Growing In God Podcast

Program Number: GIG #272

Title: From Generation to Generation

Web Description: In the wilderness the children of Israel learned the consequences of not following the Word of God. And they set themselves to rehearse the Word repeatedly so that they and future generations would not fail to follow that Word. As Christians today we cannot expect that we will have the faith and success we need if we are not following what God has made real to us. And we must have the same determination to rehearse His Word.

Show Notes: Sukkot, the Feast of Tabernacles, remembers the time when Israel lived in tents for forty years in the wilderness. This was a time when one generation died off because of their disobedience and a new generation was taught the Word of God. They had learned from the wilderness that they lived by the Word of God, and therefore every new generation must be taught to live in the Word. This is why a special day is observed at the end of Sukkot each year. This day is called Simchat Torah, which means "the joy of the Torah."

Every year the Torah is read in the synagogue from beginning to end. And every year at Simchat Torah, this annual cycle repeats. It is a continual reminder of what Moses told the people before they entered the land: "Will you make the same mistake the previous generation made, which cost them forty years in the wilderness? Or have you learned your lesson? And if you have learned your lesson, will you be able to keep that lesson alive for yourself and for your children?"

We see then the importance that Judaism places on rehearsing the Word. Do we as Christians realize that it is just as important for us? We face challenges that seem too big for us, just as the giants in the land seemed too big for the generation that failed in the wilderness. But those giants were not too big for God then, and our challenges are not too big for Him today. We need to believe what God has spoken to us and believe in His power to accomplish what He said. It is all there in His Word. And we need to make rehearsing His Word a major focus of our times together and in our daily lives.

Key Verses:

• Deuteronomy 8:1–6. "You shall remember all the way which the LORD your God has led you."

• Deuteronomy 6:1–3. "This is the commandment … that you and your son and your grandson might fear the LORD."

• Hebrews 12:5–9. "God deals with you as with sons; for what son is there whom his father does not discipline?"

• Romans 10:17. "Faith comes from hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ."

• Deuteronomy 6:4–9. "You shall teach them diligently to your sons."

• Deuteronomy 11:18–21. "You shall teach them to your sons."

• Deuteronomy 31:10–13. "Their children, who have not known, will hear and learn to fear the LORD."

Quotes:

• "We should come away from the celebration of Sukkot refreshed in the memory that God is all powerful, that He is able to give us what He's promised."

• "When we get together to fellowship, there should be a focus on worship and the Word. We can still barbecue and have fun and have other conversations. But what is the focus of it? What is the purpose of fellowship? The true purpose of fellowship is to get together surrounding the Word and the worship so that we're creating faith within ourselves."

• "Even as aliens we had the right to come and stand at the gate during Sukkot and hear the Word of God so that we could learn, and we could understand, and we could fear the Lord our God. And we could walk with Him and have long life and prosperity and blessings."

Takeaways:

1. The battle is against forgetting. If we are reminding ourselves, then faith comes by hearing. If we hear it, then we can have faith to do it.

2. We need to find the things that are foundational to our faith—who we are and what God has spoken to us—and we need the faith right now to walk in them.

3. Let us not leave the Feast of Tabernacles. Let us enter a year of hearing the Word of God.