Episode 2: Remember the Past (1-3)

We’re delving into the first three chapters of Deuteronomy today, as we get into studying this Old Testament book together. Remember to check out our season page for bible study resources that will help you start unpacking Deuteronomy for yourself.

• Questions to Dig into Over a Cup of Tea

  Why is it so important for the listeners, sitting on the plains of Moab, to hear about the past?

  How do these chapters show their hearts, and ours?

  In what ways do you see God's grace through these first three chapters?

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• Episode Transcript

  The following is an uncorrected transcript generated by a transcription service. Before quoting in print, please check the corresponding audio for accuracy.

  Felicity: We're delighted to have Kaleidoscope Bibles and 10ofthose.com sponsoring this season. And Kaleidoscope Bibles are a new product to us. We've discovered them quite recently, but we wholeheartedly love what they are doing. They are bridging the gap between the kids story Bible and the adult Bible and rewriting the books of the Bibles into that gap, so that our elementary primary age kids are able to access God's Word. We've been really enjoying reading their version of one and two Peter he's collected in a book with Jane. And I really love the way that the writer is giving the context in an accessible way our kids can definitely understand what's going on. And so then, as they hear God's word, hear what God is saying to these people through Peter and through James, it makes a whole lot more sense. We really love the book. It's beautifully produced, it's well written, highly recommend. Grab a copy at ten of those.com.

  Sarah: Welcome to Two Sisters and a cup of tea. My name is Sarah, I live in the UK. This is my sister Felicity. She lives in the US. And we're delighted that today we're getting right into Deuteronomy chapters one, two and three together. We won't be reading all of those chapters, we're going to be reading just part of chapter one, but we're getting right into it. 50 before we get there. Any nice biscuits or tea to join us?

  Felicity: Oh, yes, the chocolate finger. And I know that to the Americans that sounds like a strange kind of juxtaposition of words, but it's just a delight, isn't it? And it's very hard to eat just one. So in a way, I'm looking forward to the tin being empty of them because it's just a bit too tempting to have them there.

  Sarah: Yeah, it feels like they're not quite.

  Felicity: Big enough, are they?

  Sarah: Not quite. You know, you just always have to go back for one more, which is the danger and the genius of the person who invented the Chocolate finger, really, isn't it?

  Felicity: Absolutely, yes. We've had a team making kind of everything's changed in our house because our electric kettle, which is what most English people have in their houses, it just didn't survive the fact that it was being boiled four to five times a day, which is a very unamerican thing to do, is to make that many cups of cheese. I think, really, we basically overboiled it. So we've transitioned into the much more American on the hob kettle. I have yet to work out which one's quicker, but it's quite pleasing. It's a more pleasing looking kettle. So for those of you who are interested, the kettle situation in the Carswell.

  Sarah: House, can you cook at the same time as using a kettle?

  Felicity: Well, it is something that has crossed my mind, because that does take out one of the four hobs. I don't know how often I use all four hobs.

  Sarah: No, true. Okay, Flisty, before we get stuck into Gautonomy for those who might be feeling daunted about getting into a book that feels really foreign, a book that feels really kind of out of kilter with our culture and it's just big, give us some tips for just getting into it.

  Felicity: I think it's a really good question because I feel like this I don't know how many of our listeners have been giving the Bible in a year ago. Maybe you're a month in and maybe you're kind of you maybe got through Genesis and you're kind of heading into these big books. And I always feel, what do we do? How am I going to get to the end? And I think what has helped me as I've been in Gtronomy this time around is not thinking about the end before I've actually got going and just taking it literally one day at a time, one chapter at a time even, and just reading it for what it is rather than thinking of it with all those preconceptions. If I'm not going to understand it, I don't know where's the law but is this law? All those kind of questions, actually. Just read it for what it is. Brilliantly. This is a narrative. Like, I know it's all said in one day, but actually he is telling the story of God's. People and narratives are relatively easy to read. So if we just kind of shift our thinking on it, I think that's been a helpful thing. Just reading it with someone else really good. Like, knowing that you're reading it has really helped me to just keep oh.

  Sarah: It'S definitely I think we've both had kind of low patches where we were like, not sure I want to do this, and actually the other person is currently excited and you're like, oh, okay, I'll keep going, because there must be more.

  Felicity: Yes, absolutely. And I think it was helpful. You said in our first episode that it's quite hard to get your head around the whole book because it's so long. And I think it's just thinking, I can't get my head around the whole book and it's okay to just take a chunk at a time. And so that's why we've kind of split it up into these chaptered chunks, haven't we? To make it more manageable. Because it's not that we're reading all of Deuteronomy today. We're just looking at one chunk of it.

