seekeroftruth
Well-Known Member
Deuteronomy 26:1 When you have entered the land the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance and have taken possession of it and settled in it, 2 take some of the firstfruits of all that you produce from the soil of the land the Lord your God is giving you and put them in a basket. Then go to the place the Lord your God will choose as a dwelling for his Name 3 and say to the priest in office at the time, “I declare today to the Lord your God that I have come to the land the Lord swore to our ancestors to give us.” 4 The priest shall take the basket from your hands and set it down in front of the altar of the Lord your God. 5 Then you shall declare before the Lord your God: “My father was a wandering Aramean, and he went down into Egypt with a few people and lived there and became a great nation, powerful and numerous. 6 But the Egyptians mistreated us and made us suffer, subjecting us to harsh labor. 7 Then we cried out to the Lord, the God of our ancestors, and the Lord heard our voice and saw our misery, toil and oppression. 8 So the Lord brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm, with great terror and with signs and wonders. 9 He brought us to this place and gave us this land, a land flowing with milk and honey; 10 and now I bring the firstfruits of the soil that you, Lord, have given me.” Place the basket before the Lord your God and bow down before him. 11 Then you and the Levites and the foreigners residing among you shall rejoice in all the good things the Lord your God has given to you and your household.
Well, these are verses you might hear annually in a brick and mortar church. I found it interesting that a lot of churches preach only the Gospel all year, barely mentioning the Old Testament books, but once a year they enhance the sermon with an intimate knowledge of the Old Testament Laws.
These comments are from the Enduring Word commentary.
Numbers 18:12 speaks of the firstfruits that must be regularly brought to the priests, but the firstfruits described here in Deuteronomy 26 seem to be a special offering of firstfruits, from the first of the harvest they gain in the Promised Land.
Israel spent some 400 years in Egypt. Yet in the course of God’s eternal plan, it was nothing more than a sojourn. We can often focus so much on our own time of trial or misery that we think that it defines our whole life; God saw Israel’s experience in Egypt as a sojourn.
This was the major reason God had for sending Jacob and his family on their sojourn in Egypt. When they lived in Canaan, there was great risk of the family just assimilating with the wicked, pagan peoples around them. To prevent this, and to allow the nation to grow, God sent them down to Egypt, which was a very racist society, and who would not intermarry with Israel. Therefore, they could go down there few in number; and there he became a nation, great, mighty, and populous.
This initial giving of firstfruits when Israel came into the Promised Land was an appropriate way to say “thank you” to the Lord. This giving, and all giving done with the right heart, is a proper way to worship before the Lord your God.
This was the major reason God had for sending Jacob and his family on their sojourn in Egypt. When they lived in Canaan, there was great risk of the family just assimilating with the wicked, pagan peoples around them. To prevent this, and to allow the nation to grow, God sent them down to Egypt, which was a very racist society, and who would not intermarry with Israel. Therefore, they could go down there few in number; and there he became a nation, great, mighty, and populous.
This initial giving of firstfruits when Israel came into the Promised Land was an appropriate way to say “thank you” to the Lord. This giving, and all giving done with the right heart, is a proper way to worship before the Lord your God.
When we receive from the Lord, and give back to Him, it makes us rejoice. It is the proper response of a creature to his Creator, who has supplied him with all good things.
While reading these verses we should remember that Moses is talking to those who would enter a land where a cluster is so big, it has to be carried on a pole. These people had been traveling through the desert on the way to their new home for forty years. The majority of these people didn't remember being enslaved and doing hard labor. The majority of them had only heard stories of making bricks with no straw while being beat mercilessly. The majority of these people wouldn't even remember that calf that just popped out of the cauldron.
IMHO.... Moses was reminding these people to show their gratitude.... The opportunity to gratefully thank God for the "first time" in their new home would only come along once.... and Moses, IMHO, was telling them not to squander that opportunity to think of everything that God had done for them. I've had a few "first time" experiences. I hope to have many more "first time" experiences thanks to the Lord my God.... I hope that I remember to show Gratitude for all of them.
