evil human nature. People back in those days, they lived under a different dispensation than we do. God realized he was going to work with this group of people in the Old Testament on a physical basis, in the New Testament on a spiritual basis. We're going to see something here that again is very striking, maybe striking to you as well.

As Moses took a look across the river into the Promised Land, the nation of Israel was encamped just across from Jericho. Jericho was a major citadel, probably one of the oldest cities in the world, and staring them right at the face as they're about to go into the Promised Land is this fortress. Moses realized that the children of Israel were going to face many enemies. Some of those enemies would be fear, doubt, maybe depression, maybe discouragement. They were to face that. Moses was writing so they could face that square on, not sidestep the issue, but face it square on and deal with it.

So let's take a look now starting in chapter 7, verse 1. When the Lord your God brings you into the land which you go to possess and has cast out many nations before you, the Hittites, the Gergashites, the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, the Jebusites, seven nations greater and mightier than you. Pause there for a moment. Moses says, I know you can be fearful here.

I know you might doubt our ability. We're a bunch of slaves. We're going to go up against one of the greatest citadels in the known world. They know the arts of war. What do we know about the arts of war?

We're former slaves. The sons of slaves, daughters of slaves. Verse 2. When the Lord your God delivers them over to you, you shall conquer them and utterly destroy them. You shall make no covenant with them nor show mercy to them.

Now I said there's a term we can use here that we don't typically think of when we think of God. And that is, God is asking Israel here to engage in holy war. Holy war! He committed them to destroy everything. Men, women, and children. Now why would a loving God ask this? If you have people that were let's say maybe where you work or an next door neighbor and maybe you have an opportunity from time to time to sit down and chat and talk about the Bible, maybe they're interested in the Bible, they'd bring this up and they'd say, you know, maybe somebody's an atheist.

And the reason they're an atheist is they look at something like this and say, God's wanting holy war! Total annihilation of people! How does God justify something like that? What's your response? How do we respond? Let me respond in a number of ways here through the Scriptures. Put a marker here, because we're going to be going back and forth out of this chapter, but put a marker there in chapter 7.

Go over to chapter 9 of Deuteronomy. Let's look at the reasons, the rationale that God is giving to them as to why He's asking for this. Deuteronomy 9, verse 4, Do not think in your heart after the Lord your God has cast them out before you, saying, Because of my righteousness the Lord has brought me into possess this land. But it is because of the wickedness of these nations that the Lord is driving them out from before you. It's not because of your righteousness or the uprightness of your heart that you're going to possess the land, but because of the wickedness of these nations that the Lord your God drives them out from before you, and that He may fulfill the word which the Lord swore to your fathers to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

So in one sense, you've got two reasons here. One, the people in the land, the promised land, the occurring inhabitants, deserve to die because of their sins. And secondly, God had promised that land to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob's descendants. And now God is going to fulfill that promise. God is a God who fulfills His promises. So that's a couple of reasons right there. But that's not the only thing. Go back to chapter 7 of Deuteronomy, in verse 10, you might be thinking, well, you know, the Israelites were sinners too, which is very true.

You know, we saw them leaving Egypt. We saw them murmuring and all sorts of bad attitudes. Shouldn't they die for their sins? Well, let's take a look at verse 10 here for a moment and discuss. Deuteronomy 7.10 And He repays those who hate Him to their face, to destroy them. He will not slack with them who hates Him. He will repay Him to His face.

So another reason that God is going to have these people displaced, the current inhabitants of the land, have them killed, is because of their persistent hatred of God. Apparently, repentance was not in their dictionary. You know, the Ninevites repented, and God spared them. God will spare anybody upon repentance. These people apparently were not about to repent of their sins. Now, we also know that the plan of God was for Israel, even though they were people who were not perfect.

It was God's plan for them to be a model nation. And so God is now working with them to help them to be this model nation that all other nations can look to. That's why He's not destroying them for their sins. There's yet another reason. Go to Deuteronomy chapter 20.

Actually, this whole chapter is interesting in regards to what we're talking about here, but I'm just going to, for time's sake, quote a portion of it. But Deuteronomy chapter 20, starting here in verse 16. But of the cities of these people, which the Lord your God gives you as an inheritance, you shall let nothing that breathes remain alive. Let nothing that breathes. Pretty severe stuff, right? Now, why is that? But you shall utterly destroy them, the Hittite, the Amorite, all these different peoples, as the Lord your God's command to do. Verse 18. And verse 18 is the reason. Lest they teach you to do according to all their abominations which they have done for their gods, and you sin against the Lord your God. So basically what you're looking at is another reason God is having this holy war, is because the people who live there constituted a moral cancer. A moral cancer. You leave those people in there, and those people are going to affect the way you think. They're going to lead you away from God, and it's going to cause great harm to you spiritually. Now, again, there's lessons to be learned for us today. As Israel was to displace these peoples, you and I as Christians are to displace the sin in our lives. It's the message of the days of unleavened bread, isn't it? We are to get all sin out of our life. God is going to be the sin out of our life. God has commanded us to engage in a holy war. You and I. Not against other people, but against the sin in our life. We are engaged in a holy war against Satan, the devices of Satan, the demonic world. All evil. We are in a holy war against all evil. Now, in our lives as Christians, we do that in a way prescribed by Jesus Christ. We become converted. We become as little children. We don't go off into some holy jihad and kill other people because they don't believe as we do. That's not what Christ wanted. We see that in the pages of the New Testament, the Sermon on the Mount, the Golden Rule, any number of places in the New Testament. But, again, God wants us to vigorously go after all the negativity that's in our life that is sinful and rooted out. Let's take a look at 1 John. Again, keep your marker there. 1 John chapter 2.

