But seek the Kingdom of God, and all these things will be added to you. Luke 12:31

Deuteronomy 29-30

Deuteronomy 29

The Covenant in Moab

¹ These are the words of the covenant which the Lord commanded Moses to make with the Israelites in the land of Moab, in addition to the covenant which he made with them in Horeb.

² Moses called to all Israel and said to them: Your eyes have seen all that the Lord did in the land of Egypt to Pharaoh and to all his servants and to all his land, ³ the great trials which your eyes saw, the signs, and those great wonders. ⁴ But the Lord has not given you a heart to know, eyes to see, and ears to hear, to this day. ⁵ I have led you 40 years in the wilderness. Your clothes have not grown old on you, and your sandals have not grown old on your feet. ⁶ You have not eaten bread, nor have you drunk wine or strong drink, that you may know that I am the Lord your God.

⁷ When you came to this place, Sihon, King of Heshbon and Og, King of Bashan came out against us to battle, and we struck them. ⁸ We took their land and gave it as an inheritance to the Reubenites and to the Gadites and to the half-tribe of the Manassites. ⁹ Therefore keep the words of this covenant and do them, that you may prosper in all that you do.

¹⁰ All of you stand today in the presence of the Lord your God: your heads, your tribes, your elders, and your officers, all the men of Israel, ¹¹ your little ones, your wives, and the foreigners who are in the midst of your camps, from the one who cuts your wood to the one who draws your water, ¹² that you may enter into the covenant of the Lord your God, and into his oath, which the Lord your God is making with you today, ¹³ that he may establish you today as his people and that he may be your God, as he spoke to you and as he swore to your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob.

¹⁴ Neither do I make this covenant and this oath with you only, ¹⁵ but with those who stand here with us today before the Lord our God, and also with those who are not here with us today ¹⁶ (for you know how we lived in the land of Egypt and how we came through the middle of the nations through which you passed, ¹⁷ and you have seen their abominations and their idols of wood, stone, silver, and gold, which were among them); ¹⁸ lest there should be among you man, woman, family, or tribe whose heart turns away today from the Lord our God, to go to serve the gods of those nations; lest there should be among you a root that produces bitter poison, ¹⁹ and it happen, when he hears the words of this curse, that he bless himself in his heart, saying, “I shall have peace, though I walk in the stubbornness of my heart,” to destroy the moist with the dry. ²⁰ The Lord will not pardon him, but then the Lord’s anger and his jealousy will burn against that man, and all the curses that are written in this book will fall on him, and the Lord will blot out his name from under the heavens. ²¹ The Lord will set him apart for calamity out of all the tribes of Israel, according to all the curses of the covenant written in this book of the law.

²² The generation to come—your children who will rise up after you, and the foreigner who will come from a far land—will say, when they see the plagues of that land, and the sicknesses with which the Lord has made it sick, ²³ that all of its land is sulfur, salt, and burning, that it is not sown, does not produce, nor does any grass grow in it, like the overthrow of Sodom, Gomorrah, Admah, and Zeboiim, which the Lord overthrew in his anger and in his wrath. ²⁴ All the nations will say, “Why has the Lord done this to this land? What does the heat of this great anger mean?”

²⁵ Then men will say, “Because they abandoned the covenant of the Lord, the God of their fathers, which he made with them when he brought them out of the land of Egypt, ²⁶ and went and served other gods and worshiped them, gods that they did not know and that he had not given to them. ²⁷ Therefore the Lord’s anger burned against this land, to bring on it all the curses that are written in this book. ²⁸ The Lord rooted them out of their land in anger, in wrath, and in great indignation, and thrust them into another land, as it is today.”

²⁹ The secret things belong to the Lord our God, but the things that are revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may do all the words of this law.

Deuteronomy 30

Restoration Promised

¹ It shall happen, when all these things have come on you, the blessing and the curse, which I have set before you, and you shall call them to mind among all the nations where the Lord your God has driven you, ² and return to the Lord your God and obey his voice according to all that I command you today, you and your children, with all your heart and with all your soul, ³ that then the Lord your God will release you from captivity, have compassion on you, and will return and gather you from all the peoples where the Lord your God has scattered you. ⁴ If your outcasts are in the uttermost parts of the heavens, from there the Lord your God will gather you, and from there he will bring you back. ⁵ The Lord your God will bring you into the land which your fathers possessed, and you will possess it. He will prosper you and multiply you more than your fathers.

⁶ The Lord your God will circumcise your heart and the heart of your offspring, to love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul, that you may live. ⁷ The Lord your God will put all these curses on your enemies and on those who hate you, who persecuted you. ⁸ You shall return and obey the voice of the Lord and obey all of his commandments which I am giving you today. ⁹ The Lord your God will make you prosperous in all the work of your hand, in the fruit of your body, in the fruit of your livestock, and in the fruit of your ground, for good; for the Lord will again rejoice over you for good, as he rejoiced over your fathers, ¹⁰ if you will obey the voice of the Lord your God, to keep his commandments and his statutes which are written in this book of the law, if you turn to the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul.

The Choice of Life or Death

¹¹ For this commandment which I am giving you today is not too hard for you or too distant. ¹² It is not in heaven, that you should say, “Who will go up for us to heaven, bring it to us, and proclaim it to us, that we may do it?” ¹³ Neither is it beyond the sea, that you should say, “Who will go over the sea for us, bring it to us, and proclaim it to us, that we may do it?” ¹⁴ But the word is very near to you, in your mouth and in your heart, that you may do it.

