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Good morning. My name is Elise, and I'm part of the Little Faith Group.
And today I'm reading from the book of Deuteronomy, verses 1 to 20.
Be careful to follow every command I am giving you today, so that you may live and increase,
and may enter and possess the land the Lord promised on oath to your ancestors.
Remember how the Lord your God led you all the way in the wilderness these 40 years
to humble and test you in order to know what was in your heart,
whether or not you would keep his commands.
He humbled you, causing you to hunger and then feeding you with manna,
which neither you nor your ancestors had known,
to teach you that man does not live on bread alone,
but on every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord.
Your clothes did not wear out, and your feet did not swell during these 40 years,
knowing then in your heart that as a man disciplines his son,
so the Lord your God disciplines you.
Observe the commands of the Lord your God, walking in obedience to him and revering him.
For the Lord your God is bringing you into a good land,
a land with brooks, streams, and deep springs gushing out into the valleys and hills,
a land with wheat and barley, vines and fig trees, pomegranates, olive oil, and honey,
a land where bread will not be scarce and you will lack nothing,
a land where the rocks are iron and you can dig copper out of the hills.
When you have eaten and are satisfied, praise the Lord your God for the good land he has given you.
Be careful that you do not forget the Lord your God failing to observe his commandments,
his laws, and his decrees that I am giving you this day.
Otherwise, when you eat and are satisfied, when you build fine houses and settle down,
and when your herds and flocks grow large and your silver and gold increase,
and all you have is multiplied, then your heart will become proud and you will forget the Lord your God
who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.
He led you through the vast and dreadful wilderness, that thirsty and waterless land,
with its venomous snakes and scorpions.
He brought you water out of hard rock.
He gave you manna to eat in the wilderness, something your ancestors had never known,
to humble and test you, so that in the end it might go well with you.
You may say to yourself,
my power and the strength of my hands have produced this wealth for me.
But remember the Lord your God,
for it is he who gives you the ability to produce wealth,
and so confirms his covenant,
which he swore to your ancestors as it is today.
If you ever forget the Lord your God,
and follow other gods, and worship, and bow down to them,
I testify against you today, that you will surely be destroyed.
Like the nations the Lord destroyed before you,
so you will be destroyed for not obeying the Lord your God.
The grass withers and the flowers fade,
but the word of our God stands forever.
Thank you.
Well, what a wonderful celebration today, Christchurch.
Happy birthday to you.
Happy 15th birthday.
This is your quinceanera.
You can go get your learner's permit.
You know, you can start to drive.
This is fantastic.
As Andrew said, our real birthday is on Easter,
and so we're going to have a sweet 16 birthday party here in about six months.
So it should be really, really fun, and we'll party hard.
You know, some of us get a little tired of pretending to be excited about birthdays.
You know, every year it's like we're doing this again.
We're celebrating that you were born every year over and over.
The only thing you really did this past year was just not die for 12 months.
So what are we doing?
Some of us come to birthday parties,
and we think about, you know, those parties growing up
and the games we played as a kid.
Anybody play pin the tail on the donkey?
This is a safe game for kids.
You know, you get a bunch of kids together.
You blindfold one of them, give them a sharp object,
spin them around, and then set them loose in the group.
What could go wrong, you know?
There's puncture wounds.
You know, you pin the tail on my neck.
Somebody just pin the tail on my neck.
Musical chairs was another great game.
Anybody play musical chairs?
Anybody have anxiety attacks during musical chairs?
It took me a while to discover there's not enough chairs for everyone,
and every round one kid loses.
One kid has to make that walk of shame over to the corner.
You know, you get home, and your parents are like,
well, how was the party?
You're like, it was horrible.
I never got a chair, and I got a pin in my neck.
It was a terrible party.
So we've not planned to play any of those games today.
This is 15 years old.
It's like that's a sophisticated birthday party.
That requires nachos.
That requires cupcakes.
