Moses is 120 years old. He has left a legacy. He's trained up a new generation of young men and women who love God and are willing to obey him and go into the land. He has written five books call the Torah, the Law, the Pentateuch, that will be passed down and recited and become sort of the Magna Carta for the rest of Israel's history. So what a great life he has lived, but now he is ready to retire, 120. He's lived a good, long life. He's still in fairly good shape, as we'll read tonight. But the Lord is decommissioning him and commissioning Joshua the take over for him. One of the things we discover about Moses when we read these last chapters of his life, and the last acts of Moses, and the last time that God speaks to him face-to-face while on this earth is that Moses faces his age and death in a very mature way.

He's not afraid to say, "I'm old." He's not afraid to say, "I'm 120." He admits his age. He admits that he's close to death. Age bothers a lot of people. People are afraid of its effects, people are afraid of its wrinkles, of the gray hairs. Witness the amount of products that are sold every year to change those features as we get old. We don't like to face it---we're wearing out. The tent is one day going to be no good. We're going to trade it in. My philosophy is, you know, like my son looked at my hair the other day, he goes, "Dad, you ought to do something about your gray hair, it's coming out on the sides." I said, "I earned every one of them." [laughter]

And I think, you know, why try to look younger so that when you die people go, "Oh my goodness! I can't believe it. He looked, you know, thirty, when in reality he was, you know, much older." Notice, I didn't want to give an age there. [laughter] I've learned to be tactful. Moses says he's 120. He must have shown the signs of age, and yet at the same time he had his vigor, it says in the Word of God. You don't need to be afraid of it. Some people are afraid of a feeling of usefulness, a feeling of guilt, or their body will be intact, but their mind won't. It is a fear. Billy Graham was asked at a university, a student raised his hand and said, "Dr. Graham, of all the things of life what's the one thing that surprises you the most?" He said, "The brevity of it." It's so short. The second thing he said that surprised him is old age.

He said, "You know, we talk about living, and we even talk about death, but nobody talks much about old age." And, consequently, there it really does take, I think, a strong person to endure those years well, to live gracefully through those years. It is difficult. I've witnessed so many people entering into those years, and it takes somebody who's strong. There's a poem I heard: "I like my new bifocals, my dentures fit just fine. My hearing aid is turned up all the way, but, Lord, how I miss my mind." [laughter] I think that's probably one of the greatest fears we have, when we get to a point where we're unable to think clearly and act correctly. But God preserved Moses, did great things with him. And, by the way, as we mentioned last time, his best years were after eighty. That's where he received the call into the ministry.

So, see, if you're thinking about, "Well, I want to go to the School of Ministry, but I think maybe I'm a little too old," you are not. We'll accept anybody---even past eighty. And if you're thinking, "Now that I'm eighty, and I've lived a good life, and I'm ready to, you know, really get serious about serving the Lord," boy, we'd like to take you. Case in point is Moses. There was a survey taken, by the way, of people over ninety-five years of age. And one of the questions asked is: If you could live life all over again, what would you do? And it was an open-ended question. People wrote several things, but three answers kept recurring. Number one, people said they would risk more. They'd try more things. They wouldn't be so safe. They would risk for than they risked before.

Secondly, they would reflect more. They would risk more, but at the same time they wouldn't be so overly busy that they weren't able to think through and reflect on what is important, priorities. And the third thing they said they would do is do more of the right kind of things that would have a lasting impact after they die. In other words, rather than spending their life, they would invest their life into something is that would outlive themselves. They would invest more correctly with their time. Well, I think Moses did a good job of his life. And verse 9, this is where we really pick up from where we left off last week.

"So Moses wrote this law and delivered it to the priests, the sons of Levi, who bore the ark of the covenant of the Lord, to all the elders of Israel. And Moses commanded them, saying: 'At the end of every seven years, at the appointed time in the year of release, at the Feast of Tabernacles, when all Israel comes to appear before the Lord your God in the place which he chooses, you shall read this law before all Israel in their hearing. Gather the people together, men and women and little ones, and the stranger who is within your gates, that they may hear and that they may learn to fear the Lord your God and carefully observe all the words of this law, that their children, who have not known it, may hear and learn to fear the Lord your God as long as you live in the land which you cross the Jordan to possess.' "

Notice it says, "Moses wrote this law." There is a big controversy among certain scholars that wonder, "Did Moses really write these books?" And there's a theory that's espoused in certain camps in certain universities called the Graf-Wellhausen Theory based on two German scholars, [speaking with German accent] the Graf-Wellhausen Theory. [laughter] And this theory says that Moses didn't write what he said he wrote, and what Jesus said he wrote, and what Paul said he wrote; Moses didn't write it. The theory is that the books of the Torah, the historical books, the first five books of Moses came into publication---were written about a little before 400 BC. The reasoning, they say, is that writing wasn't invented at the time of Moses.

