All right, you can turn to Deuteronomy chapter 18 as we continue to work our way through this book and thus conclude the Pentateuch. Remember, Deuteronomy chapters 16 and 17 dealt with the maintenance of justice in the civil sphere, specifically lower courts, judicial procedure, higher courts, and monarchy. Chapter 18 turns a corner and deals with ecclesiastical matters, the regulation of religion, specifically priests and prophets in Deuteronomy chapter 18. So I'll read the chapter and then we'll look at it in some detail.

Beginning in verse one, the priests, the Levites, all the tribe of Levi shall have no part nor inheritance with Israel. They shall eat the offerings of the Lord made by fire and his portion. Therefore they shall have no inheritance among their brethren. The Lord is their inheritance, as he said to them.

And this shall be the priests do from the people, from those who offer a sacrifice, whether it is bull or sheep. They shall give to the priests the shoulder, the cheeks and the stomach. the first fruits of your grain, and your new wine, and your oil, and the first of the fleece of your sheep, you shall give him. For the Lord your God has chosen him out of all your tribes to stand to minister in the name of the Lord, him and his sons forever. So if a Levite comes from any of your gates, from where he dwells among all Israel, and comes with all the desire of his mind to the place which the Lord chooses, Then he may serve in the name of the Lord, his God, all his brethren, as all his brethren, the Levites do who stand there before the Lord.

They shall have equal portions to eat besides what comes from the sale of his inheritance. When you come into the land, which the Lord, your God is giving you. You shall not learn to follow the abominations of those nations. There shall not be found among you anyone who makes his son or his daughter pass through the fire, or one who practices witchcraft, or a soothsayer, or one who interprets omens, or a sorcerer, or one who conjures spells, or a medium, or a spiritist, or one who calls up the dead.

For all who do these things are an abomination to the Lord. And because of these abominations, the Lord your God drives them out from before you. You shall be blameless before the Lord your God. For these nations, which you will dispossess, listen to the soothsayers and diviners.

But as for you, the Lord your God has not appointed such for you. The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from your midst, from your brethren. Him you shall hear, according to all you desired of the Lord your God in Horeb, in the day of the assembly, saying, Let me not hear again the voice of the Lord my God, nor let me see this great fire anymore, lest I die. And the Lord said to me, what they have spoken is good.

I will raise up for them a prophet like you from among their brethren and will put my words in his mouth and he shall speak to them all that I command him. And it shall be that whoever will not hear my words, which he speaks in my name, I will require it of him. But the prophet who presumes to speak a word in my name, which I have not commanded him to speak, or who speaks in the name of other gods, that prophet shall die. And if you say in your heart, how shall we know the word which the Lord has not spoken?

When a prophet speaks in the name of the Lord, if the thing does not happen or come to pass, that is the thing which the Lord has not spoken. The prophet has spoken it presumptuously. You shall not be afraid of him. Amen.

Introduction

As I said, the specific emphasis is on the priests and the prophets, the medium by which God spoke and revealed himself to Old Covenant Israel. So there are three sections here. First is the provision for priests and Levites in verses one to eight. Secondly, a prohibition against wicked practices in verses nine to 14.

And then finally, the promise of another prophet in verses 15 to 22. So

Provision for Priests and Levites

let's look first at the provision for priests and Levites. Now I should say all priests were Levites, but not all Levites were priests. So that could be a bit confusing when you see references back and forth to Levites and priests. Remember, all priests were Levites, but not all Levites were priests.

And we'll make that clear as we move on. So

Their Inheritance in God

note first their inheritance in verses 1 and 2. You've got categories in verse 1. The priests, the Levites, all the tribe of Levi shall have no part nor inheritance with Israel. They shall eat the offerings of the Lord made by fire and his poor shed.

So again, priests were Levites. They were direct descendants of Aaron, and they alone were supposed to approach the altar. They were the ones that engaged in that feastly mediation, they engaged in intercession, they engaged in offering up sacrifice. They were tasked specifically with those things relative to the tabernacle temple, but specifically service at the altar.

The Levites were tasked with tabernacle and temple duties, but they did not serve the temple. They did not go into those places where the priests alone were permitted to go. And essentially, what you have in terms of the Levites is that they taught the Word of the Lord. Several passages throughout the Pentateuch indicate that they taught the Word of the Lord.

They participated in civil and criminal matters. We've already seen that in our study in Deuteronomy 16 and 17. Also, to a degree, they were involved in military matters, advisors, encouragers, exhorters, to the troops of Israel as they set out on battle. The Levites as well did not receive tribal allotments but cities.

If you drop down to verse 8, it may appear that there's some sort of a discrepancy. They shall have equal portions to eat besides what comes from the sale of his inheritance. So when it says they had no inheritance, they didn't get pieces of land like the other tribes were allotted. Rather, they got cities in the nation that they occupied, or the nation, rather, that they took over.

They had 48 of them, and six of them were rather cities of refuge. So they didn't have a tribal allotment like Judah, or like Ephraim, or like any of the other tribes. And the rationale was is that their inheritance was indeed God. God was their portion.

God was their lot. but God called upon the community to make sure that they didn't starve to death and that's the primary emphasis in this particular section. Gary Northwell said one time that men want religion but they want it cheap. Old Covenant Israel was not allowed to be cheap when it came to offering up their sacrifices and offering up their tithes to the Most High because from those tithes and offerings came support for the Levitical priesthood. From those tithes and offerings came support for the poor in Old Covenant Israel.

It's not as if God needs money. It's not as if God's up there wringing his cosmic hands waiting for the shekels to be dropped into the plate so that he can keep the lights on in heaven. No, this was the way that he orchestrated the provision of the Levites in the promised land. They were not given a parcel of land.

They had full-time jobs ministering the word, participating in civil and criminal matters. They didn't have time to tend to flocks. They didn't have time to cultivate land. They didn't have all of that wherewithal to do two jobs when only one was ultimately entrusted to them.

So make sure that the, basically the ordinance is to make sure that the children of Israel are giving sufficiently so that the priests can eat. And that's the emphasis. The priests, the Levites, all the tribe of Levi shall have no part nor inheritance with Israel. They shall eat the offerings of the Lord made by fire and his portion.

Therefore, they shall have no inheritance among their brethren. The Lord is their inheritance as he said to that. Now, I remember, I think it was Spurgeon, and it may have been somebody he knew and was talking to, but a pastor went to the deacon in the church and he said, pastor, or deacon, I need some money. I need more money.

We don't have sufficient money to live on. And of course, the deacon says, but don't you preach for souls? And Spurgeon said, yeah, but we can't eat souls. And if we could, yours would be too small to feed my whole family.

So again, this whole idea that, you know, this is a sort of a necessary evil we got to give to support these Levites. No, it was a ministry ordained by God for the good of the children of God, both in ecclesiology, with reference to teaching the Word relative to proper worship, but in civil and criminal matters. They were men charged with specific tasks, and as a result, they were supposed to depend upon God. He was their inheritance, but God wasn't just specifically raining down meat into their refrigerators or putting it on their tables.