Verse 15. 1 John chapter 2 and verse 15. Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, then the love of the Father is not with him. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world. And so, God very much says, you know, there needs to be separation here. He's telling Israel, when you go into the Holy Land, you're going to be my special people. I don't want you to be a group of people that just hang by yourselves. You know, you close out all the nations. No, because I want the nations to look at you. I want the nations to be able to say, wow, look at the success of those people. Look at those successful families. Look at how beautiful their children are, and look at how respectful they are to God, and look how God is blessing them in so many ways. And God was hoping the nations around Israel would see that and flow to Israel and say, we want to live that same way, much as we're going to see in the world tomorrow. But for you and I as Christians, you know, God doesn't say, well, don't go to work, don't have next door neighbors. We've got to live in this world, right? We want to be a good example. We want to be a light. We want to be the salt of the earth, to our next-door neighbors, to our family members, to people at work, to people in the community. We can't love the same things spiritually. There's got to be a separation. 2 Corinthians 6 In verse 14, Do not be unequally yoked together with unbelievers, for what fellowship has righteousness with lawlessness, and what communion has light with darkness? Now, once again, it's not saying don't have a next-door neighbor, or don't work with your boss, or whatever, but it is saying don't be so yoked with another person, that you've got to follow their lifestyle. We can't be following a sinful lifestyle. We've got to be totally separate from that. Verse 16, What agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God. Not only are we the temple, God's Spirit lives in us. That's why we are a temple. God said, I will dwell in them and walk among them, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. Therefore, come out from among them and be separate, says the Lord. Now, this doesn't do violence to what Jesus Christ said about being a light, being the salt of the world, salt of the earth. We want to be those things, but we have to live our lives in such a way that we're separate. We want to be a light to people, but we're not going to live the way they live. We're not going to be looking down our nose. We're not going to be belittling them. We're going to be as loving to them and as compassionate to them as possible. We're going to be the best possible light. We're going to talk straight from the shoulder if they want straight from the shoulder talk, but we need to be separate. Do not touch what is unclean, and I will receive you. I will be a father to you, and you shall be my sons and daughters, says the Lord Almighty. So, we've only gotten two verses into the chapter. We've learned quite a bit so far. Let's continue on. Let's go back to chapter 7 again, and pick up, starting here in verse 5.

Verse 3. Chapter 7 of Deuteronomy, verse 3. Nor shall you make marriage with them. You shall not give your daughter to their son, nor take their daughter for your son. For they will turn your sons away from following me to serve other gods, and so the anger of the Lord will be roused against you, and destroy you suddenly.

But thus you shall deal with them. You shall destroy their altars, break down their sacred pillars, cut down their wooden images, and burn their carved images with fire. So God says, I've got one standard for everybody. Yes, you're going to go in, and you're going to annihilate those sinful people in front of you. But note something, God says.

Look at verse 4. If you live the way they live, God says, his anger will be roused against you, and destroy you suddenly. God says, I'm not playing games here. You're going to destroy those people, whatever breathes. But if you live like them, if you don't follow my words, what is one of the great stories of the Bible? Sin brings death. Sin brings destruction and death. God says, you better understand that point. And in verse 5, he said, now I want you to make sure every vestige of their evil is gotten rid of. All their implements of false worship. Don't embrace anything that is false and that would lead you away from the great God.

So, let's pause now. This is the first section. There are four sections in this chapter. Let's take a look at some of the lessons to learn. I've already gone through a number of them. Let's go over to Ephesians 4. Lessons learned for us today as we are preparing to enter the promised land of the kingdom of God.

Ephesians 4 in verse 27 where it says, don't give place to the devil. Don't give place to the devil. Now, everyone in this room has the quietness of our own hearts and our own minds. You know your heart and mind. I know mine. We also know our human nature. We all know, especially when it comes to Passover evening, as Ken was saying in his sermon earlier, how unworthy we are in many ways. But Satan loves a Christian with a back door.

Do we have back doors? We're closing the front doors. We're closing the front windows. But if we leave that back door ajar, if we leave another way for him to get in there, he'll just kick that little opening and he'll get right in. So what is it maybe about my thinking, your thinking, my actions, your actions, where we've not eradicated things and it's like weeding.

