Leviticus 26:14-39

hey hey good morning good morning good morning welcome to coffee and devotions this where every day you and I we get together we have a little bit of coffee we get into God's word we grow in our love for the Lord together and this year Lord willing will'll make it from Genesis through Leviticus I'm glad to be with you this morning but you know I already recorded this episode the kids and I sat down we worked all through it went to the computer it's gone somehow we accidentally hit record once and then a second time and it started recording and then it recorded about 3 seconds of it and turned off for some reason so uh you don't get the kids you get me going through this again quickly but why don't we have some coffee we'll pray and we'll get into God's word let's pray father we thank you so much for your word and we thank you for this day Lord we pray that you would please help us to understand this word and that your spirit would please apply it to our lives in Jesus's name amen well we're at Leviticus CH 26 Leviticus CH 26 and we're going to be looking at Verses 4 14 down through or sorry yeah 14 down through 40 and so it's a longer section and it it's essentially right there's a covenant King the Lord himself and he's making a covenant with this his people the Israelites and the first part is if they keep his Covenant if they keep his Commandments there's going to be blessings but if they don't there's going to be curses and this is the curses section of that Covenant this is very very typical of an Eastern near e or ancient NE Eastern uh Nation where you would have a vassel a king blessings and curses so here we go but if you do not obey me and you do not observe all these Commandments and if you despise my statutes or if your soul upor my judgments so that you do not perform all the Commandments but break my Covenant I also will do this to you right so they don't walk in his ways they don't keep his Commandments they turn away and go contrary to him this is what he's going to do to them instead of all the blessings he's going to flip those blessings on their head I will even appoint Terror over you wasting disease and fever which shall consume the eyes and cause sorrow of heart and you shall sow your seed in vain for your enemy shall eat it I will set my face against you and she and you shall be defeated by your enemies those who hate you shall reign over you and you shall flee when no one pursues you do you see now it's flipped the they're going to have diseases and plagues they're going to have fleeing away even when nobody pursues them and and so they're going to be defeated by their enemies this is the opposite of what he had told them before right it would be five who chase away like a hundred and 100 would chase away a thousand right and now it's not nobody's even going to be chasing you and you're going to run away all right so let's go ahead and dig in more and after all this if you do not obey me then I will punish you 7 times more for your sins I will break the pride of your power I will make your Heavens like iron and your earth like bronze and your strength shall be spent in vain and your land shall not yield its produce nor shall the Trees of the land yield their fruit what does this mean he's going to break their pride by shutting up the rain and hardening the ground he's going to make them have no produce their work is going to be useless then if you walk contrary to me and are not willing to obey me I will bring on you seven times more plagues according to your sins I will also send wild beasts among you which shall rob you of your children destroy your livestock and make you few in number and your highways shall be desolate right he's going to bring plagues but he's also going to be bring wild beasts are going to attack them attract their herds and it's going to make them unsafe to walk around in the streets and if by these things you are not reformed by me but walk contrary to me then I also will walk contrary to you and I will punish you yet seven times for your sins and I will bring a sword against you that will execute the vengence of the Covenant when you are gathered together within your cities I will send pestilence among you and you shall be delivered into the hand of the enemy when I have cut off your supply of bread 10 women shall break bake your bread in one oven and they shall bring back your bread by weight and you shall eat and not be satisfied right this idea of he's going to pay them back Sevenfold is this idea of perfection right he's going to pay them back perfectly for all the walking contr and notice the language here if by these things you are not ref formed by me right the Lord is bringing these judgments graciously we might say like a father disciplining his children that they might turn back to the Covenant and walk in his ways but if they are stiff necked if they are hard in heart and they're hellbent on walking contrary to him this is what's going to happen he's going to shut up their cities there's going to be pestilence and they're not going to have food they're going to be hungry and after all this if you do not obey me but walk contr contary to me then I also will walk contrary to you in Fury and I even I will chastise you seven times for your sins you see the Lord is gracious he he gives them a certain amount of judgment to bring them back they won't listen he gives them more judgment to bring them back they won't listen gives them more judgment to bring them back they won't listen you shall eat the Flesh of your sons and you shall eat the Flesh of your daughters I will destroy your high places cut down your in altars and cast your carcasses on the lifeless forms of your idols and my soul shall abore you I will lay your cities waste and bring your sanctuaries to Desolation and I will not smell the fragrance of your sweet Aromas I will bring the land to Desolation and