◄ What Does Deuteronomy 30:19 Mean? ►

"I call heaven and earth to witness against you today, that I have set before you life and death, the blessing and the curse. So choose life in order that you may live, you and your descendants,

Deuteronomy 30:19(NASB)

Verse of the Day

In the Old Testament, men and women were saved by grace through faith in the Word of God. People in the Old Testament who believed God's promise in connection with the coming Messiah, were saved by grace through faith. They trusted that God's Word would one day be fulfilled, and Israel was the nation selected by God to be His chosen people through whom would be born God's anointed Saviour of the world.

It was not long after the children of Israel had been set free from slavery in Egypt, that God cut this special covenant with His people. They were to love the Lord their God with all their heart and serve only Him. They were to keep the commandments that were cut in stone and given to them through Moses, and they were to tell a lost world of the goodness of God.

There were conditions in this covenant between God and His people, Israel, and if they would keep the terms of the covenant, then God promised to bless them above all the nations. But if they failed to keep the terms of His covenant, God warned that they would receive a curse.

The covenant that God made with Israel was CONDITIONAL. It rested upon the faithfulness of Israel in keeping the terms of God's covenant, and the people quickly agreed to all God's conditions and proclaimed: "All that the Lord has spoken we will do." And yet, within a very short space of time, the special covenant God made with His chosen people was broken, and for forty years they wandered aimlessly in the wilderness.

But as the time for his departure drew ever closer, Moses once again ratified the terms of God's covenant with these words: "I call heaven and earth to witness against you today, that I have set before you life and death, the blessing and the curse. So choose life in order that you may live."

The same choice between life and death (the blessing and the curse), is extended to all people, and although the specific terms of the Law of Moses applied to Israel alone, we are all born "dead in trespasses and sins," and we are all placed under the curse of the Law. We have all sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, for there is none good, no not one.

It was only by grace that God selected Israel to be His chosen people, and it is only by grace that the choice between life and death continues to be extended to all people because Christ took the punishment that the Law required on our behalf. Christ was made a curse for us so that we might receive the blessings of God, and it is all by grace through faith in Him.

The choice of life and death is still on offer today, and all who will turn to Christ and trust Him as Saviour choose life. And the eternal, heavenly, glorious, UNCONDITIONAL blessings that follow the one Who believes in Him by grace through faith, are beyond our human comprehension.

The choice between life and death is still on offer today, but the one that rejects the free gift of salvation chooses death through their own volition. Those who choose death bring upon themselves the curse of the Law, as well as everlasting separation from the God Who loved them so much that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him would not be cursed, and punished, and condemned, and perish, but have everlasting life.

No conditions, simply by grace through faith in Christ.

My Prayer

Heavenly Father, thank You that in Your grace, You offer the free blessing of salvation to all who will trust in Christ as Saviour. Thank You that He loved me so much that He became a curse for me and died in my place so that by faith in His finished work on Calvary, I might be born from above and receive the many unconditional blessings of His resurrected Life. Thank You, in Jesus' name, AMEN.