The Law · Chapter 29 of 34

Deuteronomy 29

Moses gathers all Israel to renew the covenant in Moab, rehearsing God's mighty acts in Egypt and the wilderness. Yet he laments they still lack a heart to perceive. He binds the whole assembly, leaders and little ones, present and future, into the oath, warning against any secret root of bitterness that turns to idolatry, whose end is desolation like Sodom. The secret things belong to God; the revealed things to us.

What happens in Deuteronomy 29

Moses recounts the covenant made in Moab beside the one at Horeb, reminding Israel of all they saw in Egypt and forty years in the wilderness, clothes and shoes unworn, yet observing that to this day the LORD has not given them a heart to perceive, eyes to see, or ears to hear. He calls every person, captains, elders, wives, little ones, and even the woodcutter and water-drawer, to stand and enter the covenant and oath, binding not only those present but generations to come.

He warns against any man, woman, or family harboring a heart that turns away to serve other gods, a root bearing gall and wormwood, who secretly blesses himself while walking in stubbornness. Such presumption invites God's anger and the blotting out of his name. Future generations and foreigners will see the land laid waste like Sodom and ask why; the answer is a covenant forsaken. The secret things belong to the LORD.

Deuteronomy 29 in context

This chapter opens the covenant-renewal ceremony in Moab, distinct from Sinai, drawing the new generation into personal commitment before entering Canaan. It follows the treaty form of historical review, obligation, and warning.

Its sober note, that Israel still lacks a perceiving heart, anticipates the deeper promise of chapter 30 and the prophets' vision of a new heart that only God can give.

Main themes of Deuteronomy 29

Deuteronomy 29 (KJV)

1These are the words of the covenant, which the LORD commanded Moses to make with the children of Israel in the land of Moab, beside the covenant which he made with them in Horeb. 2And Moses called unto all Israel, and said unto them, Ye have seen all that the LORD did before your eyes in the land of Egypt unto Pharaoh, and unto all his servants, and unto all his land; 3The great temptations which thine eyes have seen, the signs, and those great miracles: 4Yet the LORD hath not given you an heart to perceive, and eyes to see, and ears to hear, unto this day. 5And I have led you forty years in the wilderness: your clothes are not waxen old upon you, and thy shoe is not waxen old upon thy foot. 6Ye have not eaten bread, neither have ye drunk wine or strong drink: that ye might know that I am the LORD your God. 7And when ye came unto this place, Sihon the king of Heshbon, and Og the king of Bashan, came out against us unto battle, and we smote them: 8And we took their land, and gave it for an inheritance unto the Reubenites, and to the Gadites, and to the half tribe of Manasseh. 9Keep therefore the words of this covenant, and do them, that ye may prosper in all that ye do. 10Ye stand this day all of you before the LORD your God; your captains of your tribes, your elders, and your officers, with all the men of Israel, 11Your little ones, your wives, and thy stranger that is in thy camp, from the hewer of thy wood unto the drawer of thy water: 12That thou shouldest enter into covenant with the LORD thy God, and into his oath, which the LORD thy God maketh with thee this day: 13That he may establish thee to day for a people unto himself, and that he may be unto thee a God, as he hath said unto thee, and as he hath sworn unto thy fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob. 14Neither with you only do I make this covenant and this oath; 15But with him that standeth here with us this day before the LORD our God, and also with him that is not here with us this day: 16(For ye know how we have dwelt in the land of Egypt; and how we came through the nations which ye passed by; 17And ye have seen their abominations, and their idols, wood and stone, silver and gold, which were among them:) 18Lest there should be among you man, or woman, or family, or tribe, whose heart turneth away this day from the LORD our God, to go and serve the gods of these nations; lest there should be among you a root that beareth gall and wormwood; 19And it come to pass, when he heareth the words of this curse, that he bless himself in his heart, saying, I shall have peace, though I walk in the imagination of mine heart, to add drunkenness to thirst: 20The LORD will not spare him, but then the anger of the LORD and his jealousy shall smoke against that man, and all the curses that are written in this book shall lie upon him, and the LORD shall blot out his name from under heaven. 21And the LORD shall separate him unto evil out of all the tribes of Israel, according to all the curses of the covenant that are written in this book of the law: 22So that the generation to come of your children that shall rise up after you, and the stranger that shall come from a far land, shall say, when they see the plagues of that land, and the sicknesses which the LORD hath laid upon it; 23And that the whole land thereof is brimstone, and salt, and burning, that it is not sown, nor beareth, nor any grass groweth therein, like the overthrow of Sodom, and Gomorrah, Admah, and Zeboim, which the LORD overthrew in his anger, and in his wrath: 24Even all nations shall say, Wherefore hath the LORD done thus unto this land? what meaneth the heat of this great anger? 25Then men shall say, Because they have forsaken the covenant of the LORD God of their fathers, which he made with them when he brought them forth out of the land of Egypt: 26For they went and served other gods, and worshipped them, gods whom they knew not, and whom he had not given unto them: 27And the anger of the LORD was kindled against this land, to bring upon it all the curses that are written in this book: 28And the LORD rooted them out of their land in anger, and in wrath, and in great indignation, and cast them into another land, as it is this day. 29The secret things belong unto the LORD our God: but those things which are revealed belong unto us and to our children for ever, that we may do all the words of this law.

Verses to carry from Deuteronomy 29

“Yet the LORD hath not given you an heart to perceive, and eyes to see, and ears to hear, unto this day.”Deuteronomy 29:4

“Lest there should be among you man, or woman, or family, or tribe, whose heart turneth away this day from the LORD our God, to go and serve the gods of these nations; lest there should be among you a root that beareth gall and wormwood;”Deuteronomy 29:18

“The secret things belong unto the LORD our God: but those things which are revealed belong unto us and to our children for ever, that we may do all the words of this law.”Deuteronomy 29:29

Reflection

Have you assumed that seeing enough evidence would finally change your heart? Moses shows that even miracles do not soften us on their own. Ask God for the deeper gift, a heart to perceive, and rest the secret things you cannot understand in his good keeping.

A prayer from Deuteronomy 29