48 SHOF'TIM (Judges); Deut. 16:18-21:9 & Acts 10-12

[Bruce Bertram]

This section starts out by giving Israel instructions on appointing judges and executing justice. We might say that ‘justice’ is what characterizes this particular part of the Word. However, it also might be said that all of God’s instructions concern right judging and justice. At this point though the people are specifically to appoint judges in the towns and not distort justice with partiality, or bribes. Interestingly, idolatry (no Asherah poles) is mentioned here too, perhaps because it also has a connection to lack of justice. At the beginning of chapter 17 there is also a mention of not offering blemished animals to God, then a description of what to do with a person who has departed into worshipping other gods. The reason all these things may be tied together is verse 17:6 where His people are told not to take testimony for a death penalty case from only one person. Two or three at least are needed, and the witnesses are the first to throw the stones. If the case is too difficult for the town judges the case is to be taken to the Levites, and their verdict is final. It is a capital offense to ignore what the priests say in the case.

In the event of Israel getting a king, then he must be a native Israelite which God will choose. He is not to have a lot of horses or wives or money, nor go back to Egypt for anything. He is also to make his own hand-written copy of the Torah for himself in the presence of Levites, read it and carefully adhere to all of its provisions so he won’t turn aside to the left or right from it.

God through Moses in chapter 18 stipulates that since the Levites have no inheritance in Israel that they are to get some of the sacrifices that are made, as well as the first fruits of grain, wine, oil and shearing. All the Levites get equal portions, even if one comes in from a town to (presumably) the place the Lord has chosen for centralized worship, except for the proceeds from the sale of an estate. Verses 9-14 go into some detail about not following the practices of the nations around Israel, such as witchcraft or divination or sorcery. Verses 15-22 discuss the appearance of a prophet like Moses who God will raise up eventually, and all who do not listen to this One will have to answer for it. A prophet is defined as truthful in that what he says comes to pass. If it doesn’t come to pass, he is false and must die.

Chapter 19:1-13 sets out the existence of cities of refuge so that a person who has killed someone without premeditation can escape immediate vengeance. He or she will be safe there as long as they stay there. However, if the killing was premeditated, they are to be brought out of the cities to face punishment for the crime. Verses 14-21 are about not moving boundary markers (a type of witness, by the way), and witnesses. There are to be more than one testifying to any crime, and if the witness testifies falsely he is to get the penalty that would’ve fallen to the person he lied about. This is also one of the places where equal justice is commanded, in the well-known verse at 19:21 concerning life for life, eye for an eye and tooth for a tooth. This might also hearken back to 16:19-20 speaking of justice and no partiality.

Chapter 20 is mostly about war and contains instructions for not being afraid of a more numerous enemy, selecting soldiers, and sieges against cities. God is the one who fights the battles for His people, so there should be no fear when going up against an apparently stronger enemy. When selecting soldiers, one who has a new house or vineyard or wife does not have to serve. One who is just too afraid is also excused. A priest is to reassure the army and do the selecting, and appoint commanders. Then when a city that is to be conquered is first offered terms of surrender, and if accepted the inhabitants become slaves. If refused, then they become toast. Women and children, livestock and possessions become the property of the army, except for the six nations mentioned again in verse 20:17 which have to be utterly destroyed. When besieging a city, fruit-bearing trees may not be cut down, but non fruit-bearing trees may be used for siege works. Chapter 21:1-9 is about a murder committed which is unwitnessed, where the elders of the closest town or city make a sacrifice at a stream of a young heifer in the presence of Levites by breaking the neck and washing their hands over it. This way the murder can be atoned and bloodguilt removed from the offending town or city.

The adventures of Peter continue in Acts 10 with a vision by a Roman centurion (commander of a hundred) named Cornelius from an angel of God telling him to send for Pete. As the three men sent by Cornelius to get Peter are coming in to Joppa where Peter is staying, Peter goes up on the roof of the house while a meal is being prepared and falls into a trance. He sees something like a sheet lowered from heaven with all kinds of livestock and birds and creeping things in it. A voice tells him to “rise, kill, and eat.” Peter refuses because he has never eaten anything unclean. But the voice says, “What God has cleansed, no longer consider unholy.” Three times this happens then the sheet is withdrawn into heaven. The guys from Cornelius then knock at the door and ask Peter to go back with them. Pete is told by the Spirit to go with them so he does. Upon arriving at the home of Cornelius, Peter tells them that God told him not to call any man unclean (10:28) so that is why he has come. Peter asks why he is there, and Cornelius tells Pete his vision and asks to hear what he has to say. Then Peter begins to speak the Word of the Lord to the assembled household, beginning with the observation that God shows no partiality (see above Deuteronomy section for similar teachings on partiality) and continuing with the message of the murder and resurrection of Jesus. But before he is finished speaking the Spirit falls on the people and they speak in tongues. Peter and the Jewish brothers who came with him are amazed, and they baptize the household.

