This morning we are going to be in Deuteronomy 28 where we are going to consider the fundamental principle that will serve as the theme for our study of the role of the follower of Christ in the political process. I hope you were blessed last Sunday by the ministry of Jason McGuire. He is a follower of Christ who has a vision for being involved in the political process. You heard it directly from his mouth that he wants to influence legislators and legislation for the glory of God. That is a great motto and certainly worthy of our imitation. If there is anything a Christian should aspire to, it is being influential. Not in a proud way, but in the biblical way of exerting an influence on those around you.
The title I have given this message is, “The Benefit of Principled Living.” Living according to principles as opposed to feelings, or polls, or your peers opinions is a discipline that will serve you well all your life. For example, a good principle to live by is to never spit into the wind. You usually only have to do that once to learn that that is a bad idea. Another good principle to live by is to make sure when you are using a hand saw, your first stroke should always be a pull, never a push. Similar to this is the principle that you should always use tools according to their design. Screw drivers are not designed to have their handles hammered, so don’t use them as a chisel.
These are all small principles and as such they have small consequences when they are violated. Breaking the handle of your screwdriver because you are pounding on it with a hammer really isn’t that big of a deal. Cutting your finger because you are using your saw the wrong way doesn’t amount to much in the grand scheme of things. But, the larger the principle, the larger the consequences of violating it. For instance:
you can’t spend your way out of debt. That is a big principle of life! Another biggie is,
you can’t have a high standard of living and high employment rates at the same time.
You can’t hoard resources and generate wealth at the same time.
The moral character of a leader affects his decision making ability – and consequently the quality of life of the follower.
These are huge principles and if you violate them, the consequences are staggering. This is why it makes sense to live according to principles. When we live principled lives, we trade short term pain for long term gain, which is why most people don’t live according to principles. The principled choice is almost always the more difficult of the two choices, but I assure you that principled living has great benefits.
Now, before we get into the passage I want us to look at, let me give you three important truths about principles. 1) Principles are divine in origin. God created this universe to operate by principles. I want to make sure everybody understands that this universe, and the inhabitants of this planet (both human and animal – cf. Gen. 9:5), are subject to the principles and laws God established at creation. 2) A principle does not become a principle because it won a majority vote. That is not how principles come into being. A principle does not cease being a principle if you get enough signatures on a petition to rescind it. Principles emanate from God and are reflections of His character. And 3), your relationship to God or lack of relationship to God does not determine whether or not these principles are binding on you or not. Every person on this planet is subject to God’s laws, regardless of his relationship to God.
So with this introduction to principles, let’s look at this passage in Deuteronomy and see the benefit of principled living. The passage we are going to be considering today is found in Deut. 28. We will be reading verses 1 – 20.
"And if you faithfully obey the voice of the LORD your God, being careful to do all his commandments that I command you today, the LORD your God will set you high above all the nations of the earth.
2 And all these blessings shall come upon you and overtake you, if you obey the voice of the LORD your God.
3 Blessed shall you be in the city, and blessed shall you be in the field.
4 Blessed shall be the fruit of your womb and the fruit of your ground and the fruit of your cattle, the increase of your herds and the young of your flock.
5 Blessed shall be your basket and your kneading bowl.
6 Blessed shall you be when you come in, and blessed shall you be when you go out.
7 "The LORD will cause your enemies who rise against you to be defeated before you. They shall come out against you one way and flee before you seven ways.
8 The LORD will command the blessing on you in your barns and in all that you undertake. And he will bless you in the land that the LORD your God is giving you.
9 The LORD will establish you as a people holy to himself, as he has sworn to you, if you keep the commandments of the LORD your God and walk in his ways.
10 And all the peoples of the earth shall see that you are called by the name of the LORD, and they shall be afraid of you.
11 And the LORD will make you abound in prosperity, in the fruit of your womb and in the fruit of your livestock and in the fruit of your ground, within the land that the LORD swore to your fathers to give you.
12 The LORD will open to you his good treasury, the heavens, to give the rain to your land in its season and to bless all the work of your hands. And you shall lend to many nations, but you shall not borrow.
13 And the LORD will make you the head and not the tail, and you shall only go up and not down, if you obey the commandments of the LORD your God, which I command you today, being careful to do them,
14 and if you do not turn aside from any of the words that I command you today, to the right hand or to the left, to go after other gods to serve them.
15 "But if you will not obey the voice of the LORD your God or be careful to do all his commandments and his statutes that I command you today, then all these curses shall come upon you and overtake you.
16 Cursed shall you be in the city, and cursed shall you be in the field.
17 Cursed shall be your basket and your kneading bowl.
18 Cursed shall be the fruit of your womb and the fruit of your ground, the increase of your herds and the young of your flock.
19 Cursed shall you be when you come in, and cursed shall you be when you go out.
20 "The LORD will send on you curses, confusion, and frustration in all that you undertake to do, until you are destroyed and perish quickly on account of the evil of your deeds.
If I were to sum up these 20 verses, here is what God is saying. “If you will live according to the principles I have established to rule my universe, you will reap positive consequences. But if you defy my principles, you will pay a very heavy price for your foolishness.” Now I know that the immediate context of this passage is the nation of Israel and their obedience to the laws God gave to Moses. But when you think about it, the reason God’s moral law was binding on Israel is the same as the reason God’s universal laws are binding on all of creation. As the creator (and it doesn’t matter whether we are talking about the creation of Israel or the universe), it is His right to regulate His creation as He pleases. So make sure you remember the teaching of Deut. 28: “If you will live according to the principles I have established to rule my universe, you will reap positive consequences. But if you defy my principles, you will pay a very heavy price for your foolishness.”
