“Just as it pleased the LORD to make you prosper and increase in number, so it will please him to ruin and destroy you. You will be uprooted from the land you are entering to possess.”
~ Deuteronomy 28:63
Hi James and Ellen,
Would you rather be blessed or cursed? What does being blessed mean to you? What does being cursed mean to you? To be blessed is good. To be cursed is bad. Being affirmed and approved is to be blessed. Being denigrated and plagued is to be cursed. Your dad and/or ma telling you that you are good kids is having your dad and/or ma blessing you. Your dad and/or ma telling you that you are bad kids is having your dad and/or ma cursing you. What is something that you have done that may lead to your dad and/or ma blessing you? What is something that you have done that may lead to your dad and/or ma cursing you? You are acting as good kids when you are obedient to your dad and/or ma. You are acting as bad kids when you are disobedient to your dad and/or ma. You are acting as good kids when you are obedient to your Heavenly Father. You are acting as bad kids when you are disobedient to your Heavenly Father. Deuteronomy 28 is God – through Moses, telling His specially chosen guys and gals to obey Him or . . . God promised His specially chosen guys and gals – the Israelite people group’s guys and gals, that if they obeyed Him that He would for the rest of their lives bless them wherever they lived in the land that He was giving to them to always to have to live as their very own land. God promised to bless all the kids who would be born to His specially chosen guys and gals. God promised to bless all the calves and lambs that would be born to the cows and sheep that were owned by His specially chosen guys and gals. God promised to prevail over all the enemies of His specially chosen guys and gals. God promised to bless with rain and abundant crops the land that He was giving to His specially chosen guys and gals to always have to live in as their very own land. The one single thing that God expected from His specially chosen guys and gals for Him to bless them was for them to be always obedient to Him while they were living in the land that he was giving to them to always to have to live in as their very own land.
God did not just pass on a list of the ways that He would through blessings affirm and approve His specially chosen guys and gals if they obeyed Him; God also passed on a list of the ways that He would curse His specially chosen guys and gals though denigration and plagues if they disobeyed Him. God spent a lot of time through Moses telling His specially chosen guys and gals how distressing and appalling it would be for them if they ever began to disobey Him. God told His specially chosen guys and gals that He would destroy everything that they have if they began to worship inanimate, inert wood, stone and metal gods. God told His specially chosen guys and gals that if they began to disobey Him that He would allow different horrible and disgusting diseases affect them. God told His specially chosen guys and gals that if they began to disobey Him that He would have their enemies destroy them and carry off their kids to be captive slaves. God told His specially chosen guys and gals that if they began to disobey Him that no matter what crop that they planted or grew that He would have their enemies take their harvested crops away from them. God told His specially chosen guys and gals that if they began to disobey Him that He would make living life for them super difficult – such as making it so dark outside that they would not be able to see anything, such as causing them to have boils, sores, tumors and itches that there would be no cure for, such as turning the land that He was giving them to always to have to live in as their very own land into a land that would be nothing more than powdery dust and such as having even the kindest specially chosen guy eat his own kids because there would be nothing else around him to eat to survive.
If you knew that your Heavenly Father would affirm and approve you with all kinds of blessings if you did everything that He wanted or expected you to do, what would you do? If you knew that your Heavenly Father would denigrate and plague you with all kinds of curses if you did not do what He wanted or expected you to do, what would you do? Do you think of your Heavenly Father as always being very kind and forgiving or do you think of your Heavenly Father as always being angry and unforgiving? Verse 63 says, “Just as it pleased the LORD to make you prosper and increase in number, so it will please him to ruin and destroy you. You will be uprooted from the land you are entering to possess.” What God succinctly told His specially chosen guys and gals through Moses about 3400 years ago applies to God’s specially elected guys, gals and kids today. God’s specially elected guys, gals and kids are the guys, gals and kids who already have and who will make a decision of faith to believe in what took place on a cross when God the Son – Jesus, suffered and died for all the sins of all the guys, gals and kids who God before He created planet Earth specially elected to be His adopted kids. Your grandpaa believes that being obedient to God today means being affirming and approving of His specially chosen guys and gals who are living in the land that God gave to His specially chosen guys and gals to always have to live in as their very own land. Your grandpaa believes that being obedient to God today means to be against all the evil that the guys and gals who are not God’s specially chosen or elected guys and gals are doing on planet Earth. Your grandpaa believes that God matters is the only thing that should matter today to God’s specially elected guys, gals and kids. A Christ-follower guy, gal or kid wholeheartedly believes through faith that God exists and that He richly rewards the guys, gals and kids who obey Him. Are you living your lives today to please God so that He will bless you? You do not want God to disavow you.
Deuteronomy 28 (346)