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Welcome to another installment of “Well That’s Interesting” (you can find the first post with a detailed explanation of the series here, or bookmark this page to keep track of the whole series).

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Today’s post is going to be a little bit different. We’re going to read an entire chapter of scripture (plus one verse of the next), and I’m going to focus on a few small verses or sections that are interesting. But I think it’s helpful to look at those verses within the scope of the chapter as a whole before getting deeper into them.

The book of Deuteronomy is interesting.. After working your way through Exodus, Leviticus, and Numbers, Deuteronomy can feel a bit repetitive. Didn’t we just read all this stuff? But on the flip side, it can also serve as a helpful sort of “summary” book after the, at-times, confusing timelines of the former books, as Moses recounts important events in the history of Israelites and refocuses on some key aspects of the Law. In fact, it’s one of the most quoted Old Testament books by those in the New Testament! It’s Moses’ final words to the people before he dies and they cross into the Promised Land, and he wants to make very clear what God expects of them, even if it involves reminding them of all the ways they had failed those expectations in the past.

So take a few minutes and read with me Deuteronomy chapter 1 and the first verse of Deuteronomy 2, and then we’ll look at three little summary statements that stood out to me.

Not All Who Wander Are Lost

If this chapter of scripture had a title it might be something like “What Should Have Been”. Moses walks the reader (or originally, the listener, given that verse 1 tells us that these are the words Moses spoke) through what God had planned for them. They received the covenant at Mount Sinai (or Horeb your translation might say), and approached the boundaries of the Promised Land. If they did what they were told, they would have crossed into the land, defeated their enemies, and settled in to their home for the future. But as we see explained throughout this chapter, that’s not what happened.

Before we get into the section with the spies and the giants and the disobedience, I want to acknowledge Moses’ own sort of editorial that starts off the chapter. I particularly like how the NLT puts it in verses 2 and 3:

Normally it takes only eleven days to travel from Mount Sinai to Kadesh-barnea, going by way of Mount Seir. ³ But forty years after the Israelites left Egypt, on the first day of the eleventh month, Moses addressed the people of Israel, telling them everything the Lord had commanded him to say. 

Deuteronomy 1:2–3 NLT

The trip from Sinai to Kadesh-barnea, which verse 19–21 reminds us is on the border of the Promised Land, should have only take eleven days. Instead, it took the Israelites forty years. I remember as a child completely misunderstanding the Israelites’ wandering. Blame it on cartoons or story books, or just an overactive imagination that pictured desert sand and mirages and hidden oases, but I just always assumed the people got lost and didn’t know how to find the Promised Land. But that’s not at all the picture that Moses paints. They knew where they were going, and they practically got there. They were on the border and God was ready to give it to them. But they failed to trust and instead disobeyed. Moses recounts how the Lord instructed them as a result:

But as for you, turn around and set out for the wilderness by the way of the Red Sea.

Then we turned and set out for the wilderness by the way of the Red Sea, as the Lord spoke to me, and we circled Mount Seir for many days.

Deuteronomy 1:40; 2:1 NASB

And so they wandered, back and forth across the wilderness, without anywhere permanent to call home. This chapter opens at the end of all of those years of wandering, making very clear the reason for the wandering (which we’ll get to a bit more in a moment), but also what the circumstances ought to have looked like. It sort of reminds me of those moments when a child has just finished a punishment and the parent/teacher/authority figure takes a moment to remind them: you brought this on yourself. “I know that time-out/grounding/extra chore/etc. wasn’t fun. But you wouldn’t have had to do that if you just obeyed in the first place. Remember that, moving forward.” Keep in mind, Moses is about to remind the people of exactly what obedience to God looks like, and so he starts out by restating the consequences of disobedience. “We could have been doing this 40 years ago if you just obeyed in the first place. Remember that, moving forward.”

Spies, and Giants, and Fear

It’s shocking to me how many instances of opposition Moses is able to fit into verses 22–33. The verses are littered with “but” or “yet”, as time and time again God tells the people to do one thing and they instead do something different. He tells them to occupy the land (vv. 21), but instead they want to send scouts to explore (vv. 22). Now, this wasn’t necessarily direct disobedience—verse 22 says “Let us send men ahead of us, so that they may spy out the land for us, and bring back to us word of the way by which we should go up, and the cities which we should enter.” It seems as though they intended to obey the command to occupy, if perhaps in a round-about way. But this could also read like the person who doesn’t want to do something, so they do anything they can to avoid or delay the process.