  Sarah: We are. One chunk. We're looking at chapters one, two and three today. Flisty, you're going to read chapter one, verses one to 33 for us, we're going to be using the NIV Bible. That's what we use in each season. Why don't you read for us?

  Felicity: We'll do. These are the words Moses spoke to all Israel in the wilderness east of the Jordan, that is, in the Arab opposite Suff, between Paran and TOFIL, Laban, hazaroth and Dishab. It takes eleven days to go from Horeb to Gadeshbaneer by the Mount Siya road. In the 40th year on the first day of the 11th month moses proclaimed to the Israelites all that the Lord had commanded him concerning them. This was after he had defeated Syon, king of the Amarites, who reigned in Heshbon and at Idre had defeated OG, king of Bashan who reigned in Ashtaroth, east of the Jordan in the territory of Moab. Moses began to expound this law saying the Lord our God said to us at Horeb you have stayed long enough at this mountain break camp and advance into the hill country of the Amarites. Go to all the neighboring peoples in the Arabba, in the mountains, in the western foothills, in the Negev and along the coast to the land of the Canaanites and to Lebanon as far as the great river, the Euphrates. See, I have given you this land. Go in and take possession of the land that the Lord swore he would give to your fathers to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and to their descendants after them. At that time I said to you you're too heavy a burden for me to carry alone. The Lord your God has increased your numbers so that today you are as numerous as the stars in the sky. May the Lord, the God of your ancestors increase you a thousand times and bless you as he has promised. But how can I bear your problems and your burdens and your disputes all by myself? Choose some wise, understanding and respected men from each of your tribes and I will set them over. You answered me, what you propose to do is good. So I took the leading men of your tribes, wise and respected men and appointed them to have authority over you as commanders of thousands of hundreds of as tribal officials. And I charged your judges at that time. Hear the disputes between your people and judge fairly whether the cases between two Israelites or between an Israelite and a foreigner residing among you. Do not show partiality in judging. Hear both small and great alike. Do not be afraid of anyone for judgment belongs to God. Bring me any case too hard for you and I will hear it. And at that time I told you everything you were to do. Then, as the Lord our God commanded us we set out from Horibbe and went towards the hill country of the Emirates through all that vast and dreadful wilderness that you've seen. And so we reached Kadeshbarnier. Then I said to you have reached the hill country of the Emirates which the Lord your God is giving us. See, the Lord your God is giving you the land. Go up and take possession of it as the Lord the God of your ancestors told you do not be afraid, do not be discouraged. Then all of you came to me and said let us send men ahead to spy out the land for us and bring back a report about the route we'd take and the towns will come to. The idea seemed good to me. So I selected twelve of you, one man from each tribe. They left and went up into the hill country and came to the Valley of Escol and explored it, taking with them some of the fruit of the land. They brought it down to us and reported, it is a good land that the Lord our God is giving us. But you were unwilling to go up. You rebelled against the command of the Lord your God. You grumbled in your tents and said, the Lord hates us. So he brought us out of Egypt to deliver us into the hands of the Amarites, to destroy us. Where can we go? Our brothers have made our hearts melt in fear. They say the people are stronger and taller than we are. The cities are large, with walled up to the sky. We even saw the Anarchites there. Then I said to you, do not be terrified. Do not be afraid of them. The Lord your God, who is going before you, will fight for you as he did for you in Egypt, before your very eyes and in the wilderness there, you saw how the Lord your God carried you as a father carried his son, all the way you went until you reached this place. In spite of this, you did not trust in the Lord your God, who went ahead of you on your journey in fire by night and in a cloud by day to search out places for you to camp and to show you the way you should go.

  Sarah: Wow. There's so much in that first bit. But first of all, I mean, amazing pronouncing of all those names. Well done.

  Felicity: Thank you. It's one of those that when you see it coming, you're like, am I going to get it right? But I don't know.

  Sarah: Should we just kind of give a quick overview of what's going on in these three chapters? So we've had in this first bit, we've had the kind of story so far, haven't we? And there's a real repetition of God, of your ancestors, and kind of repeated lines like, you've increased as numbers as stars in the sky. You're that numerous that should ring bells of, wow. All these promises that God has kind of said in the past, they're all coming true, they're kind of ready to go into the land. And then you get this massive but in verse 28 but you are unwilling. You rebelled, you grumbled, you said, the Lord hates you. You did not trust in the Lord. And that's like the Pivot, isn't it, of the kind of this beginning narrative? And then it kind of takes them into the wilderness for 40 years just.