Acts 11:1-18 are about Peter going back to Jerusalem and handling accusations that he ate with ‘unclean people.’ He recounts the vision and the interpretation, his speaking to Cornelius’ household and the baptism of the Spirit, and wraps it up by saying who was he to stand in the way of God? The Jews there come to the conclusion that God has also granted repentance to the Gentiles. In verses 19-30 we are treated to a picture of the beginning of a congregation in Antioch, started when people fleeing the persecution in Jerusalem came to town and started preaching about Jesus. The community of believers in Jerusalem hears about it and sends Barnabas to see what’s up. Barnabas is impressed by what he sees, teaches and encourages for a little, then goes to find Saul in Tarsus and brings him back to help. For a year they preach and teach, until a prophet speaks about a famine around Jerusalem. Then they are sent to Jerusalem with some money to help the believers there.

Meanwhile, Herod has James the brother of John put to death, and since this pleases the Jews he also arrests Peter intending to kill him also after Passover. On the night before Peter was to be killed, an angel appears and leads him out of the prison, causing his chains to fall off and gates to open by themselves while passing several guards. Once out on the street the angel disappears and Peter realizes that it hasn’t been a dream, so he goes to Mary’s house (the mother of John). A servant girl name Rhoda answers his knock at the gate, but is so excited to see Peter she runs back to tell the others forgetting to let him in first. Pete keeps knocking and finally the household goes to see him and is amazed, but he quiets them down and tells them what happened, and says they should tell James and the others before he heads out to another place. The next day there is a huge commotion among the guards, and Herod gets really mad and has them executed. He goes down to Caesarea where he hears from people in the area that he is having a conflict with, but while he is speaking to them the people shout that they are hearing a god and not a man. Since Herod does not give the glory to God, he is struck down by an angel and dies eaten by worms.

Shalom

[Bruce Bertram]

19"You shall not distort justice; you shall not be partial, and you shall not take a bribe, for a bribe blinds the eyes of the wise and perverts the words of the righteous. 20Justice, and only justice, you shall pursue, that you may live and possess the land which the Lord your God is giving you." (Deuteronomy 16:19-20 NASB95)

Twice in this section of Scripture God says that a matter must be confirmed by "two or three witnesses" (17:6 and 19:15) and twice (17:4 and 19:18 ) judges are told to "investigate the matter thoroughly." Difficult cases go before the Levites, which is to say that as representatives of God's Word it is God's Word that is final. Obviously, God values correct judgment, and that judgment is always to be in line with His Word.

We also have another reminder that to do what God says is the same as loving Him with all our heart.

9if you carefully observe all this commandment which I command you today, to love the Lord your God, and to walk in His ways always then you shall add three more cities for yourself, besides these three. (Deuteronomy 19:9 NASB95)

Another key section is 18:15-22, where Moses says another prophet is coming who will be like him. We know this to be Jesus the Christ. Jesus is like Moses in many ways, not the least of which is that Jesus tells us to follow God's Laws.

Acts 10 is about Cornelius, who was an Italian and a Roman Centurion, meaning he had command of a group of 100 men. Peter was sent to talk with him after having a vision of a sheet being lowered from heaven with all sorts of animals in it, and Pete ended up refusing to eat any. In Acts 10:28 Peter explains the meaning of the vision.

28And he said to them, "You yourselves know how unlawful it is for a man who is a Jew to associate with a foreigner or to visit him; and yet God has shown me that I should not call any man unholy or unclean." (Acts 10:28 NASB95)

Two times in this section (the vision and an explanation) and one time again in Acts 15, this meaningful shift in preaching to the Gentiles also is emphasized. Usually, when things are repeated in Scripture, it is best to pay particular attention to them. We should probably take God's own Word for what this means, rather than making up our own application.

