We need a Savior, and it is only by His grace that we can live for the glory of God. Today, W. Robert Godfrey looks to the book of Deuteronomy to help us grasp the relationship between faith and obedience in the Christian life. Get W. Robert Godfrey’s teaching series Discovering Deuteronomy on DVD, plus lifetime digital access to the messages and study guide, for your donation of any amount: https://gift.renewingyourmind.org/3605/discovering-deuteronomy Meet Today’s Teacher: W. Robert Godfrey is a Ligonier Ministries teaching fellow and chairman of Ligonier Ministries. He is president emeritus and professor emeritus of church history at Westminster Seminary California. He is the featured teacher for many Ligonier teaching series, including the six-part series A Survey of Church History. He is author of many books, including God’s Pattern for Creation, Reformation Sketches, and An Unexpected Journey. Meet the Host: Nathan W. Bingham is vice president of ministry engagement for Ligonier Ministries, executive producer and host of Renewing Your Mind, host of the Ask Ligonier podcast, and a graduate of Presbyterian Theological College in Melbourne, Australia. Nathan joined Ligonier in 2012 and lives in Central Florida with his wife and four children. Renewing Your Mind is a donor-supported outreach of Ligonier Ministries. Explore all of our podcasts: https://www.ligonier.org/podcasts
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Paul is saying, Moses teaches us that we are saved by faith, which leads to love, which leads to obedience, which leads us to see that we're still a sinful people and that we need a Savior.
I remember believing as a new Christian that people in the Old Testament were saved by their obedience to God's law, and that now in the new covenant, that's done away with, and we're saved by grace through faith. So as we consider the warnings of Moses in Deuteronomy, was he teaching salvation by works? You're listening to the Wednesday edition of Renewing Your Mind.
I'm your host, Nathan W. Bingham. This week, the chairman of Ligonier Ministries, W. Robert Godfrey, has been teaching us about the warnings that Moses gave the Israelites at the end of Deuteronomy. But that means we jumped ahead to chapter 26. So I encourage you to request the complete 21-message series, Discovering Deuteronomy, so Dr. Godfrey can take you through the entire book.
Request your copy when you give a donation of any amount at renewingyourmind.org, but be quick as this offer ends at midnight. Well, here's Dr. Godfrey to consider the words and warnings of Moses and their relationship with what Paul teaches in Romans 9 and 10.
Well, we're continuing to look at this section of warnings in which Moses is sort of pulling out all the stops to try to get the people to see the seriousness of the issues that are before them and to lead them to obedience and blessing rather than disobedience and curse.
And as he reviews the history of God's dealings with them to remind them of the mercies of God, the blessings of God that have attended them regularly as they left Egypt and came through the wilderness and are now on the verge of the Promised Land, But then there's a very interesting verse, verse 4.
Not that all verses aren't interesting, but some are a little more interesting to me than to others. And verse 4 says, as Moses is looking back over the history of God's relationship with this people, "...but to this day God has not given you a heart to understand or eyes to see or ears to hear."
This reminds us that there is a delicate interplay between God's sovereign purpose and plan and between human responsibility. We'll come back to look at that a little more later on. But you notice here God calls the people to faithfulness and obedience and then He reminds them that He's not given them a heart to be obedient yet.
And that reminds us that God's sovereign blessings are necessary for good to come But if He doesn't provide that blessing, it doesn't make us any less responsible. He needs to change us if we'll be better, but if we're not changed and not better, it's still our responsibility. We're the ones who plunged ourselves into sin. And some people will say, well, that doesn't make sense.
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