You know, you want to get the weeds out of your garden. You want to get the weeds out of your lawn. You can go over there with your bare hand and pull the top off. And it might look okay for a while, but that root's still there. And if the roots go there, that thing's going to come back. The same thing is true with us spiritually.

We can kind of take things away and it looks like it's okay. We look good as Christians. But if that root is still there, it's going to flourish. We've not taken care of the problem. We've taken care of an appearance. That's a physical thing, not a spiritual thing. 1 Corinthians 5. We've dissolved 100 days of unleavened bread. 1 Corinthians 5-6. Your glory is not good. Do you not know that a little leaven leavens the whole lump? A little leaven. Little crack in the door. The window being just opened just a little bit.

I think I've said enough about that. I think I've left too many back doors open. I think I've left too many windows ajar in my life. How about you? I think we all have need to kind of... You know, when I go to bed, a typical Detroiter, I go to bed at night, people will laugh at me. When I was down in the South, people are so wonderful. They don't lock their doors. They don't lock their windows. If anything, they'll open the windows and get the nice cool hair.

I go around, I lock everything. Sometimes I lock my car in the garage, I lock the garage. I'm a typical Detroiter. Let's lock everything up. That's the way we need to be spiritually, too. We need to make sure all the hatches are battened down and ready for action. The first five verses talk about destroying the enemies as we go into the Promised Land.

The next section is verses 6-11. In verses 6-11, God gives us the reasons why we obey Him. The reasons for our spiritual separation from the world. This is not by any stretch an exhaustive list. There's only five things we see here. Again, it's by no means exhaustive, but it's something to get our mind thinking. It's some very basic things God wants to give us.

Back here in Deuteronomy 7, let's look at the first reason here in verses 6-7. For you are a holy people to the Lord your God. The Lord your God has chosen you to be a people for Himself, a special treasure above all the peoples on the face of the earth. The Lord did not set His love on you nor choose you because you were more in number than any other people, for you were the least of the peoples. It wasn't because of their righteousness, it wasn't because of their stature, it wasn't because they were all pretty people.

It was because of God's love and also because of some relationship that God had with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. But here we see the first major reason that God says He wants spiritual separation from the world. And that is the reasons are spiritual. He's working with us as a spiritual people. God is holy. He wants us to be holy. He wants us to be separate from the world. He wants us to be part and parcel with the world.

So one of the reasons we obey God is because we have a spiritual heritage to look into and be a part of. Keep your marker there. Go to 1 Peter chapter 1. 1 Peter chapter 1.

1 Peter chapter 1 verse 15. But as He who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct because it is written, Be holy, for I am holy. Be holy for I am holy. So this is something God wants us to understand. This is one of the reasons for spiritual separation from the world. God wants us to be holy. God wants us to be like Him. We're His sons. We're His daughters. He wants His family to live like He lives. Let's go back to chapter 7 of Deuteronomy. Let's continue on through the chapter here. Chapter 7 verse 8. We see a second reason for obeying God. Deuteronomy chapter 7 verse 8. But because the Lord loves you and because He would keep the oath which He swore to your fathers, the Lord has brought you out with a mighty hand, and redeemed you from the house of bondage, from the hand of Pharaoh, King of Egypt. So a second reason here is that God has redeemed His people from Egypt. And the same thing is true for us today. God has redeemed us from spiritual Egypt. We're not our own. We are God's. You know, it wasn't in my notes, but it just happened as we were going through this portion of the sermon today in Ann Arbor. I don't know what God was probably inspiring us, but something I had not thought about in a long time. And I'm going to date myself here. I'm not the oldest person in the room, but remember S&H Green Stamps? Ha ha ha ha! Jewel tea and all those things we used to...back in the day when you would go get gas, we don't really have any real...well, we got a few young people here. But back in the day when you got gas, you actually had somebody come out to your car and put gas in your car. You had somebody look under the hood. You had somebody wash your windshield as you paid 21 cents a gallon for gas. And with your purchase, you know, you may have spent a whole couple of three bucks on your gas. You got a whole raft of S&H Green Stamps. You stuck those in a book. You started compiling your little books. And then you would go to a redemption store. And for so many books, you would kind of...if you only had one or two books to redeem, you would get maybe a steak knife. If you had five books or six books, you might get some of these...a set of glasses, maybe four glasses. Today I was talking to Mavis Jolin...Mavis Stevens. It used to be Mavis Jolin, many of you know from the Detroit East days. But she said, oh, I saved and saved for years, and I got some Samsonite luggage. I said, man, you must have saved for years and I got Samsonite luggage. How many hundred books must you have saved back in those days? But the point is, when you redeem something, you took ownership of it. You redeemed those books and they gave you something. We have been redeemed by the shed blood of Jesus Christ. We are His. And because we're His, we need to obey Him. Let's look at Romans 6.

