Gary Gleans

The purity of His people is a top priority for God.  He wants us all to cooperate together as we strive to follow God.  The responsibility for purity goes all the way from the common citizen to the spiritual as well as political leaders.  We must all be careful to cultivate a godly walk in our own lives, but we are also called to make sure that others are walking according to God’s Word as well.  God’s plan is to see all of His children cooperating together to promote purity in their own lives as well as the lives of others.  If we are going to be successful in following this plan these are three vial characteristics that we must cultivate in our lives. COURAGEOUS DISCIPLINE: We must not only look out for our own obedience, but God calls us to be zealous for the obedience of others. When we see or hear of a person who has abandoned the worship of God and disobeyed the will of God; we must not just stand by and let this happen.  God calls us to have th...

Holidays are something that most of us look forward to celebrating together as a family.  They should be a time for reflection on the Lord and that which He has done for us as well as a time for us to examine how the Lord would have us to walk in the days ahead.  The regular routine of life is something that is very helpful to us but we also look forward to breaks in the routine.  Unfortunately, it seems like breaks in our routine usually end up meaning that we separate less time to spend with the Lord and reflecting on Him than we do on a regular basis.  Just the opposite should be true.  Society has created an expectation of spending money on things, being involved in activities that fill up all of our time and use up all of our extra funds during the holiday season.  The end result of a holiday in the world’s way is that we rush from activity to activity and have a hard time reading Scripture or praying and then we spend as much as we can on special th...

Hope is a powerful and wonderful blessing from God.  I believe that one of the reasons that God established the year of jubilee, where debts were forgiven and where slaves were set free, was so that His children would not lose hope.  Difficult things can happen in our lives and we can experience situations where we must take drastic measures to survive.  Those who found themselves in these situations would have to borrow from their neighbor or even come to the point of selling himself as a slave in order to survive.  A person’s debt could accumulate to the point where they lost hope.  However, God does not what His children to be without hope, so every seven years all debts were to be forgiven and all slaves were to be set free.  This also provides a picture of our forgiveness in Christ in that we all have a hopeless amount of debt that we would never be able to pay.  However, because of the sacrifice of Christ our debt has been canceled and we can h...

The children of Israel were set apart by God and He gave them specific laws about what they were to eat and were not to eat.  Some of these laws had a lot to do with the health of the people but it was also a test of their loyalty to do what God required.  Today’s text has two basic principles that I think are important for us to remember. AS BELIEVERS WE NEED TO LIMIT OUR LIBERTY: The dietary laws that God gave the children of Israel do not apply to us today.  God made it very clear that believers today do not need to follow these laws.  However, there is a principle of obeying God that we must follow in the laws that He has given us.  If we are going to follow God there are going to be many times when we are going to have to limit our own liberty in order to further His kingdom.  We must never allow our own comfort or the desires of our flesh be the controlling factor in our lives.  We need to be willing to limit our liberty in order to please ...

Idolatry is a very dangerous sin from which God wants us to take every measure to protect ourselves.  Perhaps the most dangerous source of idolatrous desires comes from our very own hearts.  However, Moses warns the people in today’s passage that there are other sources of idolatry that could very easily influence the people away from the Lord.  Moses calls for the most radical reaction possible in every instance of idolatrous influence; he calls for the death of that person or persons.  In today’s society this solution is not possible, but we must be careful not to tolerate those people or elements of society that encourage us or try to induce us to flame into fire the idolatry that naturally resides in each or our hearts.  We must beware of these dangerous influences and seek to expose them quickly so that we and others will not be deceived. THE DANGEROUS INSTRUCTION OF FALSE PROPHETS: There are people who are empowered by Satan or who simply have the ab...

God calls His children to be different from the world and the people around them.  We tend to like to fit in and be like our surroundings, but God calls us to stand out and change our surroundings instead of being conformed to them.  The children of Israel are about to enter a new land and God wants to make sure that they do not become just like the people that God is removing from the land.  In order to help the children of Israel stay away from the sinful practices on the other nations, God calls the children of Israel to obey some very specific instructions. DESTROY ALL THE SACRED PLACES AND SYMBOLS: The land to which the children of Israel were going was full of altars and sacred places of worship that were dedicated to false gods.  The people worshiped every kind of thing imaginable and built shrines and temples all over the place.  Each family would have their own private place of worship and their own sacred idols that they kept in prominent places....

Our choices have consequences.  God has given us the freedom to make our own choices.  However, He has revealed to us what He would like for us to choose.  He does not force us to choose according to His will but He has graciously instructed us as to what He would have us do.  We do not, however, have the freedom to choose the consequences of our choices.  God is still very much in control of this world and then events that occur on this earth.  He may give us the liberty to choose out paths but He has determined the final destination of those paths.  Moses is urging the children of Israel to choose the path that is marked according to God’s will so that they can enjoy the blessing of obedience that God has promised to those who love and obey Him. LOVE: The first and most basic command of all of Scripture is to love the Lord with all of our hearts.  Moses reminds the people that they must love God and demonstrate that love by following His c...

