Sermon outline based on Deuteronomy 10:18-19
This sermon outline has been written and collated by Gordon Showell-Rogers, April 2022.
A presentation that you may choose to accompany the sermon can be downloaded here. Feel free to make your own/use whatever content is already provided.
Deuteronomy 10:17-1917 For the LORD your God is God of gods and Lord of lords, the great God, mighty and awesome, who shows no partiality and accepts no bribes. 18 He defends the cause of the fatherless and the widow, and loves the foreigner residing among you, giving them food and clothing. 19 And you are to love those who are foreigners, for you yourselves were foreigners in Egypt.
observations:
A Syrian refugee friend (a follower of Jesus) told me recently that his Muslim friends all ask him two questions:1. Who is God?2. Where is God?
These wonderful verses answer the first question clearly and hint at the answer to the second question.The book of Deuteronomy (the fifth book of the ‘Torah’ or ‘instructions’) summarises and repeats everything written in the first 4 books of the ‘Torah’. That’s why the book is called ‘Deuteronomy’ (the name comes from a Greek expression ‘The Second Law’).
It’s the book that was rediscovered during the reign of King Josiah (2 Kings chapters 22-23 and 2 Chronicles 34:29-35) and it is a book that is often quoted by Jesus and by New Testament writers: 9 passages from Deuteronomy (6:5, 18:15, 19:15, 21:23, 23:21, 24:1, 25:4, 30:11-14, 32:35) are quoted in 16 different places in 10 different books in the New Testament.
New Testament summaries of Deuteronomy: - Mathew 22:37-40. - And then in 1 John4:16 "God is love……." - And 1 John 4:19-21:
New Testament summaries of Deuteronomy: - Mathew 22:37-40. - And then in 1 John4:16 "God is love……." - And 1 John 4:19-21:
19 We love because he first loved us. 20 Whoever claims to love God yet hates a brother or sister is a liar. For whoever does not love their brother and sister, whom they have seen, cannot love God, whom they have not seen. 21 And he has given us this command: Anyone who loves God must also love their brother and sister.
If there is a God (and there surely is), then the only way that we can know what he is like is if he chooses to show us. The whole Bible claims to be the revelation of this Living God: and Jesus continually reaffirmed his belief in that revelation of God, quoting constantly from the books that we call the ‘Old Testament’ and then giving His authority to all the books that we call the ‘New Testament’
‘Our’ verses in Deuteronomy are introduced in Deuteronomy 10:12:
12 And now, O Israel, what does the LORD your God ask of you but to fear the LORD your God, to walk in obedience to him, to love him, to serve the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul.
So, we return to the question asked by the friends of my Syrian friend: Who is God?
And the answer is:God of gods and Lord of lords, the great God, mighty and awesome, who shows no partiality and accepts no bribes. He defends the cause of the fatherless and the widow, and loves the foreigner residing among you, giving them food and clothing.
Application
And then we return to the second question: Where is God?Wonderfully, the Bible also has two answers to this question.
Firstly, as John 1 verses 14 and 18 put it:
14 The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.
18 No one has ever seen God, but the one and only Son, who is himself God and[a] is in closest relationship with the Father, has made him known.
There’s an interesting phrase in Luke 24:21. Do read this story about the encounter between Jesus and two of his followers, after his resurrection. His followers say to him, before they understand who he is ‘we had hoped……..’.
In that small phrase, there’s a world of shattered dreams and lost hopes: a world that many of us can relate to as we look at our lives. To those who had hoped to remain in their homes, to those who had hoped to outlive their children, to those who have lost everything, the Risen Christ appears…..
Secondly, God’s people are called to live out the character of God. The Bible is full of commands to the people of God to love others (e.g., Leviticus 19:18) and most especially the most vulnerable (e.g., James 1:27). In our passage, as verse 19 puts it ‘you are to love those who are foreigners.’
In our text, the Old Testament people of God are told to do this because they had been foreigners in Egypt. In the light of the rest of Scripture (Old and new Testaments), it’s clear that New Testament followers of Jesus are to love the vulnerable, because this is what God does. Because God defends and protects the vulnerable, those who follow Him must also do so.
So, where is God?
He is in the hearts and minds, the hands and feet of those who protect and care for the most vulnerable, in the name of the crucified and risen Jesus.