It was rather the goodness and the kindness and the obedience of the covenant community as they gave their tithes and offerings that the priests were able to participate in that and share in the blessings and share in the bounty. That's what this section deals with, pay or take care rather of the Levites. In terms of the provision of God through the community for their sustenance, Christopher Wright says, this was not pious spiritualization of a life of ascetic poverty, but a statement of the principle that they would receive the full material blessing of their inheritance to the extent that the people of Yahweh were faithful in their worship of Him and in covenant commitment to one another. So, you see, there is that emphasis.

The whole section, the larger context, is community relations. It's how we function in civil society. Here it's specifically how do we function relative to religion. How do we conduct ourselves, one to another, in this body politic, which is a theocratic nation, which has God as its sovereign lord.

The lord is giving specific commandments and statutes for the regulation of their conduct, right down to the jots and tittles of how the priests get to eat. They have no portion of land. They have not huge herds. They might have a cow.

They might have some property in terms of being within those particular cities. But it's not to sustain them or to pass on as a legacy to their children. It was simply good stewardship, if they did have a parcel of land within one of those cities, to have a cow, to have a goat, to have some sheep, whatever. But they did not have an abundance.

They were rather dependent upon the Lord. And as Wright says, this is an asceticism wherein we throw off any need for worldly or earthly comforts. It's rather God called them to be dependent upon Him, and God legislates to the broader community that they need to be faithful in their sacrifices and tithes in order for the sustenance of the ministry of the Levitical priests, or of the Levites, rather.

Their Priestly Provision

Now note the provision in verses three to five, this shall be the priest do from the people, from those who offer a sacrifice, whether it is bull or sheep, they shall give to the priest the shoulder, the cheeks, and the stomach. It's my favorite meal, the shoulder, the cheeks, and the stomach, with a little bit of potatoes on the side and it's just wonderful. You see, the regulation of God spoke to every jot and tittle of life. He's preparing a people through Moses on the plains of Moab.

This longest and largest of exhortations in the book of Deuteronomy is to prep them to go into the promised land under Joshua to conquer that land, to dispossess the Canaanites, to take the gift that God had given, that he had promised Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and once they get tenure in that land, they're to function in a way to be self-sustaining, to be self-supported, to be those who can shine as a light in the midst of crooked and perverse generations and radiate the blessings of God to all the nations around them. Now, we know they fail. We know they don't do this. We know that subsequent history demonstrates that they do the same things that the Canaanites did, and they ultimately face expulsion from the land.

But this is their marching orders on how they're to conduct themselves when they get to the land, right down to what the priest's share is relative to the sacrifices that are made. The priest didn't participate or rather get to eat of all the sacrifices, but some of them specifically were given to the priest so that they could eat. And then the reason, notice in verse four continues on, the first fruits of your grain and your new wine and your oil and the first of the fleece of your sheep you shall give him. Again, he doesn't live on love and fresh air.

He can't function in his priestly activity. If he's a priest, he needs to go to the altar, he needs to sacrifice. Imagine that, you're a starving priest and you're barbecuing meat all day. That's not a good thing.

Let's not make the burden that much more difficult for the brother. Let's let him participate in it, feed his belly, feed his wife, feed his kids, so that he can give himself to that particular ministry. So, cough up, Israel, is basically what God is saying. Notice in verse five, for the Lord your God has chosen him out of all your tribes to stand to minister in the name of the Lord, him and his sons forever.

This is a God ordained ministry. And as a result, there are God ordained means for the sustaining of that ministry. And it was specifically through the obedience and the generosity of the rest of the people in old covenant Israel. and then

Their Service and Equal Portions

notice their service according to verses 6 to 8. So if a Levite comes from any of your gates, and I think what's envisaged here is again, chapter 12 in Deuteronomy sets forth the reality that there's going to be a central sanctuary. There's going to be one place with one temple, initially a tabernacle, and then a temple, and that's where Israel comes to sacrifice. That's where Israel comes to celebrate feasts.

That's where Israel comes to glorify God. So right here in verse 6, what you're seeing is those 48 cities outside of the confines of Jerusalem, when that central sanctuary takes place, those in those 48 cities might find their way to Jerusalem. They might say, hey, I'm a Levite, I want to go serve my God right there in the city of Jerusalem. So 6 to 8 is dealing with that eventuality.

The Levite's inheritance is the Lord and the sacrificial ministerial income associated with him rather than a geographically bounded territory. So again, the inheritance in verse 8 isn't what it is for the rest of the tribes of Old Covenant Israel. He's not destitute. He's not living in abject poverty.

He has something, but he doesn't have what the regular Israelites have, who have specific jobs in agriculture, or in tending flocks, or in selling, or whatever it is they do. So if the Levite comes from any of your gates, from where he dwells, verse six, among all Israel, and comes with all the desire of his mind to the place which the Lord chooses, then he may serve in the name of the Lord, his God, as all his brethren, the Levites do, who stand there before the Lord. So, the assumption is granted. Yeah, that's perfectly legit.

He can leave that city and he can come to Jerusalem. He's not a second class citizen. He's not somehow a lesser than Levite. For verse 8 tells us, they shall have equal portions to eat besides what comes from the sale of his inheritance.

You don't treat him like, you know, he's a second tier, he's a third tier, he's the B team. So therefore, he doesn't get to participate in the same thing the rest of the Levites who'd already been there are participating in. One other passage that I think kind of shines light on this as well is in Leviticus chapter 21. You can turn there.

Leviticus chapter 21. The emphasis seems to be if you were a Levite, you had the right God as your inheritance and all that that meant. God as your inheritance meant you ate based on the goodness and the obedience of God's people offering up their tithes and sacrifices and then a portion and a part be given to the Levites. Notice in Leviticus 21 at verse 16.

And the Lord spoke to Moses saying, speak to Aaron saying, no man of your descendants and succeeding generations who has any defect may approach to offer the bread of his God. For any man who has a defect shall not approach, a man blind or lame who has a marred face or any limb too long, a man who has a broken foot or broken hand or is a hunchback or a dwarf, or a man who has a defect in his eye or eczema or scab or is a eunuch. No man of the descendants of Aaron the priest who has a defect shall come near to offer the offerings made by fire to the Lord. He has a defect.

He shall not come near to offer the bread of his God. I can imagine that sounds pretty offensive. I'm sure outside of this room, people would roll their eyes and say, that seems vicious. But I think the idea is wholeness, completeness, and holiness or sanctity.

And so those who have any of these maladies are restricted in terms of access, one, to the altar, and then two, with reference to other things that God, through His law, prohibited them from. But then notice in verse 22, he may eat the bread of his God. both the Most Holy and the Holy. Only he shall not go near the veil or approach the altar, because he has a defect, lest he profane my sanctuaries, for I the Lord sanctify them." So he's got a defect, he's got eczema, he's got, you know, the hunchback, whatever his issue is, that doesn't disqualify him as a Levite. It disqualifies him from certain activities as a Levite, but it doesn't then relegate him to beggar status, throw him on the street and hope that he makes it.