Well, you have a problem to say Moses wrote it if writing wasn't invented. Enter the archaeologists who in their digs say not only did writing exist at the time of Moses, it existed well before the time of Moses, and they have the documents to prove it. [speaking with German accent] So, the Graf-Wellhausen Theory is thrown out of the window. [laughter] Moses wrote this law. In verse 10 Moses gives them a dictate, a commandment now: "At the end of every seven years, at the appointed time in the year of release," that means---remember every seven years debts were canceled? And so every seven years in the year of release when all the debts were canceled, everything is forgiven. It's a year of forgiveness. It's a very special time.

In the year of forgiveness at the Feast of Tabernacles would be the gathering together of the people. Now remember there were three feasts---we've discussed this several times in this book and other Pentateuchal books---three mandatory feasts: there was Passover, Pentecost, and Tabernacles. And every male, not every woman and child, but every male had to appear in Jerusalem, those who were within a certain distance to the temple. They would go and they would celebrate the feast. Women didn't have to go, children didn't have to go, but often they wanted to go to partake of these feasts. However, it was mandatory that not only men, but everyone every seven years would take this long pilgrimage to Jerusalem in the year of forgiveness.

And they would stand there and listen to somebody reading either the book of Deuteronomy or the first five books of Moses, depending on how this, the law, is to be interpreted. Probably the book of Deuteronomy. They'd rehearse it, go through their history, go through the basic tenets of the Law, and everybody had to listen to it. A couple reasons why this important: number one, copies of the Scripture like you and I have, Bibles, didn't exist. They didn't have their own private Torah scrolls. They didn't have their brown or black or mauve colored, covered Bibles. And so information was passed on by reciting it and memorizing it and hearing it over and over again, fathers and mothers teaching children, or priests telling the people. So, number one, it would serve to reinforce the commandments of God in an auditory way.

Secondly, the idea of taking a pilgrimage was important, I think. They would have to leave their homes, their villages, their fields, their cattle, and trust the Lord with those things while they're gone. You know, they're just going to leave all their towns and come down to Jerusalem, and it would be reminiscent to them of what it was like in the wilderness, leaving Egypt, taking this long trip, and trusting the Lord. And so just so they wouldn't forget, they'd have to take this trip; not so long as from Egypt to Canaan, but still a trip where they would trust the Lord. It would be the year of forgiveness. And it was a perfect setting in which to hear the law of God recited. It would do their hearts good. "Then the Lord said to Moses"---by the way, this is the last time we read of God giving Moses something to pass on to the people.

"The Lord said to Moses, 'Behold, the days approach when you must die; call Joshua, present yourself in the tabernacle of meeting, that I may inaugurate him.' So Moses and Joshua went and presented themselves in the tabernacle of meeting. Now, the Lord appeared at the tabernacle in a pillar of cloud, and the pillar of cloud stood above the door of the tabernacle." We remember this, this is what took them through the wilderness, led them each step of the way, the Shekinah, the shechinah, the presence of God. And so it's as if it's saying God showed up. God gave a command: "Go get Joshua." God showed up and everybody knew something is happening that's special. "Now the Lord appeared at the tabernacle in a pillar of cloud, and the pillar of cloud stood above the door of the tabernacle.

"The Lord said to Moses: 'Behold, you will rest with your fathers; and this people will rise and play the harlot with the gods of the foreigners of the land, where they go to be among them, and they will forsake me and break my covenant which I have made with them.' " God says two things to Moses, both are tantamount to the same message: "Moses, you're going to die"; "Moses, you're going to rest with your fathers." Now, we have two descriptions of the same event: death, and resting with your fathers; one is straightforward, the other is a euphemism. God says, "Moses, you're going to die." I believe in being straight. If I went to a doctor and I had something terminal, I would really want the doctor to level with me. Now, I know that's controversial.

Some say, "No. You really want the doctor to soften the blow and not really tell." I just prefer the honest truth---"Skip, you're going to die." Now, I know I'm going to die. Someday everybody will die. But if he says, "Within a month you'll be dead," I want to know that, because I've got some preparations and things I'd like to get done before that happens. The Bible often speaks this candidly about this event called "death." Now in this country we don't like to call it "death." We don't like to say, "He died"; we say, "He passed on." "Where?" [laughter] "I mean, he died." "Oh, why didn't you say so?" [laughter] We are fond of taking death and sort of wrapping it around in a nice bow and ribbon and wrapping paper, and soft organ music and special parlors where people talk softly when you come in.

And in other countries they're a little more forthright about it. Death is talked about openly. Caskets are sold in the streets in many countries. In India right where I stay in the last several times there's a casket maker, and I always like to visit him. And he looks at me---the people in India are much shorter, by and large, than I am. And so, you know, I go there and I say, "Let me see your longest casket." [laughter] And they always say, [speaking in Indian accent] "We do not have a casket that is long for you, I am sorry. We have to get two together." [laughter] But I like to visit him and look inside these caskets, and it reminds me one day this is my destination physically. I'm going to die. And in countries like that funerals are done out in the open.

