JUNE 8, 2023 – ALONE

READ: Deut. 4:32-40: For ask now concerning the days that are past … and ask from one end of heaven to the other, whether any great thing like this has happened … To you it was shown, that you might know that the Lord Himself is God; there is none other besides Him … And because He loved your fathers, therefore He chose their descendants after them; and He brought you out of Egypt with His Presence, with His mighty power …

The unique event at Horeb was not only meant by God for Israel to never forget His words, it was also to confirm that He is truly the only God who exists. Moses invites the people to consider whether anything like what happened at Horeb has ever happened or been heard of anywhere on earth, since the day (!) that God created man. So unique, so overwhelming, so divine! 

God’s people were nevertheless allowed to live through. Pay attention to the great divine acts of salvation that the LORD showed them during their exodus from Egypt and their victories over the nations on the way to the Promised Land! Everything points to the almightiness, faithfulness, and love of the LORD, as the only God. There is no god besides Him.

Israel must also realize that they were chosen by this one God from among all the nations! As in verse 34: “Or has any god ever tried to take for himself one nation out of another nation, by testings, by signs and wonders, by war, by a mighty hand and an outstretched arm, or by great and awesome deeds, like all the things the LORD your God did for you in Egypt before your very eyes?” How then could they forget Him? Yet, that is precisely what happens frequently throughout the history of Israel. Think of the time of the judges and the time of Ahab, when Elijah stood up to the Baal priests at the altar on Mount Carmel.

And how is it in our time among those who were once baptized? To whom has God shown more divine faithfulness and love by giving His own Son for our salvation than to His own church? Let us therefore love Him with all our heart, mind, and strength.

Why are so many people not believing in God?

Singing: Ps. 81:7,8