Revelations (& Rules) About Our Own Responsibilities -- Deuteronomy 24:16-22
Hang in there as we look at three more and very important areas in what appeared to be a never-ending chapter (number 24) in the book of Deuteronomy. It is after all, a book of laws.
You Pay for Your Own Sin Verse 16 tells us very clearly that 'sin' is individual. If someone committed a crime in Israel, a relative could not be punished in his/her place and the criminal be left to live and go about their business freely. The example used is a father agreeing to be killed instead of his son for a crime the latter committed, and vice-versa. The Hebrew practice of that law is borne out in 2 Kings 14:6 and 2 Chronicles 25:4. There were no substitutes -- regardless of status. There were no scapegoats as is often the case when the mighty and the rich get tangled up in crime today.
David Guzik provides a little relief here for us who are parents when he says, "It is wrong for a parent to automatically blame themselves for their wayward children; though they may have a part in the problem, it isn't always the case."
Today, there are many opportunities for those with money to pay the fines charged to criminals for various crimes. However, I am not sure that there is any way that a person who has been found guilty of a crime punishable by death and is so sentenced, can pay enough to erase that sentence. And that is the way it should be, even though there is a chance of the justice system making a mistake. When you are on death row, you know that your days are numbered. In the United States at least, only the President can pardon you.
Bottom practical line here is this: If you care enough about your relative or friend, the time to help him/her is before they commit the crime when you get whiff of their plans, not afterwards. Afterwards, they are responsible for their own sins. And maybe that's why sometimes you have to turn a person in when they're planning to do harm, rather than let them do the harm. They may not appreciate it, but in the end, it is better for them.
From a Biblical perspective, and I stand to be corrected, there was only one exception to this law. And that is when the Son of God died in our place to atone for and erase our sin, the sins of the whole world, in the eyes of God the Father. The First Adam made us all prey to sin. We had to pay our own price for our sin and the wages of sin was and is death. The Second Adam, through His own sacrifice on the cross, made it possible for us to escape that burden of dying for our sins.
Don't Pervert the Justice System Verses 17-18 required the Israelites not to fix or rig their justice system to take advantage of those who could not defend themselves including aliens, orphans and widows. The focus seems to be on their inability to pay large, or any amounts for their bail (what the text refers to as a pledge). The reason being that all Israelites are to remember that they or their forefathers were once slaves in Egypt, and that God redeemed them when they had nothing to offer.
Today, we may not pervert the justice system intentionally. It happens because of the way our legal system is set up. It has rules and requires certain mechanisms to be triggered to ensure fairness and equity in treatment. The problem is that those requirements are not either easily known or accessible to someone who cannot afford top-notch legal defence advocates to fight for them. As a result, the so-called law is applied and the poor man loses. That's why we have the expression, "a man who is his own lawyer, has a fool for a client". A poor alien (immigrant, refugee), orphan, or widow who cannot afford a good lawyer, doesn't have a chance in our court systems.
Our responsibility as Christians is to be on the lookout for situations involving people we know, or know of, who may indeed be disadvantaged in this way, and to do all we can to get them the help they need if at all possible so that they will have a fair chance of defending themselves with the authorities.
While You're Raking It In, Remember the Less Fortunate In verses 19-22, Moses tells the Israelites that while they are reaping their harvests, or beating the olives out of their olive trees, or gathering their grapes off their vineyards, they are not do go back and get every last piece sheaf in the field, every last olive, or every last grape. Only one pass-through was allowed. In fact, they are intentionally to leave the remains so that the poor folks -- again the aliens, the orphans, and the widows -- may have a chance to gather those, eat, and survive. And the Israelites were to do all this because again they needed to remember their days of slavery in Egypt. So God was commanding them, through Moses, to behave in this manner.
Chuck Smith calls this practice "God's welfare system" for those with real needs.
That may not be as practical for us today. We can't let people wander into our factories after hours and just help themselves to the leftovers, so they can make something out of them and resell them, etc. There are two many risks involved including ones for their own safety. But that does not excuse us from our responsibility to act in other ways to take care of needy strangers, orphans, and widows. I believe Christians have a choice. One option is that they have a responsibility to ensure that their church that gets all their charitable funds have a very vibrant program of assisting aliens, orphans, and widows. Alternatively, Christians must research and find meaningful avenues of wisely supporting such groups. I don't see how we can escape that. I believe the instructions given here on this matter in Deuteronomy are echoed by what Jesus taught throughout the four gospels of the New Testament. To ignore this requirement of "how then shall we live" as believers today, is to be missing a major chunk of what it means to be a follower of Christ in the 21st century.
David Guzik reminds us that satisfying this requirement was a demonstration of a grateful heart to all that God had blessed the Israelites with. How much more reason for us today to do likewise?
Let's end this review of these four verses on being charitable wth the wise words of Matthew Henry, who alone can state things this way:
- 1. "Say not, 'It is all my own, and why should not I have it?' But learn a generous contempt of property in small matters. One sheaf or two forgotten will make thee never the poorer at the year's end, and it will do somebody good, if thou have it not.'
- 2. "Say not, 'What I give I will give, and know whom I give it to, why should I leave it to be gathered by I know not whom, that will never thank me.' But trust God's providence with the disposal of thy charity, perhaps that will direct it to the most necessitous.' Or, "Thou mayest reasonably think it will come to the hands of the most industrious, that are forward to seek and gather that which this law provides for them.'
- 3. "Say not, 'What should the poor do with grapes and olives? It is enough for them to have bread and water;' for, since they have the same senses that the rich have, why should not they have some little share of the delights of sense?' Boaz ordered handfuls of corn to be left on purpose for Ruth, and God blessed him. All that is left is not lost.
Summary Comment I cannot, however, leave this section without commenting on an observation that I have made as I study my Bible. There is no escaping it, God in the Old Testament and Christ in the New Testament, have a lot to say to us about "aliens in our land, orphans, and widows". I know this realization has caused me to rethink my actions or lack thereof in this regard. I can only point this out to readers, and pray that they too will reconsider their actions in the 'necessary' and required support and blessing of aliens, orphans, and widows.
Note to reader: If you like the way we are studying scripture, why not subscribe to our posts by providing us just with your email? You can do that to the right of this column in the "Subscribe to" section. You can also search our earlier studies in the "Blog Archive" section below that. Finally, please encourage others to study along with us by sharing this link with your family and friends. Thank you and God bless. Ken G.
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