In fact, there's often times a procession in the streets of India when somebody dies, where the body is placed simply on a cot where everybody can see and paraded through the streets, so that you know this person has died and that people will make a public kind of a mourning, a public grief. And at the same time God says, "You must die." In verse 16, "The Lord said to Moses, 'Behold, you rest with your fathers.' " And now we have a euphemism for death. When you die, it appears physically as if you're at rest. That's the position of the body. Many times in the Old Testament it will say, "And he slept with his fathers," meaning he died and he's in the same place his forefathers are---at rest, dead, sleeping, as it were. That's simply an expression for death because that's the appearance of the body.

And that's why it's appropriate to call a graveyard a cemetery; it means a sleeping place. The appearance is---"Look it, they're calm, they're sleeping." Now, they're not there. They're body is there, but they have vacated the premises. And so what is left is a body that is listless, that is motionless, that appears to be at rest. Remember in John 11 when Lazarus dies and Jesus tells his disciples as he's going down toward the Jordan River, he said, "Lazarus is asleep; and I must wake him." So the disciples said, "If he's asleep, then he'll get better, he'll wake up." They thought Jesus was speaking about physical sleep. Jesus was speaking about death, and right afterwards it says, "Jesus told them plainly, 'Lazarus is dead.' " He used the term "sleep," but "Lazarus is dead."

Stephen, when he was stoned in the book of Acts, chapter 7, he looked up to heaven and said, " 'Lord Jesus, receive my spirit' . . . and he fell asleep," Luke tells us. Then Paul writes in Thessalonians and talks about all those who are asleep in Christ will rise. It's important to recognize when the Bible talks about sleep, it doesn't mean soul sleep; it's speaking of the body only. It is a euphemism for death, but it's only the body that sleeps. The spirit, the soul, the real you lives on and is conscious after death. The doctrine of "soul sleep" is not a biblical teaching. As soon as you die, if you're a Christian, you'll be in the presence of the Lord. Paul said in Corinthians, "To be absent if the body is to be present with the Lord."

He said in the jail, the Roman jail when he wrote to the Philippians, "I'm in a strait [or a quandary] between two decisions, I want to depart and be with Christ, which is far better. But for me to stay here is more needful for you." When you die, you're immediately in the presence of the Lord. If you're not a believer, you're not immediately in the presence of the Lord. You go to a place called Hades. It's written about in Luke, chapter 16, a place of torment, conscious torment. As happened to Lazarus, not Lazarus the friend of Jesus---excuse me, not Lazarus, but the rich man in the story of Lazarus and the rich man. He died and went to Hades and he cried out in torment. So it's a place of consciousness after death. So, it's only the body that sleeps, and it's a good description for a Christian who has served the Lord.

"Moses, you've served me. You're 120 years old. Your work is done. Man, it's time to rest." Now, when you rest, you get up. When I was a kid, my parents used to, I thought, punish me. They would say, "It's the afternoon, it's time for your nap." And I'd think, "I don't want to take a nap. I hate that. What did I do wrong?" "You didn't do anything wrong. You need your energy. Go take a nap." To me it was punishment. Now if somebody says, "Go take a nap," "Oh, thank you." [laughter] It's a reward. I like the idea of the siesta in other countries. You just take a couple hours in the afternoon and just kick back and snooze. It's a reward. When you take a nap, you know you're going to wake up. When a Christian dies and he is saying, "He is sleeping," he's going to get up.

In fact, he really already did get up in the spirit; one day his body will rise, however, and be resurrected. So, "You must die," and then in verse 16, "You will rest with your fathers." God predicts the disobedience of the nation once again, and he says what will happen. Verse 17, " 'Then my anger shall be aroused against them in that day, and I will forsake them, and will hide my face from them, and they will be devoured. And many evils and troubles shall befall them, so they will say in that day, "Have not these evils come upon us because our God is not among us?" And I will surely hide my face in that day because of all the evil which they have done, in that they have turned to other gods. Now therefore, write down' "---get this---" 'this song for yourselves,' " plural---that is, both Moses and Joshua had to collaborate and write a song.

" 'And teach it to the children of Israel; put it in their mouths, that this song may be a witness for me against the children of Israel. When I have brought them into the land flowing with milk and honey, which I swore to their fathers, and they have eaten and filled themselves and grown fat, then they will turn to other gods and serve them; they will provoke me and break my covenant. Then it shall be, when many evils and troubles come upon them, that this song will testify against them as a witness; for it will not be forgotten in the mouths of their descendants, for I know the inclination of their behavior today, even before I have brought them into the land which I swore to give them.' "

It is interesting that Moses was not only a strong leader, he was not only raised in the all of the splendor of Egypt, he was not only a prophet of God, not only a leader who spoke to the Lord face-to-face, but he becomes a songwriter at the end of his life. And what a commandment: "Joshua, Moses---Moses especially, I've God one last job for you. I know you're old. You're 120. You're going to die. I want you to write a song." Now he may have thought, "I'm a military man; I don't write songs. I'm not the creative sort." Yet, that was his commission, to work with Joshua on a tune. Music has always influenced people. It's one of the great voices of every culture. In fact, every new generation seeks to express itself musically in new ways. And it's interesting to watch those new ways surface.

