Returning to the Lord

Returning to the Lord.  Today’s reading is so rich and so sweet.  The New Testament picture that should come to mind is that of the parable of the prodigal son (Luke 15:11-32). Isn’t it amazing when we are reading the Old Testament how it opens up to us more fully the Scripture in the New Testament?  God had been instructing and teaching about blessings for obedience and curses for disobedience (Deuteronomy 28). Next, God describes what will happen to the land when they abandon the covenant with the Lord (Deuteronomy 29:16-29).  When God’s covenant is abandoned, He will bring every curse written in the book on the land (Deuteronomy 29:27).  It is a sad and devastating end to the chapter.  However, the next chapter begins, “When all these things happen to you – the blessings and the curses I have set before you – and you come to your senses while you are in  all the nations where the Lord you God has driven you, and you and your children return to the Lord your God and obey him with all your heart and all your soul by doing everything I am commanding you today, then he will restore your fortunes, have compassion on you, and gather you again from all the peoples where the Lord your God has scattered you” (Deuteronomy 30:1-3).  Notice that we read “When these things happen” and “blessings and the curses”.  This means that God already knew they would experience both.  God is faithful!  He will do what He says He will do!  When God’s people obeyed, there were blessings as promised.  When they disobeyed, there were curses as promised.  The next thing you notice is “and you come to your senses”.  When they realize their condition, being in other lands as a consequence of their disobedience, then what is described is what will happen when they return to the Lord.  I love how God conveys His deepest love and commitment to restoration when God says, “Even if your exiles are at the farthest horizon, he will gather you and bring you back from there” (v.4).  Isn’t that comforting.  No matter how far we stray, when we come to ourselves and return to the Lord, He is there to deliver us and restore us.  It couldn’t possibly get any richer, could it?  Oh yes!  Then we read, “He will cause you to prosper and multiply you more than he did your fathers” (v.5).  One might expect the people who abandoned the covenant and strayed, who now wants to return to the Lord, for God’s grace to look like “tolerance” again for these people.  I would suggest that if God just tolerated them again, that would be amazing grace.  However, God doesn’t just “tolerate” those who return. He fully restores them AND blesses them even greater than others before them.  I hope you enjoy the reading today of God’s Word as much as I did.  Blessings!