  Felicity: To remember that the people who are listening are not actually in the wilderness. Moses is recounting what has happened with God's people, isn't it? So these people actually sit still and listen for the whole of deuteronomy. Yeah, they're sitting just on the edge of the Promised Land, aren't they?

  Sarah: And these people are the children of all of those who have died in the wilderness. So for 40 years he said none of that generation were going to enter the land. This is all of their children. So you can imagine the context. All of these people listening have been bereaved of their parents generation. So they're sitting listening to the history of their sin, essentially of the people's sin and rebellion against the Lord and how significant it was. And so you get kind of the I think what's really striking in chapter two is then you get the Lord talking about other nations being given land and it feels very ironic because you're like, no, that is meant. To be the ones being given the land. And yet it's the nations, other nations around them who are going to have given possession of different spots of land. And then you get the defeat of these two big kings. What, literally they are giants.

  Felicity: That nine cubic bed of iron or something that's described yes, in chapter three.

  Sarah: So you get these kind of beginnings of the Lord kind of working and this is actually recalled back in numbers, this narrative of these two defeats of these kings. And that's then where they've got to at this point. So chapters one to three is like a whistle stop history of now you're sitting looking at this land.

  Felicity: Yes, exactly. And the land is the big deal, isn't it? So that they've been through the wilderness, being taken through the wilderness, kept provided for by the Lord in order that he might bring them into the Promised Land. And that's the kind of the big hope. That's literally what they're all longing for and that's what's been talked about all throughout this time. So it's interesting, just at the very start, even if we go back to the beginning, in one verse three, he's just said it takes eleven days to go from hare to Karishbarnia. That's basically eleven days to get from where they started into the Promised Land. But then it says in the 40th year, on the first day of the year, it's like, no, this all went wrong. We had to take you back into the wilderness because of as you and.

  Sarah: Literally the Lord said, you have to turn around and go back towards the Red Sea. So they're kind of turning around and going back towards slavery, that journey back. That's so striking, isn't it just that within the first couple of verses and actually it's a narrator speaking at this point, so it's not Moses. There's a narrator involved in writing Deuteronomy as well, isn't there? He could have bookends Deuteronomy and a little bit in the middle as well. So from the get go, it's like just, just remember, just remember your past. Remember that it took 40 years, nearly 41 years to do an eleven day journey because of the rebellion of the hearts of your people. And I think it's really striking the way through the book, and you get it here already, that he talks about you, you rebellion you, you're rebelling you. And he kind of lines up the people who are listening now. You actually weren't there, but he is saying it's still your sin, you're still owning it. It's still the same heart problem for you as well as it was for your parents. And that kind of flows through to us as well, I think. Yeah, absolutely.

  Felicity: I think there's a sort of smoosh of the you. Well, I think you have the u of literally the people who are sitting here listening and then you have the you of the people who made that huge, grumbling, rebellious mistake and got taken off into the wilderness to die, basically that generation before. But then you have not just us who are reading this, but everyone throughout history who has been reading Deuteronomy. And we're talking people joshua takes them into the land. It's people then, isn't it? And then it's people on it's. The prophets who talk about they reference Deuteronomy. You've got the New Testament referencing deuteronomy. So everyone's been reading this, everyone the Yous who are reading, including us. But the point of that, I think, being our hearts have not changed. And that's one of the big kind of revelations of the book, isn't it? I think we have a big revelation of who God is and or even just at this very beginning start of the book, we hear God providing for his people, like he's taking them into the wilderness, but he is providing them night and day. He showed them where to camp, he led the way. And in the same way, we have a revelation of what we're like as well. God doesn't change and unfortunately, we don't change. I thought it was interesting. One of the big things, I think that comes through Deuteronomy, and we get a hint of it here. In one verse 36, he talks about Caleb and Josh Joshua, they're going to lead them because he followed the Lord wholeheartedly. That's just a big Deuteronomy thing, isn't it? And it's helpful to notice it here. God is concerned about the heart. And so I think that's helpful to sort of set that up.