Let me give you in the rest of our time this morning an illustration of this truth that God blesses obedience and punishes disobedience. Turn with me to Prov. 13:15 where we see a very general principle. Here we read that “Good understanding gives favor: but the way of transgressors is hard.” How many of you have learned that “the way of the transgressor is hard?” We usually discover this principle early on in life, don’t we? This same principle is expressed using different terms down in verse 21. “Adversity pursues sinners, but the righteous will be rewarded with prosperity.” Look next with me at the book of Job. I want us to go to chapter 4:8-9 and see Job’s friend’s testimony. “As I have seen, those who plow iniquity and sow trouble reap the same. 9 By the breath of God they perish, and by the blast of his anger they are consumed.” This matter of suffering some kind of adversity for violating an established guideline is a universal principle established by God. It did not become a principle by popular vote, and just because you don’t agree with it or believe it is binding on you doesn’t matter – the way of the transgressor is hard.
How many of you were aware that there has never been a civilization that has not been regulated by some code of justice. You can go to the most barbaric, uncivilized tribe in the world and find that they had a recognized set of guidelines (minimal as they may have been) that established boundaries for the tribe, or group, or nation. If you lived within those boundaries, it would go well with you. But if you go outside those boundaries, adversity will pursue you! Your way will be hard. And the reason we can find this phenomenon throughout human history is because the reward of good and the punishment of evil is one of God’s principles.
The Apostle Paul elaborates on this principle in Gal. 6:7-8. While you are turning there, I will tell you that the popular way of expressing this principle is to say, “What goes around comes around.” How many of you have ever heard that saying? Is it true? You better believe it is! Another popular way of expressing this principle is to say, “He who lives by the sword, dies by the sword.” Paul’s way of expressing it is found here in Galatians 6 when he says in verse 7, “Do not be deceived, God is not mocked; for whatever a man sows, this he will also reap. 8 For the one who sows to his own flesh shall from the flesh reap corruption, but the one who sows to the Spirit shall from the Spirit reap eternal life.”
I like the way Paul states this because he starts with a warning about dismissing the truth of what he is about to say. If you think you can sow something and then get away with not reaping the consequences, you are delusional. If you think that “what goes around comes around” applies to everyone else except you, you are “deceived.” Why? Because God’s nature as a just God is on the line here, and He will not be mocked. So Paul starts with a word of caution about trying to dismiss this principle. He then goes on to narrow this principle down and tells us that there is a specific connection between the sowing and reaping. Let me develop this for just a minute.
How many of you are aware of the connection between abortion and breast cancer? The first time I heard about this was at a seminar about 10 years ago when a doctor who did extensive research into it gave a lecture explaining how it worked. He said that the single best thing a woman could do to protect herself against breast cancer was to have a full term pregnancy. This was discovered back in the 17th century when doctors started taking note of the high rate of breast cancer among nuns. So the medical community has known for a long time that there is a connection between childbearing (or the lack of childbearing) and breast cancer.1 But it is especially harmful to a woman’s body if she terminates her pregnancy. Here’s why.
When a woman conceives, her body immediately starts flooding her breasts with the hormone estradiol to get them ready for lactation. At 8 weeks, the level of estradiol is 500 times the level it was at conception. This hormone, which is a form of estrogen, causes the proliferation of both normal and precancerous cells, which is why her breasts start to swell. Now, at 8 months, a second process takes place called “differentiation.” Differentiation is the process of shaping these cells into milk producing tissue and it shuts off the cell multiplication process. If the fetus is aborted before differentiation, the woman is left with all these pre-cancerous cells – more than she had before she got pregnant. This is why there is such a high incidence of breast cancer in women who have had abortions. And interestingly enough, research has shown that most miscarriages do not raise the breast cancer risk. This is because the woman’s body knows there is a problem with the fetus so her body stops the production of the progesterone which is needed to maintain the pregnancy, as well as the estradiol, which prepares her for lactation.
The reason I’m giving you this illustration is because it shows two things. First of all, it shows in a general way that if you violate God’s laws, there are consequences. You cannot snuff out a human life and expect to merrily make your way down life’s path without any consequences. What goes around, comes around. You live by the sword, and you will die by the sword. But more precisely than this general application is the truth of what Paul says in Gal. 6. Is it a stretch to say that if a woman chooses to take the life of her child, that God will take away the very organ that was going to be used to sustain that child’s life?
Is it a stretch to say that because of the egregious nature of a woman terminating the life in her womb (the womb should be the safest place in the universe, and the mother should be the most ferocious protector of that life) that in God’s justice the most visible manifestation of her femininity will be affected?
The bottom line here is that one of the principles that God has established to rule His universe is that our actions carry very specific consequences. God blesses obedience and God disciplines disobedience. This is why it makes a lot of sense to live within the confines that God has established. There are benefits to principled living. God said it explicitly in Deut. 28, and we see it illustrated bountifully in life.
By way of conclusion, you are probably asking yourself what in the world this has to do with the role of the follower of Christ in the political process, and I have to ask you to be patient and let me build my foundation. I assure you that what we talked about this morning is relevant to our topic, but I have to lay out several planks to build on before we get into the specifics. So starting next Sunday I am going to give you a quick overview of some of the biblical principles our nation was built on.
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