Deuteronomy chapter 28

Over half way now.

vs 41

When you don't even get to keep your children, you know something is up. We see how this was experienced in the book of Daniel. I wouldn't even want to think what this meant for the average Israelite. Probably their kids were fair game to be taken as prisoners of war, so they were pretty much instant slaves.

vs 42

I don't know about you, but do you get the feeling sometimes that God has his favourite forms of punishment, and that locusts are pretty high on the list?

vs 43

And Israel thought they were low when they were still in the land and everything was going pear shaped. How low will they be when the foreigners are pushing them lower?

vs 44

So I guess they'll have to learn to wag the dog. I can't think of a better way to say that Israel will be at the ass-end of the economic and political world.

vs 45

You can't outrun God's cursing. Basically, in signing up to become God's special people, you have built into your life, and that of your children to come, a worm that will eat their future. Well, if they turn out to persistently disobey God.

vs 46

But even though destruction will come, it does not necessarily overtake them (unless you're from the northern kingdom, I guess). God uses the punishment of Israel as a sign and a wonder to later generations. Paul says in 1 Corinthians 10 that this is exactly what Israel is for the Christian - a sign to us of the need to obey God.

vs 47

Uh-oh.

vs 48

Service to God in plenty sure seems like a better deal than slavery to enemies in poverty and hunger. Certainly better than destruction!

vs 49

France?

The nation from far away just makes it all the more inevitable, or unstoppable perhaps. I mean, you can go and do pre-emptive strikes against the Phillistines all day long, but if the eagle is coming from far away, you're just going to have to fight them on the beaches, as it were.

vs 50

I wonder if old and young were usually respected when it comes to war and invasion? Certainly Israel respected nothing like that, not in the promised land anyway. Kill 'em all and let God sort them out, as it were.

Or perhaps it's a more general attitude of the nation - in which case it's basically calling them uncivilised. They throw their old people into tar pits, and they burn their young ones in the flames as sacrifices to some pagan god. Okay, the tar pits thing I got from that old show called Dinosaurs, but you get my drift.