Would Israel exemplify trust, or be “an astonishment, a proverb, and a byword among all nations” (Deut 28:37)?
How many things can go wrong in life? No doubt, you’ve heard the story that goes like this: “Life was tough, but someone told me, ‘Cheer up; things could be worse.’ So I cheered up—and sure enough, things got worse.” If you want a checklist of everything that can go wrong, you’ll find it in Deuteronomy 28: The most distressing physical problems (vv 22, 27, 35); catastrophic weather (vv 23-24); international distress and crushing military defeats (vv 25-26); blindness and mental breakdown (vv 28-29, 34); family collapse and separation (vv 30, 32, 41); financial ruin from which there is no recovery (vv 31, 33, 38-40). The list goes on and on, but I’m sure you’re already suffocating with just the thought of such devastation. For the one right way that the organs in our bodies should function, there are thousands of ways they can go wrong. So it is with spiritual health. What does God say? “This is the way, walk in it” (Isa 30:21). But “we have turned, every one, to his own way” (53:6). One way—God’s way—is right, but there are endless ways that we can go wrong. And the painful point of our passage is this: The life of obedience to God is simple, plain, and narrow. All the options on that road total exactly one—just obey! But when we turn from the Lord, how many things can go wrong? There is no end of trouble for those who go their own way. But why would God allow all this to happen to His people? Because they were a living object lesson. Either they would declare to the nations the wonderful blessings of walking in faith with God (Deut 28:9-10), or they could do the opposite (v 37). As they say, no one is absolutely useless; you can always be a bad example. But whoever would want to be that?