QT: March 14th, 2010

Deuteronomy 28:14

“¹⁴ Do not turn aside from any of the commands I give you today, to the right or to the left, following other gods and serving them.”

Here it seems as if the passage was talking about the fact that there is only one way to follow God. If you’re not on the right path then you’re not on the right one. There are numerous paths to follow, but there is only one right one. “to the right or to the left” almost seems as if it’s warning us not to stray from the commands that the Lord has given us. This makes sense. Sin is sin. Either you sin or you don’t sin. Sometimes we may not be sure and the lines might be blurred to exactly what sin is according to circumstances, but in the end, God’s judgment is final. To God there are no blurred lines. Yet at the same time even though we sin he is going to continue running after us.

General notice: The curse of the Lord for not following him is a lot greater than the passage about the blessings. At the same time, the passage on blessings is a lot more than anything can be expected already! It gives hints of plentiful harvest and boundless good occurrences. However, the curses makes it seem like those who don’t follow the Lord are savage. 53-57 talk about the savage nature of man in war that when a town is in seige they will grow desperate enough to eat their own children. This makes sense since the Lord is holy. In our relationship with God our goal is to make ourselves more holy. So in a way, we weren’t holy before we knew God. If we don’t have God, or if we chose not to follow God then it’s obviously makes us unholy. We will be like the people in this passage. Not only does God curse us, but because we don’t know the difference between sin and not sinning, we unwittingly turn to it and become unholy.

Lord in heaven may you grow my relationship in you and teach me how to hunger for you. When my relationship with you gets stronger, I can only become stronger myself and in that I would hope that I can become more holy. I understand that eternal life can only be given by you Lord and that’s already so much more than what I deserve yet you continue to bless me. Please help turn me into someone worthy of those blessings.