It’s futile to hear God’s Word preached, then go away and act as if He had nothing to say to us.
Right after the Lord had arrived on the mount, revealing “His glory and His greatness” (Deut 5:24), a contingent of Israel’s leaders, in fact “all the heads of your tribes and your elders” (v 23), met with Moses. This is too dangerous, they said. “This great fire will consume us; if we hear the voice of the Lord our God anymore, then we shall die” (v 25). So they had a plan. “You go near” they told Moses, “and hear all that the Lord our God may say, and tell us all that the Lord our God says to you, and we will hear and do it” (v 27). Of course the Lord overheard their conversation and responded to Moses: “They are right in all that they have spoken. Oh, that they had such a heart in them that they would fear Me and always keep all My commandments, that it might be well with them and with their children forever!” (vv 28-29). They spoke right, says the Lord. Oh that they would also do right. Unfortunately, when all is said and done, more is said than done. It’s the walking after the talking that matters! We need to be walkie-talkies, where our walkie matches our talkie. The Lord Jesus had a similar instruction for His disciples: “If you know these things, blessed are you if you do them” (Jn 13:17). The happiness doesn’t come in knowing something, but in seeing that it really works when we do it. That turns opinions into convictions. Now I don’t just think something is true; I know it’s true. And fourteen times in this book, the Lord warns them to “be careful.” Did you know that oversteering is one of the main reasons for traffic fatalities? “Therefore you shall be careful to do as the Lord your God has commanded you; you shall not turn aside to the right hand or to the left” (Deut 5:32). Clearly, the strait and narrow way is the safest path Home.