It seems strange that people who were made by God would need to be convinced to obey Him, but that is just what Moses is trying to do with the children of Israel.  He rehearses for them the experiences that he had with God when he was on the mountain and then he reasons with the people that they should live in fear and obedience of the Lord.  It is important for us to realize that every single word that Moses tells the children of Israel can be very simply and easily applied to us.  Even though we did not see the tablets of stone or eat manna on a daily basis; we do have the recorded Word of God and experience the provision of God in a manner unequaled throughout the history of the world. REVELATION FROM GOD DEMANDS OUR ATTENTION: God had taken the time to write the Ten Commandments on a tablet of stone for Moses to carry down to the people.  Moses crushed the original tablets when he came down from the mountain and found the people practicing idolatry with a g...

Pride is a very dangerous condition that seems to easily inflict many aspects of our lives.   The only reason that we are saved, able to serve and walk with God at any level of obedience is purely by the grace of God.   We have a hard time with grace.   In our hearts and minds we would like to think that we have earned our position before God.   The truth is that the only position before God that have earned is the position of condemnation.   We are all deserving of death and eternal damnation because of our actions, thoughts and motives.   Anything besides death is pure grace and we must never forget that reality in our lives.   Moses wants to make this truth very clear to the children of Israel before they enter the Promised Land because he knows that pride is an extremely dangerous companion and one that will bring the people under God’s judgment if it is not prevented.   In order to protect the people from pride, Moses gives them a few rem...

Knowledge brings responsibility, and God had given the children of Israel a unique knowledge of Him and His commandments.  Since they knew the commandments of God, they were required by God to keep these commandments.  The results of obedience would be great blessing; however, the results of rebellion would be discipline.  Revelation is a blessing and discipline is a blessing because they are both designed to help us enjoy our lives in ways that honor the Lord.  Satan tries to convince us that disobedience and sin will bring us joy, but just the opposite is true; any pleasure that accompanies sin is passing and only ends in great heartache.  True and lasting joy is only found in trusting and obeying the Lord.  He knows us for He has created us and His will is always what is best for us. WE MUST PROTECT OUR HEARTS FROM REBELION: God’s revelation to us implies a greater responsibility to Him.  The natural bent of our hearts is to rebel against any ...

Conformity is a condition that most people prefer over sticking out.  We all have the tendency to want to be like the people that are around us as that helps us to feel more comfortable.  However, God has a far different plan in mind.  He desires for His people to be different and set apart from the rest of the world.  Due to sin, the world is conformed to a pattern of sinfulness and rebellion against God.  God redeems His people so that they can set a new pattern of holiness and be conformed to the image of His Son, Jesus Christ. BE CONSECRATED AS GOD’S PEOPLE: The children of Israel were about to move into the Promised Land and take possession of the land that God had given to them.  The people who occupied this land were perverse and rebellious against God.  They were idolatrous and adulterous and God was using the children of Israel to judge them for their sin.  God also made it very clear that they were not to try to integrate these peo...

Christianity is always only one generation away from extinction.  Man’s tendency from one generation to the next is to forget what the Lord has done and to forget what the Lord has commanded.  We must become intentional about passing on God’s truth from one generation to the next.  His blessings must always be remembered and the stories of His provision must always be rehearsed so that those who come behind us will know who God is, what God has done and how God expects us to live.  It is important that we realize that this will not happen naturally.  If we are not purposefully and systematically talking about God’s work and will they will be forgotten by the generations to come. REPEAT GOD’S LAW: The laws of God must be constantly on our lips.  We must teach these laws to our children and our grand children, generation after generation so that they will hear and know what God expects from them.  When God reveals His will to His people, they are t...

It has been over forty years since the children of Israel received to Law of God through Moses on the mountain.  However, Moses wants to make sure that the nation remembers the reality of this experience today.  Moses knows that the success of the people is utterly dependent upon their obedience of this Law and their reverence of God.  The tasks to which God calls us can only be accomplished as a result of the power of God working through us.  God’s power in our lives is unleashed in response to our obedience of His Word. THE PEOPLE MUST LIVE IN REMEMBRANCE OF THE LAW: Moses wants to make sure that the children of Israel remember the commandments the Lord gave to them in the very beginning.  These Ten Commandments are the basis of God’s moral will for all of mankind.  God wants us to worship Him alone and have no other gods in our lives.  His name is to be kept holy and we are to set aside a day in our lives for the purpose of worship and rest....

As Moses continues his review of the law he reminds the people about who God is and what God has done.  However, besides the focus upon God Moses makes sure that the people understand that the commands and character of God are to have a profound impact on the people.  We must never simply seek to know God for the sake of knowledge.  Our knowledge of God must bring about the transformation of our lives.  Moses urges the people to look to God and remember all that He has done and said and then look at themselves to make sure that they are living accordingly. GOD IS COMUNICATIVE SO BE RECEPTIVE: Moses reminds the people that God has reveled Himself to them on various occasions.  He gave them commandments, godly leaders who taught them the will of God and even spoke to them from the fire on the mountain.  No other people in the history of the world had received so much revelation from God.  However, this revelation implies responsibility, so the chil...

