Welcome to Delight in Grace. The Teaching Ministry of Rich Powell. pastor of Grace Bible Church in Winston-Salem. The things you spend your time and money on. often point to the desires of your heart.
God doesn't want our performance. God wants our love He wants our hearts. He calls us to love him. How do we do that? We behold him.
As we come to know him through his word and his spirit, we can be captivated by his beauty. It is then that He can work a mighty transformation in our affections and our attitudes. Let's listen to this message from Deuteronomy 10, titled The Call to Faithfulness. This is part two of a message first preached on June 30th, 2024 at Grace Bible Church in Winston-Salem. And so Moses asks the Lord to show him his glory up on the mountain.
And God says, I will put you, I will protect you in a rock, and you will see the back part of my glory. And when God shows himself, look at chapter 34. When God shows himself, look at 34, verse 5. The Lord descended in the cloud and stood with him there and proclaimed the name of the Lord. And when God showed himself, who is God?
What is he like? Here it is, verse 6. The Lord passed before him and proclaimed the Lord, the Lord, a God, merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, but who will by no means clear the guilty. Do you know God? Do you know what he is like?
Moses asked to see the glory of God and the Lord protected him in the cleft of the rock and he saw the very back part of the glory of God as much as he could stand. And it's after that account that Moses comes down from the mountain and the people noticed his face shining. Why? Because he had been in the very presence of God. And saw as much of God as a human could possibly stand.
And so the Lord now. is ready to renew the covenant with the people of Israel. And this is what he asks, and this is what he tells them. Chapter 10, verses 1 to 11 is a recap of all the events of. Exodus 33 and 34.
And then in verse 12, and now, Israel, look at it with me. And now, Israel, what does the Lord your God require of you? What does the Lord require of you? Here's what I want you to hear when we read those words, when you read those words in scripture. This is the heart of God.
asking for the hearts. of his people. The heart of God asking for the hearts. of his people. There's five things he asks for here.
What does the Lord require of you but to fear the Lord your God, to walk in all his ways, to love him, to serve the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul, and to keep the commandments and statutes of the Lord which I am commanding you today? What are the last three words? For your good. God delights Himself in our flourishing. And he is the point of our flourishing.
So What does the Lord require of you, first of all, to fear God? What does it mean to fear God, to be captivated by his perfections and my accountability to him? To fear God is to be captivated by his perfections. and my accountability to him. And then he says, to walk in all his ways, in all my ways, every path that I take, every decision that I make.
Every choice. Every action, every thought, every attitude, God's character and purpose are the chief guide in life. That's what it means to walk in all his ways. And then, right in the middle of all this, he says, love him. to love him.
That's right out front. To love him means to endear, to draw near. And what does James tell us? Draw near to God, and He will what? Draw near to you.
Do you understand that? And then he says, to serve him with all your heart. Let me put that in a different phrase, a different way. It says, His desire. becomes my chief ambition.
To serve him with all your heart means his desire becomes my chief ambition. And then in verse 13 it says, And to keep the commandments and statutes of the Lord, which I am commanding you today for your good. His commandments are for our good. Let me say that again. His commandments are for our good.
What are his commandments? They are loving parameters. If you have a pool, What do you have around that pool? Offense. Why?
Those are loving parameters. You give your kids boundaries. Why? Because you love them. God's commandments for us are for our good because He loves us.
We must remember that.
So, what we have here is, and this should be kind of like the tip of an arrow, okay? and what is right at the center of it all, what's leading out front. It is to love God. God, the heart of God, is calling for the hearts of his people. And to love God, it's a term of affection, to endear, to draw near.
And when God captivates us at the level of our affections. That's what he's looking for. leading out front with the heart. Captivating us at the level of our affections. And if he captivates us at the level of our affections, he will also then captivate us at the level of our attitudes.
And the attitudes are to serve him with all your heart and walk in all his ways. That's my attitude. And then, if I am captivated by God at the level of my affections and my attitudes, then. I will serve God with my actions. Do you see how it works there?
That's leading with the heart.
Now, stop there for a minute. Say, Rich, you're always talking about following your heart, not following your heart. Because Jeremiah says the heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked, right? And the mantra of Disney is in Hollywood is follow your heart. I have news for you.
Okay, you ready for this? This is going to be enlightening for some of you. You will follow your heart. You will. What's captivated your heart?
God knows. We pursue what we desire. And he makes himself known to us in all his beauty, his goodness, his majesty, and his holiness.
So that He will captivate our hearts. Because when our hearts are captivated by Him, It molds our attitudes and shapes our actions.
Okay. Amen Hear the heart of God. asking for the hearts of his people. Behold the grace of God. And he knew, he knew the law was temporary for a specific time and for a specific people.
This is the Mosaic law, this covenant that the people had already shattered. Before Moses even came off the mountain, they'd already shattered it. But he's ready now to renew covenant again. Hear the heart of God calling for the hearts of his people. May we learn from that today.
You say What did they know about God?
Well, God reviews that. Verses 14 to 22. Look at that with me. God makes Himself known here. Eight things I want to point out.
Say a rich, good grief. Eight points. Come on, man. Let's do this quickly. I was complaining to the staff this week.
I said I could preach for a whole month out of Deuteronomy chapter 10.
So write quickly. Here's your homework. Take it home. Study it and unpack it.
Okay? There you go. You do all the work. Behold your God. Do you know God in the way that He's made Himself known?
Most people don't. Most people on earth have created God in their image. But what we have in Scripture here is a portrait of God, who God is. Look at verse 14. What's the first word of verse 14?
Behold. Behold. Look, look and see. Gaze upon this. This is who God is.
To the Lord your God belongs heaven and the heaven of heavens, the earth with all that is in it. What does that exclude? Nothing. What is he saying here? He is the owner.
He is the owner. You are not. Government is not. He is. It's all his.
Say it with me. It's all his. Including you. We were made. by him and we were made for him.
This is His universe. He brought us into it. It's all his. That's a good place to begin, don't you think? It's pretty all-encompassing.
If we think of God any less than that, We're diminishing him. to our detriment. Then look at verse 15 with me. Yet the Lord set his heart in love on your fathers and chose their offspring after them. and you above all peoples.
as you are to this day. The God who created the whole universe and everything belongs to Him, He set Him. His heart on this family. Because he had a purpose. He had a purpose.
Messiah would come through this family. the one who would redeem. Humanity. Thanks for joining us here at Delight in Grace. You've been listening to Rich Powell, the lead pastor at Grace Bible Church in Winston-Salem.
The Delight in Grace mission. Is to help you know that God designed you to realize your highest good. and your deepest satisfaction in Him. the one who is infinitely good. We hope you'll join us again on weekdays at 10 a.m.
