Word of Encouragement (12/08/2022)
When you have finished paying all the tithe of your produce in the third year, which is the year of tithing, giving it to the Levite, the sojourner, the fatherless, and the widow, so that they may eat within your towns and be filled, 13 then you shall say before the LORD your God, ‘I have removed the sacred portion out of my house, and moreover, I have given it to the Levite, the sojourner, the fatherless, and the widow, according to all your commandment that you have commanded me. I have not transgressed any of your commandments, nor have I forgotten them. 14 I have not eaten of the tithe while I was mourning, or removed any of it while I was unclean, or offered any of it to the dead. I have obeyed the voice of the LORD my God. I have done according to all that you have commanded me. 15 Look down from your holy habitation, from heaven, and bless your people Israel and the ground that you have given us, as you swore to our fathers, a land flowing with milk and honey.’ (Deut. 26:12-15)
Let us observe how this petition connects the people of Israel (“your people Israel”) with the promised land (“the ground that you have given us, as you swore to our fathers, a land flowing with milk and honey”). The well-being of the people of Israel is bound up with the fertility of the land. There doesn’t seem to be anything special about this fact. For all nations, a close connection between their well-being and the land, in which they live, exists. This was true especially in the ancient world, which did not have the kind of technology we have to overcome the limitations of the land.
But for the people of Israel, their land was not where they happened to settle by chance; their land was divinely gifted to them by God’s covenant: “the ground that you have given us, as you swore to our fathers....” The land was one of the central features of God’s covenant with Abraham: “To your offspring I will give this land” (Gen. 12:7). As we saw yesterday, by that same covenant, the produce of the land was joined to Israel’s covenant faithfulness, or the lack thereof (Deut. 28). That is why God demanded Israel to testify to their faithfulness to God’s law as they brought their offerings and offered this petition to God (vv. 13-14).
So then, is it any surprise that, as the Israelites asked the LORD to bless them, they also pleaded with Him to bless the land, in which they lived by God’s gracious provision? When the land was rich in produce, the people took it as a sign of God’s favor. When the land was afflicted with drought and famine, they knew that God was displeased with them. We can say that Israel’s fate was bound up with the land. That was why the final curse mentioned in the list of the curses to strike Israel for her persistent rebellion would be to be cast out of the promised land (Deut. 28:63-68).
How about us Christians? Our inheritance from God is not the promised land of Israel, is it? No! Our inheritance is what Israel’s promised land pointed to—the heavenly promised land, from which we will never be exiled. God has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus (Eph. 1:3), which will never be taken from us. This is true because we received all of them not on the basis of our righteousness, of which there is none, but on the basis of Christ’s perfect righteousness.
So then, what should we pray for? We are bound up with the kingdom of heaven, the heavenly promised land. The sign of God’s favor or displeasure is no longer the produce of the land; it is rather the fruit of the Spirit. But why should we pray for this when we have already received every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places? We are praying that we will experience and enjoy these blessings more and more and that their surpassing goodness will manifest itself in the world more and more through our transformed lives. How should this truth affect your prayer life?