CHAPTER 7

(1451 B.C.)

SEPARATION

¹When the LORD your God shall bring you into the land where you go to possess it, and has cast out many nations before you, the Hittites, and the Girgashites, and the Amorites, and the Canaanites, and the Perizzites, and the Hivites, and the Jebusites, seven nations greater and mightier than you (the Lord could easily have destroyed these nations, exactly as He did Sodom and Gomorrah, etc., but He deemed it desirable that Israel dispel them in order that Israel might learn trust and faith; faith comes by hearing the Word; however, faith put to practice can only come about by experience; it is the same with us presently; the Holy Spirit helps us, which means that we have a part to play ourselves; that part is Faith in Christ and the Cross [Rom. 8:26]);

²And when the LORD your God shall deliver them before you; you shall smite them, and utterly destroy them; you shall make no covenant with them, nor show mercy unto them (the wickedness of these Tribes had reached such a state that there was nothing left but extermination; but God made that decision, not man, even though man was the instrument in carrying it out; likewise, anything and everything in our lives which isnt Christlike must be smitten and destroyed):

³Neither shall you make marriages with them; your daughter you shall not give unto his son, nor his daughter shall you take unto your son.

⁴For they will turn away your son from following Me, that they may serve other gods: so will the anger of the LORD be kindled against you, and destroy you suddenly. (When we join the world, thinking to win the world, the world instead wins us. The unredeemed are brought to the Lord Gods Way. Any other way has the opposite effect. Gods Way is the Word being preached and anointed by the Spirit, with conviction seizing the heart of the unredeemed [Jn. 16:7-14; I Cor. 2:2.])

⁵But thus shall you deal with them; you shall destroy their altars, and break down their images, and cut down their groves, and burn their graven images with fire (there can be no compromise with sin).

⁶For you are an holy people unto the LORD your God: the LORD your God has chosen you to be a special people unto Himself, above all people who are upon the face of the Earth (Israel, Gods chosen People!).

ISRAEL

⁷The LORD did not set His Love upon you, nor choose you because you were more in number than any people; for you were the fewest of all people (in fact, the entirety of the line had begun with Abraham and Sarah):

⁸But because the LORD loved you, and because He would keep the oath which He had sworn unto your fathers (Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob), has the LORD brought you out with a mighty hand, and redeemed you out of the house of bondmen, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt (God loved Israel, and all He asked in return was that they love Him; it is the same presently with Believers!).

⁹Know therefore that the LORD your God, He is God, the Faithful God, which keeps covenant and mercy with them who love Him and keep His Commandments to a thousand generations (God has never broken His Covenants, and never will break His Covenants; it is man who breaks the Covenants);

¹⁰And repays them who hate Him to their face, to destroy them: He will not be slack to him who hates Him, He will repay him to his face (Israel is warned again against disobedience; if they come to the place that they hate the Lord, destruction is sure; and thats exactly what happened!).

OBEDIENCE

¹¹You shall therefore keep the Commandments, and the Statutes, and the Judgments, which I command you this day, to do them. (The Law of Moses, which was really the Law of God, was hands-down the fairest legislation the world had ever known. In fact, it was the only legislation that had come strictly from God, and not at all from man. As a result, the fact of having this Law put Israel far ahead of the surrounding nations or, in fact, any nation in the world.)

¹²Wherefore it shall come to pass, if you hearken to these Judgments, and keep, and do them, that the LORD your God shall keep unto you the Covenant and the Mercy which He swore unto your fathers:

¹³And He will love you, and bless you, and multiply you: He will also bless the fruit of your womb, and the fruit of your land, your corn, and your wine, and your oil, the increase of your cattle, and the flocks of your sheep, in the land which He swore unto your fathers to give you.

¹⁴You shall be blessed above all people: there shall not be male or female barren among you, or among your cattle.

¹⁵And the LORD will take away from you all sickness, and will put none of the evil diseases of Egypt, which you know, upon you; but will lay them upon all them who hate you. (However, we must remember that all of these blessings are conditional, even as blessings now are conditional. The condition is obedience.)

¹⁶And you shall consume all the people which the LORD your God shall deliver you; your eye shall have no pity upon them: neither shall you serve their gods; for that will be a snare unto you (the world is a snare to many Christians presently).

¹⁷If you shall say in your heart, These nations are more than I; how can I dispossess them?

¹⁸You shall not be afraid of them: but shall well remember what the LORD your God did unto Pharaoh, and unto all Egypt (we should remember and recount the great Blessings of the Lord concerning the past, which will give us faith for the present and for the future);

¹⁹The great temptations which your eyes saw, and the signs, and the wonders, and the mighty Hand, and the stretched out Arm, whereby the LORD your God brought you out: so shall the LORD your God do unto all the people of whom you are afraid (in other words, you dont have to be afraid; the Lord is with you!).

²⁰Moreover the LORD your God will send the hornet among them, until they who are left, and hide themselves from you, be destroyed (God has all of Creation at His disposal, which He may use at any time, even something as lowly as a hornet).

²¹You shall not be affrighted at them: for the LORD your God is among you, a mighty God and terrible (whatever the enemy has or is, God is greater!).

²²And the LORD your God will put out those nations before you by little and little: you may not consume them at once, lest the beasts of the field increase upon you (likewise, Sanctification is of the same process; little by little, the works of the flesh fall by the wayside, or at least thats the way it ought to be).

²³But the LORD your God shall deliver them unto you, and shall destroy them with a mighty destruction, until they be destroyed (faith exercised on the part of Gods people guarantees the mighty Power of God evidenced on our behalf).

²⁴And He shall deliver their kings into your hand, and you shall destroy their name from under heaven: there shall no man be able to stand before you, until you have destroyed them (but, once again, there were conditions).

²⁵The graven images of their gods shall you burn with fire: you shall not desire the silver or gold that is on them, nor take it unto you, lest you be snared therein: for it is an abomination to the LORD your God (unfortunately, idolatry is still alive and well, and comes in many forms; in fact, religion is the worst idolatry of all!).

²⁶Neither shall you bring an abomination into your house, lest you be a cursed thing like it: but you shall utterly detest it, and you shall utterly abhor it; for it is a cursed thing (idols or parts of idols; all such were cursed by God, which means they were devoted to destruction).