No, there's legitimacy to him because of his tribal connection with reference to Levi, but as well, there's legitimacy in what God had spoken with reference to the inheritance of God or God as inheritance to the Levites and all that that entail. So the same thing is happening in chapter 18 as it sort of looks forward to those Levites coming to Jerusalem. They're not the B team. They get everything that everybody else who's a Levite gets.

That's what God says.

Prohibition Against Wicked Practices

Now the next section is the prohibition against wicked practices. I don't think it should take much for us to understand why this is here. They've left Egypt. There was all kinds of false gods there.

In fact, Exodus 12, 12, God, when He judges, He's going to judge the Egyptians and all the gods of Egypt. He's going to show that He alone is God. He alone is the living and true God. And while the Bible speaks of other gods, Molech, it speaks of Baal and Asherah and Chemosh and Dagon, they're not real.

They're what people worship. They're what people believe to be God. It's not legitimizing the existence of other little g gods. It is rather highlighting that the Canaanites, the pagans and the heathens, had these idols, had these objects of worship that they gave names to.

Perhaps demons were behind that. Perhaps it was satanic in nature. But Either way, whether Satan was directly involved in putting up an Asherah pole or a statue to Dagon or to Chemosh or Molech, it's just wicked. It's a departure from the first commandment.

You shall have no other gods before me or you shall have no other gods besides me. You're not supposed to displace me with other gods, but you're not supposed to put me next to other so-called gods as if I'm just one out of a pantheon that you can call on for particular names. That is wrong and wicked, and that's what's facing Old Covenant Israel. So they leave it in Egypt.

They're in the plains of Moab, presently here in Deuteronomy. They're getting ready to go into Canaan. What do you think's going on in Canaan? Bunch of righteous, God-fearing people?

A bunch of people singing praises and Psalms to the most high? No, they're wicked, they're lawless, they're vile, they're idolaters. So Israel's gonna go into the land, there's been several prohibitions along the way about do not engage in idolatry, don't go a-whoring after those other gods, don't fall into that trap, or rather that practice of worshiping other gods, don't do it. Just don't even think about it.

Deuteronomy 7, the legislation concerning holy war. What are you supposed to do with their other religions? Well, we're supposed to respect them. It's going to be a pluralistic society.

You know, let go, let bail. No, no, no, no, no, no. Tear down the altars, kill the inhabitants. Get it out of the land.

Is that because God's vicious? No, it's because God is just and righteous. And he's judging the wicked Canaanites through the almost as wicked Israelites. And when the Israelites ate the absolute wickedness of the Canaanites, God raises up Assyria and takes down the northern tribes.

And then he raises up Babylon to take down the southern tribes. So the charge of arbitrariness or capriciousness cannot be made against God. He's an equal opportunity judge. When Israel is poised and ready to go, God uses them to judge the wicked Canaanites.

When Israel becomes like the Canaanites, God raises up Assyria and sends them in. When Judah continues on that path, didn't learn the lessons from the northern tribe, God raises up Babylon, calls Nebuchadnezzar my servant, and then sends them in to wipe out the southern tribes. At the time of the Lord Jesus Christ, what happens? He comes to his own, his own receive him not.

He's their very Messiah prophesied in all of their scriptures, and they shout, away with him, away with him, crucify him. They employ a betrayer, a treacherous man. They give him 30 pieces of silver. He hands over Jesus.

The Sanhedrin engages in a kangaroo court. They manipulate and blackmail Pontius Pilate to get the death sentence. They crucify the Lord of glory. What happens?

God sends the Romans in 80-70, I'd say the second person of the Godhead, the Lord Christ, sends the Romans to destroy that city. All those, Assyria decimating the northern tribes, Babylon killing the southern tribes, and the Romans sacking the nation once and for all in 80-70, it's all in the book. When we get to Deuteronomy 28, it's all told. You go into the land, you do what you're supposed to, blessings will follow.

You go into the land, you don't do what you're supposed to, and cursings will follow. There was no mystery. There's no, wow, I can't believe all these calamities are coming upon us. Why can't you believe it?

It's in Leviticus 26 and it's in Deuteronomy chapter 28. It's as clear as clear can be. You break God's covenant, he breaks you and shatters you. It's just that simple.

So now, notice in this particular context, they are prohibited against the wicked practices. In other words, you're gonna live next door. I mean, again, it envisages they're not gonna dispossess the land of the Canaanites. An Israelite family is going to live next to a pagan family.

And the Israelite family is going to see the pagans having, you know, seances and casting spells and conjuring up, you know, spirits and engaging in all this stuff. And the Israelite might think, you know, there's something to that. There's something that's alluring there. They've got contact with the supernatural.

That's something we should try. This passage says, don't you even begin to think about trying it. So

General Prohibition: Do Not Learn

notice there's a general statement in verse 9. When you come into the land which the Lord your God is giving you, reminder, grace, He's giving it to you, you didn't earn it, you shall not learn to follow the abominations of those nations. Don't do it. You know, the Bible never, ever addresses the believer as having such a holiness and a purity that he's going to positively affect everybody he comes into contact with.

But it regularly portrays it just the opposite. We get contaminated when we go amongst the ungodly. Our holiness is not so pure and spotless that we can walk down the street and bolts of love fall upon the neighbors and they confess faith in Christ. No.

But we can walk down that same street and be contaminated and thoroughly polluted because we're not as holy and pure as we ought to be. So this is the nature of the prohibition. You're going to go into the land and there's going to be witches, there's going to be warlocks, there's going to be soothsayers, there's going to be necromancers, there's going to be all these people. and they're all gonna be plying their wares and they're all gonna be saying how successful this is. I can tell your fortune.

I can tell you what's gonna happen. I can put you into contact with the dead. I can make life better for you. No, don't do it.

You shall not learn to follow the abominations of those nations. And then

Specific Prohibited Practices

note the specific prohibitions in verses 10 to 12. It gives you sort of an idea of just how polluted Canaan was. Because these are the sorts of things that children of Israel are to be on the lookout for. The first is the prohibition against child sacrifice.

Verse 10a, there shall not be found one among you anyone who makes his son or his daughter pass through the fire. Previously in the book of Leviticus in chapter 18 and in chapter 20, you've got references to Moloch. And Moloch basically was a big God in terms of statue, not big in terms of deity, but a big statue without stretched arms and they'd light a fire at the base of Moloch and they'd come and throw their children into the arms of Moloch. What's the psalmist say in Psalm 115?

They have eyes, but they don't see. They have ears, but they don't hear. They have mouths, but they don't talk. They have hands, but they don't catch.

So when you throw your baby up to Moloch, guess what happens? It bounces and falls into the fire. So there's already been prohibitions against engaging in Moloch worship. Look back at chapter 12, the emphasis on the central sanctuary.

