I Will Send You Rain

Leviticus 26:4-6 – I will send you rain in its season, and the ground will yield its crops and the trees their fruit. Your threshing will continue until grape harvest and the grape harvest will continue until planting, and you will eat all the food you want and live in safety in your land. “‘I will grant peace in the land, and you will lie down and no one will make you afraid. I will remove wild beasts from the land, and the sword will not pass through your country.

Zechariah 10:1 – Ask the Lord for rain in the springtime; it is the Lord who sends the thunderstorms. He gives showers of rain to all people, and plants of the field to everyone.

Psalm 37:11 – But the meek will inherit the land and enjoy peace and prosperity.

Psalm 3:5 – I lie down and sleep; I wake again, because the Lord sustains me.

Application:

• ·         The Lord is the one who controls the weather and the rain, giving life and fertility to the land.
• ·         The meek are those who humbly acknowledge their dependence on the goodness and grace of God and betray no arrogance toward their fellowman.
• ·         Even while my watchfulness is surrendered to sleep, the watchful Lord preserves me.

All Scripture verses taken from ESV

Obey My Commands

Leviticus 26:2-4 – You shall keep my Sabbaths and reverence my sanctuary: I am the Lord. “If you walk in my statutes and observe my commandments and do them, then I will give you your rains in their season, and the land shall yield its increase, and the trees of the field shall yield their fruit.

Exodus 24:8 – And Moses took the blood and threw it on the people and said, “Behold the blood of the covenant that the Lord has made with you in accordance with all these words.”

James 1:25 – But the one who looks into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and perseveres, being no hearer who forgets but a doer who acts, he will be blessed in his doing.

Application:

• ·         Obedience is the key to blessing.
• ·         Only after the people agreed to obey the Lord could they participate in His covenant with them.
• ·         In contrast to the sinner, who is a slave to sin, obeying the moral law gives the Christian the joyous freedom to be what he was created for.

All Scripture verses taken from ESV

Do Not Make Idols

Leviticus 25:54-26:1 – “‘Even if someone is not redeemed in any of these ways, they and their children are to be released in the Year of Jubilee, for the Israelites belong to me as servants. They are my servants, whom I brought out of Egypt. I am the Lord your God. “‘Do not make idols or set up an image or a sacred stone for yourselves, and do not place a carved stone in your land to bow down before it. I am the Lord your God.

Leviticus 11:44 – I am the Lord your God; consecrate yourselves and be holy, because I am holy. Do not make yourselves unclean by any creature that moves along the ground.

Exodus 20:4 – “You shall not make for yourself an image in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below.

Psalm 97:7 – All who worship images are put to shame, those who boast in idols—worship him, all you gods!

John 4:24 – God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in truth.”

Application:

• ·         Israel was to be totally consecrated to God. Because of who God is and what He has done, His people must dedicate themselves fully to Him.
• ·         The Bible probably does not forbid making statues, but it does forbid worshiping God in any material form.
• ·         Because God had no visible form, any idol intended to resemble Him would be a sinful misrepresentation of Him. Since other gods are not to be worshiped, making idols of them would be equally sinful.
• ·         Joy should be given to all who acknowledge the Lord; shame and disgrace to those who trust in the false gods.
• ·         The place of worship is irrelevant, because true worship must be in keeping with God’s nature, which is spirit. In John’s Gospel truth is associated with Christ, a fact that has great importance for the proper understanding of Christian worship.

All Scripture verses taken from ESV

To Be Your God

Leviticus 25:32-42 – “‘The Levites always have the right to redeem their houses in the Levitical towns, which they possess. So the property of the Levites is redeemable—that is, a house sold in any town they hold—and is to be returned in the Jubilee, because the houses in the towns of the Levites are their property among the Israelites. But the pastureland belonging to their towns must not be sold; it is their permanent possession. “‘If any of your fellow Israelites become poor and are unable to support themselves among you, help them as you would a foreigner and stranger, so they can continue to live among you. Do not take interest or any profit from them, but fear your God, so that they may continue to live among you. You must not lend them money at interest or sell them food at a profit. I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt to give you the land of Canaan and to be your God. “‘If any of your fellow Israelites become poor and sell themselves to you, do not make them work as slaves. They are to be treated as hired workers or temporary residents among you; they are to work for you until the Year of Jubilee. Then they and their children are to be released, and they will go back to their own clans and to the property of their ancestors. Because the Israelites are my servants, whom I brought out of Egypt, they must not be sold as slaves.

Genesis 17:7 – I will establish my covenant as an everlasting covenant between me and you and your descendants after you for the generations to come, to be your God and the God of your descendants after you.

Application:

• ·         “To be your God” is the heart of God’s covenant promise, repeated over and over in the Old Testament.

