Christian Living

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Blessin’s & Cursin’s (Part 3 of 4)

“Now it shall come to pass, if you diligently obey the voice of the LORD your God, to observe carefully all His commandments which I command you today, that the LORD your God will set you high above all nations of the earth. And all these blessings shall come upon you and overtake you, because you obey the voice of the LORD your God:
“Blessed shall you be in the city, and blessed shall you be in the country.
“Blessed shall be the fruit of your body, the produce of your ground and the increase of your herds, the increase of your cattle and the offspring of your flocks.
“Blessed shall be your basket and your kneading bowl.
“Blessed shall you be when you come in, and blessed shall you be when you go out.
“The LORD will cause your enemies who rise against you to be defeated before your face; they shall come out against you one way and flee before you seven ways.
“The LORD will command the blessing on you in your storehouses and in all to which you set your hand, and He will bless you in the land which the LORD your God is giving you.
“The LORD will establish you as a holy people to Himself, just as He has sworn to you, if you keep the commandments of the LORD your God and walk in His ways. Then all peoples of the earth shall see that you are called by the name of the LORD, and they shall be afraid of you. And the LORD will grant you plenty of goods, in the fruit of your body, in the increase of your livestock, and in the produce of your ground, in the land of which the LORD swore to your fathers to give you. The LORD will open to you His good treasure, the heavens, to give the rain to your land in its season, and to bless all the work of your hand. You shall lend to many nations, but you shall not borrow. And the LORD will make you the head and not the tail; you shall be above only, and not be beneath, if you heed the commandments of the LORD your God, which I command you today, and are careful to observe them. So you shall not turn aside from any of the words which I command you this day, to the right or the left, to go after other gods to serve them. Deuteronomy 28:1-14 NKJV

In Part 2, we determined that whether we should focus on blessings or the cursings of Deuteronomy 28 comes down to whether our focus is on FAITH or LAW. Here, we look at why that is.

Faith

As mentioned in Part 2, God established his people through the descendants of Abraham, but the Law did not come until the children of Israel were freed from centuries of slavery in Egypt. Abraham’s relationship with God was through Faith, not the Law; Isaac, Abraham’s son, related to God through Faith, not the Law; Jacob, Isaac’s son, whom God re-named Israel, related to God through Faith, not the Law; and so on, until Moses delivered the Israelites out of slavery. We saw in Part 2 that God established a strict set of laws and demanded that people strictly adhere to those laws in order to keep sin at a minimum in preparation for the coming of Jesus as our savior – as “the Lamb of God who [would take] away the sins of the world” (John 1:29) – and that once Jesus had done so, God began to measure our obedience by our acceptance of Jesus as our savior, through Faith, rather than by how perfectly we can keep a list of laws.

The Israelites who came out of Egyptian slavery were essentially unfamiliar with their ancestor Abraham and his God. They knew their heritage in a sort of outline form, but living for so long in the wealthy, pagan Egyptian society had severely limited their understanding of how Abraham, once a pagan himself, had believed, trusted and depended upon God through sheer faith, as God had always intended people to relate to Him. The Israelites lacked the faith of Abraham and were continually falling into the sin of doubting, disbelieving and accusing God.

Where Abraham’s Faith caused him to be “fully persuaded that God was able to perform” as He had promised (Romans 4:20-21), the Israelites constantly murmured and complained that God didn’t care about them. Abraham believed God, and his Faith was accounted to him as righteousness.” (Galatians 3:6) The Law was established to compel obedience, but the Law, without perfect obedience, also brought with it a curse. (Galatians 3:10) The Israelites questioned and disbelieved God and were made accountable under the Law – until Jesus.

Jesus, through His work on the cross, took the curse for our disobedience. Jesus’ death, burial and resurrection and our belief and acceptance of that as payment for our sins puts us back where Abraham was. (See Galatians 3:13-14) Because of Jesus, we can be in right standing with God, redeemed from every curse and eligible for every blessing, which is where God had always intended us to be.

In Part 4, the conclusion, we answer the question: Why are we Curse-Focused!?!

**Adapted from the author's website at http://www.seedwords.com/pages.asp?pageid=78979

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