Boy, those were the days, weren't they? Gas at 21 cents a gallon? Of course, we were only making two bucks an hour. I mean, everything's relative. I remember, you probably do too, when gasoline was 99 cents a gallon. We thought, boy, once it clicks over to a dollar a gallon, this is the end of the day. You know, prophecies, it's going to be like those Basil-Wolferton cartoons. We're all going to start gnawing on one another. But here in Romans 6, verse 16, Do you not know that to whom you present yourselves slaves to obey? You are that one's slaves whom you obey, whether of sin leading to death or of obedience leading to righteousness. But God be thanked that those you were slaves of sin, yet you obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine to which you were delivered. We obeyed from the heart. Why? Because God opened our heart. God helped our mind to understand the true doctrine. And, verse 18, and having been set free from sin, just as Israelites were, you became slaves of righteousness. We are gods. We have been we are the redeemed. We are gods. God's people. So that's another reason for obeying God. We go back to chapter 7 of Deuteronomy. Let's look at verse 9. Deuteronomy 7, 9. Therefore, know the Lord your God, He is God, the faithful God who keeps His covenant and mercy for a thousand generations, with those who love Him and keep His commandments. Really, a couple of things here in verse 9. Reasons for obeying God. We obey God because He is the true God. He's not wood. He's not stone. He's not what the Egyptians would worship. You know, something with a body of a man but ahead of a snake or something weird. He is the true God, but also in verse 9, something in addition. That is, He is a faithful God. The time had come, and God is the one who is in charge of time. The time had come for God to faithfully give to the people the promises were made to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. And God delivered. Brethren, we need to appreciate the fact that we are God's people and God will deliver for us too. He will deliver for us too. He is a faithful God. And what He's promised you, He will deliver to you. And that's one of the reasons why we obey God, because He is the true God and He is a faithful God. Hebrews 6.

Hebrews 6. Verse 16. Hebrews 6.16.

For men and deeds were by the greater, and an oath for a confirmation is for them, and end of all a dispute. Now notice. But thus God, because of what it said in verse 16, thus God determining to show more abundantly to the heirs of promise, that's us, the heirs of promise, the immutability of His counsel, the unchangeability of His counsel, confirmed it by an oath.

He confirmed it. He guaranteed it. That by two immutable things, two unchangeable things, in which it is impossible for God to lie, we might have strong consolation who have fled for refuge till they hold to the hope set before us. So as it says there in verse 16, men swear by a hire.

Well, God's going to swear by Himself. There is no hire. God says here that there are two things for which it is impossible for God to lie. Number one is the Bible. It's true from cover to cover. The other thing that's impossible for God to lie is whatever comes out of God's mouth.

Either His verbal word or His written word. That is truth, and God will not lie. And it says at the end of verse 18, we had that hope set before us. Verse 19, this hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast. Moses was talking to a group of people who were fearful. They were doubting. Can we conquer the Promised Land? There's more people. There's a lot more people. They're used to warfare. They've got armies. They've got forts. We're slaves. What are we going to do? What do we know about this sort of thing?

God says, if I swear it, if I tell you you're going to have it, you're going to have it. Let's go back to chapter 7 of Deuteronomy. Look at verse 10. We move through the chapter here. A fourth reason for obeying God. Verse 10, and he repays those who hate him to their face. To destroy them. He will not be slack with him who hates him. He will repay him to his face. A fourth reason here is that God doesn't hesitate to execute judgment.

God doesn't care about political correctness. If we sin, we die. Unless we repent. If we repent, then we're pardoned. We have life. We have life eternal. But if we don't want to repent, and we keep on sinning, that's going to be it for us. That is it for us. So a fourth reason for obeying God is, remember, our God is a fair God. He's a just God. Ephesians chapter 5. Ephesians chapter 5 verses 3-6. Ephesians 5 verse 3- But fornication and all uncleanness or covetousness, let it not even be named among you as befitting for saints.

Neither filthiness nor foolish talking nor coarse jesting, which are not fitting, but rather giving of things. For this you know that no fornicator, unclean person, covetous man who is an idolatr, has any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and God. Let no one deceive you with empty words, for because of these things the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience. So here we see God is not to be mocked, and He's going to fulfill His will, and if we're not going to live righteously as God is asked, then He will execute judgment upon us.

Let's go to verse 11 now of chapter 7 of Deuteronomy, the last reason that's stated here in this chapter. Again, this is not an all-inclusive listing of items here. Deuteronomy 7, verse 11, Therefore you shall keep the commandment, the statutes, and the judgments which have commanded you to observe them. We obey God because He tells us to obey God. It's really quite straightforward. There's all sorts of reasons we give. We've gone through a number of them, but we do because God tells us to do it.

He demands we do it. Let's just say it very simply. It's one thing for us to get the sin out of our life. That's part of the procedure. The other part of the procedure is taking that void that is now there. We've gotten rid of the sin. We need to replace it with God's righteousness.

God's righteousness. And of course, that's the story of the Days of Unleavened Bread. We get rid of our leavening. We bring in the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth. It's a two-step process. I'm not going to turn there, but in your notes of my jot down, Matthew 7, 21, where it says, "...not everyone who says to me, Lord, Lord, shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of my Father in heaven." He who does the will.

