Kick or Kiss?

Deuteronomy 32:15-18
P. G. Mathew | Sunday, November 25, 2001
Copyright © 2001, P. G. Mathew

There are many parents who with great expectation and joy, as well as with much suffering and sacrifice, have brought up their children. But many children have grown up healthy, tall, and beautiful, only to rebel against their parents. Oh, what disappointment, what pain, such parents experience as they see their children becoming prodigals!

We read about this type of situation in Deuteronomy 32:15-18:

Jeshurun grew fat and kicked ; filled with food, he became heavy and sleek. He abandoned the God who made him and rejected the Rock his Savior. They made him jealous with their foreign gods and angered him with their detestable idols. They sacrificed to demons, which are not God-gods they had not known, gods that recently appeared, gods your fathers did not fear. You deserted the Rock, who fathered you; you forgot the God who gave you birth.

Jeshurun is God’s love name for Israel. It comes from a Hebrew word yashar, which means “straight,” “upright,”or “righteous.” We find this pet name also used in Deuteronomy 33:5, 26 and in Isaiah 44:2.

This passage expresses the covenant Lord’s case against Israel. We find a similar indictment in Isaiah 1:2-3 where the prophet says, “Hear, O heavens! Listen, O earth! For the Lord has spoken: ‘I reared children and brought them up, but they have rebelled against me. The ox knows his master, the donkey his owner’s manger, but Israel does not know, my people do not understand.'”

God chose the Israelites out of all the families of the earth to be his people. But instead of rendering lifelong, thankful service to the covenant Lord who saved them, they used the strength God gave them against him. Just as a cow kicks the person who milks her, the people of Israel chose to kick their God.

The Birth and Growth of Jeshurun

The first point we want to examine is the birth and growth of Jeshurun. As we said, Jeshurun stands for Israel, the people of God. Therefore, Jeshurun stands for the church.

Jeshurun was chosen by God in eternity for salvation. The world consists of many people and nations; yet God chose only certain people whom he calls Jeshurun. What is the purpose of his choosing? In Ephesians 1:4 Paul writes that God loved us and chose us in him to be holy and blameless in his sight. He did this to prepare us for everlasting fellowship with him. The greatest blessing a human being can experience is eternal fellowship with God.

What was Jeshurun like before God called him? He was dead in trespasses and sins. The Bible says all people are born dead in trespasses and sins. We who are Jeshurun were rebels; we were without strength and at enmity with God. There was nothing in us that was desirable to God. Modern man does not like this description of our natural state, but if a person does not acknowledge the pervasiveness of sin, he cannot be a Christian. Only a Christian will acknowledge his total depravity.

Yet because God chose us from all eternity, he sent his Son to seek and to save that which was lost. We read in Deuteronomy 32:10-12: “In a desert land he found him, in a barren and howling waste. He shielded him and cared for him; he guarded him as the apple of his eye. . . . The Lord alone led him; no foreign god was with him.” Spiritually, we were in a desert-abandoned, wasting away, and exposed to death. Yet God came to that desert. He sought us, found us, and redeemed us. We find the same idea in Ezekiel 16. There we read that our father was an Amorite and our mother was a Hittite. After our mother gave birth, she threw us out to die. But God came by, and, seeing us in our distress, he told us “Live!” and we lived.

Not only do we read about the birth of Jeshurun, but we also read about his growth. In Deuteronomy 32:10 we notice how tenderly God cared for Jeshurun, as a father and mother would, and enabled him to grow. So we read, “He shielded him and cared for him.” The word for “shielded” is “encircled.” In other words, the one who had been thrown out and exposed for destruction received compassion and great love from the One who was passing by. He picked him up and embraced, shielded, protected, and loved him. Then we are told that God guarded him as the apple of his eye. This wretched, dying, unloved person was looked upon with great love by God himself, who treated him as the most precious thing in the universe.

In verse 11 we read that God guarded Jeshurun “like an eagle that stirs up its nest and hovers over its young, that spreads its wings to catch them and carries them on its pinions.” This is a picture of God training and teaching this little being to walk in faith, in the howling waste of the wilderness, just as an eagle would train, disciple, and teach its eaglets to fly.