So thanks to all of you who brought things,
and we hope that all of you will stick around to party with us,
especially if you're new with us today.
We'd love to meet you and just get to know you and get connected with you.
But we've been in this sermon series in the book of Deuteronomy,
which we're going to continue today.
And this book itself is a series of sermons from Moses to the people of God
in the last days of his life.
And part of the reason we're looking at this book is because it's one of Jesus'
favorite books in the Bible.
And we're taking time to go deeper on some of these chapters that we know Jesus
had memorized and were some of his favorite parts of this favorite book.
And really these sermons that Moses gives,
they're given to people that are moving from the wilderness into the promised land,
people that are moving from their adolescence spiritually into adulthood,
people that are moving from being 15 to 16, 17, 18,
with massive privileges as the people of God and therefore massive responsibilities.
And so I want to just dive in this morning to Deuteronomy 8.
And I think God's word for us today is that our hunger requires wonder bread and a loving father.
Our hunger requires wonder bread and a loving father.
I want to talk first of all about our hunger.
Think about the last time you were really hungry.
Like you had gone for 24 hours or 48 or 72 hours or more without any food.
You know, hunger is a serious crisis in the world today,
but here we are and we're in the gourmet ghetto this morning.
I doubt many of us have had to skip a meal out of necessity.
Maybe a few grad students here,
but that's the word that jumps off the page to me immediately is this word hunger.
It says in verse 3,
He humbled you, causing you to hunger.
Why would God cause His people to hunger?
What sort of God is this?
Why would Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount tell His disciples to fast,
to be hungry on purpose?
Because hunger is the most basic universal form of human need.
It's this visceral experience of being empty,
of being hollow,
of being vulnerable and faint and desperate.
To hunger is to know that I need something outside of me to fill me.
And we're hungry from the very first day we come into the world.
We're born hungry.
Newborns spend, you know, most of their time crying for food,
eating food, and sleeping off their food.
Amen?
I know some of you have newborns.
We live hungry first for food,
and then for the stuff that we think will satisfy
all of those hungers we come to discover within ourselves.
And hunger drives us, doesn't it?
Hunger drives us not just to In-N-Out Burger,
but hunger drives us to all that stuff that we think we can't live without.
The Bible actually opens in the first two pages telling this creation story,
presenting humans as hungry beings.
Hungry for that fruit that's going to grow on the trees in the Garden of Eden,
but not just hungry for the creation.
We're beings that are hungry for our Creator.
We're hungry to walk in the garden with God in the cool of the day.
And so behind all of our hungers in life, there's this hunger for God.
All of our desires are ultimately a desire for Him.
And that's why Moses says,
God humbled you, causing you to hunger.
Why does God do this?
To teach His people that they're hungry for something more than bread.
This universal spiritual hunger of humankind
that is often just this inarticulate longing for something we know not what.
We know we're hungry for justice.
We're hungry for beauty.
We're hungry for love.
We're hungry for transcendent experience.
And of course, the secular myth tells us
that we can satisfy these hungers in this world.
We can satisfy these hungers with material reality.
And yet, if you've lived long enough,
you go out and you pour yourself out in some cause of justice,
some just cause,
only to find that it's slipping through your fingers.
It's eluding your grasp.
You go out and search of beauty in the mountains and at the ocean.
You search for beauty in the arts and in music,
and you find that after a little while, it wears off.
And you have to keep going back.
We go in search of love in the company of friends
and in the arms of a partner,
only to find ourselves wanting more and more.
I've gone on quests for transcendent experience,
and then I wake up, you know, at some point,
and I say, you know, somehow I'm still just me.
Anybody have these hungers in your heart,
these longings in your soul?
Have you considered that God is the one causing you to hunger?
That's a humbling thought, isn't it?
That God has given me these insatiable appetites,
these insatiable desires that will never be satisfied
unless something from the outside comes to fill my emptiness.