So in these verses, verses 6 through 11, the second section, we've seen why God is wanting us to do this, to obey Him. Now with the next section, verses 12 through 16. 12 through 16. Verses 12 through 16 show what happens as a result of our obedience to God. What are the beautiful fruits that we have as we obey God? And actually, verse 12 here is kind of a summary statement of that whole section. Verses 12 through 16. Let's look at verse 12. You obey Me. All those beautiful things are going to take place and happen in your life.

Because you obey Me. And of course, I think all of us in this room realize America, our beloved country, our country is not the country it is, because America is not the country it is. Because the Americans, the people who became Americans, who came from all over Europe and all over the world, literally all over the world, this great melting pot we call America, we are not a great nation because of us as people. No more than Israel was when they were going in to possess the Promised Land.

They were a weak people, they were a small people, they didn't know anything about warfares to speak of. In World War II, I mean, you've probably read the story, seen the evidence, we barely beat the Germans, we barely beat the Japanese, and we had broken their codes early on in the war. We knew what they were going to do, and we still barely beat them.

We only beat them because God was there for us, because we are God's people, and God says, well, let's keep on blessing this nation, because of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. But there's something for us to remember, and I think we're seeing it right now in our nation's history. God has fulfilled those promises to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. At one point, the British Empire, and it's no longer a British Empire, but at one point, every fourth person on planet Earth was a part of that empire. Every fourth person on Earth used to be in a day you could look at a map, red always symbolized the English, the British Commonwealth, it just seemed like everything was red on the map.

We're not talking red China. Now, Mr. Rose himself says, I don't refer to it as Great Britain anymore. And look at our nation. Our nation is very much on the decline, and people in this country are now saying it. They think, Brethren, we see it because we know prophecy, but we've got people who are atheists who said, we see it!

We're in a state of decline! So, even though God said, I'll bless the nation, the peoples because of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, there comes a point where God says, you know, I've fulfilled that. I have fulfilled that. And when a nation, any nation, begins to act the way our nation is acting, live the way our nation is living, the things you see on TV, the things you hear on radio, you know what I'm talking about.

It is Sodom and Gomorrah. Well, God can certainly take away those blessings as easily as He gave them, and that's exactly what God is going to do. But notice, this is being on the positive side. God said, now, if you obey me, here's what you're going to get. You're going to get all those blessings I promised to Abraham. Verse 13. Chapter 7, verse 13. And He will love you, and bless you and multiply you. He'll bless the fruit of your womb, the fruit of your land, your grain, your new wine, your oil, the increase of your cattle, the offspring of your flock, in the land which He swore to your fathers to give you.

You know, the blessing of the fruit of the womb. How many poor children today are born with so many difficult situations? I had a grandson for six hours. The poor little guy when he was being developed in his mother's womb, his kidneys blocked up, and even with a child in the womb, the kidneys had got to disperse that water into the sack.

Well, that wasn't happening. So the kidneys were getting larger and larger and larger in the little guy, and as a result, there were no very little in the way of lungs reforming, a little striker. And so when he was born, the doctors tried valiantly, I was able to hold him for a moment, for a couple of minutes, and the poor little guy, he looked like any other little boy, eight pounds, fifteen ounces, something like that.

But they couldn't put air into him because there was nothing to put air into. And how many stories like that do we have in this nation? Where we're just not being blessed, and it's because of, you know, years and generations of the way our peoples have lived, really not caring one way or another about God and the things of God. We have been under a curse. But God says, now if you obey me, you know, you're going to have these beautiful children, you're going to have these beautiful flocks, you're going to have these beautiful farms, all these things are going to be right.

That way the people in the world, they can see these physical things and say, you know, we want that. You're doing something right because your God is really blessing you and we need to know that God. He's the true God. Verse 14. You should be blessed above all the people. There shall not be a male or female barren among you among your livestock. You know, great, great, tremendous blessings that God offers His people here.

Verse 15. And the Lord will take away from you all sickness and afflict you with none of the terrible diseases of Egypt which you have known, but will lay them on all those who hate you. Now, understand something about the Bible. When the Bible's talking about all, you know, there's a place in the Bible where it talks about all Israel being saved. In Bible terminology, all doesn't mean every last person.

It's talking about, generally speaking, you know, everyone, you know, most of the people in Israel will be saved. The same thing is true here about, you know, all these illnesses or none of the illnesses. It's talking about, in general, you're going to be a very healthy nation. You obey God, you'll be a very healthy nation. Verse 16. You also shall destroy all the peoples from whom the Lord your God delivers over to you. Your eyes shall not have pity on them, nor shall you serve their gods, for that will be a snare to you.

So here in verse 16, God goes back to this whole second time He's saying this. Look, you need to be separate. You need to come out. You can't live like the people around you. So there is a lesson there for us today as well. Become, you know, be you separate and don't touch the evil thing. Matthew 6. Matthew 6.

