Moses gives his valedictory address to the people. He has already seen the land but also knows
he won't enter the Land with them. His
speech begins at Horeb with the giving of the Law and God's dictate to move out
and go and possess the land. He recounts
that he tells the Lord he can't bear the nation, they are "as numerous as
the stars of heaven." The promise
to Abram of such descendants has been fulfilled and now all that remained was
for those descendants to possess the land of the promise. His story is of the visit and counsel of his
father-in-law, Jethro, that the work of judging between the people, explaining
the application of God's law in their disputes with one another, was too much
for one man to do. He reminds them that
they presented him with leaders they had chosen to help with the work, to work
under and with Moses in this task. There
has always been an organization since that time, they have been accustomed to
looking not only to Moses but to these others, they need not fear his absence.
The hypocrisy of the leaders is such that they put on a good
front, a show of righteousness, but they are full of dead men's bones, like the
tombs that are whitewashed so that the pilgrims at the festival don't think too
much about death. They are also heirs of
the people who refused to accept the
prophets and therefore who have rejected God's words of rebuke. They are exactly like their fathers in that
they are even now rejecting God's words to them to repent and believe. They will soon act as their fathers have
acted in persecuting and murdering the prophet sent to speak for God. Nonetheless, Jesus mourns for the city and
the people of God, the very ones who have rejected the prophets, are now
rejecting Him, and will soon demand His crucifixion. God's love knows no bounds for His covenant
people.
Paul understands election as completely an act of God. He points to Jacob and Esau as a perfect
example of this process. Before the
children were born there was a prophecy concerning them that the elder would
serve the younger. God had chosen Jacob
for some unknown reason to be the line through which the promise to his
grandfather, Abraham, would be realized.
Nowhere do we see any human reason we might have for this choice. Jacob was well named as the deceiver or supplanter. Paul points to election of this one as an
irrevocable matter, Israel is elect because God chose this people and that
election is not compromised by the inclusion of Gentiles into the covenant because
we come through Israel in Jesus, the lion of the tribe of Judah. It is all a mysterious work of God.
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