Are there consequences for obeying or disobeying God? Did God give Israel plenty of chances to repent? What are Christians to obey? Let’s look at Leviticus 26.
What important things did God want the Israelites to remember?
Do not make idols for yourselves, set up a carved image or sacred pillar for yourselves, or place a sculpted stone in your land to bow down to it, for I am Yahweh your God. You must keep My Sabbaths and revere My sanctuary; I am Yahweh. (Leviticus 26:1-2 HCSB)
What behavior would be required to give Israel God’s blessings!
Faithfully obey my laws, and I will send rain to make your crops grow and your trees produce fruit. Your harvest of grain and grapes will be so abundant, that you won't know what to do with it all. You will eat and be satisfied, and you will live in safety. I will bless your country with peace, and you will rest without fear. I will wipe out the dangerous animals and protect you from enemy attacks. You will chase and destroy your enemies, even if there are only 5 of you and 100 of them, or only 100 of you and 10,000 of them. (Leviticus 26:3-8 CEV)
What behavior would be required to give Israel God’s presence!
I will turn to you and make you fruitful and multiply you and will confirm my covenant with you. You shall eat old store long kept, and you shall clear out the old to make way for the new. I will make my dwelling among you, and my soul shall not abhor you. And I will walk among you and will be your God, and you shall be my people. I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, that you should not be their slaves. And I have broken the bars of your yoke and made you walk erect. (Leviticus 26:9-13 ESV)
What would be the consequences of disobeying God’s commands?
But if you won’t listen to me and obey all these commands, and if you refuse my statutes, loathe my ordinances, and fail to carry out all of my commands, thereby breaching my covenant, then I will certainly do this to you: I’ll appoint sudden terror to infect you like tuberculosis and fever. Your eyes will fail and your life will waste away. You’ll plant in vain, because your enemies will consume what you plant. I’ll set my face against you so that you’ll be defeated before your enemies. Those who hate you will have dominion over you and you’ll keep fleeing even when no one is pursuing you. (Leviticus 26:14-17 ISV)
If after these warnings, they refuse to listen to God, is there a second set of punishments?
And if ye will not yet for all this hearken unto me, then I will punish you seven times more for your sins. And I will break the pride of your power; and I will make your heaven as iron, and your earth as brass: And your strength shall be spent in vain: for your land shall not yield her increase, neither shall the trees of the land yield their fruits. (Leviticus 26:18-20 KJV)
If after these warnings, they refuse to listen to God, is there a third set of punishments?
If then, you walk in hostility against Me and are unwilling to obey Me, I will increase the plague on you seven times according to your sins. And I will send out among you the beasts of the field, which will bereave you of your children and cut down your cattle and reduce your number so that your roads lie desolate. (Leviticus 26:21-22 LSB)
If after these warnings, they refuse to listen to God, is there a fourth set of punishments?
And if by these things you do not learn your lesson regarding Me, but you show hostility toward Me, then I in turn will show hostility toward you; and I, even I, will strike you seven times for your sins. I will also bring upon you a sword which will execute vengeance for the covenant; and when you gather together into your cities, I will send a plague among you, so that you will be handed over to the enemy. When I break your staff of bread, ten women will bake your bread in one oven, and they will bring back your bread in rationed amounts, so that you will eat and not be satisfied. (Leviticus 26:23-26 NASB)
If after these warnings, they refuse to listen to God, is there a fifth set of punishments?
If in spite of this you still do not listen to me but continue to be hostile toward me, then in my anger I will be hostile toward you, and I myself will punish you for your sins seven times over. You will eat the flesh of your sons and the flesh of your daughters. I will destroy your high places, cut down your incense altars and pile your dead bodies on the lifeless forms of your idols, and I will abhor you. I will turn your cities into ruins and lay waste your sanctuaries, and I will take no delight in the pleasing aroma of your offerings. I myself will lay waste the land, so that your enemies who live there will be appalled. I will scatter you among the nations and will draw out my sword and pursue you. Your land will be laid waste, and your cities will lie in ruins. Then the land will enjoy its sabbath years all the time that it lies desolate and you are in the country of your enemies; then the land will rest and enjoy its sabbaths. All the time that it lies desolate, the land will have the rest it did not have during the sabbaths you lived in it. (Leviticus 26:27-35 NIV)
If after all these warnings, they still refuse to listen to God, is there a sixth set of punishments?
And as for those of you who are left, I will send faintness into their hearts in the lands of their enemies; the sound of a shaken leaf shall cause them to flee; they shall flee as though fleeing from a sword, and they shall fall when no one pursues. They shall stumble over one another, as it were before a sword, when no one pursues; and you shall have no power to stand before your enemies. You shall perish among the nations, and the land of your enemies shall eat you up. And those of you who are left shall waste away in their iniquity in your enemies’ lands; also in their fathers’ iniquities, which are with them, they shall waste away. (Leviticus 26:36-39 NKJV)
If after all this, is there hope for the people of Israel?
But at last my people will confess their sins and the sins of their ancestors for betraying me and being hostile toward me. When I have turned their hostility back on them and brought them to the land of their enemies, then at last their stubborn hearts will be humbled, and they will pay for their sins. Then I will remember my covenant with Jacob and my covenant with Isaac and my covenant with Abraham, and I will remember the land. For the land must be abandoned to enjoy its years of Sabbath rest as it lies deserted. At last the people will pay for their sins, for they have continually rejected my regulations and despised my decrees. (Leviticus 26:40-43 NLT)
Will God utterly forsake Israel despite all their many sins?
“Yet for all that, when they are in the land of their enemies, I will not reject them, neither will I abhor them, to destroy them utterly and to break my covenant with them; for I am Yahweh their God. But I will for their sake remember the covenant of their ancestors, whom I brought out of the land of Egypt in the sight of the nations, that I might be their God. I am Yahweh.” These are the statutes, ordinances, and laws, which Yahweh made between him and the children of Israel in Mount Sinai by Moses. (Leviticus 26:44-46 WEB)
Under the new covenant, why do we make up rules that Jesus did not command and overlook obeying Him?
Although he was a Son, he learned obedience from what he suffered. After he had been made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation for everyone who obeys him. (Hebrews 5:8-9 CEB)
Are there consequences for obeying or disobeying God? Did God give Israel plenty of chances to repent? What are Christians to obey? You Decide!
