Hear, O Israel

Hear, O Israel
And one of the scribes came, and having heard them reasoning together, and perceiving that he had answered them well, asked him, Which is the first commandment of all? And Jesus answered him, The first of all the commandments is, Hear, O Israel; The Lord our God is one Lord: and thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength: this is the first commandment. And the second is like, namely this, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. There is none other commandment greater than these. – Mark 12:28-31

In this passage Jesus quotes from Deuteronomy.

Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God is one Lord: And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might. And these words, which I command thee this day, shall be in thine heart: And thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up. – Deuteronomy 6:4-7

This passage in Deuteronomy also instructs us to teach our children and talk of the things the Lord has done, leading to our passages in Psalms. It never ceases to amaze me how God so often lines up our readings to give a theme and a Word.

Tell the Generation Following
Let mount Zion rejoice, let the daughters of Judah be glad, because of thy judgments. Walk about Zion, and go round about her: tell the towers thereof. Mark ye well her bulwarks, consider her palaces; that ye may tell it to the generation following. For this God is our God for ever and ever: he will be our guide even unto death. – Psalms 48:11-14

I am so thankful as I approach this day that God is with me to guide me through it. He is here no matter what is in store. Our Father knows and has planned out my course, just as He did for His Children of Israel as He led them through the wilderness toward the Promised Land. Even in their wanderings, He was there! He is still here today, and as our forefathers have done, we are to tell the next generation of all that God has done for us. God uses our testimonies to encourage and guide us.

No Room for Sluggards
As vinegar to the teeth, and as smoke to the eyes, so is the sluggard to them that send him. – Proverbs 10:26

God wants to be Lord over every area of our lives.  We should do everything we do as unto Him. There is no room for laziness in the Kingdom of God. If there is a sluggard on the job, someone else has to pick up the slack, which means someone is getting paid to do less than he should, while another is getting paid less than he should because he is doing more.

Sluggard –  a person who is habitually inactive or lazy.

No Menial Tasks
And this is the charge of their burden, according to all their service in the tabernacle of the congregation; the boards of the tabernacle, and the bars thereof, and the pillars thereof, and sockets thereof – Number 4:31

And this is what they are assigned to carry and to guard [on the march], according to all their service in the Tent of Meeting: the boards or frames of the tabernacle, and its bars, and its pillars, and its sockets or bases, – Numbers 4:31 AMPC

There are no menial tasks when it comes to God’s work. In the reading in Numbers today, it is evident that how they took care of and moved the Tabernacle was important to God. He cared about who did a task because He assigned them, and they were Holy tasks. When I read this, I think about everyone having a job, and it took everyone doing their part. Of course, we know that caring for the Tabernacle was given to the Levites regarding the Tabernacle. Still, it took every tribe to do their assignments and not jump ship or cross into another’s assignment or be as the “sluggard” that we read about in the Proverbs today to accomplish all that God was doing in the place He had them.