In Deuteronomy 12 we have statutes and judgments. Thus we come to what might be called the direct charges, having done with all the introductory part. All the previous part prepares the way. Now we find what would test their obedience. “These are the statutes and judgments, which ye shall, observe to do in the land, which Jehovah God of thy fathers giveth thee to possess it, all the days that ye live upon the earth.” In the very first place is laid down utter destruction of the high places. The reason is obvious. The first of all rights, and the highest of our duties, is that God, should have His rights. With this then most fittingly He begins. It is no use talking about Israel: the first object is God. If therefore God was dishonored by the high places, they must all come down. Besides, if these high places had been dedicated to heathen gods, Israel must not dare to consecrate them to the true God. Such conversion does not suit God, who must have His own.
God must and does choose for Himself – a simple yet most important consideration (Deut. 12:5, 11, 14, 18, 21, 265But unto the place which the Lord your God shall choose out of all your tribes to put his name there, even unto his habitation shall ye seek, and thither thou shalt come: (Deuteronomy 12:5)
11Then there shall be a place which the Lord your God shall choose to cause his name to dwell there; thither shall ye bring all that I command you; your burnt offerings, and your sacrifices, your tithes, and the heave offering of your hand, and all your choice vows which ye vow unto the Lord: (Deuteronomy 12:11)
14But in the place which the Lord shall choose in one of thy tribes, there thou shalt offer thy burnt offerings, and there thou shalt do all that I command thee. (Deuteronomy 12:14)
18But thou must eat them before the Lord thy God in the place which the Lord thy God shall choose, thou, and thy son, and thy daughter, and thy manservant, and thy maidservant, and the Levite that is within thy gates: and thou shalt rejoice before the Lord thy God in all that thou puttest thine hands unto. (Deuteronomy 12:18)
21If the place which the Lord thy God hath chosen to put his name there be too far from thee, then thou shalt kill of thy herd and of thy flock, which the Lord hath given thee, as I have commanded thee, and thou shalt eat in thy gates whatsoever thy soul lusteth after. (Deuteronomy 12:21)
26Only thy holy things which thou hast, and thy vows, thou shalt take, and go unto the place which the Lord shall choose: (Deuteronomy 12:26)). Will-worship is intolerable. It ought most of all to shock the Christian. If it were merely a question of man, nobody would think of choosing for another. Nobody likes this. If people like to choose for themselves, as mere men, what an awful delusion it is to be choosing for God – to be really governed by your own will in matters of religion! We can all see how very bad it was in Israel; but do we feel that it is still worse in the Christian? He has given no title to adopt doctrines, practices, ways, government, or any one thing that is not His expressed will for His children. Some there are, no doubt, who assume that God has not in these things expressed any will of His own. I do not envy them the thought that God has not revealed His mind about what is nearest to Himself; and what most of all is bound up with His glory. It is making God less than a man; for if he could not be content without it, how much less the living God?
Here we see that God had a most deliberate choice in the smallest matters as well as in the greatest; but He begins with what most nearly touches His presence. He sets Himself against the high places; He will not have them. He chose to have a place where He would put His name. This becomes the center for all; and the book of Deuteronomy is founded on that fact, Israel being on the point of entering into the land. Consequently it is an anticipation of what was before them. It is not a book for the wilderness, except for their hearts to look back on whilst on the borders before they entered the land.
And the grand principle too we may just notice in passing: Jehovah reminds them by Moses that He had allowed much while they were in the wilderness which could not be tolerated now (Deut. 12:88Ye shall not do after all the things that we do here this day, every man whatsoever is right in his own eyes. (Deuteronomy 12:8)). If they were going to possess the land, let them remember it was God’s land, not theirs. He might and would give it to them, but still He always kept His place. It was the land which “Jehovah thy God giveth thee.”
In fact He acted as the landlord. They were only tenants, and had to pay Him rent. This was the substantial meaning of the tithes and other requisitions (verse 11). They were the dues He demanded in virtue of His position as landlord of the people in the land. Therefore we can understand it as if He said, When you were in the strange country, when you left it in haste to wander here and there in the wilderness, there were great difficulties and many irregularities which cannot be allowed now. The greater the blessing of God, the more thoroughly you are put on the ground that God has given you, the more He insists on thorough and constant obedience. This is the point here, and thus we see the connection with all that has gone before.