And it's interesting too that every time the new generation seeks to express itself, the previous generation doesn't like the expression. Now, be honest. The expression that your kids are making today with the songs and the music, you think, "That's not music. When I was a kid, that was music." But I bet if you recall what your parents said about your music, it was the same thing. Now, of course, Moses being 120 years old, the kind of song that he would write may not be considered a contemporary song among the younger generation, but, you know, who could argue? "This is God's song; he told me to write it. This is what you get." [laughter] But music has always influenced every generation, and it was always prominent in Israel in their history and in their worship.

When they crossed the Red Sea there was a song that was written with timbrels and dancing. When David brought in the ark to Jerusalem, there was the commissioning of music artists, songwriters, musicians. In fact, David later on commissions and pays full-time on staff 288 musicians to come up with songs to make it sound "hot" when you'd come into the temple to worship. Then there was Jehoshaphat leader of Israel's army. One day the Ammonites, the Moabites, come against the armies of Israel down at En Gedi, and he gets wind of it, and so he humbles himself, cries out to God, and he bows down and worships himself. Then he commissions a bunch of musicians. In fact, they go first in the battle. They're the first ones to march.

Now, (a) it could be that Jehoshaphat didn't think much of the musicians and thought to get rid of them by putting them as the target, and I don't think that was it. Or (b) he knew the secret and the inspiration of worship to the armies of Israel. And so the musicians and the singers began the battle march by saying, "Praise the Lord, his mercy endures forever," 2 Chronicles, chapter 20. And they marched off to battle. And when they praised the Lord in music, it says that God ambushed the Moabites and the Ammonites and gave Israel victory. And so songs were always prominent in Israel. They're prominent in every culture from the national anthem to commercials. If you want to sell something, come up with a jingle, a song, it'll work its way into the gray matter of people and they'll be singing.

And, you know, if we were to go around the room tonight and think of little jingles you've heard on television, it would be an interesting night. So we won't that. [laughter] But we all remember certain jingles, right, advertisements on television? "You asked for it, you got it . . . Toyota"---good. Well, some of you didn't remember that. I'm surprised. Maybe I'm dating myself. I don't know, it's an old commercial. [laughter] So, "Write down this song." I heard an interesting story about some missionaries in Nigeria. They were building a mission station. They were Western Missionaries. They assembled the materials. They assembled the builders. The local people all gathered on the day. Everything was in place, but nobody was working. The sun rose, nobody was working. Hours passed by, nobody was working.

And, finally, you know, with the Western mind-set the head missionary came up to some of the indigenous peoples and said, "When are we going to build? Time is passing." And the representative of the tribe said, "I don't know, but something is delaying the musician." He said, "The musician? We're building a mission station." But he didn't know that in that culture a musician comes, and to a certain beat of the log and other instruments, it sets a pace, it sets a beat, and the people work to the beat of the music. You do the same thing. Sometimes you'll turn on the radio or you'll put in---I see people working out or jogging and they put little headsets in, and they're running or biking to the beat of the music. It influences people. And this was to influence the children of Israel.

It was a song about their history. They were to recite it in years to come. But notice, verse 21, " 'I know the inclination of their behavior today, even before I have brought them to the land which I swore to give them.' " "Here's a song. Put it in their mouths. Have them sing it. Pass it on generation after generation." It'll be on the top forty of Israel. But that song as they sing it will bring to remembrance the covenant, which will also bring to remembrance their failure to keep the covenant. "And I know, I know what kind of people they are. I know their kinds of hearts. And I know that they're going to disobey, even before they do it, I predict it's going to happen." When Billy Sunday the famed evangelist years---this is, of course, before Mordecai Ham and before Billy Graham.

When Billy Sunday was holding a crusade in a town back East, he wrote a letter to the mayor of the city asking that he give Billy, he give him a list of any special people in that town that have some special problems or sins that require prayer and dealing with. And Billy Sunday was really surprised when the mayor sent him back an entire city directory, which would be tantamount to a phone book today. Everybody was listed in it. "Everybody in this city needs prayer. Everybody needs help. Everybody is going through something." And God says, "I know the inclination of these people," and so this song will serve to remind them. "Therefore Moses wrote this song the same day, and taught it to the children of Israel.

"And he inaugurated Joshua the son of Nun, and said, 'Be strong and of good courage; for you shall bring the children of Israel into the land which I swore to them, and I will be with you.' So it was, when Moses had completed writing the words of this law in a book, when they were finished, that Moses commanded the Levites, who bore the ark of the covenant of the Lord, saying: 'Take the Book of the Law' "---that would probably be the book of Deuteronomy---" 'put it beside the ark of the covenant of the Lord your God, that it may be there as a witness against you.' " So they would have this book, this scroll, or tablets, perhaps, maybe a stone, and set it next to the ark. Now, inside the ark was---what?---the Ten Commandments.

