Week 10 Deuteronomy
I finished reading Deuteronomy yesterday. Which means I’ve finished a law-heavy section of my bible-reading year. There are hundreds of laws in Exodus Leviticus Numbers (and then a pretty thorough review of them in Deuteronomy).
I think it’s easy to come away with the general feeling that the content there is just a bunch of formalized mechanistic going-through-the-motions ritualistic stuffy perfunctorily-necessitarian restrictive glumly-judicious & suffocatingly-legalistic regulations and kosherisms.
So reading through Deuteronomy is a helpful reminder that other things are in play. For example:
if you search for the Lord with all your heart and soul you will find him…
you must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your strength…
the Lord requires you to fear him, to live according to his will, to love and worship him with all you heart and soul…
always love the Lord your God and walk in his ways…
the Lord…will delight in you…if you turn to him…with all your heart and soul…
love the Lord…and keep his commands…
choose to love the Lord…and obey him and commit yourself to him…
take to heart all the words I have given you.
When I think about the laws as abstract requirements that are independent of everything except their own archaic necessity then the law seems like a kind of dinosauric regulatory-irrelevancy. So Deuteronomy’s reminders help with that bit of asymmetry.
Note: quotes from Deuteronomy 4:29, 6:5, 10:12, 19:9, 30:10, 30:16, 30:20, 32:46 (NLT)