Sermon Tone Analysis

Incentive to Obey

Sometimes in life we are expected to do something, obey someone, or follow some orders, without knowing the reason, or perhaps not even respecting the person giving the orders.

You could ask anyone who has served in the military, and most likely they will tell you that at some point they had to follow an order that didn’t make sense; or, they had to follow an order that came from someone they did not respect.

When I was a young Marine, I was once tasked with raking a parking lot.

It was a gravel and dirt parking lot, and a visiting general was in the area, so several of us raked the parking lot of the mess hall, so that the General would be duly impressed if he were to come to lunch there.

There was much grumbling among us who were raking that parking lot, and even more so when the General never showed up for lunch anyway.

At other times, I was under the charge of someone who I personally felt should have no authority to give any orders whatsoever.

You would wonder, “How did this person get promoted?”

How could they possibly be given any authority at all?

And certainly, no matter what political spectrum you come from, there has likely been times where you viewed a public leader with disdain or derision, because they were very difficult for you to resect.

While this isn’t the point of this sermon, I would urge caution for all in how you think of and speak of anyone in leadership, because God himself is above all, and He is the one who puts into place the rulers.

I remember years ago, and I won’t give the exact year, but there was a lot of angst in the area I lived immediately following a presidential election, and I was driving past a church and the marquee sign out front that simply said “Romans 13” Romans 13:1-2

But this is easier said than done.

What if the authority seems to be incompetent, or even evil?

What if it seems the election was unfair, or people voted not knowing something that would have changed their vote?

Notice though, that Paul does not write that we are to be subject to the governing authorities we like or agree with.

And further down, he says give respect to whom respect is owed and honor to whom honor is owed.

Yet in nearly every case since I have been paying attention in my lifetime, the majority of those of the party opposite the current president have held that president in contempt.

They do not show proper respect or honor.

And we seem to have a hard time balancing our responsibility to be engaged in our republic and advocating for issues important to us with being respectful and decent.

I doubt not one of us in this room could say we have perfectly kept Romans 13.

So we struggle with authority, particularly if we disagree or if we think the one in authority is wrong or immoral, or whatever we think of them.

What can help us is to be reminded of what should be our proper motivation to be good followers.

Romans 13 is one scripture that guides us here.

We are given an incentive to be subject to the governing authorities.

One incentive is that authority comes from God, and authorities that exists have been instituted by God.

Not only that, but in Romans 13, Paul reminds the reader that governors bear the sword, that is, they are responsible to punish wrongdoers.

So if you want to avoid punishments, you obey the law, the only exception scripture gives is if following the law puts you at odds with God’s law.

But if you do good, you will not need to fear those in authority.

Again, a clarification is not made here that this only applies to leadership if you voted for it, or if your currently appreciate the direction they are going in.

So from national politics down to the local level, we are to obey laws and leaders.

Even in the HOA, and I can tell you, having recently attended my first homeowners meeting, that many of the people certainly had not read Romans 13 that day.

This morning, after a two week break, we return to Deuteronomy 4, and we have seen in this chapter so far that Moses commands obedience.

He has taught the people rules and statutes, which are from God and passed down through Moses, so that Moses is not the author or really the one in full authority, but rather God himself has made these decrees.

These statutes are to be made known to future generations as well.

We will see this recurring theme in the next few chapters, the theme of obedience to God and His commands, and the charge to teach these things to your children, grandchildren, and every generation.

So you may have seen an email from me a few weeks ago, and the governing board has been having discussions about bringing Sunday School back to Oasis Church, and the curriculum we are looking at is called D6, and D6 has a couple of meanings.

One, it is based upon Deuteronomy6.6-7

Second, the 6 also represents that the curriculum goes through the entire bible every six years.

And throughout the rest of the spring and summer, we will be seeing again and again this theme of obedience to God’s commands, the repetition of them, and the charge to every generation to teach and pass down God’s law.

And this is to be the highest goal and the most important task for parents and grandparents in particular, but to the whole community.

You are to always be talking about what it means to live for God.

It is to be a constant theme in your conversations.

So when you are sitting, when you are walking, or driving, when you are getting ready for bed, when you are waking up, you should be constantly reminding yourself and those you are given to care for of the things of God.