So, you had the book of Deuteronomy next to it; inside: the Ten Commandments, along with Aaron's rod that budded, and that pot of manna was kept as a memorial throughout the generations of Israel. But this law set next so it as a reminder. " 'For I know your rebellion and your stiff neck. If today, while I am yet alive with you, you have been rebellious against the Lord, then how much more after my death?' " So he's kind of laying into them. " 'Gather to me all the elders of your tribes and your officers, that I may speak these words in their hearing and call heaven and earth to witness against them. For I know that after my death you will become utterly corrupt, and turn aside from the way which I have commanded you; and evil will befall you in the latter days, because you will do evil in the sight of the Lord, to provoke him to anger through the work of your hands.' "

And now the song is given to us, the introduction of it. Verse 30, "Moses spoke in the hearing of all the congregation of Israel the words of this song until they were ended." This is sort of like their national anthem right now. Now it doesn't stay their nation anthem, other songs will be introduced in their history as time goes on. If you go to Israel today and you go, "Hey, sing me that song of Moses." They'll go, "Huh?" Now in certain synagogues they may be able to sing certain portion of it, but there are new reflections in every generation. You remember in the Psalms, more than once David said, "Sing a new song unto the Lord." "Sing a new song unto the Lord." I love hearing musicians come up with new forms of expression of worship. I love the old ones too, but I really love the new ones.

And so let me encourage any musicians in this room who are listening, if you're a musician, if God has given you the craft, the ability to compose, write some new worship songs that we might sing them, that we might pass them on to other fellowships. And I think it's important to have a continual flow of new songs. And, as you know, it's sort of our practice to bring up not only new songs, but every Sunday we like to bring an old song, an old hymn to sort of tie the past with the present and the future. And some people are resistant to the new song. "You keep teaching us these new songs, and, you know, we want the old songs." I like the old songs too, but this is the way I look at it: when I sing a hymn, much as I love the words and they're filled with such a rich theology and doctrine and beauty and depth, I am basically singing an expression.

I am singing about what God did probably 300 years ago, and it's a great expression. It's a good reminder: "Hey, God worked 300 years ago. God was moving in this lives of musicians 300 years ago." But if there's not a new song, what we are saying is that God stopped working 300 years ago. And when we sing new songs, we're saying, "God's still at work," fresh expressions of praise and worship. Don't be resistant to it. Undoubtedly some will, don't worry about them, move on. It happens in every generation. When Dwight L. Moody and Ira D. Sankey started doing revivals and crusades---and it was back in Glasgow, Scotland. They went from Chicago to Glasgow in the late 1800s---and they started singing their new style of worship, which today are the old hymns, the people in Scotland said, "That's steam kettle music."

That's what they called it, "steam kettle music." "It's just racquet, making a noise." Because the people in Scotland in those days were used to only singing the psalms of David paraphrased. They were resistant to anything else. But then they started noticing something interesting happening in Chicago and New York and Glasgow; and that is, the songs that were sung at the crusades, they started to be sung around factories and offices and homes and streets. Churches were resistant to them, but the common person caught on to the tune so well---"I like that tune." And it started revolutionizing the common man and the common churchmen. It started revolutionizing worship. Once a young boy went to his father and said, "Dad, the songs at church are boring!"

His dad got angry at him. He said, 'Well, that's almost blasphemy. How dare you, young whippersnapper. If you think you're so smart, why don't you write some new ones?" And so young Isaac Watts who wrote "Joy to the World," "Away in a Manger"---oh, that was Luther. "Joy to the World," "A Mighty Fortress Is Our God," and others. He decided to write some new songs to revolutionize his day, but those are older songs now. So, Moses writes this new song, they have to learn it, but there will be new songs that come on later on as generations pass. First four verses form the introduction, and then the song unfolds. " 'Give ear, O heavens, and I will speak; and hear, O earth, the words of my mouth. Let my teaching drop as the rain, my speech distill as the dew, as raindrops on the tender herb, as showers on the grass. For I proclaim the name of the Lord.' "

Isn't that a beautiful introduction and isn't that a beautiful description of with what the Word of God is like? " 'Let my words---or let my teaching drop as the rain, and speech distill as the dew.' " In other words, let what I say penetrate your heart, refresh your soul, stimulate your heart to worship the Lord." And just like dew, it's quiet. It's not like rain, sometimes rain you hear it, and he mentions rain. But dew is pretty silent, it just kind of appears, but it has the power to revive and refresh. The Word of God can revive, refresh, stimulate, encourage your heart. There are those who are what I call spiritual thrill-seekers. They are not content unless there's something dramatic. "Forget the dew. Forget the gentle rain. We want power! We want lightning from heaven!"

