The Joy of Glory

Judges 2:11-15 (click here)
And the people of Israel did what was evil in the sight of the LORD and served the Baals. And they abandoned the LORD, the God of their fathers, who had brought them out of the land of Egypt. They went after other gods, from among the gods of the peoples who were around them, and bowed down to them. And they provoked the LORD to anger. (Judges 2:11-12)

Reflection
There I was. Caught red-handed.

Well ok… I don’t know if the paint on my hand was actually red, but there was no denying I was responsible for every ounce of paint splattered all over myself and the back porch. It basically looked like I had decided to try and juggle the paint can. How did I end up in such a colossal mess? Well, it didn’t happen all at once.

My mother was painting the back porch… I was watching, or playing, or doing whatever I did when I was roughly three-years-old.

She needed to go inside for something and left me alone with strict instructions not to touch anything. Her mistake. It wasn’t long before I was pawing at a screwdriver she’d left lying on the floor. I was just poking at it… no big deal.

Then I was picking it up. Then I was pretending it was a sword. Then I was dropping it… right into the paint can.

No problem… I can fix this… I’ll just reach right into the paint can and pull out the screwdriver. But what’s this? A new problem has developed because now my hand is covered in paint! Well, I’ll just shake it off! When all of a sudden…

Enter the mother!

And one small step of disobedience at a time turned into a slippery slide of rebellion that got all over everything.

This is what happened to Israel at the beginning of the book of Judges. When we read that they “did what was evil in the sight of the LORD and served the Baals,” we mustn’t imagine that happened overnight.

No one wakes up and thinks… today I’ll try idolatry!

No… the slippery slide into that rebellion happens one small step of disobedience at a time. For the people of Israel, it began by not completely clearing the promised land of its former pagan inhabitants as God had told them to do. As a result, they lived surrounded by the gods of other peoples.

These gods became normal to them… and then enticing… and before they knew it… the “paint” of idolatry was splattered all over everything.

This is how it happened to them… and this is how it happens to us… one small step of disobedience at a time. And so we pray today, “God guard our steps! Keep us by your power! Light our way with your word and establish our steps! Bring us all the way home so that you get all the glory!”

“Now to HIM who is able to keep you from stumbling and to present you blameless before the presence of his glory with great joy,  to the only God, our Savior, through Jesus Christ our Lord, be glory, majesty, dominion, and authority, before all time and now and forever. Amen.” (Jude 24-25)

*All previous devotionals may be found at www.thejoyofglory.com
*The complete SVCC Lenten reading guide is available here.

Hosea 1-3
On Sundays there will be no written devotional as the reading for that day also serves as the sermon text for Shades Valley Community Church. If you would like to listen to this morning’s sermon on Hosea 1-3 you may do so by clicking here.

Deuteronomy 7:6-13 (click here)
It was not because you were more in number than any other people that the LORD set his love on you and chose you, for you were the fewest of all peoples, but it is because the LORD loves you and is keeping the oath that he swore to your fathers, that the LORD has brought you out with a mighty hand and redeemed you from the house of slavery, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt. Know therefore that the LORD your God is God, the faithful God who keeps covenant and steadfast love with those who love him and keep his commandments, to a thousand generations, and repays to their face those who hate him, by destroying them. He will not be slack with one who hates him. He will repay him to his face. (Deuteronomy 7:7-10)

Reflection
What assurance do you have that God loves you? What makes you think that God will keep on loving you day after day?

I know that my own heart is so fickle and prone to wander… prone to forget… just like the people of Israel in the Old Testament. God’s people were always forgetting, always wandering away from him. What assurance could they possibly have that he would continue to love them day after day… failure after failure?

Deuteronomy 7:7-8, “It was not because YOU were more in number than any other people that the LORD set his love on you and chose you, for you were the fewest of all peoples, but it is because the LORD loves you and is keeping the oath that he swore to your fathers…”

The people’s assurance of God’s love was not rooted in how lovely or faithful they were… it was and is rooted in the greatness of God’s own love and faithfulness! My assurance that God loves me and will continue to love me has nothing to do with me, but everything to do with him and the kind of God he is!

That is amazing Gospel good news!… but then you keep reading in Deuteronomy 7 and it seems like everything I’ve just said… everything God has just said seemingly comes unraveled by what he says next.

Deuteronomy 7:9, “Know therefore that the LORD your God is God, the faithful God who keeps covenant and steadfast love with those who love him and keep his commandments…”

Wait! So God’s faithfulness depends on my commandment keeping? I’m doomed!

Again and again in the Old Testament, we see these twin truths set side by side… God is loving and faithful towards his people… AND… he is just towards all who sin. How can both of those things be true? My hope hinges on how this is possible!

My hope… our hope… hinges on Christ!

Christ faithfully kept the commandments of God… and on the cross, he took on our unfaithfulness and gave us his faithfulness!

Through the cross, our assurance is made complete! God has shown himself to be the great-loving-faithful God by taking on flesh and keeping our side of the covenant as well as his own! And now HE is at work by HIS power transforming us into an a people who are actually faithful!

Again we arrive at the answer that our assurance that God loves us and will continue to love us has nothing to do with us, but everything to do with him and the kind of God he is!

Turn to him… trust in him… not in yourself! There is no assurance to be found in our fickle, wandering hearts! There is full and final assurance to be found in the eternally faithful heart of God!

*All previous devotionals may be found at www.thejoyofglory.com
*The complete SVCC Lenten reading guide is available here.