It’s almost time “to cross over the Jordan” (Deut 9:1), but the Lord has a few things to tell them first.
I don’t know about you, but there are some things I don’t like to be told. One is my present weaknesses. A second is my past failures. And the third is upcoming challenges too big for me to handle. But in a world full of make-believe, we can always count on our mega-Friend being real. In this chapter, God gives it to Israel head on. Let’s start with the upcoming challenges: “You are to…go in to dispossess nations greater and mightier than yourself, cities great and fortified up to heaven, a people great and tall, the descendants of the Anakim” (Deut 9:1-2). You’ll think these city walls go on forever. Built on mountains, you’ll have to climb up from the valley floor to the crown of the hill before you even come to those walls. And if you somehow breach them? May I introduce you to the fellows on the other side—the Anakim kin, “a people great and tall.” But don’t think, “We’re on the side of right, so we’ll be OK.” No less than THREE times God says, “Do not think in your heart,…‘Because of my righteousness the Lord has brought me in to possess this land’”(v 4, see vv 5-6). No, no, no! It’s not because you’re good; it’s that the Canaanites are so bad. And let me remind you of your track record: “From the day that you departed from the land of Egypt until you came to this place, you have been rebellious against the Lord” (v 7). Then follows the sad litany of failures. So there you have it. Impossible challenges. Personal weakness. Past mess-ups. The lesson here? Don’t count on yourself! Moses says to God, “Yet they are Your people and Your inheritance, whom You brought out by Your mighty power” (v 29). Exactly! “Therefore understand today that the Lord your God is He who goes over before you” (v 3). Keep your eyes on the Lord!