So they'll try to work people up in their meetings into a frenzy and, you know, into, you know, the deep breathing and the shaking and laughing and barking and moaning, and all sorts of interesting forms of behavior. They're not content with a Bible study. "What good is that? There's no power in that." And so they'll hop around from experience to experience, whether it's the Airport Vineyard in Toronto; or the Pensacola Revival in Brownsville, Texas---all of the odd, fringe kind of experiences. And they'll say, "It's God. It's God. It's gotta be God." But they're only content in going where that kind of fire burns. Sort of like Elijah, if you remember, Elijah sort of expected the dramatic when he was down in the Sinai and the angel of God said, "Go in the cleft of the rock and God will be there."

So he's sitting in the cleft of the rock and a great wind tore through the rocks, but God wasn't in the wind; and an earthquake, but God wasn't in the earthquake; and a fire, but God wasn't in the fire. It said God spoke in "a still small voice." Now perhaps Elijah didn't expect that. He's a dramatic man. He saw dramatic miracles happen through his hands. And so he started going, "Okay, God, speak." [whispering] [laughter] "Huh, that's it?" Some of the greatest works of the Holy Spirit are like gentle rain and like dew that is just refreshing and it appears and revives. It's unseen, but it's very, very powerful. It's "a still small voice." It could be a simple Bible study and a word could be spoken to a certain person and it's like, bam, "That's to my heart."

That person may go out and serve the Lord in the mission field, go to the School of Ministry, go start a church somewhere, go help restore a marriage. Great works can be done by the power of the Word of God, and I think it's just a beautiful description. Now some people will say, "God never speaks to me." Perhaps it's because you're like Elijah, you sort of want the Cecil B. DeMille episode. [laughter] If it's not that dramatic, then you say, "God didn't show up." God could be speaking to your heart right now. It could be a still small voice, but a powerful move of the Holy Spirit. And I often hear this: "We gotta get back to the book of Acts. Look at the book of Acts, filled with miracles!" Granted, granted.

You could read the book of Acts in a very short period of time and you may infer that a miracle happens once every, what, ten, fifteen minutes? Maybe even every five minutes. You're reading it, "Wow! Miracle; wow! Miracle; wow! miracle." The book of Acts covers a time span of about thirty years. There's thirty, thirty-one miracles in the book of Acts. That's about one a year. Oh, really? It doesn't sound that dramatic when looked at in that kind of a perspective. And, by the way, if you really say you want the book of Acts---do you really? Are you ready for it? All of it, like Ananias and Sapphira? [laughter] If there's any hypocrisy in the church, God will strike you dead on the spot? Are you ready for the book of Acts? [laughter]

I don't know about that, but I think when you say that, you're saying it very selectively and often very naively. And I just love this portion of Scripture---beautiful perspective. " 'As showers on the grass. For I proclaim the name of the Lord: Ascribe greatness to our God. He is the Rock, his work is perfect; for all his ways are justice, a God of truth and without injustice; righteous and upright is he.' " What a great contrast, really: God is a Rock, now Israel is not a rock, maybe a dirt clod, [laughter] maybe dust blowing in the wind, very unstable, very unfaithful; in contrast to a God who is mighty, strong, a refuge, always faithful, always consistent. " 'They have corrupted themselves; they are not his children, because of their blemish: A perverse and crooked generation. Do you thus deal with the Lord, O foolish and unwise people?

" 'Is he not your Father, who bought you? Has he not made you and established you? Remember the days of old, consider the years of many generations. Ask your father, and he will show you; your elders, and they will tell you: when the Most High divided their inheritance to the nations, when he separated the sons of Adam, and set the boundaries of the peoples according to the number of the children of Israel. For the Lord's portion is his people; Jacob is the place of his inheritance. He found him in a desert land, in the wasteland, a howling wilderness; he encircled him, he instructed him, he kept him as the apple of his eye.' " This is a pretty long song, and we haven't even got through half of it yet. Keep in mind, they had to memorize it, and they had to sing it all the time.

And, by the way, this was not that uncommon. Many ancient peoples memorized songs or even legal treaties. You may be surprised---what's the longest Psalm? Psalm 119; what, 172 verses? It's acrostic of the alphabet: Aleph, Beth, Gimel, Daleth---all of the Hebrew alphabet. There's sections that follow that. That Psalm was memorized, all of it, ascribing greatness to the law, the Scripture, the Word of God. And so it wasn't that uncommon, you know, they didn't have movies, television, radio. They had time on their hands and they would memorize stories and retell the stories in songs and in poems. Verse 11 and 12 is a beautiful picture of God: " 'As an eagle stirs up its nest, hovers over its young, spreading out its wings, taking them up, carrying them on its wings, so the Lord alone let him, and there is no foreign god with him.' "

The Hebrew word for "eagle" is the word nesher. It speaks of a griffon eagle. It's indigenous to Israel. In fact, I had a picture of it today. I wanted to get it on the computer, but I couldn't get away to scan the slide. I took one this last time. It's an interesting bird. And God says like "an eagle stirs up its nest." Over in Exodus God says, "I was like an eagle that cared for its young." And often times God is pictured as an eagle and God's people are pictured as baby eaglets, which I find interesting. There's some characteristics about eagles you may be interested in. Number one, the nesher, this griffon eagle builds its nest high up in inaccessible places. It's out of the way in the heights of the canyons, in the heights of the cliffs or the mountains. The mother eagle will build the nest for protection and for dependence.

