Deuteronomy 33

The Lord is committed to His people. God made promises to us that stretched all the way from the Garden of Eden to the final resurrection. Like a good father He disciplines His children, but He has promised to bring great blessing upon us through His Son.

Long before Jesus came to secure for us eternal life through His death and resurrection, God used special servants like Jacob and Moses to pronounce blessings upon the tribes of Israel. Moses spoke these words just before his departure.

The Lord God Almighty talked to Israel through Moses. He blessed the tribes from His place of highest authority in heaven. The Lord was not only the Law-Giver. He was also the sovereign Ruler and God of Israel. Each tribe had a future according to His decree.

The tribe of Reuben, the first-born, would live, and not die out. Yet they would not have preeminence, just as Jacob had pronounced centuries before. Who would be first in the list of tribes?

The word to Judah was brief, but significant in placement and content: “Hear, O Lord, the voice of Judah, and bring him in to his people. With your hands contend for him, and be a help against his adversaries.” David and the line of kings would come from this tribe until the Messiah King was given. This final King, the Word of God made flesh, would be the Voice of the Lord. God would hear this anointed Voice and would bring about the gift of communion between the Messiah and His people. The Lord would preserve the line of the King through many dangers.

Levi, the tribe of priests and tabernacle servants, would teach the Law of God and offer up sacrifices on the Lord's altar until the final Sacrifice came. Not long after the coming of a Messiah Priest, Israel would no longer have Levitical priests or sacrifices. See Hosea 3:4-5.

Benjamin would be the beloved of the Lord. He would dwell under the Lord's protection.

Joseph would be blessed by the Lord in his land, especially the descendants of Joseph that came through his son Ephraim. This part of Joseph would eventually be the leading tribe of northern Israel. Though conquered and scattered by the Assyrians, the strong influence of Israel would be known all over the earth.

Zebulun and Issachar would rejoice in the gifts of the Lord in the land that God would give to them. Gad, Dan, Naphtali, and Asher would have their particular words of victory and bounty from God.

These words to the tribes of the conquest generation were surprisingly bountiful in view of the earlier warnings that God spoke through Moses. Nothing here denied the curse that would come upon Israel. But even after those earlier devastating words had been given, these last prophetic words of Moses would still come to pass. God would bless His people Israel.

Why would He do this? The oracle of Moses recorded in this chapter ended with the answer: because of the Most High. “There is none like God.” He would make a way for Israel to be called by the name “Jeshurun,” which means “the upright one.” To be “upright” is to be morally excellent. How could God use this title to bless Israel?

The God of Israel, the Voice that saves, He alone is the upright One. Yet in Him, in His Son's death for Israel and for His people everywhere, the blessings of God upon His elect would be secure. Israel would be granted His Name in their union with Jesus.

This Voice has come from heaven to be our Help. The eternal God is our dwelling place. His are the everlasting arms that support Israel and the church. He is our happiness, our salvation, our protection, and our victory forever.