The last section is a warning. notice in 1229 when the lord your god cuts off from before you the nations which you go to dispossess and you displace them and dwell in their land take heed to yourself that you are not ensnared to follow them after they are destroyed from before you and that you do not inquire after their gods saying how did these nations serve their gods i also will do likewise You shall not worship the Lord your God in that way. For every abomination of the Lord, which he hates, they have done to their gods. For they burn even their gods and daughters in the fire to their gods. Whatever I command you, be careful to observe it.

You shall not add to it nor take away from it. Verse 32 is what we call the regulative principle of worship. You do what God commands when it comes to worship. You don't add to it.

You don't supplement it. Well, God, we'd like a rock band. Well, God, we'd like puppets. Well, God, we'd like story time.

No, you do what God says when it comes to the worship of God. Nadab and Abihu, earlier in chapter 10 of the book of Leviticus, underscore the reality of that principle. They offered strange fire to the Lord, and what did God do? He killed them.

He sent fire down on them, not on their sacrifice. And so what we have is the wickedness and the lawlessness of the pagans offering up their children to false gods. Later on, as you move through, past the Pentateuch, you've got 2 Kings 17, which is a prophecy concerning the impending judgment of God via Assyria upon the northern tribes. What's one of the reasons?

Because the Israelites threw their children into the fire. You have 2 Kings 21. What did King Manasseh do? He threw his children into the fire. 2 Kings 23, you've got Josiah, who was godly, who made sure, or tried to make sure, that no one could throw their kids into the fire.

Unfortunately, that didn't obtain, because all the way into Jeremiah, which they overlapped, Josiah and Jeremiah, to some degree, which is intriguing, but the bottom line is, is that it continued on. Also, there's another god named Chemosh, according to 2 Kings 3, verse 27, and then Psalm 106, 37 tells us the Canaanite gods in general, this just happened to be part of their regulative principle of worship, grab a kid, bring him to Baal or Chemosh or Molech and chuck him into the fire. Because once you do that, blessings are going to flow to you. It's a warp-twisted mindset, and you'd think a prohibition like that would be enough to cause any Israelite to shake his head in disbelief.

God has to warn us? I can't ever imagine me throwing my child into the fire. And yet they get into the Promised Land, and what do they do? They got a king throwing his children into the fire.

It's a disgusting display of our wickedness and our depravity and why God has to command us things that don't seem like he should even have to command us. There's prohibitions in the Pentateuch against bestiality. That man has to be told not to have relations with animals is a pretty poor reflection upon man and his depravity, and that it continues in our day, testifies to the reality that God knows the human condition far better than we do, and these laws are not arbitrary, they're given to restrain the lawlessness and the wickedness that seems to prevail amongst men when they have no fear of God before their eyes. So, you're not supposed to chuck your kids into the fire.

Next, the prohibition against divination in verses 10-11. Divination proper. Basically, the practice of seeking hidden knowledge, future events, or guidance through supernatural powers, magic rituals, or the interpretation of omens. Again, don't do it.

That's what your pagan neighbors are going to be doing. You may be tempted. Hey, they get immediate answers. They roll the dice and there's an answer.

Well, you know what? You're not supposed to roll the dice and seek your answer. You're not supposed to hire a witch to come to your house and read your tea leaves. You're not supposed to do that.

And then notice the practice of magic. Magic is simply, this isn't sleight of hand. Pick a card, any card, and I'll tell you what card you pick. That's magic as we know it.

That's not what this is about. Magic is the attempt to manipulate natural or supernatural forces, beings, or events through rituals, symbols, words, or other practices in order to achieve a particular end. There's an end in view. Magic is manipulation.

It's ritual. It is trying to game the system in one's favor, and it's condemned by God. You're not supposed to do that. And then spiritism, communication with the spirit world.

Notice, specifically in verse 11, or one who conjures spells, or a medium, or a spiritist, or one who calls up the dead. Necromancy is one who apparently talks to the dead. It's just forbidden. Again, you're going to be living probably next door, because you're not going to dispossess the land, even though I've told you, God, several times, you need to dispossess the land, because if you don't dispossess the land, you're going to be bowing down to the gods of the land, because you are infected by and you are exposed to the lawless rebel heathen that you were supposed to get rid of.

Part of the implications of Holy War in Deuteronomy 7 was their self-preservation. If you don't get rid of them, it won't be long before you're joining at their altars. And that's precisely what the rest of the Old Testament displays for us. They did exactly what they were told not to do.

They followed and ate the Canaanites, and they wandered, you know, happily and joyfully into that kind of wickedness. In terms of spiritism, medium, spiritist, necromancy, Christopher Wright again, he says, it's a universal human desire to know the unknown, to have some preview of the future, to get guidance for decisions, to exercise control over others, to harm others and ward off the harm others may aim at oneself. Alienated from the living God, humans devise the dark arts of verses 10, B, and 11 for such purposes. If you don't have contact with the living and the true God, that doesn't, you know, neutralize your desire for contact with something.

And remember in 1 Samuel chapter 28, Saul was dutiful. He got rid of all the witches, got rid of all the spiritists, got rid of all the necromancers and the soothsayers from the land. But then Saul was hypocritical because Saul was cut off from the revelation of God. Saul had to prepare to go into battle, and as a legitimately wise king would want, he'd want a word from the Lord in terms of going into battle.

Well, God's not talking to him, so what does he do? He fetches the witch at Endor. And the witch at Endor brings up, the text says Samuel, there's debate over whether it was or not Samuel. She brought something up.

And I don't mean her lunch. She brought something up from the deck. So whatever it was, you know, some say Samuel, some say not Samuel. I think there's a better case to be made for not Samuel, but I don't have any problems with those who say Samuel.

Well, I think it's a tough, tough read on the text. But at any rate, the point is, is that it works. Okay? You know, when you tell people, you know, don't do this, don't do that.

It's not simply because it's a waste of time and it doesn't work. It's because it's positively wicked. You're not supposed to try to talk to the dead. You're not supposed to, you know, engage in witchcraft.

You're not supposed to, you know, engage in magic beyond, you know, sleight of hand. Which card am I holding? Davis, commenting on 1 Samuel 28. Scripture describes such practices not as futile, but as pagan.

Yahweh forbids Israel to use these means, not because they do not work, but because they are wicked. And that's precisely the trap or pit that Saul fell into. Saul needed a word. God's not talking to him, because God's cut him off.

And so what's the next best step? Well, get the witch from Endor. Let me sit down with her. Let me get some advice and counsel in terms of the war that I'm gonna engage in with the Philistines.

The prohibition, or the reason for the prohibition is clearly stated in verse 12. For all who do these things are an abomination to the Lord, and because of these abominations, the Lord your God drives them out from before you. See, I think we need to keep that in our mind. Turn back to Leviticus 18 for a moment.

There's this, you know, objection to Christianity that kind of goes like this. Your God is vicious. He's a tyrant and he's a genocidal sort of maniac. And they point to the dispossession of the land of Canaan as proof positive.