¹⁵ I have set before you today life and prosperity, and death and destruction. ¹⁶ For I command you today to love the Lord your God, to walk in his ways and to keep his commandments, his statutes, and his ordinances, that you may live and multiply, and that the Lord your God may bless you in the land where you are going in to possess. ¹⁷ But if your heart turns away, and you will not hear, but are drawn away and worship other gods, and serve them, ¹⁸ I declare to you today that you will surely perish. You will not prolong your days in the land where you pass over the Jordan to go in to possess. ¹⁹ I call heaven and earth to witness against you today that I have set before you life and death, blessing and curse. Therefore choose life, that you may live, you and your descendants, ²⁰ to love the Lord your God, to obey his voice, and to cling to him; for he is your life, and the length of your days, that you may dwell in the land which the Lord swore to your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give them.

Luke 12:8-34

Confessing Christ

⁸ “I tell you, everyone who confesses me before men, the Son of Man will also confess before the angels of God, ⁹ but he who denies me in the presence of men will be denied in the presence of God’s angels. ¹⁰ Everyone who speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven, but those who blaspheme against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven. ¹¹ When they bring you before the synagogues, the rulers, and the authorities, do not be anxious about how or what you will answer, or what you will say, ¹² for the Holy Spirit will teach you in that same hour what you must say.”

The Parable of the Rich Fool

¹³ Someone among the crowds said to him, “Teacher, tell my brother to divide the inheritance with me.”

¹⁴ But he said to him, “Sir, who made me a judge or an arbitrator over you?” ¹⁵ He said to them, “Beware! Keep yourselves from covetousness, for a man’s life does not consist of the abundance of the things which he possesses.”

¹⁶ He spoke a parable to them, saying, “The ground of a certain rich man produced abundantly. ¹⁷ He reasoned within himself, saying, ‘What will I do, because I don’t have room to store my crops?’ ¹⁸ He said, ‘This is what I will do. I will pull down my barns, build bigger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods. ¹⁹ I will tell myself: You have many goods laid up for many years. Take your ease, eat, drink, and be merry.’

²⁰ But God said to him, ‘You foolish one, tonight your soul is required of you. The things which you have prepared—whose will they be?’ ²¹ So is he who lays up treasure for himself and is not rich toward God.”

Do Not Worry

²² He said to his disciples, “Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious for your life, what you will eat, nor for your body, what you will wear. ²³ Life is more than food, and the body is more than clothing. ²⁴ Consider the ravens: they do not sow, they do not reap, they have no warehouse or barn, and God feeds them. How much more valuable are you than birds!

²⁵ Which of you by being anxious can add a foot to his stature? ²⁶ If then you are not able to do even the least of these things, why are you anxious about the rest?

²⁷ Consider the lilies, how they grow. They do not toil, nor do they spin, yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. ²⁸ But if this is how God clothes the grass in the field, which is here today, and tomorrow is cast into the oven, how much more will he clothe you, O you of little faith?

²⁹ Do not seek after what you will eat or what you will drink, nor be anxious. ³⁰ For the nations of the world seek after all of these things, but your Father knows that you need these things. ³¹ But seek the Kingdom of God, and all these things will be added to you. ³² Do not be afraid, little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the Kingdom. ³³ Sell that which you have and give gifts to the needy. Make for yourselves purses which do not grow old, a treasure in the heavens that does not fail, where no thief approaches, nor moth destroys. ³⁴ For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.

Psalm 78:32-55

³² For all this they still sinned,
and did not believe in his wondrous works.
³³ Therefore he consumed their days in vanity,
and their years in terror.
³⁴ When he killed them, then they inquired after him.
They returned and sought God earnestly.
³⁵ They remembered that God was their rock,
the Most High God, their redeemer.
³⁶ But they flattered him with their mouth,
and lied to him with their tongue.
³⁷ For their heart was not right with him,
nor were they faithful in his covenant.

³⁸ But he, being merciful, forgave iniquity,
and did not destroy them.
Yes, many times he turned his anger away,
and did not stir up all his wrath.
³⁹ He remembered that they were but flesh,
a wind that passes away, and does not come back.

⁴⁰ How often they rebelled against him in the wilderness,
and grieved him in the desert!
⁴¹ They turned again and tested God,
and provoked the Holy One of Israel.
⁴² They did not remember his hand,
nor the day when he redeemed them from the adversary;
⁴³ how he set his signs in Egypt,
his wonders in the field of Zoan,
⁴⁴ he turned their rivers into blood,
and their streams, so that they could not drink.
⁴⁵ He sent among them swarms of flies, which devoured them;
and frogs, which destroyed them.
⁴⁶ He gave also their increase to the caterpillar,
and their labor to the locust.
⁴⁷ He destroyed their vines with hail,
their sycamore fig trees with frost.
⁴⁸ He gave over their livestock also to the hail,
and their flocks to hot thunderbolts.
⁴⁹ He threw on them the fierceness of his anger,
wrath, indignation, and trouble,
and a band of angels of evil.

⁵⁰ He made a path for his anger.
He did not spare them from death,
but gave their lives over to the pestilence,
⁵¹ and struck all the firstborn in Egypt,
the chief of their strength in the tents of Ham.

⁵² But he led out his own people like sheep,
and guided them in the wilderness like a flock.
⁵³ He led them safely, so that they were not afraid,
but the sea overwhelmed their enemies.
⁵⁴ He brought them to the border of his sanctuary,
to this mountain, which his right hand had taken.
⁵⁵ He also drove out the nations before them,
allotted them for an inheritance by line,
and made the tribes of Israel to dwell in their tents.

Proverbs 12:21-23

²¹ No mischief shall happen to the righteous,
but the wicked shall be filled with evil.
²² Lying lips are an abomination to the Lord,
but those who deal truthfully are his delight.
²³ A prudent man keeps his knowledge,
but the hearts of fools proclaim foolishness.

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