And not just something, but someone,
a person, a relationship,
to come and fill that hunger
to which all the other hungers are pointing.
This is what God is saying to Israel in the desert.
It's what he's saying to us
in our own wilderness experiences,
that you have needs
that only I can satisfy.
Isn't that humbling?
That I'm actually not a self-sufficient being,
but I'm radically dependent on God.
One of our great pastors
in the fourth century in North Africa,
St. Augustine,
he said,
O Lord, you've created us for yourself,
and our hearts are restless
until they find their rest in thee.
Our hearts are hungry.
Our hearts are empty
until they find their fullness and satisfaction in thee.
One person in the 20th century
said it like this.
He lived his life at Oxford and Cambridge.
He wrote a book called Mere Christianity,
and C.S. Lewis says it this way.
He says,
Most people,
if they had really learned to look into their own hearts,
they would know that they do want,
and want acutely,
something that cannot be had in this world.
There are all sorts of things in this world
that offer to give it to you,
but they never quite keep their promise.
If I find in myself a desire
which no experience in this world can satisfy,
the most probable explanation
is that I was made for another world.
That's what our hunger is all about.
And what Deuteronomy 8 is telling us
is that our hunger requires wonder bread.
Our hunger requires wonder bread.
Anybody grow up eating wonder bread?
Made by the company Hostess.
Hostess also made Twinkies,
Ho-Hos,
and other sugary treats,
things that actually aren't food.
And you might be surprised.
They declared bankruptcy in 2011
because I think people prefer real food
to chemically engineered,
industrially produced food.
But I want to suggest to you this morning
that manna is the original wonder bread.
Manna, you can read about this story
in its fullness in Exodus chapter 16,
but manna was this daily supernatural miracle from God.
And listen to verse 3 again.
It says,
He humbled you,
causing you to hunger,
and then feeding you with manna,
which neither you nor your ancestors had known,
to teach you
that people do not live on bread alone,
but on every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord.
You see, God takes His people out of Egypt.
And where does He take them?
He takes them into desolation wilderness.
And what does He do?
He causes them to hunger.
He causes them to feel this gnawing emptiness
on the inside.
And then He begins to provide for them.
And He provides not just one day
or not just one week
or one month or one year,
but God gives them manna every morning
for 40 years.
For over 14,000 days,
God gives this revelation to His people
that though your resources are inadequate,
mine are totally adequate.
That though you cannot secure your well-being
and your own strength,
I can.
And though you cannot give yourself life,
I will.
Why does God provide this wonder bread for His people?
The obvious answer is
so that Israel could eat and live
rather than starve and die.
But the deeper answer
is that the wonder bread
reveals the wonder of God.
It says, yes, we need bread,
but more than that,
we need the baker of the bread.
Yes, we need the gift,
but more than that,
we need the giver of the gift.
So that every time you put this wonder bread
in your mouth,
every single day,
I want to move you from knowledge about me
to really knowing me,
your creator,
your sustainer,
your deliverer,
your provider,
who's unlimited
in His power
to meet your needs.
Moses says,
He did this to teach you
that people do not live on bread,
but on every word
that comes from the mouth
of the Lord.
See, bread is important
and essential,
but what is more important
and more essential?
God is.
The one who creates
and provides the bread
by His word
is the same one
from whose mouth
come these covenant-making,
world-saving promises.
The one who speaks
into the world
these life-giving revelations
about the purposes of creation
and the purposes of humanity.
We're being told here
that yes,
your body needs bread
for biological life,
but you have a soul
and your soul
needs the word of God
to redeem your life.
Your soul needs
the word of God
that will allow you
to share
in His divine life,
His eternal life.
You see,
Jesus loved
the message of the manna.
Jesus absolutely
loved the story.
It's the story
that He has in His heart
when He's teaching
the Sermon on the Mount
in Matthew chapter 6
when Jesus says,
I don't want you
to be anxious for bread
because your Father in Heaven
knows how to provide
your bread.