In verse 33. But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you. Seek first the kingdom of God. Now, if we want to be entering into the Promised Land, which we call the kingdom of God, we have to have the right priorities. And here it is. First things first, the kingdom of God. Ephesians chapter 3 and verse 20. Very powerful scripture. Very encouraging scripture. Ephesians 3.20.

Ephesians 3.20. Now to Him who is able to exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think according to the power that works in us. God can bless us exceedingly abundantly over what we think. And I can think a lot of stuff. I can think of a lot of blessings.

And God says, you know, I'm able to help you with this. I'm able to exceedingly abundantly above all we ask or think according to God's Spirit. So those are powerful statements. Revelation chapter 22. I read this last week over in Ann Arbor. Obviously I was needed over there because of the circumstances. Could not come over here. But, you know, in the book of, I don't want to have time to turn to this, or simply won't turn to it at this point, but over in the book of Genesis we see because of Adam and Eve's sin that God had to separate Adam and Eve from the tree of life.

God had to place an angel there so mankind could not have access to the tree of life. That's the very early chapters of the book of Genesis. Now here we are in the very last chapter of the Bible. Revelation chapter 22. Look what it says in here in verse 14. Blessed are those who do His commandments that they may have the right to the tree of life and may enter through the gates into the city. Have the right to the tree of life. So we go full circle. From the book of Genesis at the very beginning of the book of Genesis toward the very end of Revelation we have a healing that takes place.

It was interesting as Ken was going through the section of Genesis there that he was, how mankind just doesn't get it. Mankind wants to shake his hand into the heavens. Well, where is God? Well, what happened there where Ken was reading? Was it God that went off and hid? No. It was man that went off and hid. God asked where man was. Man knew where God was. Man didn't want God. Mankind just doesn't, with so many things, mankind just doesn't have it right. Man went off and hid.

Not God. God said, okay, if you want to do that, if you want to go run off on hide, if you want to be left to your own devices, if you want to listen to the other guy there in the tree, then, okay, we'll perform an experiment. We'll give you 6,000. We'll give you plenty of time. I'm God's, I'm patient. I'll give you 6,000 years and we'll see what happens in that 6,000 years. Well, we know what's happened in that 6,000 years. But here it says that now, as we do His commandments, we may have the right to the tree of life and may enter into the gates of the New Jerusalem.

Nothing abominable enters that city. Nothing sinful enters that city. Nothing negative or contrary enters that city. But we'll be able to. Because we'll be the people of God who at this point, all spirit. All spirit. Okay, so this section we went through, verses 12-16, showed the blessings for obedience. Now, the last section of Deuteronomy, chapter 7, which is verses 17-26, show the solution to doubt, doubting, and fearing. Again, Moses realized they're about to cross over the river into the Promised Land. The people have doubts. They've got fears. They've got foibles. They've phobias. They've got all sorts of things that are in their mind.

They've got all their hang-ups. And God says, okay, now here's how we deal with that. We deal with that by the presence and the power of God. By the presence and the power of God. Let's go back now to Deuteronomy, chapter 7. Deuteronomy, chapter 7, verse 17. Deuteronomy, chapter 7, verse 17. Verse 17, if you should say in your heart, these nations are greater than I, how can I dispossess them?

Well, that's a question, but actually this is part of the solution right here. Part of the solution is we have to be able to face our fear. Not stick our head in the sand, not dodge it, not sidestep it, not try to explain it away. Moses knew that they had fear, that they had doubt. And here Moses basically is going to say to them, okay, let's face it straight on.

Let's stand toe to toe with whatever we're fearing here. Let's confront the problem. The very first step to a healing is confronting the issue. When we were in the Slippery Rock University for our regional conference, there was a fairly good discussion about people having issues with various problems. We had some discussion about alcoholism and what have you. Obviously denial is a very big factor in a lot of people's lives. It's not just alcoholism. It could be any kind of abuse.

It could be spiritual issues in our life. If you and I are denying the reality, we can't have a healing. We have to accept the reality of the situation. As ugly as it may be. But that's the first stage of a healing. If we're going to move from point A to point B, we've got to say, okay, I am at point A.

Here it is. All this ugliness, here it is. Point A. That's where they are in verse 17. Verse 18. You shall not be afraid of them, but you shall remember well what the Lord your God did to Pharaoh and to all Egypt. The great trials which your eyes saw, the signs, the wonders, the mighty hand, the outstretched arm by which the Lord your God brought you out.

So shall the Lord your God do to all the peoples whom you are afraid. So a second step, once you are facing your fears straight on, is we have to remember how God has helped us in the past. Remember how God has helped us in the past. He's delivered each and every one of us in this room.

We all have victories that we've been able to chalk up with God's help. Some of them have been smaller, some of them have been larger, but we've all had success in our Christian walk with God. We need to remember those things. Remember those things and let those meditate on those things. You know, sometimes we meditate too much about the things we have not conquered. Let's meditate on the things that God, with God's help, we have conquered and realize we've done it with His help.

