HOSANNA TO OUR SAVIOR-GOD!
DEUTERONOMY 32:36—39 APRIL 13, 2003
DEUTERONOMY 32:36-39
36The LORD will judge his people and have compassion on his servants when he sees their strength is gone and no one is left, slave or free.
37He will say: "Now where are their gods, the rock they took refuge in, 38the gods who ate the fat of their sacrifices and drank the wine of their drink offerings?
Let them rise up to help you! Let them give you shelter!
39"See now that I myself am He! There is no god besides me. I put to death and I bring to life, I have wounded and I will heal, and no one can deliver out of my hand."
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Dearest Fellow-Redeemed and Saints in the Lord:
On this Palm Sunday, it is always amazing how quickly the people change from praising the Lord to proclaiming His crucifixion. He comes into Jerusalem as a King and He will go out as one put to death on the cross. It is a short time, from that Sunday morning until late Thursday evening when he is betrayed, when He faces trial very early Friday morning, His crucifixion begins. That is not a very long time for the crowds to change so quickly. It reminds us of how fickle our sinful nature really is. It reminds us along with the crowd that not only do we need to proclaim hosanna on this Sunday, but on every day of our life—Hosanna to our Savior-God. Hosanna, if we look in the footnotes of some Bibles, means ‘save us’, namely, ‘Lord, save us.’ It comes from the Old Testament from the Psalms. From PSALM 118:25,26 we read, "O LORD, save us; O LORD, grant us success. Blessed is he who comes in the name of the LORD. From the house of the LORD we bless you.”
And so it is today, from the house of the Lord we proclaim:
HOSANNA TO OUR SAVIOR—GOD!
I. False gods cannot help
II. Our Lord alone delivers
I. False gods cannot help
Deuteronomy is one of the first five books of the Bible, which is known as the Torah, written by Moses. Here we have in our text in chapter 32, the Song of Moses. Moses is now giving over his leadership to the next leader, Joshua. He had finished his task of leading the children of Israel through the wilderness for forty years and now they have come to the Promised Land. Moses was not going to go into the Promised Land according to God’s word. But, before he would die, he sings this song—a song of blessing and a song of warning. Moses knew these children of Israel were going to be blessed beyond what they could ever imagine. Because of that they might tend to forget God. The fact is that is exactly what they did. Moses warns them about their false gods. He says, 36The LORD will judge his people and have compassion on his servants when he sees their strength is gone and no one is left, slave or free. The Israelites had seen the judgements of God in their wanderings in the wilderness. They had seen the Lord’s anger when they had complained against Him. The snakes came out and put many to death. They had seen the Lord’s anger when they worshipped the golden calf and many again were put to death. It wasn’t anything unusual that these people had fallen away.
The Lord, through Moses, says He will judge His people. Here the Lord even challenges them. 37He will say: "Now where are their gods, the rock they took refuge in.” He wants to know about their false gods—if they’re going to help God’s people. Of course, you and I know that they can’t. The people soon realize that the false gods cannot help them. They cannot help them do anything. In one sense, they did help themselves to the sacrifices of the people. He said, 38the gods who ate the fat of their sacrifices and drank the wine of their drink offerings? It’s hard to imagine that these people with whom God had been walking with very visibly (the pillar of smoke and the cloud) would forget about Him and would follow false gods…false gods who could not help. He said, “Let them (the false gods) rise up to help you! Let them give you shelter!” The false gods could not, would not help them. They had no ability. They were dead gods.
The prophet Jeremiah says these false gods had to be carried around because they were not living. They had ears but could not hear, eyes that could not see, mouths that could not speak. They were not like the living God. It reminds us today as we look at the example of the children of Israel that we also always need to encourage ourselves to say, ‘Hosanna!’ to our Savior-God. Today’s text reminds us in the midst of temptations and in the midst of our false gods to say ‘Hosanna!’ to our Savior-God.
But we might wonder, ‘Well, we don’t set up altars to false gods and we don’t bow down and worship anything that is false.’ What false gods do we worship? As long as we are on this earth and have sinful flesh and have a sinful nature, sin is a part of our life. We will, like the children of Israel, stray from time to time. One of the things which leads us astray is the fact is that people tell us they are the authority on this or that. Then we all too often listen to them, sometimes putting too much trust and confidence in their words. The Lord warns us in JEREMIAH 17:5, "This is what the LORD says: ’Cursed is the one who trusts in man, who depends on flesh for his strength and whose heart turns away from the LORD’." Don’t we do that from time to time? We listen to psychologists, psychiatrists or counselors; we listen to weathermen and our trust turns away from the Lord. The Lord says sometimes we worship the advice of those who are ‘so-called’ experts in their field. The Lord encourages us to say ‘hosanna’ to our Savior-God because false gods can never help.
Sometimes we trust ourselves. We depend on ourselves to figure out what is wrong in our life, to find a solution and to provide for ourselves. It is this society in which we live. Society tells us if we work hard enough we can make something of ourselves; we can pull ourselves up by our own bootstraps. The cliches go on and on. The Lord says we are to trust in Him. Solomon writes in PROVERBS 28:26, "He who trusts in himself is a fool, but he who walks in wisdom is kept safe.” Maybe in your lifetime you’ve found that trusting in yourself has made you look foolish from time to time. It is not always easy to put our complete trust and confidence in the Lord. Today the Lord says to remind us to say ‘Hosanna’ to our Savior-God. In other words, ‘Save us, our Savior-God from ourselves.’
