Saturday
Saturday
Wilderness Wanderings
We are setting out for the place about which the LORD said, “I will give it to you.”
Numbers 10:29
It must have been a moment of great excitement when the people of Israel set out for the Promised Land. At long last, some seven centuries after God had first made his promise to Abraham, it was about to be fulfilled. But their expectation was short-lived. Moses’s plan to send twelve scouts (one for each tribe) to reconnoiter the land ended in disaster. For although they returned with ripe fruit to prove that Canaan was indeed a land flowing with milk and honey, ten of them also declared that its inhabitants were invincible. This majority view prevailed. So none of that generation would enter the Promised Land, only the faithful Caleb and Joshua.
Forty years were now to elapse between the exodus from Egypt and the entry into Canaan—years in which they wandered from oasis to oasis and in which they experienced a variety of adventures, which are recorded in the book of Numbers. At last, however, the forty years were ended, and the whole adult generation had died out. Israel was now encamped on the plains of Moab, a little north and east of where the River Jordan flows into the Dead Sea.
Here Moses addressed the people for the last time, and his speeches are recorded in the book of Deuteronomy. He rehearsed their recent history and its lessons, and he sought to prepare them for taking possession of the Promised Land. But his main emphasis was on the covenant of love that bound Yahweh and his people together. Yahweh had set his love on them and chosen them, Moses said, not because of any merit in them but solely because he loved them (Deut. 7:7–8). So now they must love him in return with all their being and express their love in their obedience (Deut. 6:4–9; 10:12–13).
It is extraordinary that our Lord Jesus took these words to himself, saying, “Whoever has my commands and obeys them, he is the one who loves me” (John 14:21). The test of love is obedience.
For further reading: Deuteronomy 6:1–12