There's the little eaglet stranded. There's no 7-Eleven around. There's no McDonald's around. It's not a zoo so somebody is feeding this thing an ongoing, steady, daily diet. They're up there out of the way in the nest, and if mother doesn't feed them, they're dead. That's the picture of Israel, taken from Egypt---now remember they miss the garlic and the leeks and the meat, and all of the things that they said they had in Egypt. And God took them and delivered them through the Red Sea out into the desert in a place where there was no other provision but God, there was no other food but what God would give them, manna from heaven. If God didn't feed them, they'd be dead. Secondly, a mother eagle, a nesher, a griffon eagle is very protective. It has a heavy beak, strong hands with huge talons, and it's a bird of prey.

It's ready for a fight. If you ever decide to go and find an eagle's nest and play with the babies or take one home, just make sure you're born again, [laughter] because it'll probably be your last fight and you'll lose. Very protective, and the eagle can spot what's going on, can spot the nest even being a couple miles away. God led the children of Israel through the Red Sea, out into the wilderness, and as soon as they were out there, as soon as they were going toward the Red Sea, the Egyptians started saying, "Let's go pursue them." God took them out of Egypt and brought them into his nest, so to speak, his protection. And so you got the Egyptians saying, "Let's chase them, let's pursue them, let's kill them." What did they do? They messed with God's nest.

And like a good mother eagle would do, swept down and destroyed the enemies trying to get at her young. What is interesting too is the way, thirdly, mother eagles teach their young how to fly. And it says, "As an eagle stirs up its nest, hovering over its young, spreading out its wings, taking them up." It's a picture of God with his people. Eagles mature very slowly. Isn't that good to know? Does that comfort you a little bit? Three years for that eaglet to become even ready to fly. It's a slow maturity. And when it's time to fly, the way the mother eagle does it is she just stirs up the nest. She flutters and basically kicks the young out. Lesson number one is like this: eaglet kicked out, eaglet does nosedive, eaglet goes into tailspin irrecoverably.

And before the eaglet is about to smash face-first on the ground, that mother eagle comes down and spreads up its wings bearing up that young and bringing it up again. And as the little heart is going boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, the mother eagle can say, "You passed your first lesson." How often have you felt, "I'm going to hit the ground. This is it. This is the last trial. I'm dead meat!" only for God to with his strong arm preserve you somehow? Maybe the last moment, but he was there. He was faithful. Also, I think this gives insight into trials: "God, why are you doing this!?" "Stirring up the nest." "Why would you let this happen?" "You need to learn to mature. You gotta learn to use your wings sometime."

So God brought them out into the wilderness and tried them time after time, after time, to mature them, to get them to depend on God. But even when it seemed like there was no deliverance, God would provide a way. " 'He made him ride in the heights of the earth, that he might eat the produce of the fields; he made him draw honey from the rock and oil from the flinty rock; curds from the cattle, and milk of the flock, with the fat of lambs; and rams of the breed of Bashan [northern Israel to the east of the Jordan], and goats, with the choicest wheat; and you drank wine, the blood of grapes. But Jeshurun' "---that's the Hebrew for "the upright one." It's a synonym for Israel, an interesting synonym. God says, "You're going to fail. You're going to blow it. I'm going to call you my upright one."

It's a term of endearment. It's a term of grace. " 'Jeshurun grew fat and kicked; you grew fat, you grew thick, you are covered with fat.' " You know, that's not a compliment. [laughter] You couldn't get away with saying that to your spouse or your parents or your friends: "You're thick, man, you really grew fat." [laughter] But God can get away with it. And God isn't speaking of their diet as much as using a metaphor for "you in your abundance when you're in the land." And this is often what happens when people are in abundance. They don't need to trust God anymore. They don't need to see him as their Rock anymore. "After all, something happens, I've got wherewithal to pay my bills and things are all right." You grow lazy, apathetic. You're not trusting. And it was a prediction of their future condition.

" 'Then he forsook God who made him, and scornfully esteemed the Rock of his salvation. They provoked him to jealousy with foreign gods; with abominations they provoked him to anger. They sacrificed to demons, not to God, to gods they do not know, to new gods, new arrivals that your fathers did not fear.' " Is it not interesting that instead of just calling them little idols or little statutes or one of many religious systems, God says, "When you worship those idols Baal and Ashtoreth and others, you were worshiping demons"? That's what false gods really are. That's what Baal is. That's what any gods of the New Age are. That's what the mediums are when they say, "I've got a spirit that I'm contacting that is a powerful spirit. And you can get in contact with this spirit and tell you about . . . ." All that is demonology.

