“And now, Israel, what doth the LORD thy God require of thee, but to fear the LORD thy God, to walk in all His ways, and to love Him, and to serve the LORD thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul, to keep the commandments of the LORD, and His statutes, which I command thee this day for thy good?” (Deut. 10:12-1312And now, Israel, what doth the Lord thy God require of thee, but to fear the Lord thy God, to walk in all his ways, and to love him, and to serve the Lord thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul, 13To keep the commandments of the Lord, and his statutes, which I command thee this day for thy good? (Deuteronomy 10:12‑13)).
It was all for their real good and full blessing to walk in the way of the divine commandments. The path of wholehearted obedience is the only path of true happiness; and, blessed be God, this path can always be trodden by those who love the Lord.
This is an unspeakable comfort at all times. God has given us His precious Word, the perfect revelation of His mind; and He has given us what Israel did not have, even His Holy Spirit to dwell in our hearts, whereby we can understand and appreciate His Word. Hence our obligations are vastly higher than were Israel’s. We are bound to a life of obedience by every argument that could be brought to bear on the heart and understanding.
For Our Good
And surely it is for our good to be obedient. There is indeed “great reward” in keeping the commandments of our loving Father. Every thought of Him and of His gracious ways, every reference to His marvelous dealings with us should bind our hearts in affectionate devotion to Him in loving obedience. Wherever we turn our eyes, we are met by the most powerful evidences of His claim upon our heart’s affections, and upon all the energies of our ransomed being. And, blessed be His name, the more fully we are enabled by His grace to respond to His most precious claims, the brighter and happier our path must be. There is nothing in all the world more deeply blessed than the path and portion of an obedient soul. “Great peace have they which love Thy law: and nothing shall offend them” (Psa. 119:165165Great peace have they which love thy law: and nothing shall offend them. (Psalm 119:165)). The disciple who finds his meat and his drink in doing the will of his beloved Lord and Master, possesses a peace which the world can neither give nor take away. True, he may be misunderstood and misinterpreted; he may be dubbed narrow and bigoted, and suchlike; but none of these things move him. One approving smile from his Lord is more than ample recompense for all the reproach that men can heap upon him. He knows how to estimate properly the thoughts of men; they are to him as the chaff which the wind drives away. The deep utterance of his heart, as he moves steadily along the sacred path of obedience, is:
“Let me my feebleness recline
On that eternal love of Thine,
And human thoughts forget;
Childlike attend what Thou wilt say,
Go forth and serve Thee, while ‘tis day,
Nor leave Thy sweet retreat.”
A Privileged People
In the closing verses of Deuteronomy 10, the lawgiver seems to rise higher and higher in his presentation of moral motives for obedience, and to come closer and closer to the hearts of the people. “Behold,” he says, “the heaven and the heaven of heavens is the LORD’S thy God, the earth also, with all that therein is. Only the LORD had a delight in thy fathers to love them, and He chose their seed after them, even you above all people, as it is this day.” What a marvelous privilege to be chosen and loved by the possessor of heaven and earth! What an honor to be called to serve and obey Him! Surely nothing in all this world could be higher or better; to be identified and associated with the Most High God, to have His name called upon them, to be His peculiar people, the people of His choice, to be set apart from all the nations of the earth to be the servants of Jehovah and His witnesses. Nothing could exceed this, except that to which the church of God is called.
Higher Privileges
Assuredly, our privileges are higher, inasmuch as we know God in a nearer, more intimate manner than the nation of Israel ever did. We know Him as the God and Father of the Lord Jesus Christ, and as our God and Father. We have the Holy Spirit dwelling in us, shedding abroad the love of God in our hearts, and leading us to cry, Abba, Father. All this is far beyond anything that God’s earthly people ever knew or could know; and, inasmuch as our privileges are higher, His claims upon our hearty and unreserved obedience are also higher. Every appeal to the heart of Israel should come home with augmented force to our hearts, beloved Christian, every exhortation addressed to them should speak far more powerfully to us. We occupy the very highest ground on which any creature could stand. Neither the seed of Abraham on earth, nor the angels of God in heaven could say what we can say, or know what we know. We are linked and eternally associated with the risen and glorified Son of God. We can adopt as our own the wonderful language of 1 John 4:1717Herein is our love made perfect, that we may have boldness in the day of judgment: because as he is, so are we in this world. (1 John 4:17), and say, “As He is, so are we in this world.” What can exceed this, as to privilege and dignity! Surely nothing save to be, in body, soul, and spirit, conformed to His adorable image, as we shall be, before long, through the abounding grace of God.
Our Obligations
Well then let us ever bear in mind—yea, let us have it deep down in our hearts—that according to our privileges are our obligations. Let us not refuse the wholesome word obligation as though it had a legal ring about it. Far from it; it would be utterly impossible to conceive anything further removed from all thought of legality than the obligations which flow out of the Christian’s position. It is a very serious mistake to be continually raising the cry of legality whenever the holy responsibilities of our position are pressed upon us. We believe that every truly pious Christian will delight in all the appeals and exhortations which the Holy Spirit addresses to us as to our obligations, seeing they are all grounded upon privileges conferred upon us by the sovereign grace of God, through the precious blood of Christ, and made good to us by the mighty ministry of the Holy Spirit.
C. H. Mackintosh