your enemies who dwell in it shall be astonished at it I will scatter you among the Nations and draw a sword after you your land shall be desolate and your cities waste then the land shall enjoy its sabbaths as long as it lies desolate and you are in your enemy's land and the land shall rest and enjoy its sabbaths as long as it lies desolate it shall rest for the time it does not rest on your sabbaths when you dwell in it the Lord says okay eventually I'm going to upore you I'm going to turn away from you I'm going to have your enemies come and they're going to conquer you I'm not going to put up with even what you do in the Tabernacle anymore no more incense no more Aroma I'm going to take that from you and you're going to be exiled but it's going to get so bad in your cities that you're going to eat your Offspring this is the terribleness of God's judgment not terrible in the fact that God is horrible but that is horrifying it is Terror it is terrifying and is meant to be that and here's the thing God isn't one who just makes threats he told them this was going to happen in 2 Chronicles 38 the Lord tells us these things came to pass they did have famine there was times Without Rain there was pestilence there were wild beasts as the people turned their back on the Covenant the Lord turned his face towards these curses in the Covenant and as for those who are left I will send faintness into their hearts in the lands of the enemies the sound of a shaken Leaf shall cause them to flee they shall flee as of fleeing from a sword and they shall fall when no one pursues they shall stumble over one another as if it were before a sword when no one pursues and you shall have no power to stand before your enemies You Shall Perish among the Nations and your land of your enemies shall eat you up and those of you who are left shall waste away in their iniquity in your enemy lands also in their father's iniquities which are with them they shall waste away it says they're going to pursue you and you're going to try to run but you're not going to be able to get away you're going to be so scared for your life even when no one does pursue you it's like you're walking out in the dark night and there's you hear the leaves rustling behind you and even though no one's there but the wind you're going to run like the wind I'm going to turn you into cowards the Brave Hearts that they would have in Joshua's day would turned towards even their kings fleeing away from the king of Babylon the Lord did these things second chronicles 36 the Lord remembered these curses and so what's the best verse to summarize this well I have a number of things underlined in my Bible you might underline something else but I would say uh verses 14 and 15 I think is what gets at the heart of this right verses 14 and 15 but if you do not obey me and do not observe all these Commandments and if you despise my statutes or if your soul upor my judgments so that you do not perform all my Commandments but break my Covenant I will also do this to you right I think that that's the beginning of the Clause of stipulation the curses of not keeping his Covenant well we know what this is about right the Covenant and the Covenant curses we know that these things came true we read about it in 1 and 2 Kings and 1 and 2 Chronicles we read about it in the Major Prophets when we read through things like Jeremiah and Isaiah right we read about it in the Minor Prophets all over the place in the Old Testament that these things did come true but that's old Covenant what does it mean for us now what how does this point us to Christ well you see the Lord did remember these curses and we have to be careful because we might think of ourselves as being better than the Old Testament Israelites but I'm no better and you know you're no better If we're honest with ourselves we know that we are those who who have stiff necks and hard hearts that there are sins in our lives that are are besetting sins they entangle us and and we seem like we can't get away from them but the Lord is doing these things for a reason the Lord is going to make us more and more into His Image but here's the thing right we deserve this death we deserve these curses but we're not Old Testament Israelites but we are under the curse of the Covenant of Works we're all still children of Adam go read Romans chapter 1 3 and 4 and five but here's the thing we can't keep these Commandments but Jesus has that Jesus has kept these Commandments Jesus kept the law perfectly did everything his father sent him to do kept the Covenant and the Lord himself became our sin he was hung on that tree he became that curse for us that we might have eternal life but that we might also walk in him and so look to Jesus who took these Covenant curses for us who fulfilled the Covenant of works let's pray father we thank you so much for this day Lord we pray thanking you for Jesus Christ and we pray that we would follow after you Lord please please let us know that you have Avenged your sin our our sins perfectly upon that cross of Calvary that the debt has been paid and that we have been redeemed from your wrath Lord please teach us to walk in the freedom now that you have given us in the New Covenant we pray in Jesus's name amen may the Lord bless you may you walk in the peace that comes from knowing that Jesus Christ is your Covenant King and The Keeper of the Covenant I'll see you next time bye thanks for listening to this week's message from God's word for you a Ministry of Sharon RP Church in rule South East Iowa we pray that the message would be used by God to transform your faith and your life this week if you'd like to get more information about us feel free to go to the website Sharon rc.org we'd love to invite you to worship with us our worship time is 10:00 a.m. every Sunday at 25204 160th Avenue Morning Sun Iowa 52640 may God richly bless you this [Music] week