Deuteronomy 28:47-48

JOYFUL SERVICE

‘Because thou servedst not the Lord thy God with joyfulness, and with gladness of heart, for the abundance of all things … He shall put a yoke of iron upon thy neck.’

Deuteronomy 28:47

Many a man has been frightened by this text until he sought and found out that the joy is not dependent on natural characteristics or temperament, it is quite independent of them. We may have this joy, though the body is racked with pain; we may have fulness of joy. In fact the joy of the Holy Ghost is quite distinct from natural joy. Henry Martyn, in his diary, bids us distinguish between these two. In Psalms 124, we read that the tongue of God’s people was filled with singing—the Hebrew is ‘with shouting.’ ‘Then said they’—when they heard the shouting—‘then said they among the heathen, The Lord hath done great things for us, whereof we are glad.’ When we get this blessing, there is something to be joyful about. We must shout aloud and say, ‘What great things hath the Lord done for us.’ Some are determined to box up their joy like the pipes in an organ; it is only a muffled sound they send forth—not a full diapason, singing hallelujah with a gladness of heart. ‘I am not a bit afraid’, said one, ‘of shouting Hallelujah, glory, glory! for if the heathen heard this shouting they would believe that God has done great things for us.’ Captain Dawson, in the company of worldly officers, wondered what he could do. All he could do was to begin to whistle ‘Safe in the arms of Jesus,’ and that was the means of the conversion of one of these officers. We can do many things for the glory of God. And if we go forth and rejoice before God, letting it be seen that our religion makes us happy, we shall soon win others to God’s Truth.

Illustration

(1) ‘In this remarkable Lesson we have a description of the national captivities which, in consequence of their disobedience, were to befall the Hebrew people, first at the hands of Assyria and Babylon, but subsequently, and more especially, of Rome. Here are the Roman eagles, the horrors of the siege of Titus, the present dispersion of the Jews, which has lasted for nineteen centuries, the Jew-hate which has again and again broken out. All has come to pass; and here is a mighty proof of the truth of Scripture. But there is a ray of hope flung on the edge of this great thunder-cloud by the words of the Apostle (Romans 11:25). And for this the Jewish remnant is waiting, scattered in every land, at home in none; mingling with every people, but still distinct.’

(2) ‘This chapter, in its prophetic declarations, which have been so strikingly fulfilled, contains clear proof of the divine foreknowledge, and of the inspiration of Moses. This is all the more clear since the prophecies relate mainly, and in their extreme and awful particularity, to the curses, which should rest upon the unfaithful people. Moses does not spare his own people, but holds before them the glass of their future defection and sufferings, as he foresaw them. There might have been a motive for dwelling particularly upon their prosperity, but there is no assignable motive for the character of this discourse, unless it is found in the clear foresight given to him of what was to occur.’