Deuteronomy 26

Stage 1: Eternity Past, when God already had His eternal plan for His glory and your good.

Stage 2: Old Testament Preparation, when the Lord prepared His people for the coming Messiah. The laws in Deuteronomy are a part of that period.

Stage 3: New Testament Gospel Life, when we who have received Jesus are given the privilege of following the Suffering Servant. You are here now.

Stage 4: Eternity Future, when we dwell in the fullness of blessing together forever in accord with the eternal purpose of God. This is your hope, but you get to taste it and live in it today.

Got it?

We live in Stage 3 with the hope of Stage 4 as a daily imminent reality to us. This hope “does not put us to shame, because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us” (Romans 5:5).

Back in Stage 2, the time of Old Testament Preparation, God commanded Israel to give to the Lord the first and the best of the harvest. This was an act of faith. God could be trusted to bring in the fullness of the harvest. We need to live this way in everything, giving away our lives to the Lord, in the sure hope of the coming day. As we wait in joyful/tearful hope of the coming resurrection, we give out of our poverty to the Lord.

We cry out to the Lord, and He hears us and helps us. We also declare to the Lord our thanksgiving. We are grateful that we are already tasting the new life in our souls, and we proclaim our expectation that what Christ has won for us through His cross and resurrection is surely coming.

A testimony of suffering was a part of the experience of Israel. But they were delivered from bondage in Egypt and brought into the promised land. We who follow Christ face a cross of suffering that we must bear today, but we must not forget that we have a promised land far better than Canaan, and it is coming soon. Don't give up. Talk to God. Ask for a taste of heaven. Ask for Him.

We have the firstfruits of the Holy Spirit, and our King is the firstfruits of the resurrection. Whatever we have we give to God as our testimony before Him that all that we have has come to us by His grace based on the merits of Christ.

In this same Spirit, we bring frequent gifts to the Lord out of what He has granted to us. In the earlier stage of Old Testament Preparation, there was a tithing year, and storehouses for the tithes of the people. Their proportional giving (the more that He blessed, the more you gave) was used to care for the Levites who were serving the Lord, and the destitute who were strangers, widows, and orphans; those without the protection of family support. There was a verbal declaration in worship that all of the “sacred portion” had been given, and a petition to the Lord to bless the people and the land.

But our Lord gave Himself entirely on the cross.

We have been purchased by Him, bought back, redeemed by His blood. We are not our own.

We give ourselves in worship all the time. Then we give ourselves in service. And the invisible heavenly kingdom of God on earth is made visible.

This kind of obedience in giving and serving, this declaration of faith and need in prayer, is not merely a duty to those who are counted as sons of God through Jesus Christ our Lord. It is our privilege because Christ is our delight. The obedience that secured our salvation has been provided by Jesus. We commit ourselves to love in grateful devotion to the One who loved us before we were born. We are His treasured possession. We are “a people holy to the Lord.” He came to serve. We come in His Name as a giving and serving people.

One word of caution: Do not waste your passion today judging others who don't seem to get this yet. If they belong to Jesus Christ, they will soon grow in the family resemblance. He knows how to save the weak. He knows how to deliver people that are caught in many entangling affections. If you do feel led to give a word of encouragement, make it something like this: “This is the way I look at it – We love because He first loved us.”

God is able to save. After all, He saved you and me. Thank you, Lord!