Verse 20, Moreover the Lord your God will send a hornet among them until those who are left, who hide themselves from you, are destroyed. Now some of the scholars will look at verse 20 and they would argue whether we're talking or something, are these literal hornets, or is this figurative language or symbolic language?

In one sense it really doesn't matter. What matters here is in verse 20 it says that God will intervene on your behalf. Frankly, I don't care how God intervenes on my behalf. Because I know that when God intervenes everything He does, He does for a reason, He does well. He doesn't do something slipshod or half way. When God intervenes, He's going to do exactly what is needed for the moment. And that's something else we, you know, as God's people, we want to remember that God is going to intervene on our behalf. He's done it in the past, He'll do it today and He'll do it in the future.

We had a wonderful sermon up today by Steve St. Charles talking about that very point. Ken's sermon was very good for what we had here today too. Kind of setting the sermon up here. Both messages were well tailored for what we're going into here. Now verse 21. Verse 21, You shall not be terrified of them, for the Lord your God is great and awesome, and He is among you. Our God is among us. He's not far away. He's among us. Brethren, why is it that we enjoy Sabbath services? Why is it we enjoy going to a Holy Day service where there's even more people than we've got here in Detroit?

We enjoy being with more people who've got God's spirit. Where there's more of the spirit of God flowing. I enjoy going to the Feast of Tabernacles. Of course it's festive. It's someplace nice. I'm looking forward to the Dells. 40th anniversary of the Dells. To me, Dells is almost like home. I've been there so many times. I enjoy it so much. I enjoy the smell of the air. I enjoy the look of the place. I enjoy walking into that Crystal Ground Ballroom and seeing people that I don't even know all of their names.

They know my name because I speak there from time to time. So people come up and say, hey! And I'll say, hey! We'll enjoy one another. But we also enjoy the spiritual content. There's a sameness of mind. There's a oneness of mind there. It's a beautiful thing.

The spirit of God is here in us. It's not only among us, it's in us. I was reminiscing, and again, I don't know why I thought of this, but it wasn't in my notes, but I was reminiscing about the very first sermon that I gave at the Feast of Tabernacles. There was a time in my career I thought, boy, I'll never speak! Because back in the worldwide days, we had 1,600 ministers, and Della Sandra was way down at the bottom of that list. I thought, I'll never give up. I'll be lucky to give an opening or closing prayer someday at the Feast. But one day, finally, they said, let's give Della Sandra a chance.

So I had a sermon at, this was in 1987 in Norfolk, Virginia. Benny Luker gave a sermon that day. I thought, what am I going to speak about? There's going to be 6,000 people there in Norfolk. I'd never spoken before anything more than about 350 in the Detroit East Church. 6,000 people? And therefore, I'd never have done that before. I thought, well, what if I get up there and I can't remember my own name?

That was a very real fear. So, I was living in Raleigh, North Carolina at the time. That's the home of North Carolina State. So I went over to the University and did some research. I'd seen something in a paper or an article or saw something on TV that kind of put a thought in my mind, I'm sure God inspired it, about sequoia trees.

And I thought, you know, that would make for an interesting sermonette. 15 minutes on the attributes of sequoia. So I went to their school of forestry and I pulled out some books and I did some research.

Some of these sequoia trees in Southern California were old trees when Jesus Christ walked the earth. They're some of the oldest organisms on the planet, these sequoia trees. Some of them have bark that is two feet thick. Bark is two feet thick. Because the trees themselves could be 30 feet or more thick. As a matter of fact, there was a minister that was a friend of mine, he said, when I gave the message afterwards, he came up and said, Randy, that was interesting because when I was a kid in Southern California, we used to come up to Northern California for social activities as a team.

And so, I remember one year we had a dance. And the dance floor was a sequoia tree that had been cut off at the base. And the base of the sequoia, that was the dance floor. It was that big. It was bigger than what we got here. It was like 30 feet across. It was amazing. You've probably seen some pictures where they've hollowed some of these things out and trucks could drive through them and what have you. Big trucks. So I was giving, I was looking at this material.

I said, well, here's these trees. They are literally thousands of years old. Some of them are over 300 feet high. You take a football field, you stand it up on end. That's how tall they are. Because of the tannin in the bark, they're virtually, you can't set the things on fire. But what makes them strong? Why are these trees so old? Obviously the bark is a tremendous protection. But the secret I found was really in their root structure. The root structure of most trees is that the roots will go down as deep as the tree is tall.

But with the sequoia, that's not true. These things may be 300 feet tall, 350 feet tall or more, like the General Sherman tree, who was the biggest one, I think, out there. Sequoia's roots go down 4 or 5 feet, and then they turn. They'll go down 4 or 5 feet. But then when they turn and start growing out, they interlock with all the other roots of the trees around them. Whenever you get a sequoia grove, you've got a number of trees that encompass miles.

Miles. And there's an underground network of all these roots where they're all intertwined and locked together. You would have a hard time knocking one of those things over. And their strength is because they are unified. Our strength is our unity with God. We are interlocked with God. We are interlocked with the Holy Spirit with one another.