I mean, he commands genocide. He commands the extermination of every Canaanite in the land. kind of behind the scenes is they're just poor pathetic Canaanites living their lives in tranquility and harmony. And why, you know, at the behest of some God should Israelites have any, you know, wherewithal to go in and utterly dispossess the land of the Canaanites? They're wicked.

They're evil. They're vile. And again, when Israel gets in the land and they start doing Canaanite things, what happens? God drives them out of the land.

Assyria, Babylon, Rome. So there's no arbitrariness. There's simply righteousness and justice. Notice in verse Well, it's all prohibition against sexual sin.

Laws of sexual morality, that's sort of the supplied heading at the top of Leviticus chapter 18, talks about a lot of different things, you know, don't see your your family members' nakedness, you need to make sure you stay away from all that stuff. Notice, we'll pick up in verse 19. Also, you shall not approach a woman to uncover her nakedness as long as she is in her customary impurity. Moreover, you shall not lie carnally with your neighbor's wife to defile yourself with her.

You shall not let any of your descendants pass through the fire to Molech, nor shall you profane the name of your God. I am the Lord, You shall not lie with a male as with a woman. It is an abomination, nor shall you mate with any animal to defile yourself with it, nor shall any woman stand before an animal to mate with it. It is perversion.

Do not defile yourselves with any of these things, for by all these the nations are defiled, which I am casting out before you. So, you know, that objection runs like, oh, these poor, innocent Canaanites are just minding their own business, living off the land and singing Kumbaya to Baal. Why would Yahweh command Israel to go in and disrupt that? God is a God of justice, God is a God of righteousness, and God is a God who punishes lawlessness, in this case, raising up none too righteous Israel to be the means of judgment upon less than Israel in abject wickedness, and to judge them and cast them out of the land.

It's the justice of God. And while that, you know, horribly offends and terribly offends people today, unfortunately, even people in the church, which really baffles my mind, but nevertheless, God is just and righteous. And as I said, and as I'll always say, when Israel does the same thing, Israel gets the same punishment. You can't accuse God of being unfair.

You can't accuse God of being, you know, unevenly handed. You can't do that. He's righteous. He's just.

If you go into the land and you start bowing down to Chemosh, or you start having your, you know, tea leaves read by some witch, so that you can somehow predict the future, or you conjure up a demon, and you have, you know, coffee with him, you're gonna be cast out of the land too. You're gonna be ejected, you're gonna be thrown out. The land is gonna vomit you out. That's precisely the language that's used, intriguingly picked up by Jesus to the church in Laodicea, when he says, because you're neither hot nor cold, I will, what?

I will vomit you out of my mouth. I will spit you or spew you out. Why? Because you are not doing what you're supposed to be doing.

It's pretty simple principle and we like to hide behind God's a big meanie because he commanded genocide rather than I should repent, I should believe the gospel and I should seek to live in a manner that is consistent with that blessed gospel. It's always easier to blame God than ourselves. It's always easier to play the victim rather than the sinner, and that is precisely the argument that God reminds Israel. Verse 12, again, in chapter 18 of Deuteronomy.

For all who do these things are an abomination to the Lord, and because of these abominations, the Lord your God drives them out from before you.

Exhortation to Blamelessness

Note the exhortations then, verse 13, you shall be blameless before the Lord your God. In other words, don't do these things. You know, in terms of blameless here, what's the margin have? 18, 18, 13. Sometimes the margin gives us a little perfect.

It doesn't mean, you know, spotless perfect, blameless, whole, covenantally faithful. And you know, if you're paying attention, It's not super unachievable. What's blamelessness in this passage? Don't practice witchcraft.

Don't try to communicate with the dead. Don't try to manipulate natural or supernatural forces for your own wicked ends. You know what I mean? Well, I mean, I got to go fast and pray for 40 days.

I have to, you know, whip myself on. No, to be blameless covenantally in the Old Testament is don't be completely wicked. Don't go out and bow before Chemosh or Molech and then chuck your kid into the fire. You know what I mean?

Like, we read these things, oh man, you know, God, I can't believe how, you know. No, no, just don't be completely, utterly debauched and degenerate. Verse 14, for these nations which you will dispossess, they listened to soothsayers and diviners. Basically, look at what happened to them.

Did their soothsayers and diviners spare them from the conquest? Did the soothsayers and diviners keep them from General Joshua's campaign when everything's going pretty well in the book of Joshua as the Israelites are by and large doing what they're supposed to do, a few exceptions along the way. Do you think the soothsayers and diviners came through for the Canaanites? No, they went in and they conquered.

But as for you, the Lord your God has not appointed such for you. Now,

Promise of the True Prophet

that leads to the question, the potential question that's going to be addressed here. The condemnation of the practice of the pagans may, you know, well, if we can't talk to soothsayers, if we can't seek out witches, if we can't, you know, try to read omens, if we can't talk to the dead, then what whatsoever shall we do? That's verse 15. The condemnation of the practice of the pagans may lead to the question, what or who shall direct us then?

The answer is in 15 to 22. It's the prophets of God. Yeah, the priests teach the word, most certainly, but so do the prophets. They declare the word.

They come in the name of God most high, and they bring the message of the most holy. Craigie says, having forbidden certain illegitimate methods of attempted communication with the supernatural world, verses 9 to 14, the Sermon on the Law now turns to prophecy, the true and legitimate means by which God's Word would be delivered to his people. You see the cohesion in this chapter. You know, sometimes people read Old Testament books, and probably New Testament books, and say, well, it just seems so scattered.

It is so tight, it is so literarily constructed as to present cogent arguments for why they ought not to be debauched and idolatrous in the land. This would naturally arrive. Well, God, if you're cutting us off from all the supernatural means of revelation when we get in the land, what will we do for supernatural revelation? You'll listen to my prophets.

You'll listen to the school of prophets, that succession of prophets that ultimately terminates in the prophet, the Lord Jesus Christ. So God, through Moses, on the plains of Moab, here specifically is preaching Christ to these Israelites.

The Promise: A Prophet Like Moses

Notice, specifically, The promise in verse 15, the Lord your God will raise up for you, Moses, a prophet like me. I'm sorry, the Lord your God will raise up for you, Israel, a prophet like me, Moses, from your midst, from your brethren. Him you shall hear. Not the soothsayer, not the necromancer, not the witch, not the spiritist, not the one who has this contact with the dead and has all the messages that could ever help you.

No, no, no, no, no. You listen to the prophet. One that's like Moses. Again, this establishes what we shall see here on out in the Old Testament, a succession of prophets.

Not by blood, not like the tribe of Levi, not like the sons of Aaron, but by God's calling, by God's choice, by God's separation. Jeremiah was separated from the womb to be a prophet to the nations, God says in Jeremiah chapter one. The same thing holds today. We live in a society that, you know, I used to see over on Broadway.

I don't think she's there anymore. Business must not have been too good, but a crystal ball reader. You know? I mean, who would have thought you could have an actual business reading crystal balls?

I'm smiling. It's wicked. It's an attempt to kind of peer behind the scenes and have some contact with the supernatural. But the point is, is that, you know, ours might look a little bit different.