  Sarah: And it's in contrast, isn't it, to the people who it's their heart that's been unwilling to go up. The kind of language of unwilling rebellion grumbled, you did not trust in the Lord. That is all heart language, isn't it? So it's not abstract in any way. They had more than enough to be able to trust the Lord. He has given them everything. And even in these chapters in the wilderness, he still provided for them. And in this defeat of these two giant kings, he's done all of that. All of that as he kind of go the way through, use that repetition tool and go through. Just see what's repeated time and again. And it's the Lord gave them this, the Lord gave them that, the Lord delivered them into your hands. He goes before you. He was there after you, like in every way. It's the Lord who has made this happen. So they're now finally sitting on this kind of edge of the promised land. Yes, absolutely.

  Felicity: Is it worth just momentary, considering the fact that we seem to have quite a bit of destruction of the other nations and we're going to see that that's going to be a thing that comes out, which is an uncomfortable thing. And I think that's right, that it's uncomfortable. We're not supposed to be comfortable with this, but it's worth just noting at this point, deuteronomy sits within the kind of Genesis exodus, like the whole penteu, these first five books. And from the very start we have, if you're not following God, if you're not choosing the God way, you're choosing the sin death way. That's been a start from chapter three back in Genesis. And so it's not so much we need to see that these other nations is not really about who they are, it's whether they're of the Lord or not, like whether they're choosing the sin way or the God way. And we hear throughout Deuteronomy loads about idols and chasing other gods and he wants to protect his people from that. And so it seems just as a first kind of start of thinking about it, the backdrop for it is it's either sin and death or it's God, his grace and life. Yeah, I don't know, is that helpful? This is a huge question.

  Sarah: It's a big question. It is here, isn't it? And it's important to think about it, but also there will be other opportunities to talk about it as it goes.

  Felicity: On, that's like we unbelievably is almost time to wrap it up already. But Sarah, just one thing driving it to the heart. That's what we always want to do, isn't it? Even though three big chapters, anything that's hitting your heart.

  Sarah: The nature of my heart being the same as their hearts here. The nature of the unwillingness, the grumbling kind of not trusting wholeheartedly in the Lord and seeing my heart and actually seeing this kind of makes you squirm, I think. This passage he starts this is not the kind of motivational speech that you were expecting at the start of a massive sermon, is it? He's going for the sin, he's going for your heart first. And actually I need to hear that. I need to hear that today, I need to hear that every day that actually I am naturally like this. And yet God doesn't change and he's faithful to his covenant, promises ultimately in Jesus. Hooray for Jesus. So I think my heart is thankful and yeah, just seeing God's grace despite them, how about you?

  Felicity: I think yes. And in that similarly seeing our heart, seeing our God, but in that remembering that God did and has rescued his people, including us. And I think that's one of the big calls of the book is to remember. Remember who remember who we are. And even just beginning to get a handle on that. Remember, don't forget who we are. In that kind of what you're saying, the reality of my heart, but also the reality of what God has done and continues to do. The fact that he's given us Jesus, and we're standing on firm ground because of the blood of Christ, and that is praise the Lord. It's good.

  Sarah: Yeah. Like, remembering our past, remembering our hearts, remembering their past, and sitting in that narrative together helps you to remember how much we have in Christ, isn't it? There is an active thing that's going on there as you do that, and I think that's really helpful. And then therefore, we're like, oh, well done, Moses. And she has a really good sermon.

  Felicity: Thanks, Moses. Yeah, we'll take it.

  Sarah: I'll take it. And I'm going to pray in light of it now. Should I do that?

  Felicity: Please do, Father.

  Sarah: Thank you. Thank you that this word speaks to our hearts. Thank you that we need to hear it. Thank you that we need to see our own hearts in the midst of this word, as well as seeing Your people back then. Thank you, Lord, for your grace. Thank you that we live by grace alone. And thank you so much that we are not defined by our past, by our sin, but we're in Jesus. We're defined by him, and we're your people in him. So we just praise you for what we've read, what we've discussed, even just even on the surface here. Lord, we just thank you that you are at work. Oh, man.

  Felicity: Oh, man. Wow. Three chapters down. We're looking forward to next week. Aren't we actually just taking one chapter?

  Sarah: Next week is just one chapter. I know. Until that point, if you're listening to this podcast, if you're enjoying it, why not share it with a friend? Why not suggest reading Deuteronomy together and get this book open over a video call, over a phone call, over text message, over a group message, whatever it is, even in person, over a cup of tea. Get it open with someone else, have a chat and see how you go. And we look forward to seeing you next time.

  Felicity: Absolutely. See you then. Thank you to Kaleidoscope and ten of those for sponsoring this episode.

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