Well the spies brought some good news: the land was great; but also some bad news: it was well protected. They were supposed to trust God to go before them and occupy it anyways, but they rebelled and gave in to fear (vv. 26). Beyond that, in verse 27 we read the chilling report of how they completely mischaracterize God’s plans and purposes for them.

You grumbled in your tents and said, “Because the Lord hates us, He has brought us out of the land of Egypt, to hand us over to the Amorites to destroy us.”

Deuteronomy 1:27 NASB

I picture that scene in the Lord of the Rings when Bilbo Baggins, unwilling to confront his own obsession with the evil ring, accuses his old, wise friend Gandalf of trying to steal it for himself. Gandalf’s response is clear: “I am not trying to rob you. I’m trying to help you.” How angering it must have been for God to lead his people to freedom, make a covenant with them, prepare a Land for them, and promise them victory over their enemies, only for them to turn around and say “you must hate us. You’re trying to kill us.” He literally led them through the wilderness, physically in their presence as a pillar of cloud and a pillar of fire; “Yet in spite of all this, you did not trust the Lord your God” (vv. 32). They are so afraid to admit their own issues that they turn to attacking the one who is actually helping them.

Whose Fault Is It Anyway?

The final verse I want to look at before we move on to application is verse 37.

The Lord was angry with me also on your account, saying, “Not even you shall enter there.”

Deuteronomy 1:37 NASB

This is one of those verses that immediately gave me pause when I read it. Remembering the rest of the story, Moses is denied entry into the Promised Land because of his disobedience in striking the rock for water (Num. 20:11–12), which actually took place relatively close in time to this speech he’s giving at the beginning of Deuteronomy. But the way it’s phrased here, at least in English, can almost make it seem as though he’s grouping his punishment in with the Israelites’ original disobedience, or even blaming them in place of his own guilt. However, later on in the book, Moses clearly acknowledges responsibility for his own actions (Deut. 32:50–52), and so it can’t be that he blames them (directly at least) for the punishment he rightfully earned.

Instead, it seems as though he really just wants to emphasize just how disastrous disobedience can be. If they would have just trusted God in the first place, they never would have been forced to wander for decades, and perhaps Moses’ frustration with them would not have reached the point where he, himself disobeyed God in anger. Perhaps he’s also using himself as an illustration of just how powerful the temptation to disobey can be—it even wore him down eventually! As he prepares to remind them of God’s Law, he wants them to know just how important it is that they are constantly vigilant.

Why Does it Matter?

When I read passages of scripture like this, I’m reminded of just how important it is to do as the old hymn says: trust and obey. Moses opens the book by reminding the people of what life could have looked like if they had trusted God and obeyed what he had told them. Technically, the reminder is even harsher when we consider that he’s actually speaking to the next generation about what could have happened if their parents, who had died during the desert wandering, had trusted and obeyed.

He then takes time to recap exactly where the people went wrong: the slippery slope of delaying by sending out spies rather than acting in faith, the blatant distrust and fear and unwillingness to move forward, and the blasphemous mischaracterization of the God who rescued them. These warnings ought to be just as sobering to us now. Who among us hasn’t been faced with adversity and chosen fear instead of following? Who among us hasn’t at some point questioned God’s love, his plan, his faithfulness, his power, or his goodness? And who among us hasn’t known exactly what God wants from us, and chosen to do the opposite anyways? I’ve said it before: it’s easy to look back at the Israelites and scoff at their behaviour, until we pause and realize just how similar we can be.

The passage ends with verses 41–44 detailing how the Israelites tried to change their mind and follow God after-all, but it was too little, too late. This reminds me that trust and obedience isn’t about trying to find loopholes, or serving God when I see fit, or trying to make it all fit perfectly into my life. It’s about doing God’s will God’s way. Not just when we feel like it, or when it’s convenient, or when we’ve exhausted all our other options. Trust and obey.