Drastic Measures

When you begin living in the towns the Lord your God is giving you, you may hear that scoundrels among you are leading their fellow citizens astray by saying, ‘Let us go worship other gods’—gods you have not known before.  In such cases, you must examine the facts carefully.  If you find that the report is true and such a detestable act has been committed among you, you must attack that town and completely destroy all its inhabitants, as well as all the livestock.  Then you must pile all the plunder in the middle of the open square and burn it.  Burn the entire town as a burnt offering to the Lord your God.  That town must remain a ruin forever; it may never be rebuilt.  Keep none of the plunder that has been set apart for destruction.  Then the Lord will turn from his fierce anger and be merciful to you.  He will have compassion on you and make you a large nation, just as he swore to your ancestors. [Deuteronomy 13.12-17]

This direction, following essentially the same direction for household members, is drastic!  These drastic measures served as a basic utility to keep Israel pure in their worship of the LORD.

However, rather than seeking out mandates and directives for living my own life here, I remain tasked to find Jesus.  And, find Jesus I have!

While it is easy to get absorbed and even lost in the drastic measures outlined in this part of Deuteronomy, it is more important to see Jesus the Messiah clearly portrayed within these very drastic measures!

Death has always presented a bit of sobering reality to mankind.  Losing money, going to jail, or being beaten, while certainly being deterrents, hold no comparison to capital punishment.  Death is the ultimate and final penalty!  Death most competently insures that the offender will not offend again.  Death leaves no experienced offender.  Death leaves no repeat offender.  Death erases the offender, the offense, and the callousness that accompanies repeat offenses in the repeat offender.

In reviewing the drastic measures Moses laid out here we can see a picture of God, for a moment in history, viewing and rewarding His very own precious Son Jesus as an offender deserving death!

Although 'resurrection' may not be so clearly portrayed in this particular passage, we know that Jesus, unlike the offenders Moses described above, rose from the grave.  His Advent to earth was single-fold in purpose, to suffer the just and drastic measure of death - the worst-case scenario - on behalf of all mankind.  It had to be the worst-case scenario in order to cover all mankind.  Unlike all upon whom death was inflicted as a penalty before Him, Jesus returned from the dead providing the first opportunity for the would-be heirs of the benefit of His actions to reap that benefit.  Jesus' resurrection provides the first opportunity for faith, singling out His believers for the benefit of His actions.  Without necessary faith, all the world would have been redeemed by Jesus' death and the whole transaction could not and would not have been valid in the realm of the Spirit in which God dwells.

Father, I am so glad You went to drastic measures to allow me to be saved by faith!  Thank You!