It may seem a bit different, but it's the same. you know, seeking contact from above or from without or from below. And anything that's not God is wicked. It's condemned. It's paganism.

It's heathenism. It's an abomination such that it's one of the reasons why the Canaanites were thrown out of the land. It's one of the reasons why the Israelites were thrown out of the land. I mean, there's other reasons to be sure.

Sexual immorality, Leviticus 18. The Israelites were not immune from that, obviously, but it's a bad thing. So God will raise up for you a prophet like me from your midst, from your brethren, him you shall hear. Now this specifically applies to Jesus.

So it establishes a school of or a succession of prophets. So you've got, you know, Hosea, you've got Jeremiah, you've got Isaiah, you've got Ezekiel, you've got, You know, Amos, Obadiah, you've got Jonah, Nahum, Habakkuk. You've got all those prophets. You've got the major prophets.

When we break down the prophets into major and minor, it doesn't mean that Isaiah is more important than Hosea. Major means longer book. Minor means shorter book. So when we say major prophets, we don't mean, oh, you've got to listen to Jeremiah more than you listen to Obadiah.

No, it's just the size of the book. So you've got major prophets, you've got minor prophets. You've got David. David was an interesting fellow.

He was a prophet, Acts 2.30. He was also a king, sort of imaging, typifying, typologically signifying the prophet, priest, and king, who is our Lord Jesus. But turn to the Mount of Transfiguration in Matthew 17. Matthew chapter 17.

Now after six days, verse one, Jesus took Peter, James, and John, his brother, led them up on a high mountain by themselves, and he was transfigured before them. His face shone like the sun, and his clothes became as white as the light. And behold, Moses and Elijah appeared to them, talking with him. Then Peter answered and said to Jesus, Lord, it is good for us to be here.

If you wish, let us make here three tabernacles, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah. While he was still speaking, behold, a bright cloud overshadowed them, and suddenly a voice came out of the cloud, saying, This is my beloved son, in whom I am well pleased. Notice this next two words, hear him. That's a direct, direct connection to Deuteronomy 1815.

This is the 1815 prophet. Yeah, Moses and Elijah are impressive Peter, but the father says this, Jesus is my beloved son and whom I am well pleased, hear him. And when the disciples heard it, they fell on their faces and were greatly afraid. That's legit, right?

In the presence of the holy God, you fall down. Drop down for just a moment to verse 11 or verse 10. His disciples asked him saying, why then do the scribes say that Elijah must come first? they got Malachi the prophet in their heads. And Malachi the prophet said that Elijah and then the Lord.

So notice how Jesus responds, Jesus answered and said to them, indeed Elijah is coming first and will restore all things. But I say to you that Elijah has come already and they did not know him, but did to him whatever they wished. Likewise, the son of man is also about to suffer at their hands. Then the disciples understood that he spoke to them about or of John the Baptist.

I don't think Jesus is God. There's no way to navigate out of this passage without seeing that Jesus is God. Malachi said, Elijah, then the Lord of the Covenant. They're like, if you're the Lord of the Covenant, why didn't we see Elijah first?

Because that's what Malachi prophesied. You did see Elijah first. Oh, John the Baptist. It truly is, you know, one of those times Jesus peels back the flesh and shows the glory of divinity.

Turn to Acts 3. Again, just showing it's terminus, 1815 in our Lord Jesus. We'll get back to 18. finish up there in just a moment. But notice in 322 in the book of Acts.

For Moses truly said to the fathers, the Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from your brethren. Him you shall hear in all things whatever he says to you. And it shall be that every soul who will not hear that prophet shall be utterly destroyed from among the people. Yes, and all the prophets from Samuel and those who follow as many as have spoken have also foretold these days.

You are sons of the prophets and of the covenant which God made with our fathers saying to Abraham, and in your seat, all the families of the earth shall be blessed to you. First, God, having raised up his servant, Jesus sent him to bless you and turning away every one of you from your iniquities. It's Peter saying that we see in us, or in this time, the first advent of our Lord Jesus, the one at Peter's vantage point in Acts 3, had ascended back to his heavenly kingdom. That's the Deuteronomy 18.15 prophet.

That's the final word, as it were, from God Most High to us. It truly is an amazing thing. So you've got in 1815 and following the establishment of the prophetic ministry, the prophecy concerning the prophetic ministry, Jesus, and the requirement with reference to the prophetic ministry, Him you shall hear. Now certainly that focuses primarily on Jesus when we look at Matthew 17, 15, but that doesn't mean you don't need to listen to Isaiah.

That doesn't mean you can turn off Moses now. That doesn't mean you don't have to listen to Habakkuk, the prophet, when he comes. Of course, you've got to hear him. If God is speaking through these men, you need to listen.

Notice he speaks from,

The Precedent at Horeb

he talks from the promise, verse 15, and then the precedence in verses 16 and 17. According to all you desired of the Lord your God in Horeb in the day of the assembly saying, let me not hear again the voice of the Lord my God, nor let me see this great fire anymore lest I die. Remember that scene in Exodus chapter 19. Remember they couldn't go up to the mountain.

They couldn't go near the mountain. They or their animals. The only ones authorized into the Holy of Holies was Moses. And so they were not allowed.

They were terrified at the sight of it. Give us a mediator. Give us a prophet. The mediator, Moses, functioned in that particular capacity.

God's saying, remember the precedent. They understand. They can't draw near to me and have everything hunky dory. They need prophetic word.

They need somebody to communicate to me. And that leads then to verse 17, the provision of God. And the Lord said to me, what they have spoken is good. I will raise up for them a prophet like you from among their brethren, and will put my words in his mouth, and he shall speak to them all that I command him.

And it shall be that whoever will not hear my words, which he speaks in my name, I will require it of him. So you've got the reference to the prophet in verses 18 to 22, but it's further broken down.

True and False Prophets

You've got the commendation of the true prophet, verses 18 and 19, and then the condemnation of the false prophet in verses 20 and 22. Not the false prophet, as if there'd only be one, but the false prophets. who are going to plague Old Covenant Israel, because that happened too. For every true prophet, there was probably a handful of other guys out there claiming to be prophets and they weren't prophets. I got a word from the Lord.

Well, there's a criterion by which we can judge as to whether or not you are speaking of the word of the Lord. So you see the initiative of God in verse 18, I will raise up for them a prophet like you from among their brethren. The message of the Lord, I will put my words in his mouth and he shall speak to them all that I command him. And then the authority of the Lord, and it shall be that whoever will not hear my words, which he speaks in my name, I will require it of him.

Again, perfectly acceptable for the just judge of all the earth, the righteous one and law giver. You don't obey his law, he will require it of you. You don't obey his law, he will throw you out of his land. You don't obey his law, and you will be judged and punished.

Again, all this should underscore to us how beautiful and glorious the New Covenant is. Because Jesus took all that for us. Jesus was made a curse, according to Galatians chapter 3, so that we might receive the adoption as sons. What old covenant Israel fails to do, new covenant Israel, who is Jesus Christ, does.