We also have the second recorded martyr, James the brother of John, both of whom were called the 'sons of thunder' in Mark 3:17 (see also Matthew 4:21 and 20:23). Herod (Agrippa, grandson of the Herod who styled himself 'the great' who killed all the babies in Bethlehem at the time Jesus was born) tried for Peter too, but was foiled. Herod meets his end when he doesn't give glory to God (12:23). There is a different James mentioned in Acts 15, which is most probably the 'Lord's brother' mentioned in Galatians 1:19 and also was probably the one to write the book of James.

Shalom

[golfnerd]

Did anyone else pick up on the prophetic verses regarding establishing a king over Israel and the requirements of said king? Did anyone else notice that Solomon VIOLATED EVERY one of the commands regarding a king?

(Deu 17:14 RNKJV) When thou art come unto the land which YHVH thy Elohim giveth thee, and shalt possess it, and shalt dwell therein, and shalt say, I will set a king over me, like as all the nations that are about me;

(Deu 17:15 RNKJV) Thou shalt in any wise set him king over thee, whom YHVH thy Elohim shall choose: one from among thy brethren shalt thou set king over thee: thou mayest not set a stranger over thee, which is not thy brother.

(Deu 17:16 RNKJV) But he shall not multiply horses to himself, nor cause the people to return to Egypt, to the end that he should multiply horses: forasmuch as YHVH hath said unto you, Ye shall henceforth return no more that way.

(Deu 17:17 RNKJV) Neither shall he multiply wives to himself, that his heart turn not away: neither shall he greatly multiply to himself silver and gold.

Wasn't there about 500 years from this time until Saul ascended to the throne? I know that all of the Judges had already gone...

[Bruce Bertram]

Shoftim; Deuteronomy 16:18-21:9; Isaiah 51:1-53:12; Acts 10 through 12

7He was oppressed and He was afflicted, Yet He did not open His mouth; Like a lamb that is led to slaughter, And like a sheep that is silent before its shearers, So He did not open His mouth. 8By oppression and judgment He was taken away; And as for His generation, who considered That He was cut off out of the land of the living For the transgression of my people, to whom the stroke was due? (Isaiah 53:7-8 NASB95)

Remember last week’s portion, particularly Acts 8, where Philip is moved by the Spirit to meet the Ethiopian eunuch? This is the section the eunuch was reading in his chariot as Philip ran up to him. The eunuch was the chief treasure handler for the Ethiopian Kandake (the office of queen rather than a name) and a Gentile, yet had been to Jerusalem to worship. He was reading the Word out loud, so when Philip ran up he heard the eunuch reading Isaiah and asked if he understood what he was reading. The man responded, “How could I, unless someone guides me?” After inviting Philip to sit with him (and it was probably obvious that Philip was a Jew), he asks, “Please tell me, who is the prophet speaking of, himself or someone else?”

The eunuch was searching the Word, had been to worship in Jerusalem, and recognized Philip as a Jew and someone who might be able to help him understand. This brings us to the focus of my commentary this week. Cornelius, who was a Roman soldier and an Italian Gentile, was also searching. Neither person might not have known what they were searching for, but through their searching God found them and made Himself known to them in particular ways.

Moses starts a search in our Deuteronomy section when he refers to another prophet coming that will be like him.

18‘I will raise up a prophet from among their countrymen like you, and I will put My words in his mouth, and he shall speak to them all that I command him. 19‘It shall come about that whoever will not listen to My words which he shall speak in My name, I Myself will require it of him. 20‘But the prophet who speaks a word presumptuously in My name which I have not commanded him to speak, or which he speaks in the name of other gods, that prophet shall die.’ (Deuteronomy 18:18-20 NASB95)

You would think that a statement like this would’ve encouraged an intense search for that Prophet, and that all prophets would’ve been subject to the tests commanded here. It would’ve been obvious that the Prophet hadn’t been born at the time, or Moses would’ve pointed him out in the crowd. So Israel knew it was future. You’d think there would’ve been an intense sort of scrutiny of everyone who claimed to speak for God down through the centuries. Unfortunately, history shows that it is usually the prophet who speaks presumptuously or in the name of other gods who gets accepted. This happened all the way up to Jesus, who we know to be The Prophet spoken of by Moses, and was, predictably, rejected, and keeps happening even now.

In some respects people can be forgiven for misunderstanding the nature of The Prophet. When Moses says, “A prophet like me,” for instance, we might think (and the Jews at the time of the incarnation did think) that He was going to liberate the people of Israel from the Romans in the same way Moses liberated the people from Egypt. That was a common expectation of the time, and even the disciples bought into this line of thinking. Jesus really did liberate from bondage, but it was a different bondage than expected. It wasn’t a physical bondage, in the sense of not having to do what the Romans said anymore; it was the bondage to sin and disobedience which caused the physical bondage in the first place.

