Deuteronomy 19:1-13

hey hey good morning good morning welcome to coffee and devotions this morning we're at Deuteronomy chapter 19 we're going to look at about the first 15 verses this is regarding our sorry 13 verses 13 15 13 that's right 13 versus we're going to be looking at the Cities of Refuge what do you do when you're setting up a nation and you have horrible things happen like manslaughter accidental deaths and and even outright murders but how how how would they deal with that so let's have some coffee we'll pray we'll get into God's word let's pray father we thank you so much for your word father we thank you for the blessing it is to have your word and to read how you established a nation how you gave them a law and how you told them through various sunry and case laws how they were to handle things Lord how you reveal yourself as a God of Justice Lord we pray that you would please help us to understand your word teach us to know what it's talking about but also help us Lord to take the principles that are embedded and rooted in it from you we pray that you would help us to understand it in our lives in jesus' name amen all right here we go Deuteronomy chapter 19 the first 13 verses when the word of the Lord your God has cut off the Nations whose land is the Lord your God is giving you and you dispossess them and dwell in their cities and in in their houses you shall separate three cities for yourself in the midst of your land which Jehovah your God is giving you to possess you shall prepare roads for yourself and divide into three parts the territory of your land which Jehovah your God is giving you to inherit that you that any manslayer May flee there and this is the case of the manslayer who flees there that he may live whoever kills his neighbor unintentionally not having hated him in the past as when a man goes to the woods with his neighbor to cut timber and his hand swings a stroke with the axe to cut down the dream and head slips off from the handle and Strikes his neighbors so that he dies he shall flee to one of these cities and live lest the Avenger of blood while he is hot in anger pursu the manslayer and overtake him because the way is long and kill him though he was not deserving of death since he had not hated the victim in the past therefore I command you saying you shall separate three cities for yourself now if the Lord your God enlarges your territory as he has swore as he swore to your fathers and gives you the land which he promised to give to your fathers and if you keep all these Commandments and do them which I command you today to love the Lord your God and to walk always in his ways then you shall add three more cities for yourselves beside these three lest innocent blood be shed in the midst of your land which Jehovah your God is giving you as an inheritance and thus blood guilt be upon you but if anyone hates his neighbor lies in wait for him Rises against him and Strikes him mortally so that he dies and he flees to one of these cities then the Elders of his City shall send and bring him from there and deliver him over to the land of the Avenger of blood that he may die your eyes shall not pity him but you shall put away the guilt of innocent blood from Israel that it may go well with you well we need to ask ourselves a what's this about B what's the best verse to summarize this and C what are we called to do so a what is this about they're going to go into the land they're going to inherit it right the Lord's giving it to them there's people there they're going to fight against them the Lord's going to dispossess those people this is his doing it's his land he gets to do with it what he wants gives it to the Israelites not because they're good enough but he just gives it to them but in they when they go in they need to have a system of justice that sets up even for horrible accidents right if something happens where they're going to go and there's two guys that go out to the woods are cutting down a tree the head slips off the ax flies off and ACD accidentally kill someone we call that manslaughter they're calling this person the manslayer right didn't hate his buddy he didn't have any malice against him he didn't bad talk him down at the tavern or anything no he he was friends with this guy they were co-workers and now they were neighbors and now that guy's dead he's got to have a place to go right he the Lord's a lot of the law that the Lord gives here is just look people are going to sin and they're sinful things so how is God mitigating that damage right he's not saying that all these things are good that manslaughter is good anything like that he's saying look this is the real life that you're going to live in because you're a sinful people and you're going to follow me and I'm like out of justice so here's how I'm going to display it they're going to have these three cities right kind of three different outposts and they need to have roads that go to them and if something like this happens the guy who accidentally killed his buddy he's got to be able to get to one of those cities and find Safe Haven he's got to be able to run there and find refuge and so these are the three Cities of Refuge now the goyel that Avenger of blood right this family member who might get super hot under the collar right you killed my brother I'm goingon to kill you right you got to have a safe place for that guy to go but the family does have a right to seek Justice and it's in that City of Refuge that there's going to be a trial and I to figure out whether this was murder or manslaughter and if it was murder and if it was murder notice very carefully if it was actually murder then the Elders of the city shall send and bring him from there and deliver him over to the hand of the Avenger of blood that he may die right this same Commandment that the lord gave all the way back in Genesis right if a man sheds another man's blood by man's hands shall his blood be shed right capital punishment is still a Biblical principle and in Israel if it's not manslaughter if it's murder then it's a capital offense and the man can't just hide behind the lie that oh it was an accident it was an accident no if you were talking bad about this guy to everyone else in town and every and people knew he had beef with him they were going to say that this was murder and capital punishment was the Judgment for that so what is this about right this is about manslaughter and murder these Cities of Refuge But ultimately it's about what happens with horrible accidents and God's justice even with manslaughter and murder and how would God of mitigate that potential for Injustice so that's what I think this is about the best verse to summarize this well uh I have in my Bible verse 4 underlined but I think I probably better would be verse three but I also do have verse 12 underlined about if but but if it's murder what do you do uh so maybe verse three and verse 12 you could disagree with that feel free to write it in the comments let me know that's fine last SE calling what are we called to do well do we still hold to Justice right are we slow to avenge blood are we careful to make sure there's a testimony of two or three Witnesses do we know that God is a God of Justice and that we also live in a fallen world that there are times that horrible things happen and it's not anybody's fault it's the definition of an accident yeah God is Sovereign but sometimes there's tragic things that happen there needs to be a system of justice set up that we can trust that life is going to be preserved but so is justice but I think we're all somewhat and rightly so outraged in our society when we see people who have outright killed other people it's not manslaughter it's murder and our Criminal Justice System puts them in jail for you know what 15 20 years maybe 30 years and then lets them out of prison and the recidivism rate is pretty high murder somebody else or hurt somebody else injur somebody else and you wonder why was this ever allowed to happen we have to cry out to the God of Justice but we have to know in this life there's always going to be injustices like this there's always going to be mistakes there's always going to be accidents and tragedies because we live in a fallen world and so we look forward to that day when Jesus Christ the just one will come and make all things right again let's pray father we do pray for our own Nation we pray for our judges that they would make just judgments we pray for our legislator that they would make just laws we pray for our criminal justice system that they would would do justly Lord we pray for each of them that they would know what is good and what is right and that they would follow in accordance with your will Lord we pray that life would be upheld and preserved both for those who are involved in tragic accidents but also for those who would be victims of horrific violence and for those Lord who are the family members who are robbed of loved ones because of violence Lord we pray pleading with you in our own country that you would give us Justice we pray in the churches that you would give Elders wisdom with Justice as well father please we live in a fallen World help us to look unto you Lord that we might cry out maratha Lord please come quickly in Jesus's name amen well may you know that the King of Kings and the Lord of of Lords is a lord of righteousness and Justice and will someday come again to judge the living and the Dead with perfect Equity look to Jesus the author and perfector of your faith I'll see you next time bye