And what he does benefits all those whom the Father had given him. Everyone who believes on the Lord Jesus Christ receives the forgiveness of sins and receives the righteousness of Jesus imputed to them, and it's received by faith alone. The old covenant was a covenant of works. You go into land, you mess up, you're out.

The new covenant is a covenant of works for Jesus and thus a covenant of grace for us because he kept it perfectly and obediently. Every time you come to the Old Testament, you need to be reminded it was a covenant of works. Do this and live. You get to the New Covenant, Jesus did it, and therefore we get to live.

It's beautiful. I think that when you start seeing these connections and you start realizing that this wasn't an afterthought, this is back in the very passages we're studying, moving forward in redemptive history to the fullness of the time when God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the law to redeem those under the law. That one, as mediator, who functions beautifully as a prophet, we listen to him for the word of God. As a priest, he dies for us.

He's not only the priest, but he's the victim. He dies for us. And as king, he rules over us. The Old Testament, through all of its narrative, is setting Christ forth in the threefold office of prophet, priest, and king.

And then in terms of the condemnation of the false prophets, notice in verses 20 to 22, you've got the problem of false prophecy. Wouldn't it be nice if God said, hey, I'm going to give you a bunch of prophets. They're going to speak my word. They're going to be like Moses.

They're going to be from among your brethren. They're going to terminate ultimately in our Lord Jesus. Now, you know, live happily ever after. There's always a plague.

There's always some wretch. There's always some false prophet that has to come along. Perhaps he sees there's money in it. Perhaps he sees there's fame in it.

Perhaps he sees there's some other adulation in it. So notice in verse 20, the prophet who presumes to speak a word in my name, which I have not commanded him to speak, or who speaks in the name of other gods, that prophet shall die. Again, oh, I can't believe God would command the death of the false prophet. Why can't we believe that?

Why can't we believe that somebody so arrogant as to claim that they're speaking for the Most High and they're fakes? I'd ask, you know, why aren't they all slaughtered? Why aren't they all dead? Because that is probably the height of arrogance.

I've come with a message from God and you have no such message? That's arrogance, that's presumption, that's pride, that's wickedness, that's lawlessness. I mean, of all the capital offenses, that one, I would never even think to question that one. It just seems legit, it seems right.

And then notice, okay, this pretty hardcore God, the prophet who presumes to speak a word in my name, which I have not commanded him to speak, or who speaks in the name of other gods, that prophet shall die. Verse 21 naturally follows, and if you say in your heart, How should we know the word which the Lord has not spoken? In other words, how do we know? How can we ferret out whether this prophet is true or false?

Is there a test? Is there an exam? Take three hours, go over there, fill out this paper. When you come, we'll determine whether or not you're a false prophet.

No, not a paper, not a quiz, but it's built in. Notice in verse 22, when a prophet speaks in the name of the Lord, if the thing does not happen or come to pass, that is the thing which the Lord has not spoken. Pretty simple. Now, the prophet both foretold and foretold.

The primary emphasis was on his foretelling. God wants you to repent. God says you're wicked. If you look at the prophetic ministries of the guys in the major prophets and the minor prophets, there was a foretelling of future events.

Isaiah 53, suffering servant. Obviously, Daniel's 70 weeks and Daniel chapter nine, there's a predictive prophecy foretelling element involved in the prophetic ministry. But the bulk of it was foretelling the word of God to a generation and saying, look, if you don't act, get your act together, God's gonna cast you out of the land, right? So, but with that predictive prophetic element, you predict the future, you know, hey, Jesus is gonna return on, you know, May 21st, 2012, Harold Camping.

And he doesn't. What should happen to Harold Camping on, you know, May, what is it, 22nd? Well, you know, I got my numbers wrong. No, you falsely prophesied that a future event was coming and you botched it up.

Now, I'm not saying, you know, we should have flown to wherever Harold Camping was and took him out, but this is a big deal. This is, you know, date setting when it comes to eschatology. No man knows the day or the hour, but we can predict the year Are you that foolish? Like, come on, it's just wrong.

And then, so if he says something that's gonna happen and it doesn't happen, he's wrong. The prophet has spoken it presumptuously, you shall not be afraid of him. Now, this isn't all there is though on the false prophet. This is a negative test, okay?

If he says that something's gonna happen next Thursday, and by Friday it's determined it didn't happen on Thursday, he's a fake. But Deuteronomy 13, 1-5 indicates that a false prophet can say right things. He can get things right, which, okay, now what? What's he doing in Deuteronomy 13, 1-5, specifically at verse 2?

He's trying to get you to follow another god. So let's just say he gets some wood on the ball, says something's gonna happen next Thursday, and it happens. What are you inclined to do? Well, Chemosh must be good.

Baal must be, you know, the God. So at times, a false prophet can get something right. It's ultimately probably God testing and ensuring and watching over and saying if the people are obedient to it. So there's more to false prophecy, and I think Deuteronomy 13 indicates that.

I would suggest as well, if he's not prophesying predictably about next Thursday, but let's say something in 100 or 200 years, how would we ever know? There's got to be other criteria. What's his track record? What's his life look like?

Can we verify the legitimacy of this prophet? And intriguingly, it is built into the text. I'm gonna raise up for you one like who? Moses.

Moses is the comparison. If the guy's not like Moses, was Moses a perfect man? No. Was Moses a faithful man?

Yes. Was Moses a godly man? Yes. Was Moses a consistent man?

Yes. So it's got to be like Moses. If he doesn't have Moses-like characteristics, then he's a false prophet. In fact, Christopher Wright says that.

He says, clearly people should have been able to recognize his truth and reject the falsehood of other prophets on grounds other than fulfillment alone. Again, a false prophet could get things right, Deuteronomy 13. A false prophet predicting future events that were 200 years from the time of prediction, we could never verify the validity of his prophetic element or of his prophetic ability. So Wright says, our text provides a clue to the distinction even though it is not included in the test verses at the end.

The prophet whom God would raise up would be like Moses. This was a qualitative criterion. There was some standard by which to measure the moral and spiritual credentials of prophets. Those who pandered to the nation's wickedness were not like Moses.

Those who posed no challenge to oppressive government were not like Moses. Those who were immoral in their own lives or self-seeking in their ambitions were not like Moses. It was on these grounds that Jeremiah actually attacked the false prophets of his own generation. In the New Testament, prophets were subject to testing.

In our age, when we are faced with the multiplication of prophetic cults and sects, the adulation of people with prophetic ministries, and the proliferation of all kinds of miracle-attested claims on our attention by the purveyors of consumer religion, Ordinary Christians could be excused for being as confused as the contemporaries of Jeremiah, were it not for the fact that we possess far richer resources for exercising discrimination, the whole canon of Scripture and the teaching and example of one greater than Moses. So we can't conclude, well, there's just not enough information. His predictive prophecy isn't supposed to take place for 200 years, so we'll never know. Yeah, he's fornicating.