What I want you to do
is seek first
the kingdom of God
and His righteousness
and all of this bread,
everything else you need
will be given to you
as well.
Well,
just before Jesus
preaches that amazing sermon,
the Sermon on the Mount,
in Matthew chapter 4,
we're told that Jesus
is led out into the desert
for 40 days.
Not 40 years,
but 40 days,
but there's an obvious parallel
with the story of Israel.
The people of God
came out into the wilderness
and they completely failed God.
And now here comes the Messiah
to represent God's son Israel.
And the question is,
will He fail
or will He keep
the commands of God?
And so Jesus also
goes through
this humbling experience,
this testing
in the wilderness.
Jesus is denied bread.
Jesus is full
of emptiness.
And in His hunger,
this dark power
comes to Jesus
and says,
turn these stones
into bread.
Don't trust in God
to be your provider.
Use your power
to get what you need
right now.
Jesus had said
in John chapter 4,
He said,
my food is to do
the will of Him
who sent me
and to finish His work.
And that's the question
is here at the beginning
of His work,
is this what's going
to satisfy
the soul of Jesus?
Will costly obedience
to His Father
be His food
in this dark hour
or not?
And Jesus is facing
this attractive offer
that would make Him
absolutely and wildly popular.
Can you imagine
being able to turn stones
into bread?
If you could turn stones
into bread,
you could abolish famine,
you could abolish sickness
and injustice
and misery.
To turn stones
into bread
means that you can turn
what you don't want
into what you do want.
That you could take
all the boulders
and all the problems
of your life
and make them go away
and you could have
everything you want.
You could provide everything
you and everybody
around you really wants.
And so what does Jesus
say in this moment?
What does He say
to this evil one
who's questioning
His identity
as the beloved of God?
This evil power
that's causing Jesus
to be lured away
from trusting in His Father
as His provider.
Jesus says,
human beings,
do not live
on bread alone
but on every word
that comes
from the mouth
of the Lord.
And when Jesus
says that,
He chooses
not self-sufficiency
but radical
God dependency.
Jesus deliberately
comes out here
into this place,
into the wilderness,
into this place
of temptation
to do for us
what we cannot
do for ourselves.
Because if you're
honest with yourself,
we choose,
I choose myself
over God.
I choose self-sufficient
autonomy
over total trust
in God.
I choose self-serving
power over desperate
dependence on God.
I choose self-interest
over costly obedience
to the Word of God.
And that's why
the Son of God
had to come down
from heaven
and become
one of us.
That's why God
the Father
sent His Son
to come and live
the one true
human life
that each one of us
were created
to live.
It's why Jesus
was filled
with the Spirit
to make
these daily choices
that we all
should be making
to live
every day
of His life
in total trust
and desperate
dependence
upon every
inspired
and authoritative
and life-giving
word
that's flowing
out of the mouth
of His Father.
But Jesus
went further
than that.
The Gospels
tell us that one day
Jesus fed
over 5,000 people.
That Jesus,
just as the Lord
had provided
manna and quail
in the wilderness
for His hungry people,
Jesus provided
bread and meat
in the wilderness
for more hungry people.
And as people
ate
and were satisfied
a conversation
ensued
after that great
feast
and we read about it
in John chapter 6
where Jesus says this,
He says,
It is my Father
who gives you
the true bread
from heaven.
The bread of God
is the bread
that comes down
from heaven
and gives life
to the world.
Sir,
they said,
always give us
this bread.
And Jesus said,
He declared,
I am the bread.
I am the bread
of life.
Whoever comes
to me
will never
go hungry.
Whoever eats
this bread
will live forever.
This bread
is my flesh
which I will give
for the life
of the world.
You hear what Jesus
is saying.
Jesus says,
I am the manna.
I am the wonder bread.
I am the source
of all life.
Life abundant.
Life eternal.
And I can provide
what you most
deeply need.