There's a demon behind all those false gods, and when people pray to them, they're praying to demons, demon worship. In Egypt and in Mesopotamia there was a belief system that when you construct an idol, the spirit of that god resides in that stone or in that piece of wood, so that whatever you do to that object, the spirit, the god itself will be able to perceive it and to feel it. So in countries like Egypt, Mesopotamia, they would wash their little idols, they would dress them, you know, put new fashion statements on their little gods; little hat one day, little purse another day, [laughter] and thinking the god is, you know, enjoying this. They would put food, bowls of food at the base of these gods thinking that the spirit of the god would itself be able to get energy from it and would strengthen the god's power.

So, "I'm helping my god out." Weak gods if you have to help them out that way. In India today they still believe that statutes of Kali and Shiva and others, that the statues, the god itself is inhabiting that image. So, it's idol worship, it's demon worship. And interesting God says, "to gods they did not know, to new gods, new arrivals," you know, new kids on the block, new gods that would come from different nations. "Oh, we got a whole new set of gods here. You're the new gods on the block, new arrivals." " 'That your fathers did not fear. Of the Rock who begot you, you are unmindful, you have forgotten the God who fathered you.' " And every missionary who goes into country today has to confront the gods of that culture at some point in time, and they have to pray that God will give them keys to unlock the culture.

In World Vision Magazine put out, the March edition 1997, there was an article about Ethiopia. The Asan River that goes through Ethiopia, by the banks of it is this huge, huge tree that covered a good chunk of land. It had been there for years and it was a superstitious tree. And, as you know, Ethiopia has seen much famine and many people have died, but they would always trust and pray to this tree. Adults would come by and kiss it. They would speak reverently of the tree. Never put the tree down. They would teach their children that, "That tree is what delivered our people in the past and he will deliver us again."

In 1989 when Christian relief organizations came to Ethiopia to better to land and give food supplies, they noticed the people's reverence to this tree, while at the same time the relief organizations were putting in irrigation systems, giving them water in their land, raising crops, the soil began to be productive again. Who did people ascribe this answered prayer to but this tree. So the Christians knew, "We've got a problem as long as this tree is around. What do we do?" And somebody remembered the Scripture in Luke, chapter 17, "If you have the faith as the grain of a mustard tree, and you say to this mulberry tree, 'Be uprooted and cast into the sea,' it'll do it." So he said, "Let's pray against the tree." Well, they did it for about six months, and the villagers found out.

"These Christian missionaries who have come with food and supplies are praying against our tree." Now, they put up with them because they're giving them so much food, but, "They're praying against our tree." Within six months the tree started to dry up, the leaves started to fall off, and eventually the tree capsized. It fell into the river. The villagers surrounded the Christians and said, "Your God killed our tree." [laughter] And about a hundred of them put their faith in Jesus Christ, because they saw his power was greater than their tree who didn't give them anything. But they realized---"These guys are praying to demons. God, give us a key to this culture," and God gave it to them and the gospel was furthered. Times is just about up, just getting into it. [laughter] Let's finish down verse 22.

" 'When the Lord saw it, he spurned them, because of the provocation of his sons and his daughters. And he said: "I will hide my face from them, I will see what their end will be, for they are a perverse generation, children in whom is no faith. They have provoked me to jealousy by what is not God; they have moved me to anger by their foolish idols. I will provoke them to jealousy by those who are not a nation; I will move them to anger by a foolish nation. For a fire is kindled in my anger, and shall burn to the lowest hell; it shall consume the earth with her increase, and set on fire the foundations of the mountains." ' " And we'll finish up next time and I said that last time. [laughter] We'll continue next time into our study in the book of Deuteronomy. "Whatever a man sows, that shall he also reap."

God warned them and said, "You're acting foolishly, you're raising up idols, you're going to raise up idols, you're going to worship these idols. They're really not gods. So what I am going to do, since you're acting so foolishly in idol worship, and basically you are declaring, 'I love idols,' I'm going to send you into a nation that is so packed full of idols, and acts even more foolishly than you are now, to give you the full of what you are really saying you want in hopes that a light will go on in your heart and you'll cry out to me in anguish. The day that you do," Deuteronomy, chapter 30 says, "I'll bring you back." It's always beautiful, as much as God anticipates their failure, God as provided their return, and always says there will be forgiveness: "In the day that you cry out there will be forgiveness, and I'll return you, I'll restore you."

Israel takes step after step, after step, after step, after step away from God. God says, "There's one step to come back." Isn't that great? God doesn't say, "You want to come back to me? Crawl on your hands and knees, retrace all those steps." God just says, "Just turn right there." And so God said to the prophet, "Turn ye, turn ye . . . for why will you die?" Are you worshiping something other than the Lord God? Is your deliverer, is your object of affection and worship anything other than the Lord Jesus Christ? You say, "Well, you know, I don't have any little carvings that I bow down to." A lot of things can take the place of God. They can be things you drive. They can be things you live in. They can be things you wear. They can be you. So whatever it is that's standing in the way between you and God, know that it's one step back to God tonight.

For more resources from Calvary Albuquerque and Skip Heitzig visit calvaryabq.org.