Word of Encouragement (05/18/2023)
"There is none like God, O Jeshurun, who rides through the heavens to your help, through the skies in his majesty. 27 The eternal God is your dwelling place,and underneath are the everlasting arms. And he thrust out the enemy before you and said, 'Destroy.' 28 So Israel lived in safety, Jacob lived alone, in a land of grain and wine, whose heavens drop down dew. 29 Happy are you, O Israel! Who is like you, a people saved by the LORD, the shield of your help, and the sword of your triumph! Your enemies shall come fawning to you, and you shall tread upon their backs."
What is your condition when God is your Help, your Dwelling Place, and His everlasting arms support you? “So Israel lived in safety, Jacob lived alone, in a land of grain and wine, whose heavens drop down dew” (v. 28).
When Moses described Israel’s happy lot in this way, the people of Israel were not yet in the promised land. They were still living off manna in the wilderness; they had no grain or wine. What is going on? I believe that, in his inspired and prophetic state, Moses was able to see their future as if it had already happened. This reflected the nature of God’s eternal and infallible decree. Whatever God decreed in eternity before the foundation of the world cannot fail to materialize because He is an all-wise, almighty God: it is as if it had already taken place. It is only a matter of time before His eternal decree becomes a material reality: only time stands between His decree and its fulfillment. As the passage of time cannot be stopped, nothing can stop His decree from being realized in history. If God’s will is for your good, it will not fail to come to pass. And you know that God’s will is for your good if you are in Christ Jesus. What a blessed assurance!
In v. 28, the happy lot of Israel is described in terms of two blessings: safety (“Israel lived in safety, Jacob lived alone”) and abundant provision (“in a land of grain and wine, whose heavens drop down dew”). If the eternal God is your dwelling place, you live in safety and alone (v. 28). Why alone, though? The word “alone” has both negative (like a leper having to live “alone” in isolation, Lev. 13:46) and positive connotations (like God “alone” being Israel’s Guide, Deut. 32:12). Since it is mentioned in Moses’ praise of God’s goodness to Israel and paired with “in safety,” it must connote a good thing—isolation or seclusion from their enemies and harms (just like the lions and their cubs in their lairs).
Israel also lived “in a land of grain and wine, whose heavens drop down dew.” The land of Canaan had two seasons of harvest—grains (barley and wheat) in the spring and fruits (grapes and olives) in the autumn. Because Canaan did not have a major river like the Nile to irrigate the land, it had to depend on rain and dew for its agriculture. V. 28 showed how Israel would be well supplied with the produce of the land in all its seasons by God’s faithful care (“whose heavens drop down dew”).
We know how this promise was fulfilled in Israel’s history, but only briefly and intermittently. What Moses saw in his prophetic vision was a faint reflection of God’s eschatological blessings on His people in Jesus Christ under the new covenant. In this fallen world, God does not give us perfect, perpetual, physical safety. This is not because God lacks the power and goodwill; this is because this world is not our eternal home: He uses the adversities and sufferings in this world to draw our eyes of hope and faith in the eternal world to come. Even though we must suffer and receive persecution in this world, our eternal security is never shaken. In fact, the more we suffer here, the more we grow to value our eternal security in Jesus Christ, which no power in this world can shake. How happy indeed are the redeemed of the LORD! How abundant is our heavenly inheritance in Jesus Christ!