My crucifixion
is going to become
for you
manna
which will nourish you
in the forgiveness
of sins
and the freedom
of your soul
and the righteousness
of your life.
My resurrection
is going to become
for you manna
which will strengthen
you with victory
over death
and life
that never ends.
I am going
to make a way
through my flesh
and through my bones
sacrifice for you
to give you
the one thing
that will ultimately
satisfy
all of your hunger.
And what is that?
Jesus says
in Luke 22
that you may eat
and that you may drink
at my table
in my kingdom.
That's what we all want
and that's what Jesus
provided for us.
And I want to invite you
today
to put your trust
in Jesus
maybe for the first time
but all of us
to renew our trust
in Jesus
as God's eternal word
who was made flesh
for us
as God's wonder bread
that he provided
to give life
to the world
because that's what
our hunger requires.
Our hunger
requires
wonder bread.
A bread that only
God can give.
And our hunger
requires
not just wonder bread
but also
a loving father.
A loving father.
And I want to end
with this.
I want you to think back
to when you were a child.
And I want you to think back
to that moment
if you can remember it
when your mom
forced you
to swim
for the first time
without floaties.
Remember that moment?
Maybe it's a subconscious
maybe it's a repressed memory.
Or I want you to remember
that moment
where your dad
forced you
to ride your bike
for the first time
without training wheels.
Was anybody scared?
Was that kind of painful
for us?
I want you to think back
like why did your parents
make you do that?
They did it because
they wanted you
to enjoy the water.
They wanted you
to enjoy the road.
They wanted you
to enjoy your freedom
ultimately.
Or think back
to when you were
15 years old
getting your learner's permit.
16 year old
getting your driver's license.
Anybody else's parents
teach them how to drive?
Was that anxiety provoking
for you at all?
Was it just me
or were you also
yelling at your parents
while they were yelling
at you,
hit the brakes!
Hit the brakes!
Left!
No, the other left!
Why were our parents
forcing us into this?
Because they wanted us
to travel in safety.
They wanted us
to have the gift
of mobility
but to be protected
and to be injury free
in our mobility.
Did anybody else's mom
and dad ever say
hey, you know
you're going to thank me
for this later?
Anybody hear those words?
You're going to thank me
for this one day.
We all know I think
that good parents
put us through difficult
and even painful experiences
because they love us
and because they want
the best for us.
And that's what
Deuteronomy tells us
is that God is a good
and loving father to us.
Deuteronomy 131
you might remember
it said
that the Lord your God
carried you
through the wilderness
as a father
carries his son.
God is pictured
as this tender
compassionate father
who supports
his young child
who needs help
who needs carrying.
And here
that same theme
comes up
in verse 5
where it says
know then in your heart
that as a man
disciplines his son
so the Lord your God
disciplines you.
We have a father
who is fond
yet firm.
A father who is
tender yet tough.
And he comes to us
in our spiritual adolescence
in our spiritual 15
and 16 year oldness.
And he challenges us
because he wants us
to learn
a very important
life lesson.
Why does our father
bring his teenage son
Israel out here
into the wilderness?
Why does he put us
in these places
that are parched
and hard
and lifeless
and hot?
Because the desert
is a crucible
of transformation.
The desert
is a crucible
of the transformation
that all of us
myself included
needs.
The desert
is this place
where gold
is refined
and purged
of all of its
dross.
The desert
is this place
where steel
is tempered
by intense
heat.
It's out here
in the desert
places
that God
removes all
of our props
and our father
strips us
of all of our
false securities.
He takes off
our floaties
and he takes off
our training wheels
and he causes us
to come to the end
of ourselves.
He causes us
to feel that scary
thing of being
powerless
and not in control.
And why does he do that?
Because our father
wants us to teach us
how to trust in him
and rely on him
alone.
Our father
wants us to learn
how to love him
with all of our heart
in the midst
of our hunger
in the midst
of our emptiness
so that we can love him
with all of our heart
in the midst
of our abundance
in the midst
of our fullness.
