Quick Note – Deuteronomy 29:18-20 – Abusing Grace

Deuteronomy 29:18-20 – – Beware lest there be among you a man or woman or clan or tribe whose heart is turning away today from the LORD our God to go and serve the gods of those nations.  Beware lest there be among you a root bearing poisonous and bitter fruit, one who, when he hears the words of this sworn covenant, blesses himself in his heart, saying, “I shall be safe, though I walk in the stubbornness of my heart.”  This will lead to the sweeping away of moist and dry alike.  The LORD will not be willing to forgive him, but rather the anger of the LORD and his jealousy will smoke against that man, and the curses written in this book will settle upon him, and the LORD will blot out his name from under heaven. 

The longer we are Christians, the more likely we become callous to sin.  I have noticed that when a person first gives their life to the LORD, they are on fire for Jesus.  They want to follow Him; they want to do what is right; they want to obey His every word.  They hate sin and will do whatever they can to stay away from it.  However, as the years go by, they start to compromise here and there.  They allow the occasional “white” lie; they slack off reading the Word of God for a day or two a week; they stop praying as often.  And gradually, sin starts to creep in.  They begin to participate in the sins that once made their heart heavy, excusing themselves because God is a forgiving God.  And unfortunately, many Christians stay there.  They live lives telling themselves that it is okay to sin, because God is a God of grace anyways.  Since they won’t go to hell, they feel it is okay to continue in sin.  But this is the wrong attitude for a Christian. 

Moses, in Deuteronomy 29, warned the people of Israel before they entered the Promised Land to keep and to follow God’s law.  He warned them to be careful, lest there be one person in their nation who thinks to himself, “I shall be safe, though I walk in the stubbornness of my heart.”  He wanted them to be wary of anybody who thought, “I am part of God’s chosen people, so I will always be protected by Him, so why be afraid of breaking His law?  He will forgive me anyways.”  Moses knew that this attitude towards God’s mercy and grace would lead to the downfall of the nation, so he warned them about it. 

Unfortunately, this attitude exists in many Christians today.  This is the attitude that I described earlier, where a Christian abuses grace by continuing in sin, because he is already “saved.”  This attitude was so damaging that Paul warned the church in Rome in Romans 6:1-2, “What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? 2 By no means! How can we who died to sin still live in it?”  This nonchalant attitude towards sin has creeped into the church and harmed its witness to the world.  It has damaged its reputation, which desperately needs repair today.  So stop living in the stubbornness of your heart, thinking that God will not punish you for your sin.  Yes, salvation will never be taken away from you; however, God can and will bring judgment for your sin.  So instead of living in sin, let us run towards God.  Let us follow His commands and reprove any Christian, even ourselves, when we abuse God’s grace and mercy.

PS:  If you continue in sin, you need to consider whether you are a true believer.  For 1 John 3:8-10 says, “Whoever makes a practice of sinning is of the devil, for the devil has been sinning from the beginning. The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the works of the devil.  No one born of God makes a practice of sinning, for God’s seed abides in him; and he cannot keep on sinning, because he has been born of God.  By this it is evident who are the children of God, and who are the children of the devil: whoever does not practice righteousness is not of God, nor is the one who does not love his brother.”