People also expected Jesus to perform the same or similar types of signs and wonders that God through Moses performed in the sight of all Egypt and Israel. That was probably one of the motivations behind the demand of the religious leaders for a sign.

38Then some of the scribes and Pharisees said to Him, “Teacher, we want to see a sign from You.” 39But He answered and said to them, “An evil and adulterous generation craves for a sign; and yet no sign will be given to it but the sign of Jonah the prophet; 40for just as JONAH WAS THREE DAYS AND THREE NIGHTS IN THE BELLY OF THE SEA MONSTER, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. (Matthew 12:38-40 NASB95) See also Matthew 16:1, 24:3; Mark 8:11-12, 13:4; Luke 11:16, 29, 21:7, 23:8; John 2:18, 4:48 and so on.

But God tells us in numerous places that signs are not necessarily the main indicator of the Prophet. Partly, if the prophet says something is going to happen and it doesn’t, we know he is false. But the other factor is ‘speaking in the name of other gods.’ In other words, the Prophet would speak God’s Words, in addition to any signs, which would authenticate not only the Prophet, but the message. Signs alone do not validate the prophet.

41Many came to Him and were saying, “While John performed no sign, yet everything John said about this man was true.” (John 10:41 NASB95)

37But though He had performed so many signs before them, yet they were not believing in Him. (John 12:37 NASB95)

We know a false prophet because his signs might work, but he speaks words other than what God would speak, or speaks against words that God has already spoken. So the signs and the Word work together to validate the person of the Prophet like Moses whom God would raise up from Israel’s brethren.

21“You may say in your heart, ‘How will we know the word which the LORD has not spoken?’ 22“When a prophet speaks in the name of the LORD, if the thing does not come about or come true, that is the thing which the LORD has not spoken. The prophet has spoken it presumptuously; you shall not be afraid of him. (Deuteronomy 18:21-22 NASB95)

Jesus performed many signs that were obvious indicators that He was the Prophet spoken of by Moses. But His message was also completely in line and consistent with everything God had spoken up to that point. Many people were figuring this out.

14Therefore when the people saw the sign which He had performed, they said, “This is truly the Prophet who is to come into the world.” (John 6:14 NASB95)

But many were not. The disciples in Acts were also performing signs, yet at the same time their message was completely consistent with Jesus’. Acts 10 tells us of an encounter similar to Philip’s, in that Peter was moved to go to the Gentiles with the gospel.

Then in Acts 11 we are given an account of Peter defending his actions in going to Cornelius’ house to ‘the circumcised.’ Peter’s message was different, again, from what they expected, in that Jews were not supposed to be around Gentiles (notice that this idea was not according to Scripture). Peter gave them an account of the dream, and because the dream’s message and Peter’s account of the signs (Gentiles receiving the Holy Spirit) were compatible with God’s Words, they were forced to believe. It was difficult for the circumcised to accept, and some of them didn’t as witnessed by their continual persecution of the new sect throughout the book of Acts. But those who search the Scriptures and humbly obey God are always willing to listen to something different, as long as it goes along with those Scriptures.

So are we searching for The Prophet today? Do we compare what prophets or teachers say with the Word of God to see if they are true or false? Do we put up with a person who might be a tremendous motivating speaker, yet speaks in the name of other gods? Is the message full of phrases like, “The Old Testament is for Jews, the New Testament is for Christians” or “Parts of God’s Words are old and outdated?” Isn’t this like speaking in the name of other gods, because the message is to stop listening to God’s Word and listen instead to the speaker? Messages like these are not compatible with the Word, and have the consequence of pointing people to ‘other gods’ such as the ‘god’ who is speaking, if you catch my drift.

The kingdom of God is ruled by the Word of God and that only. Any attempts to split it up or water it down amount to ‘going after other gods.’ We must cling to His Word with all our might, with no additions or subtractions, because the false prophets are all over still. But The Prophet has come and gone and is coming again, and we know who He is and what He says. And like God said in Deuteronomy 18:19, if we are not listening He will require it of us.

20Now having been questioned by the Pharisees as to when the kingdom of God was coming, He answered them and said, “The kingdom of God is not coming with signs to be observed; 21nor will they say, ‘Look, here it is!’ or, ‘There it is!’ For behold, the kingdom of God is in your midst.” (Luke 17:20-21 NASB95)

Shalom