So as we learn about these things over the next few months, and are reminded again and again of this charge, my prayer is that as you hear God’s Word, especially regarding your responsibility to be part of a community that is constantly engaged in reminding ourselves what following God is all about, that you would be challenged and if need be convicted to do the work God has given you; If you are a parent with kids at home, that you would feel the need and conviction to obey these scriptures.

If you don’t have your own children, you may be given spiritual children to train up.

But as a church, we at Oasis must be obedient to God’s Word and foster a culture of always talking about these things.

So this is why I take very seriously my highest charge as your pastor, to make sure there are opportunities for every believer, young, old, new to the faith, mature in the faith, and everyone in between, to engage with God’s Word in a way that challenges us each to live it out.

So Deuteronomy 4. we started out with a command to obey, and to make these things known to each generation.

then in 15-30, we saw a prohibition against idolatry.

God is a consuming fire, a jealous God, He will not tolerate anything being held higher than Him in our esteem, and certainly not pathetic idols that are made by people.

This morning we will look at 32-40.

And here we see some incentives for our obedience.

You see, when it comes to obeying God, it isn’t like obeying a person.

We may wonder about orders from a person, whether they make sense or not.

You contemplate things like that as you are raking a parking lot.

But we need never to question God’s rulings.

We don’t question His authority, we don’t question His reasoning.

We don’t question whether He is qualified to be in charge or not.

In our passage this morning, this is what Moses is reminding the people.

Notice one of the first things Moses brings in as an implication is the creator and creature relationship we have with God.

Moses often reminded the people of the creation, and indeed, in many of the Jewish rituals, God as creator is a prevalent theme.

Devout Jews today still read the creation account routinely.

Drawing back to the creation, Moses is basically saying this: That from man’s perspective, that is, in human history, there has not been the sort of signs and wonders the people of the exodus have witnessed.

Of course, this refers to God speaking from the pillar of fire, and here we should note that is important that God is not the fire itself.

Yes, I know Moses had earlier used the phrase that God is a consuming fire.

Keep in mind this is not literal in the sense that God exists as a fire, or as any other physical thing.

Jesus told the woman at the well, “God is Spirit”.

And so Moses does not use the language that God appeared to them as fire, but rather, that he spoke out of the midst of the fire.

The people of the Exodus witnessed this, and there is a level of amazement stacked on another level of amazement in that the first amazement if that the people witnessed this; Not only did they witness this, but they survived.

You heard the voice of God and lived.

This speaks to the holiness of God.

You may remember Isaiah’s fear at encountering God: Isa6.1-7

We know that even those beings that are simply God’s messengers struck fear into the heart of just about everyone who encountered them.

From Zechariah in Luke 1, to many other encounters that people had with God’s messengers, we see the common statement of those angels, “fear not”.

They say that apparently because the response of people to an angelic encounter is fear and trembling.

If the holiness of angels is enough to make men tremble, how much more the holiness of God!

In fact in human terms, no one of us would survive in the unfiltered presence of God.

The only reason we can even encounter God is that He protect us from his own holiness.

He provides for us to approach His throne room through the provision of His Son, Jesus.

The people of Israel had heard the very voice of God, and lived!

Another rhetorical question.

The clear answer is no.

No other god has done this.

Of course, this is not some admission by Moses that there are other Gods.

Remember, in scripture, just as in literature today, literary devises were used, and this is a rhetorical statement.

Really it is a statement made as a question, probably for making the point stronger.

Clearly there is no other God, and even the gods men have made for themselves have not done what God has done, in selecting for himself a people, and bringing them out through trials, showing signs and wonders, making war on their behalf against Egypt.

Again and again God had proven himself to Israel.

So many signs and wonders, from the plagues of Egypt to the parting of the Red Sea, to the pillar of fire and the pillar of cloud, to the provision of food and water in the wilderness, to the snakes and the remedy of the brass serpent, to the victories in battle, God had proven himself.

Moses is well aware of the fear that hearing God’s voice brought.

It was a form of discipline to them.

Remember the difference between discipline and punishment.

Even though sometimes punishment and discipline are the same thing, it is not necessarily the case.

Sometimes punishment comes that does not bring any learning or result in increased obedience.

Discipline is not just punitive.

Discipline is to help someone grow into their potential.

Loving fathers discipline their children.

They don’t simply operate out of wrath, but out of love.

If a child is misbehaving and they hear the voice of their father, then they may be jolted out of their disobedience into obedience.