Yeah, he's an adulterer. Yeah, he's committing idolatry. But, you know, we got to wait on his, no, no, no, no, no. He's not like Moses.

He's not like Jesus. So he must be a fake. So false prophecy was a threat, religiously, to the cult, to temple, tabernacle, priesthood, people, but to the state. Remember, they're a theocracy.

You let false prophets into a theocracy, what do you have? Revolution. You have wide scale, massive problems. So God is orchestrating this civil slash ecclesiastical polity under one big tent, or one big roof, and he's speaking to all the details, all the jots and tittles to hold this thing together.

Now, of course, they don't, they get judged, and they find the curses of the covenant applied to them. So priests and prophets, that's what Israel was supposed to cleave to, not witches and warlocks and men who communicated with the dead.

Closing Prayer

Well, let us pray. Our Father, we thank you for your word. We thank you for the emphasis always in your word, on your word. I pray that you'd give us ears to hear and hearts to receive it.

I pray that you would help us by your Holy Spirit to be faithful. Help us to let our conduct be worthy of the gospel. And may we know the truth such that we're able to spot the counterfeit. May we know the truth such that we worship you and that we honor you and we praise you.

We ask for your blessing upon our church as a whole to watch over all the suffering, all the sick, all those who are having struggles and trials and difficulties. And Lord, bless all the families and individuals and give us grace to finish the week well, to start the new week on the Lord's Day. We pray for Jane that this would be a special day when she's baptized. It's always a blessed Sunday when we can have a baptism in the morning, and the supper in the evening, and we give thanks to you for your kind provisions to us.

And we pray in Jesus' name. Amen.

Questions and Answers

Any questions or comments? I have a question about the priests. How did they persist? They weren't moving from one part to the other.

What facilitated that? Well, perhaps they heard that the central, you know, once the tabernacle takes shape, once the city becomes the, you know, Jerusalem, it's not really till David, right? That's when Jerusalem becomes the political and the religious capital. And I don't know, maybe they wanted to move to Jerusalem and participate closer.

I don't know. It seems to just see the possibility, and if they do come, don't relegate them to the B team. They're Levites, they get to share in the same sorts of things that the other Levites that were previously there get to share. Right.

Well, maybe they wouldn't. You know, I mean, maybe the guy's single. He doesn't have a family. He's young.

He figures, hey, I got a lot of years left in me. I'm going to go to Jerusalem and do my thing there. I wouldn't if I was in the 48th city and I was, you know, 60 and I had my wife and kids and grandkids. I wouldn't go to Jerusalem.

But if I was 25, I didn't have a wife, I might, hey, and there might be a, you know, Levitical honey in the city of Jerusalem waiting for me. You know, various reasons, why does anybody move today? Why would he leave? Well, you're a Reformed Baptist, it's like for life.

But you realize Reformed Baptists are unique in that. I think the Dutch Reformed churches, they move more frequently. They're the ones that we know, they've had pretty long times where they're at. We tend to take the scripture as our pattern.

The pattern is for the Levites to stay where they are, for the priests to stay where they are. Yeah, I think the emphasis basically is verse 8. They shall have equal portions to eat. Because the emphasis in 1 to 8 is Levite's eating.

So if there is a scenario where a Levite shows up at your gate, maybe he got in a fight with another Levite in city 48, and he's there in Jerusalem. The main point is, he's supposed to eat equally along with you guys, and that burden is because of the status of the Levitical tribe to God. He is their inheritance. How does God administer blessing?

Through the community. So don't relegate him to the back bench and pass him over with the cheeks and the shoulders and the stomach. He gets to eat that stuff too. Yeah.

Yeah. But I think all things being equal, I mean, if you're asking the other question, when is it right for a pastor to leave? I think I've got some answers if you want to hear. I'm kidding.

I mean, obviously, you've been exposed to a Reformed Baptist model. And for the most part, guys live and die. There was a pastor at Brick Street Presbyterian Church in New York, a guy named Gardner Spring, wrote a few good books. I think he pastored there for 60 years, which to me is like, wow.

Yeah. If Pastor Butler is alive at 90, he sure ain't going to be preaching every Sunday. That much I can tell you. It's a long time.

Wow. Yes. But as we're going through, the abominable practices, there's a reference to a prohibition on the climbing of the deck. And I know there's a lot of technical objections, but cats and maybe some other groups, they have bookmachines.

And there's a reference, I think, to operators who put the deck in there. And I know there's gonna be differences in canon and authority. And I'm sure they have some sort of theological interpretive dance they use to kind of write about that. Do you have any thoughts on that?

Yeah, I think prayers to saints and all of that is condemned. I don't, I mean, it's used, I mean, the Bible tells us that Christ is the mediator. You know, they've got Mary as a co-meet, the mediatrix, you know, I was taught as a young Catholic, you know, God's pretty busy. So he needs, you know, Mary, and he needs the saints and all of that.

That's a horrible view. That's a horrible theology. You know, you're taught to pray to St. Christopher, so I don't lose stuff.

I mean, they have a whole list of different saints and what their specialty item is. So no, I'm not sure it's the same as necromancy, but it's definitely not a sanctioned practice. It's not an option for the people of God. Yeah, I just remember reading this, all these different saints with all their different particulars.

So when you were taught, as young papists, you know, it's just, oh, that's your patron saint, you should pray, you know, to her or him for this. It's just bad. And, you know, Catholic theology is good. Their doctrine of God, their doctrine of the Trinity, their doctrine of Christology, I don't know how they ended up with some of the bizarre practices that they have.

I don't, other than Maccabees or extra-biblical or non-canonical writings, and just a lot of power structure. I think, you know, they've always seemed to leverage all those extracurriculars as a way to get money and power, you know, consolidate power and get money out of the faithful. That's, I mean, you don't see it as much in a North America, but you see it in the Latin American countries where Roman Catholicism is predominant. Big, beautiful, gold-plated everything surrounded by abject poverty.

I think they have an ability to manipulate through a lot of the extracurriculars and create a dependence of the people on the church to mediate the blessings of God. Yeah, it's a bad system.

Scripture References

• Exodus 12:12; 19
• Leviticus 10; 18; 18:19; 20; 21; 21:16; 21:22; 26
• Deuteronomy 7; 12; 12:29; 12:32; 13; 13:1-5; 13:2; 16-17; 18; 18:1; 18:1-8; 18:3-5; 18:4; 18:5; 18:6; 18:6-8; 18:8; 18:9; 18:9-14; 18:10; 18:10-12; 18:11; 18:12; 18:13; 18:14; 18:15; 18:15-22; 18:16-17; 18:17; 18:18; 18:18-19; 18:18-22; 18:20; 18:20-22; 18:21; 18:22; 28
• 1 Samuel 28
• 2 Kings 3:27; 17; 21; 23
• Psalms 106:37; 115
• Isaiah 53
• Jeremiah 1
• Daniel 9
• Matthew 17; 17:1; 17:10
• Acts 2:30; 3; 3:22
• Galatians 3