God treated Jeshurun as a father would treat a beloved son. In verse 9 we read, “For the Lord’s portion is his people, Jacob his allotted inheritance.” Throughout the Bible we read that we are God’s own inheritance. In verse 12 we read, “The Lord alone led him; no foreign god was with him.” God guided Jeshurun as a shepherd would guide his sheep, showing him the way and constantly telling him, “Not this way, but that way; go here, not there.” All this speaks of the great care and rule of God in the life of his people.

In verse 13 we read, “He made him ride on the heights of the land.” The idea here is that God caused Israel to be triumphant and to occupy the beautiful land. God fought the battles and gave success to Jeshurun. Not only that, God fed Jeshurun with plenty of food. In verses 13 we also read that he “fed him with the fruit of the fields,” and in verse 14 we read that “he nourished him with honey from the rock . . .” In Israel there are rocks where bees make their hives. A person can get honey from such rocks. Then we read that he gave him, “oil from the flinty crag. . .” That is speaking about olive oil from the trees that grew in the stony ground. Then we read about “curds and milk from herd and flock and with fattened lambs and goats, with choice rams of Bashan and the finest kernels of wheat.” Oh, Jeshurun enjoyed butter, milk, meat, and bread from the finest wheat. And, finally, we are told God gave him plenty of wine from grapes: “You drank the foaming blood of the grape.” How richly God provides for his people!

Notice, we are not told about Jeshurun doing anything in this process of birth and growth. God did everything for him. Jeshurun was born and grew sleek and fat, strong like a well-fed ox. But he owed all his strength, power, and beauty, as well as his very being, to God alone.

Jeshurun Kicks God

God richly blessed Jeshurun and gave him everything he needed. But Jeshurun was strong physically, not spiritually. So the second point is the kick of Jeshurun. As Jeshurun grew strong and powerful, he also became restless. Like a teenager, he wanted to show his independence, his strength, and his sufficiency by kicking someone. Who did he choose to kick? God-the One who found him when he was dying in his blood and saved him, cared for him, and fed him until he became beautiful, strong, and powerful.

In verse 15 we read, “Jeshurun grew fat and kicked.” In the Hebrew it is stated this way: “You grew fat. You grew thick. You became gross.” The word “you” is second person singular. In other words, not only Israel generally, but people individually, kicked God. Jeshurun became like a well-fed ox that uses its strength, not to serve the master in gratitude, but to kick the master.

We must also understand that Jeshurun was doing all this within the context of the covenant that God had made with his people Israel. There is the covenant Lord, there is the covenant document, and there is the vassal, who is rebelling against the beneficent rule of the Lord who showed such great mercy to him. Thus was the unthankfulness of Jeshurun!

In Hosea 4:16 we read, “The Israelites are stubborn, like a stubborn heifer.” This is a description of God’s people. Jeshurun used God’s grace to rebel against him.

God’s Warnings to Jeshurun

Jeshurun’s actions did not come as a surprise to God. In fact, God had warned his people several times before about such behavior.

In Deuteronomy 6:10-12 we read

When the Lord your God brings you into the land he swore to your fathers, to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, to give you-a land with large, flourishing cities you did not build, houses filled with all kinds of good things you did not provide, wells you did not dig, and vineyards and olive groves you did not plant-then when you eat and are satisfied, be careful that you do not forget the Lord, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.

In Deuteronomy 8:10-14 we read,

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 commands, 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.

In Deuteronomy 31:20 God gives a solemn warning to his people. He begins, “When I have brought them into the land flowing with milk and honey, the land I promised on oath to their forefathers, and when they eat their fill and thrive. . . .” Would the recipients of such blessings then praise and thank God, serving him and delighting themselves in his rule? No! When these things happen, God warns, “they will turn to other gods and worship them, rejecting me and breaking my covenant.”

What thoughts were going through Jeshurun’s mind? “I am sleek. I am fat. I am strong. