Have you ever made a big mess of things? Have you ever dug a hole for yourself so deep that you think there’s no way you could ever climb out? That’s how Moses predicted the people of Israel would eventually feel. Even before they went into the Promised Land, he said that they would turn against God. They would forget to be grateful and instead take their success for granted. They would become too focused on God’s good gifts, and end up worshiping the creation rather than the Creator.

And God eventually did exactly what Moses said He would do in verse 27. The northern tribes would be taken into exile by the Assyrians and the southern tribes by the Babylonians. And why? Because the Israelites ended up giving their hearts to all sorts of pagan gods, God allowed the people who worshipped those gods to come and conquer them. In the same way, when we put our trust in booze or pills or sex or politics or power or money or family or friends, in anyone or anything besides the Lord our God, God often lets us have our way for a time, giving us a snootful of whatever it is that we think will give our lives meaning and purpose. For the sad truth is that sometimes we have to realize the destructive power of our idols for ourselves. We have to experience for ourselves the inability of our idols to save us. We have to hit bottom before we can truly turn back to the only One Who can save us.

But listen to the good news that we find in verse 31, and indeed all throughout the Bible: God is merciful. He will never forget His covenant promises to all who trust in Christ. No matter how great our sin may be, no matter how serious our rebellion, no matter how hurtful our behavior, we are never beyond the reach of God’s love. Nothing we’ve ever done to ourselves or to others puts us beyond the possibility of Christ’s forgiveness. As verse 29 says, no matter how deep the hole we have dug for ourselves may be, if we will but stop digging and look up, if we’ll turn away from our sin and turn to God, if we’ll stop looking to anyone or anything else and seek Jesus Christ alone to be our Savior, we will find Him. For on the cross He has accomplished everything necessary for our forgiveness and our restoration. And by the power of His Holy Spirit, He has made it possible for us to live lives of true love and loyalty to God, hearing and obeying His voice not because we have to but because we want to.

Can anyone or anything else be more worthy of our devotion? So today, let’s live for the One Who died for us. Let’s give ourselves completely to the One Who has given us everything.

Deuteronomy 4:25-31 (ESV)

25 “When you father children and children’s children, and have grown old in the land, if you act corruptly by making a carved image in the form of anything, and by doing what is evil in the sight of the LORD your God, so as to provoke him to anger,
26 I call heaven and earth to witness against you today, that you will soon utterly perish from the land that you are going over the Jordan to possess. You will not live long in it, but will be utterly destroyed.
27 And the LORD will scatter you among the peoples, and you will be left few in number among the nations where the LORD will drive you.
28 And there you will serve gods of wood and stone, the work of human hands, that neither see, nor hear, nor eat, nor smell.
29 But from there you will seek the LORD your God and you will find him, if you search after him with all your heart and with all your soul.
30 When you are in tribulation, and all these things come upon you in the latter days, you will return to the LORD your God and obey his voice.
31 For the LORD your God is a merciful God. He will not leave you or destroy you or forget the covenant with your fathers that he swore to them.