Year 7, Day 153: Deuteronomy 2

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Within chapter 2 of the book of Deuteronomy, I see an overarching theme of commitment.  The Lord is committed to His people.  Mind you, I’m not just talking about the Hebrew people.  After all, while the Hebrew people may be the main subject of God’s interaction in the Old Testament, they are not the only subject.  God is committed to all those with whom He is in relationship.

Do you hear how Moses recounts that the people are not to go into Edom – the area around Mount Seir?  They are not to go into Edom because it is Esau’s people.  The Hebrew people come from Jacob.  However, God entered into a promise with Esau and gave the land of Edom to him.  So long as Esau’s people do not do anything deserving of being tossed out of the land, God will keep His promise.  That land is Esau’s land and the people of Jacob are to have no part in it.

Just to make his point clear, God also tells the Hebrew people to not go into or harass the Moabites.  The Moabites were mingling with the people of Lot.  God reminds the Hebrew people that in the same way as God has been protective of Esau’s people, He is remembering Lot’s people as well.  These are people who have been in an agreement with God from practically the same time as the Hebrew people entered into the covenant through Abraham!

God is faithful to His Word.  It doesn’t matter who you are, where you come from, and what your status is.  God is faithful to His Word.  If you hold up your end of the agreement, God will hold up His end, too.

As a bit of an aside at the end, I am also mindful that this shows us that God does not have an exclusive relationship with the Hebrew people.  The Old Testament is largely the story about God’s relationship with the people of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.  But this is not an exclusive relationship.  They do not own God, so to speak.  There are other people in relationship with god and those relationships are equally as meaningful to Him.  Our ability to be in relationship with God does not depend on biology, it depends upon our heart.  I believe that this is a very subtle but consistent theme in the Old Testament that often gets overlooked.

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