You Shall Talk of Them

 Deuteronomy 6:1-3 ESV

“Now this is the commandment—the statutes and the rules—that the Lord your God commanded me to teach you, that you may do them in the land to which you are going over, to possess it, that you may fear the Lord your God, you and your son and your son's son, by keeping all his statutes and his commandments, which I command you, all the days of your life, and that your days may be long. Hear therefore, O Israel, and be careful to do them, that it may go well with you, and that you may multiply greatly, as the Lord, the God of your fathers, has promised you, in a land flowing with milk and honey.”

This isn’t just Old Testament teaching. Yes, we are not under the Old Covenant. Yes, we don’t have to obey all those old ceremonial and purification laws that the Jews of old had to obey. But we still have to obey our Lord’s commandments to us which are repeated in the New Testament.

God’s grace to us is not free license to continue living in sin. So, we should not continue in sin now that we are under grace. For, how can those of us who have died to sin continue to live in it? For our old self was crucified with Christ in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin but to righteousness (Rom 6:1-23).

We aren’t free from having to obey our Lord’s commandments (New Covenant) just because we are under grace. For, love for God is to obey his commands. We know that we have come to know Christ, in fact, if we keep (obey) his commandments. If we say we know him but we don’t keep his commandments (in practice), we are liars (Jn 14:23-24; 1 Jn 2:3-6).

Also, the New Testament teaches the fear of the Lord. We are to walk in the fear of the Lord. We are to honor and glorify God with how we live our lives. We are to show him reverence and respect by doing what he says. Jesus is to be Lord (owner-master) of our lives, and we are to live for him.

By faith in Jesus Christ, we die with Christ to sin that we might live to Christ and to his righteousness. We forsake our former lives of living for sin and self, and we are changed in heart and mind away from sin to living for our Lord and his will for our lives. And now we conduct our lives according to the Spirit of God and we no longer walk (in practice) by our flesh.

[Rom 6:1-23; Rom 8:1-17; Eph 4:17-24; 1 Jn 1:5-9; Tit 2:11-14]

Deuteronomy 6:4-9 ESV

“Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise. You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.”

Love for God in this respect is taught also in the New Testament under the New Covenant. Jesus summed up the prophets and the law into two commandments. The first one has to do with loving God in this way, and the second has to do with loving our neighbors as ourselves (Matt 22:37-40).

So, if we love God with all our heart, and with all our soul, and with all our might, we are going to serve the Lord as though he truly is our Lord and master, we will surrender our lives to him, we will leave our lives of sin behind us, and we will follow him in obedience to his commands.

Also, if we love our neighbors as ourselves with the love of God which is within us then we won’t sin against our neighbors (all other people). We won’t lie to, cheat on, steal from, commit adultery against, slander or otherwise do them willful harm. 

But we will be kind to others. We will pray for them, do good to them, and do for them and say to them what will be beneficial (healthful) to them spiritually. We will treat them as Jesus treated the people on this earth when he lived on the earth.

So, this also means that we will speak to them the words of Jesus and of his New Testament apostles. We will counsel people in the right way, and we will share with them the truth of the gospel, and we will expose the fruitless deeds of darkness for what they are, and we will warn of judgment and call people to repentance and to obedient faith in Jesus Christ, our Lord.

When we are on social media or anywhere on the internet where we have a presence and a voice, we should be sharing Jesus Christ. Our conversations should reflect our love for him and our walks of faith in Christ. We should talk about the things he talked about with full conviction of spirit that what we are sharing we are also living.

And when we are with our family members and our friends and our fellow Christians, our conversations should reflect Christ and should be representative of the kinds of things he talked about. We should be sharing with them the word of God and what it teaches if we genuinely believe what we say we believe. 

For, if the word of God is truly what is on our hearts, then it should also be on our lips consistently. For, don’t we talk about the things which are on our hearts? Don’t we talk about the things which concern us or which we care about or which are part of our daily lives? So, shouldn’t the word of God be what we talk about daily, too?

But it can’t be just talk. We must live it, too. For binding (securing) it on our hands is like binding it on our deeds (works). And binding (affixing) it on our foreheads is like binding it on our minds, our thinking, and our believing. The word of God should be what we think, what we say and what we do.

Only Hope

By Jonathan Foreman

I give you my destiny

I'm giving you all of me

I want your symphony

Singing in all that I am

At the top of my lungs

I'm giving it my all

So, I lay my head back down

And I lift my hands and pray

To be only yours I pray

To be only yours I pray

To be only yours 

I know now you're my only hope

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-gnS7ZEbEqU

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Disclaimer: This is not an endorsement of the singers nor of all their music