Title Deuteronomy 34:1~12
Content Title: Song Gu Young-shin
Text: Deuteronomy 34:1~12
Sermon: Bishop Paul Lee (Incheon Naeri Church)
Today is the time to end the old year and welcome the new year. Through today's worship service, we should give thanks for the past and look forward to new blessings.
In this time, we should look back on the faith life of the past through Moses' life, believe in God's grace that will be given to us anew, and resolve to make a new start.
Moses is now standing on the top of Pisgah on Mount Nebo, looking at the two worlds. I am thinking of the world that has already passed, the world that will develop in the future, and the grace I have received and the grace that will be given in the future.
God was with us when we led nearly 2 million slaves into the wilderness. The law that made them cross the Red Sea like dry land and was given on Mount Sinai made these slaves a spiritual pillar and gave them pride. He was with us as a pillar of cloud during the day and a pillar of fire by night, allowing us to see the manna covered in white on the rough ground and the quails that were poured down on it. Moreover, the golden calf incident and Korah's rebellion in the Sinai wilderness were bitter memories.
Psalm 90:9 'All our days pass in thy wrath, and all our days are spent in one eclipse,' Moses confessed. When we ascended from the Plains of Moab to Mount Nebo and reached the top of Mount Pisgah, the land of hope finally began to appear. It was Canaan, the promised land flowing with milk and honey.
Even though he was being treated as a prince in Pharaoh's palace, Moses could not spend a single day at peace when he saw that his people were being oppressed.
Nearly 100 years have passed since then, and now we have finally reached the destination we have longed for. Moses, who had grown old in the wilderness, was moved by the sight that unfolded before his eyes on Mount Pisgah.
Views stretch all the way from Gilead to Dan, to the palm-growing Jericho, to the fertile Naphtali, and to the tidal Mediterranean.
But Moses forgot all the regrets that he could not enter there and thought about the future of Israel. At that time, Moses may have been looking at Mount Zion, where God would build the temple, and the hill of Moriah, where the cross would be built.
Now Moses had to die because he had fulfilled his mission. Moses went up a high mountain to die alone. No matter how many people there are around him, Moses realized that the way of death is the way to go alone. There was no one between Moses and God. No one saw his body.
Deuteronomy 34:6 'No one knows the grave to this day.' If Moses' tomb had been found, it would have been the object of worship, as were the remains of Jerusalem.
Bible scholars claim that Moses ascended to heaven like Elijah based on Matthew 17:1-8 and Jude 1:9, where Moses appeared with Elijah on the Mount of Transfiguration. If Elijah was alive and ascended into heaven, Moses was a man who ascended to heaven from death. If Moses was the representative of the law, then Elijah was the representative of prophecy. If Elijah was the representative of the living, Moses was the representative of the dead.
Moses went up to the top of Bisga alone. It was to look at the land of Canaan, which he could never enter. But there, with the eyes of faith, he could see the welfare of Canaan in heaven, into which he would soon enter. Moses went up to heaven.
All people in this world are living with the goal of “the land of Canaan according to their own way, flowing with milk and honey”. In other words, the farmer cultivates the land, the artist draws a picture on the canvas, the merchant does business, and the politician tries to achieve the goal.
Some people may have reached their humanistic goals, but Samsung's Lee Byung-cheol and Hyundai's Chung Ju-young went. It is said that Lee Byung-cheol clinged to the doctor to find a way to live without giving up his fortune. I don't know if it's true, but there was also a public opinion that Jung Ju-young changed a lot to young blood when he was healthy.
We have no destination on this planet. Heaven is the only home we will return to.
As the year goes by and the year comes, the tree rings are drawn. In the midst of these repetitions, people eventually stand before God and are judged before Him. So, people should live each day with no regrets.
Moses had many obstacles and enemies, but he entrusted all judgment to God, the righteous Judge, and lived a life of absolute faith, a life of peace, and a life of love.
Moses said in Deuteronomy 34:10 that he was 'one whom the Lord knew face to face'. Also, in Deuteronomy 33:1, it is difficult to understand the depth of Moses' spiritual fellowship with God. Perhaps Moses wanted to enter the land of Canaan. But God's will and thoughts were different. In order to become the leader of Israel, liberate the slaves, and lead the Israelites to Canaan, in other words, to become a man of faith and obedience after God, it takes 40 years of training in the wilderness as a shepherd in the position of a prince. I did. That is why it is said in Numbers 12:3, “This man Moses was more gentle than all men on the face of the face of the earth.” He also suffered a lot of pain and suffering for 40 years while leading the slave people of Israel.
So, because God loved Moses so much, to the nomadic slave nation, Israel, Canaan was a land flowing with milk and honey, but because it is a place where sinful humans live, it is bound to become a place of sin, iniquity, pain, suffering, sickness, and old age Because of this, he did not allow Canaan to Moses, sin no longer intervened, and the glorious and beautiful holy city recorded in Revelation 22:1-22:5 was prepared for Moses. At this time of the new year, we must pray quietly, read the Bible, and live with the goal of our lives in the eternal heaven.
Therefore, when we do our best for the mission God has given us while we are on earth, He will fulfill His promise that if we seek His kingdom and His righteousness first according to His word, He will give us all these things. I pray that the new year of 2002 will be a blessing both physically and spiritually by living in faith and obedience, relying only on the Almighty God of love. Hallelujah! Amen!