All Scripture verses taken from ESV

The Land Is Mine

Leviticus 25:22-31 – While you plant during the eighth year, you will eat from the old crop and will continue to eat from it until the harvest of the ninth year comes in. “‘The land must not be sold permanently, because the land is mine and you reside in my land as foreigners and strangers. Throughout the land that you hold as a possession, you must provide for the redemption of the land. “‘If one of your fellow Israelites becomes poor and sells some of their property, their nearest relative is to come and redeem what they have sold. If, however, there is no one to redeem it for them but later on they prosper and acquire sufficient means to redeem it themselves, they are to determine the value for the years since they sold it and refund the balance to the one to whom they sold it; they can then go back to their own property. But if they do not acquire the means to repay, what was sold will remain in the possession of the buyer until the Year of Jubilee. It will be returned in the Jubilee, and they can then go back to their property. “‘Anyone who sells a house in a walled city retains the right of redemption a full year after its sale. During that time the seller may redeem it. If it is not redeemed before a full year has passed, the house in the walled city shall belong permanently to the buyer and the buyer’s descendants. It is not to be returned in the Jubilee. But houses in villages without walls around them are to be considered as belonging to the open country. They can be redeemed, and they are to be returned in the Jubilee.

Exodus 19:5-6 – Now if you obey me fully and keep my covenant, then out of all nations you will be my treasured possession. Although the whole earth is mine, you will be for me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.’ These are the words you are to speak to the Israelites.”

Ruth 2:20 – “The Lord bless him!” Naomi said to her daughter-in-law. “He has not stopped showing his kindness to the living and the dead.” She added, “That man is our close relative; he is one of our guardian-redeemers.”

Application:

• ·         God is the Creator and Possessor of the earth and everything in it.
• ·         The kinsman-redeemer was responsible for protecting the interests of needy members of the extended family—e.g., to provide an heir for a brother who had died, to redeem land that a poor relative had sold outside the family, to redeem a relative who had been sold into slavery and to avenge the killing of a relative. Naomi is encouraged when she hears that the Lord has led Ruth to the fields of a relative who might serve as their kinsman-redeemer.

All Scripture verses taken from ESV

Live Safely In The Land

Leviticus 25:18-21 – “‘Follow my decrees and be careful to obey my laws, and you will live safely in the land. Then the land will yield its fruit, and you will eat your fill and live there in safety. You may ask, “What will we eat in the seventh year if we do not plant or harvest our crops?” I will send you such a blessing in the sixth year that the land will yield enough for three years.

Jeremiah 23:6 – In his days Judah will be saved and Israel will live in safety. This is the name by which he will be called: The Lord Our Righteous Savior.

Ezekiel 34:25 – “‘I will make a covenant of peace with them and rid the land of savage beasts so that they may live in the wilderness and sleep in the forests in safety.

Psalm 133:3 – It is as if the dew of Hermon were falling on Mount Zion. For there the Lord bestows his blessing, even life forevermore.

Psalm 134:3 – May the Lord bless you from Zion, he who is the Maker of heaven and earth.

Application:

• ·         Although Zedekiah did not live up to the meaning of his name, “The Lord is my righteousness”, Jesus the Messiah would bestow on His people the abundant blessings that come from the hands of a King who does what is just and right.
• ·         All of God’s covenants aim at peace.
• ·         God’s blessings flowed to Israel through the priestly ministrations at the sanctuary—epitomizing God’s redemptive mercies—and through heaven’s dew that sustained life in the fields—epitomizing God’s providential mercies in the creation order. Life was the great covenant blessing.
• ·         May the Lord bless you.

All Scripture verses taken from ESV

Do Not Take Advantage Of Each Other

Leviticus 25:11-17 – The fiftieth year shall be a jubilee for you; do not sow and do not reap what grows of itself or harvest the untended vines. For it is a jubilee and is to be holy for you; eat only what is taken directly from the fields. “‘In this Year of Jubilee everyone is to return to their own property. “‘If you sell land to any of your own people or buy land from them, do not take advantage of each other. You are to buy from your own people on the basis of the number of years since the Jubilee. And they are to sell to you on the basis of the number of years left for harvesting crops. When the years are many, you are to increase the price, and when the years are few, you are to decrease the price, because what is really being sold to you is the number of crops. Do not take advantage of each other, but fear your God. I am the Lord your God.

1 Samuel 12:3 – Here I stand. Testify against me in the presence of the Lord and his anointed. Whose ox have I taken? Whose donkey have I taken? Whom have I cheated? Whom have I oppressed? From whose hand have I accepted a bribe to make me shut my eyes? If I have done any of these things, I will make it right.”

Jeremiah 7:5-7 – If you really change your ways and your actions and deal with each other justly, if you do not oppress the foreigner, the fatherless or the widow and do not shed innocent blood in this place, and if you do not follow other gods to your own harm, then I will let you live in this place, in the land I gave your ancestors for ever and ever.

Zechariah 7:10 – Do not oppress the widow or the fatherless, the foreigner or the poor. Do not plot evil against each other.’

1 Thessalonians 4:3-6 – It is God’s will that you should be sanctified: that you should avoid sexual immorality; that each of you should learn to control your own body in a way that is holy and honorable, not in passionate lust like the pagans, who do not know God; and that in this matter no one should wrong or take advantage of a brother or sister. The Lord will punish all those who commit such sins, as we told you and warned you before.

Application:

• ·         The Lord prohibited the accumulation of property to the detriment of the poor.
• ·         Samuel did not use his position for personal gain.
• ·         Rulers and people alike should not oppress the alien, the fatherless,  or the.widow.
• ·         In the ancient Near East, the ideal king was expected to protect the oppressed and needy members of society.
• ·         No one should wrong his brother or take advantage of him.

All Scripture verses taken from ESV