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Deuteronomy 26 (ESV)

12 “When you have finished paying all the tithe of your produce in the third year, which is the year of tithing, giving it to the Levite, the sojourner, the fatherless, and the widow, so that they may eat within your towns and be filled, 13 then you shall say before the Lord your God, ‘I have removed the sacred portion out of my house, and moreover, I have given it to the Levite, the sojourner, the fatherless, and the widow, according to all your commandment that you have commanded me. I have not transgressed any of your commandments, nor have I forgotten them. 14 I have not eaten of the tithe while I was mourning, or removed any of it while I was unclean, or offered any of it to the dead. I have obeyed the voice of the Lord my God. I have done according to all that you have commanded me. 15 Look down from your holy habitation, from heaven, and bless your people Israel and the ground that you have given us, as you swore to our fathers, a land flowing with milk and honey.’

16 “This day the Lord your God commands you to do these statutes and rules. You shall therefore be careful to do them with all your heart and with all your soul. 17 You have declared today that the Lord is your God, and that you will walk in his ways, and keep his statutes and his commandments and his rules, and will obey his voice. 18 And the Lord has declared today that you are a people for his treasured possession, as he has promised you, and that you are to keep all his commandments, 19 and that he will set you in praise and in fame and in honor high above all nations that he has made, and that you shall be a people holy to the Lord your God, as he promised.”

REFLECTION:

Moses anticipates that the people will soon enter and settle in the land.  When they do, they will work the land, which will produce crops.  Moses instructs them to take the first of the produce of the land and offer it to the Lord as an acknowledgement that their presence in the land and their agricultural bounty are gifts from the severing Lord.  With this they are to rehearse the great narrative of their deliverance from Egypt and entry into the land.  God’s people today can look back in history to the cross and tell the story of their deliverance.  Israelites established an annual festival (28:26-31) in which the first of the crops are offered in the context of a holy assembly.  We too should be moved to offer the best of our efforts to the God, who saved us and provides for us.

PRAYER:

It has been estimated that 99% of the money Christians spend is on themselves.

How do I decide how much to give, to whom and why?  What does my giving pattern say about God’s character and commands?  Is money or the control that I feel from having money an idol in my life?

What would I like to change about my giving pattern to more closely “walk in his ways” (v17)?  What first step can I take this week?

Commit this to the Lord and ask him to help me carry it out so that I “will walk in his ways, that I will keep his decrees, commands and laws, and that I will obey him.”