That's why it's so important for us to get together and assemble as a group. What do the sequoias that sometimes fall down, why do they fall down? Why are they, why are some sequoias a sitting duck? They almost always happen to be the sequoias that are on the edge of the grove. There might be three quarters of the area around them where they're not connected to any other tree. And they may be connected to only a couple of trees.

They don't have to sit, they get so tall, they get so heavy, a good wind will knock them over because they're off by themselves. So, you know, a tremendous lesson to learn. We learn it right here, too. God is among us. He's among us. And we need that unity, that strength, with one another and with Him. Let's move on to verse 22. And the Lord your God will drive out those nations before you little by little, and you'll be unable to destroy them at once, lest the beasts of the field become too numerous for you.

Now, there's an interesting thought here in verse 22. It may fly in the face of some of the things we've said in the past, but we need to understand the whole counsel of God. Now, there are some things where God says, I want you to stop doing it right now. It's not a matter we're going to wean ourselves. Somebody says, well, I've got a problem with the ladies. Well, it's not going to be, well, I'll go from 15 ladies to 10 ladies. We don't do that.

No, if you get a problem, you stop. There are some things you just stop, okay? But as all of us know in this room, there are other things in our life that may take our whole life, our whole lifetime, to work on. Little by little. You see, if the Israelites went into the Promised Land and got rid of all the inhabitants that were there, all at one time, it probably would have taken them a number of years. Well, how do you live? You're not growing anything. You all have to be soldiers. And your enemy, all those seven nations we talked about, they're not growing anything. No one's growing anything other than what's going to grow up itself.

And so the land would revert back to being nothing. The wild beasts would run rampant. So God says, no, let's do this the right way. Let's do this a little at a time. That way, you can plant some crops. We could have some of your people farming. Some of your people will be in the military. You'll do it a little at a time.

You'll eventually clear the land. I say that to you, brethren, because there are times in our life when we've got to look at the larger view. There are some things in our life, yes, we, you know, was this flea fornication?

Immediately. Was this flea idolatry? Immediately. But there are some other things. Maybe we've got an anger issue. Maybe we've got other kinds of issues that may take a little at a time as we're moving through life. God doesn't mind that. He looks at our forward movement. If we're moving forward, it may not be as big a step as we like, but if we're moving forward, a little by little, even God Himself says He's pleased with that.

So I think there's a balance there, and I think we need to appreciate that balance. Verse 23, But the Lord your God will deliver them over to you, and will inflict defeat upon them until they are destroyed. So, victory is assured here. Verse 24 as well. And He will deliver their kings into your hands, and you will destroy their name from under the heaven. No one will be able to stand against you until you have destroyed them. So God assures victory. If you are living the way He wants, and you have God with you, and you are honoring Him, then victory is assured.

Verse 25 and 26 Now, of these two verses, verses 25 and 26, we'll go back to something I said earlier. We can't give Satan the back door. If these people were to allow these various images and things in their life, if they allow a back door, a cracked window, Satan's going to get back in. In our lives, we've got to ask ourselves, if Satan is going to get back in, if Satan is going to get back in, in our lives, rather than we've got to ask ourselves the same thing, are we giving Satan that open back door?

Or maybe the door is closed, but the door is unlocked. Satan can just simply turn the knob and walk on in. You all know what I'm talking about because I think all of us have probably left the back door open a crack. We've probably left the window ajar. We've probably done those things in our lives. I've related to where it says flee sexual immorality, 1 Corinthians 6, 18. That's where you find that.

We need to make sure we're fleeing these things. 1 Corinthians 10, 14. Flee from idolatry. Those are actions. That's an action list from us. We need to flee from immorality. We need to flee from idolatry. We need to flee from sin. Notice James chapter 4. Just a couple more scriptures will be done for the day. James chapter 4.

James chapter 4. Starting here in verse 7. Therefore, submit to God. Isn't that the same thing that Moses was saying to Israel? Submit to God, resist the devil, and he will flee from you. As powerful as he is, he's not more powerful than God. Draw near to God, and God will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners. Purify your hearts, you double-minded. How do we do that? That's repentance. God grants us the repentance. He gives us the heart. He gives us the mind. He gives us the power and his strength. Lament and mourn and weep. Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom. Again, this is something we saw back in Deuteronomy 7. We've got to face our problems. We've got to face it square on. We've got to look straight in the eye and realize, here's what I've done. Here's what I am. But, you know, I'm not going to stay there. I'm not going to stay there. If it be that God's going to help me to eradicate it instantaneously or real quickly, then fine, if not little by little, I'm going to work on that thing and whittle it down. First, then humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and he will lift you up. Humble yourselves in the sight of God. So, a lesson to be learned is that God is there with us. He is there to help us conquer. He is there to help us enter the Promised Land. We simply have to do what He says. And that is a beautiful story to me of Deuteronomy 7. Hopefully it's been helpful to you.