Deuteronomy 4:32-40 For ask now of the days that are past, which were before you, since the day that God created man on the earth… Moses would have the Israelites to regard God's deliverance of them from Egypt as a matter for the most grateful admiration. There had been nothing like it since the beginning of the world. There was direct and immediate communion with God; there was deliverance of the people from Egypt by unexampled judgments; and all was to show his character as a sovereign and loving God. The effect of such a discipline should be filial obedience. It suggests the following lessons:- I. THE LORD'S PEOPLE SHOULD GRATEFULLY STUDY THEIR DELIVERANCE. The marvelous Exodus from Egypt and communion at Sinai were deserving of the most faithful study. No people had ever been so favored before. But our personal deliverance from the bondage of sin, our march through the wilderness of life, our fellowship with God from the mountain-top of ordinances, the entire experience of a spiritual soul, combine to eclipse even the discipline of Israel. Each one is prepared, who understands his state, to say, "Come and hear, all ye that fear God, and I will declare what he hath done for my soul" (Psalm 66:16). II. UNPARALLELED EXPERIENCE FROM GOD ARGUES AN UNPARALLELED GOD. For it is a revelation of his powers and character he makes in these matters, and we are expected to reason from our experience up to himself. "Unto thee it was showed," said Moses, "that thou mightest know that the Lord he is God; there is none else beside him." He moves in an unparalleled fashion, that we may recognize in him the unparalleled One. The use of personal experience is, therefore, to reach the Divine side of it, and see what reflection of Deity it presents. III. IT WAS GOD'S LOVE WHICH HE ILLUSTRATED IN BRINGING ISRAEL FROM EGYPT TO CANAAN. The casting out of the Canaanites, the extermination of the idolaters, was judgment justly exercised upon them; but it was love towards Israel. Hence one of the psalmists makes these conquests a proof that "his mercy endureth forever" (Psalm 136:17-22). And God's dealings with his people always are to illustrate his love, They find how all things work together for good unto them (Romans 8:28). IV. IT IS FILIAL OBEDIENCE HIS PEOPLE SHOULD RENDER. The similarity between ver. 40 and the fifth commandment of the Decalogue is certainly remarkable. The idea of God's fatherhood is as certainly in the mind of Moses and of the filial obedience of Israel. Long life is attached to their filial obedience to God, as it is attached in that commandment to the filial obedience we render to man. And indeed this "fatherhood of God," with its correlative "sonship of man," constitutes the crowning relation into which God and man come. How glorious it is l Earth becomes the school of God's children; the promise of the life that now is cheers them on, and heaven contracts the kindly light of home. We should never rest contented till our study of God's dealings leads us into assurances and hopes like these. The Israelites were to be obedient, and in consequence successful children; and the same blessed conditions become ours by faith! - R.M.E. Parallel Verses KJV: For ask now of the days that are past, which were before thee, since the day that God created man upon the earth, and ask from the one side of heaven unto the other, whether there hath been any such thing as this great thing is, or hath been heard like it? |
    |