Our father
brings his people
into the desert
so he can prepare us
to move into
the promised land.
Listen to this description
of the promised land
in verse 7.
The Lord your God
is bringing you
into a good land.
A land with streams
and pools of water
with springs
flowing in the valleys
and hills.
A land with wheat
and barley
vines and fig trees
pomegranates
olive oil and honey.
A land where bread
will not be scarce
and you will lack
no thing.
And a land
where the rocks
are ironed
and you can dig
copper out of the hills.
The promised land
is going to be
an all you can eat
buffet.
You're never going
to be hungry there.
But God says
be careful
in verse 12
because when you eat
and are satisfied
when you build
fine houses
and settle down
when your herds
and flocks
grow large
and your silver
and gold
increase
and all you have
is multiplied
then your heart
will become proud
and you will forget
the Lord your God
who brought you
out of Egypt
out of the land
of slavery
your heart
can so easily
become puffed up
puffed up
with pride
which is our
fatal flaw
which is that
malignant cancer
inside of us
that our Father
knows needs
to be cut
out of us
if we're going
to have any
hope of living.
Listen to verse 17
you may say
to yourself
my power
and the strength
of my hands
have produced
this wealth
for me.
Listen to your
self-talk.
Listen to that
self-sufficient
voice
that pride
inside of you
that says
my ability
my strength
my hard work
my cleverness
my professional
skills
as if I'm
this self-made
self-sufficient
as we're
this self-made
self-sufficient
community
as if
everything we
have
is not
a gift
of God's
free grace
to us.
That is why
our Father
brings us out
into these
desert places
that are parched
and hot
and hard
and lifeless
because he's
saying to us
when you're
no longer
in the desert
when you are
swimming in bread
when you have
plenty of resources
when you're
in the promised
land and it's
like the garden
of Eden
when all of
your needs
are met
and you're
no longer
hungry
and you're
free of that
gnawing ache
of emptiness
on the inside
will you
remember me?
Will you
remember that
I'm the source
of all your
bread
and I'm the
source of
your very life?
Will you
have learned
this life's
most important
lesson
of moving
from self-sufficiency
to God
dependency?
Christ Church
as I close
I just want
to ask
the question
is it
possible
that our
Father
our good
and loving
Heavenly Father
has brought
us through
these last
two years
of desert
fire
of a
pandemic
of relentless
change
of really
difficult
losses
of crazy
challenges
in order to
do just
this
to deal
with our
pride
to deal
with that
self-sufficiency
in us
to deal
with that
me myself
and I
inner
monologue
and to
humble us
to purify
us
to temper
us
and to
strengthen
us
to prepare
us
for the
good things
that lie
ahead of
us
to prepare
us
for Lord
willing
the next
15 years
at Christ
Church
I think
it's
highly
likely
that that's
what God's
been up
to
I know
that's
what he's
been doing
in me
and I
wonder
if that's
what he's
doing
in you
I love
this verse
verse 10
it says
when you
have eaten
and are
satisfied
praise the
Lord your
God
for the
good land
he has
given you
and it
became
Jewish
custom
out of
this
verse
to say
grace
by blessing
the Lord
after meals
as well
as before
meals
because
Israel
became aware
that fullness
can lead
to forgetfulness
and plenty
can generate
pride
and so
they prayed
two times
before the
meal
and then
after the
meal
to remind
their hearts
that these
gifts
are meant
to drive
us
into the
arms
of our
generous
giver
that this
daily bread
is meant
to move
us
into total
trust
and desperate
dependency
on our
loving
father
this is the
life that
Jesus lived
for us
and this is
the life
that he
wants
to give
to us
and I
pray that
by the
power of
the spirit
God would
do this
in me
and God
would do it
in you
as well
in the name
of the
father
the son
and the
holy spirit
amen
in you
can
know
going
in you
to