It is important to understand who God is and what He has done in the past so that we can obey Him correctly in the present.  As we look at the faithfulness of God it should create great confidence and peace in our hearts because of His great provision and the victories He has granted.  We can always be assured that God does not change and that He will continue to be faithful to His Word today just like He was yesterday.  This should be a great source of hope to all of us as we seek to serve the Lord and accomplish His will.  We must also remember that God’s promise to keep His Word means that He must also judge us justly when we fail to be faithful.  Our condemnation has been removed through faith if Christ; but that does not mean that our sins are free from consequence. GOD IS FAITHFUL TO DEFEAT THE ENEMY: The kings in the land that that the children of Israel had already conquered were much stronger than Israel was by human standards.  In the natura...

Moses continues to recount the history of the children of Israel from the time of their refusal to enter the land up until this day.  It is clear that God has been at work in their lives but also in the lives of the people around them.  God is active in the history of the nations of this world.  He establishes one nation while He destroys another in accordance with His will.  It is interesting to observe His different dealing with the diverse nations of the world.  He continues to be in control to this very day.  No matter what we might think about the condition of today’s world, we can be assured that God is in control.  We can see His control demonstrated in His dealings with various nations. RENEW: Israel was a nation that was in the stage of renewal.  God had made unconditional promises to Abraham, and He was going to fulfill them.  Despite the fact that Israel had disobeyed and deserved to be judged and pass out of existence; God w...

They say that those who ignore history are bound to repeat it.  Moses seems to be very aware of this truth so he sets out to try to prevent the children of Israel from repeating the same mistakes that their forefathers had made.  He begins this book as his last reminder to the people of what God has done, what God has promised and what God expects from them.  There will be very little new information in this book, but it will be an important reminder that all of us need to hear.  Repetition is an important part of learning for all of us; we constantly repeat instructions to our children because we want them to remember these instructions and begin to pattern their lives according to these instructions.  We repeat the same stories over and over again because we want our children to be aware of their history, to learn from the mistakes of the past as well as be aware of their godly heritage when they hear of victories that have been won by God’s grace. REMEM...

There are times when laws and principles can conflict with one another.  These questions can be the source of serious conflict within a people if they are not dealt with correctly.  In this case there was a law that a man who had no sons could pass on his inheritance to his daughters.  There was also the law of the division of the land according to the tribes.  The problem was stated that if a daughter who inherited land from her father then married a man from another tribe then that land would be lost to the tribe from which the daughter came.  The law of a daughter’s right to inherit land created a potential conflict with the principle of land division.  The concern was a valid one and it is very interesting to see who this conflict was resolved.  I believe that there are some key principles that we can learn from this chapter about conflict resolution. CLEAR COMMUNICATION: The men who would be hurt by this conflict did not take matters into th...

There are a lot of details that go into organizing a nation and the laws that will rule the new nation.  This chapter provides insights into two details that were important for the nation to take into account.  The Levites needed a place to live and those who killed a person on accident needed a place to seek refuge.  God gave Moses clear instructions on these issues that provide basic principles that continue to communicate to us to this day. PROVISION FOR THE LEVITES: The Levites would not get a specific portion of land as a tribe, but each tribe was responsible to provide cities in which the Levites could reside with pasture lands around that city that the Levites could use.  In this way the Levites would be spread throughout the entire nation.  They would be able to lead the people in worship and assure that the Law of God was represented in every nation.  The entire nation benefited from the ministry of the Levites so it was the responsibility of...

God is making it very clear to the children of Israel that He is going to give them this land.  We have an expression that advises us not to count our chickens before they hatch.  I would say that is good advice unless of course you are God or if you have a promise from God.  The Lord has been promising this land to Israel since the call of Abraham and He is making it very clear that this promise is about to come true.  It always gives me great joy to consider that we serve a God who keeps His promises.  He has promised to return for all those who have trusted Christ and give us eternal life with Him in heaven.  It may take awhile for that promise to come true, but it will come true and what a glorious day that will be. THE DEMARCATION OF THE LAND: The Lord made it very clear to them that they would be given the land with very clear boundaries.  These markings have not changed since the time God called Abraham, and now it is about to come true....

Two things that we need to know in this life are: where to go and what to do.  With the children of Israel God has supernaturally directed them to this point in their lives.  He has guided them along every path of the journey and He has directed them through the instruction of Moses.  We all should have as our aim in life to do what He wants us to do and to go where He wants us to go. A REVIEW OF WHERE THEY WENT: God told Moses to keep a record of all the places that the children of Israel had gone along their journey to the Jordan and then the wilderness wanderings and then back to the Jordan.  Over the last forty plus years they had moved from place to place at the direction of the Lord.  The biggest problem in their history came when they decided to rebel against going into the Promised Land as God had directed them to do.  This disobedience resulted in another forty years of wanderings.  We do not benefit from a pillar of fire or a cloud that...