In our society, emphasis is put on family life and the importance of family. That is good. But some have emphasized the family to a point of worship. We are blessed to know the importance of a family that enjoys parents who love their children. Again, sometimes, the family can stand in the way. The Lord says in the gospel as he spoke to His disciples, "Anyone who loves his father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; anyone who loves his son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me"(MATTHEW 10:37). He warns us to be very careful that we don’t put our family that we can see and those people that we love ahead of God. He says to us today, ‘Hosanna! Hosanna to our Savior-God!’
Save us Lord from the things of this world that would lead us astray. Save us Lord from our own sinful flesh. Save us Lord from the things that we love in this world from loving you more. Hosanna to our Savior-God because false gods cannot help. It is only, only the Lord God alone who can and will and does deliver.
II. Our Lord alone delivers
That was Moses’ concern here as he sings this song. He knew what was going to happen. He knew that the children of Israel would sit in the lap of luxury in the Promised Land and forget God. He says to them, 36The LORD will judge his people and have compassion on his servants. They had faced the Lord’s judgement but they would also face the Lord’s mercy. He tells them why in the last verse of our text. He begins it by singing 39"See now that I myself am He! There is no god besides me. That sounds strange that Moses would have to tell the children of Israel, ‘I am the Lord. There is no other God.’ He had to say that because it wouldn’t be very long when the children of Israel would sit in the Promised Land and say, ‘you know what? We’re tired of the Lord telling us what is right and wrong.’ When that did happen they asked the Lord to give them kings. The Lord gave them kings. He told them the kings wouldn’t always be good and they weren’t.
It didn’t take very long for the people who sat in this land flowing with milk and honey to say, ‘we have enough. We don’t need the Lord anymore.’ Worst of all, it took less than a generation for them to begin to worship false gods, to forget that this was the Lord God and there was none other beside Him. It makes sense then that Moses sings ‘And now, where are those false gods?’ It is only the Lord who can deliver.
Moses writes, “I (the Lord) put to death and I bring to life, I have wounded and I will heal, and no one can deliver out of my hand." Certainly, Moses was talking about the future that was close by for the children of Israel. He would punish them for their sins; He would wound them, then he would heal them with His forgiveness. He also was looking beyond, way into the future to the time when Jesus would come; when the Lord, who is in control of everything, would put Himself to death. By putting Himself to death, it would heal the sins of the world, the sins of mankind.
No wonder then that the crowds came on that Palm Sunday singing, ‘Hosanna in the highest!’ No wonder that you and I agree today and everyday to remind ourselves, ‘Hosanna in the highest!’ because it is the Lord alone who delivers. We cannot save ourselves and there is no one in this world who can save us. There is no one who can believe for us. God gives us faith by His grace.
We look at Job, a man of God who was tested by Satan, himself. He lost all of his flocks and possessions; lost all of his family and yet never once cursed the Lord but praised Him that he was still a believer. Then Job comes to this conclusion (and we ought to too), "For he (the Lord) wounds, but he also binds up; he injures, but his hands also heal. From six calamities he will rescue you; in seven no harm will befall you"(JOB 5:18,19). He goes on to list those six calamities and seven…famine, the loss of family, the loss of friends, etc. Then he says in all those calamities the Lord delivers. Isn’t that true? If we look back at our life-- maybe there has been a big calamity or one calamity after another. We wonder how we’ll get through it and the Lord delivers us from one calamity and another (at least those things that we think are calamities).
Then the Lord reminds us that He delivers us from more than just calamities or troubles on this earth. He delivers us from that which is the greatest disaster…He delivers us from sin itself. JOHN 10:18 tells us, "No one takes it (My life) from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down and authority to take it up again. This command I received from my Father.” Here we find the fulfillment of Moses’ words. He says, ‘I put to death and I bring to life.’ Here is Jesus saying, ‘I can lay down my life and I will come back to life.’ He does it for us. He does it for us, for the sins of believers and even for the sins of unbelievers. And we say, ‘Hosanna to our Savior- God!’ because as believers, we know by faith the importance of Jesus laying down His life for us. By doing that, He has rescued us from the power of God, He has saved us from the snares of Satan and He has released us from the effects of sin. He is our God. There is none other besides Him.
Our ever-gracious God has delivered us in the past, He delivers us in the present and He promises to deliver us right into eternity itself. Paul writes that in 2 CORINTHIANS 1:10. "He (God) has delivered us from such a deadly peril, and he will deliver us. On him we have set our hope that he will continue to deliver us.” That’s the promise of our God, the only true God. He promises to take care of His people and deliver them. No false god ever offers that, only the Lord God. We say, ‘Hosanna to our Savior-God!’
Sometimes we may feel down in the dumps and blame God for our situation in life. The Lord says, ‘Say hosanna! Hosanna to our Savior-God!’ Praise Him and say, ‘Lord, save us!’ Hosanna to our Savior-God because there is no false god that can ever, ever help us. Hosanna to our Savior-God because it is our God alone who delivers us—delivers us from calamities on earth, delivers us from the deadly peril of sin, from Satan and even from death, itself. We agree! We agree with the prophet Isaiah who says, "I am the LORD; that is my name! I will not give my glory to another or my praise to idols"(ISAIAH 42:8). Neither should we. Rather, we say, ‘Hosanna to our Savior-God!’…Not just today, but everyday and finally forever in heaven. Amen.
Pastor Timm O. Meyer
