Promised Blessings: The Details -- Deuteronomy 28:1-14

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Do Israel's Promised Blessings Apply to Us? -- Deuteronomy 28:1-14

In this 28th chapter of Deuteronomy, Moses expands on two words from the previous chapter -- blessings and curses. In this first passage, verses 1-14, he provides the Israelites with the details of the blessings that God will provide under certain conditions. Throughout all the writings so far with respect to the Covenant God made with Israel, there were elements of the blessings that would be as Matthew Henry says, at three levels -- personal, family, and national, with the emphasis of course on the national level. But we cannot avoid seeing how often Israel is blessed through the blessing of individual families and later on, as will see in the rest of the Old Testament, individuals themselves. 

I also like the way Robert Jamieson lays out the real purpose and impact of this chapter for us when he says:

"In this chapter the blessings and curses are enumerated at length, and in various minute details, so that on the first entrance of the Israelites into the land of promise, their whole destiny was laid before them, as it was to result from their obedience or the contrary."

Let me make the following point here and get it out of the way. Salvation is free. You can't do anything for it except accepting it as a free gift of God through His Son Jesus Christ. But blessings are not a big free giveaway. They weren't in the days of Israel and they aren't now, no matter what some of your TV preacher friends may tell you. They come with conditions.

They are conditional on two things as indicated very clearly in verse 1 of this chapter: "IF you will diligently obey the Lord your God" and in case we misunderstand what that means, Moses goes on to say, "being careful to do all His commandments".  [Please note, the word "If" in the verse isn't there just for fun. It never is there just for fun in any part of Scripture.]

If you can do that, then blessings start to flow. So many of us in 2021 are wondering where our blessings are. Why are we not being blessed?  Why doesn't this thing work? Perhaps the answer may be because we have failed to read the instruction pamphlet. Which part of verse 1 aren't we following?  Is it the being diligent part?  I think that's the one that matters today.  We can't possibly be satisfying all 613 of the laws. And besides, that is why Jesus died -- because no one could satisfy that requirement.

But we can diligently obey the Lord in all He tells US, you and me, personally, to do. Our blessings friends will, for all intent and purpose, indeed be related to that. That is not to say that God won't bless more than we deserve in our lame attempt at diligent obedience if He wants to. He can and often does. But it is also to say that He may hold off because right now He wants more obedience from you or me. He is God. It's His call.

David Guzik provides this interesting bit of history in relation to this chapter:

"As a literary form, this chapter is similar to ancient treaties between a king and his people; this is God the King, making a covenant with His people, Israel. 'In the ancient Near East it was customary for legal treaties to conclude with passages containing blessings upon those who observed the enactments, and curses upon those who did not.' (Harrrison)"

So what will God do for the Israelites and I believe, for you and I, where appropriate, if we do our part?  Let's take a look:

Verse 1: The Lord your God will set you high above all the nations of the earth. You will be honored among others -- at school, at work, in the community.

Verse 2: All these blessings will overtake you. You will be awed and amazed. Henry says it this way: "Good people sometimes, under the sense of their unworthiness, are ready to fly from the blessing and to conclude that it belongs not to them,; but the blessing shall find them out and follow them notwithstanding."  Wow, obey God and you can't run away from the blessings. I believe we can claim that.

Verse 3: Blessings will follow you around no matter where you go. No matter where you go. That to me also speaks of protection in our travels, especially these days.

Verse 4: Your children will be blessed and so will your land and your livestock. The fruits of your labor.

Verse 5: You will have all you need at home to eat.

Verse 6: You will be recognized at home and outside your home.

Verse 7: Your enemies won't stand a chance against you. You will be blessed in actual warfare of all types.

Verse 8: All your well-intentioned God-approved projects will be blessed. Again, to me this speaks of success in our employment from God's perspective, not necessarily ours. That means He may want us to leave a job, or He arranges for us to lose a job because there is something else He wants us to do. I know that's hard to accept but that is what this is all about.  Obedience means obedience and that comes with total trust on Him.

Verse 9: The Lord will deem you, and make you, His holy people for Himself. This may be the best blessing -- a special relationship with God, now available to each and every one of us.

Verse 10: People will fear you because you are called by the Lord's name. I think many godless people are going after Christians today while they have safety in numbers because they really fear what Christians claiming the whole power of God could do.

Verse 11: You will prosper with offspring, crops, and livestock. Now Henry again here says there is method in God's promise. He writes, "They should be rich, and have an abundance of all the good things of this life, which are promised them, not merely that they might have the pleasure of enjoying them, but (as bishop Patrick observes out of one of the Jewish writers) that they might have wherewithal to honour God, and might be helped and encouraged to serve him cheerfully and to proceed and persevere in their obedience to him."  Where have we heard the idea of "blessed to be a blessing" before? 

Verse 12: You will have access to God's storehouse, including rain for your crops, so that you can help others and not need their help. Or said another way, you will have influence among other nations. How true that is today. Every politician is concerned about what Israel is doing or might do. But at the same time, every nation is aware of what Israel has accomplished in science, especially medicine, and research. 

Verse 13: You will be a leader of others, not the other way around. The phrase "the Lord will make you the head and not the tail" stems, according to Robert Jamieson, from "an Oriental form of expression, indicating the possession of independent power and great dignity and acknowledged excellence ( Isa 9:14 19:15 )."

Henry says, "both the promises and the threatenings are designed to bring and hold us to our duty, yet it is better that we be allured to that which is good by a filial hope of God's favour than that we be frightened to it by a servile fear of his wrath. That obedience pleases best which comes from a principle of delight in God's goodness." That is, let us not follow these conditions out of fear of what may happen, but rather because we want to please our God.

Guzik again helps us out here:

"God's purpose in blessing Israel was greater than just enriching the nation for its own sake. He intended to glorify Himself through blessing them. When Israel walked after the LORD, these blessings were real; one example of this is when the Queen of Sheba came to Solomon and saw a nation so blessed, she knew it had to be of God (1 Kings 10:1-13)."

And the passage ends with another warning: Don't turn aside from any of the words you were commanded to follow. Moses then adds God's favorite emphasis with respect to what God hates -- Don't go after other gods to serve them. Henry sees this as a third condition in addition to those mentioned above.

Before we move on into the next passage the next time in our study, I wanted to share with you what David Guzik says about what we're looking at:

"The idea behind the choice [that Israel and we have to obey or not to obey] is that God was determined to reveal Himself to the world through Israel. He would do this either by making them so blessed that the world would know only God could have blessed them so; or by making them so cursed that only God could have cursed them and cause them to still survive. The choice was up to Israel."

I believe that was true for Israel, as it was for Job later on, and also true for us today. Read that one paragraph above one more time and let it sink in as it applies to you and me. We have a choice. Make it well.

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