“When Vision Becomes Reality”
What is Vision?
18 Where there is no vision, the people are unrestrained, But happy is he who keeps the law. —Proverbs 29:18 (NASB95)
1 These are the words which Moses spoke to all Israel across the Jordan in the wilderness, in the Arabah opposite Suph, between Paran and Tophel and Laban and Hazeroth and Dizahab. 2 It is eleven days’ journey from Horeb by the way of Mount Seir to Kadesh-barnea. 3 In the fortieth year, on the first day of the eleventh month, Moses spoke to the children of Israel, according to all that the LORD had commanded him to give to them, 4 after he had defeated Sihon the king of the Amorites, who lived in Heshbon, and Og the king of Bashan, who lived in Ashtaroth and Edrei. 5 Across the Jordan in the land of Moab, Moses undertook to expound this law, saying, 6 “The LORD our God spoke to us at Horeb, saying, ‘You have stayed long enough at this mountain. 7 ‘Turn and set your journey, and go to the hill country of the Amorites, and to all their neighbors in the Arabah, in the hill country and in the lowland and in the Negev and by the seacoast, the land of the Canaanites, and Lebanon, as far as the great river, the river Euphrates. 8 ‘See, I have placed the land before you; go in and possess the land which the LORD swore to give to your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to them and their descendants after them.’ —Deuteronomy 1:1–8 (NASB95)
1. The Mapping of the Book
2. The Meaning of the Book
The Word Deuteronomy means “
3. The Message of the Book
i. Moses’ Final 3 Sermons
ii. Prepares the people to enter the
2 Thoughts for when Vision Becomes Reality
I. Always Remember
1 “All the commandments that I am commanding you today you shall be careful to do, that you may live and multiply, and go in and possess the land which the LORD swore to give to your forefathers. 2 “You shall remember all the way which the LORD your God has led you in the wilderness these forty years, that He might humble you, testing you, to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep His commandments or not. —Deuteronomy 8:1–2 (NASB95)
Always remember God provided for your belly.
Deuteronomy 8:3 (NASB95) — 3 “He humbled you and let you be hungry, and fed you with manna which you did not know, nor did your fathers know, that He might make you understand that man does not live by bread alone, but man lives by everything that proceeds out of the mouth of the LORD.
Psalm 37:25 (NASB95) — 25 I have been young and now I am old, Yet I have not seen the righteous forsaken Or his descendants begging bread.3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ, —Ephesians 1:3 (NASB95)
Always remember God provided for your body
4 “Your clothing did not wear out on you, nor did your foot swell these forty years. —Deuteronomy 8:4 (NASB95)25 “For this reason I say to you, do not be worried about your life, as to what you will eat or what you will drink; nor for your body, as to what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? —Matthew 6:25 (NASB95)
Always remember God provided for your behavior
Deuteronomy 8:5–6 (NASB95) — 5 “Thus you are to know in your heart that the LORD your God was disciplining you just as a man disciplines his son. 6 “Therefore, you shall keep the commandments of the LORD your God, to walk in His ways and to fear Him.7 It is for discipline that you endure; God deals with you as with sons; for what son is there whom his father does not discipline? 8 But if you are without discipline, of which all have become partakers, then you are illegitimate children and not sons. —Hebrews 12:7–8 (NASB95)
II. Never Forget
11 “Beware that you do not forget the LORD your God by not keeping His commandments and His ordinances and His statutes which I am commanding you today; —Deuteronomy 8:11 (NASB95)
1) Always Remember is to be Reminded .
2) Never Forget is to be mindful.
B. We could also say …
1) Always Remember is a “looking back ”.
2) Never Forget is a “looking forward”.
1) Never Forget Who has Provided for You
12 otherwise, when you have eaten and are satisfied, and have built good houses and lived in them, —Deuteronomy 8:12 (NASB95)
A. Is it possible for a church to do this?
14 “To the angel of the church in Laodicea write: The Amen, the faithful and true Witness, the Beginning of the creation of God, says this: 15 ‘I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot; I wish that you were cold or hot. 16 ‘So because you are lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of My mouth. 17 ‘Because you say, “I am rich, and have become wealthy, and have need of nothing,” and you do not know that you are wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked, 18 I advise you to buy from Me gold refined by fire so that you may become rich, and white garments so that you may clothe yourself, and that the shame of your nakedness will not be revealed; and eye salve to anoint your eyes so that you may see. —Revelation 3:14–18 (NASB95)
2) Never Forget Who has Prospered You
13 and when your herds and your flocks multiply, and your silver and gold multiply, and all that you have multiplies, —Deuteronomy 8:13 (NASB95)
48b …From everyone who has been given much, much will be required… —Luke 12:48b (NASB95)
1) We must
2) We can
3) We must ask, “Lord,
“Never be afraid to trust an unknown future to a known God.” —Corrie Ten Boom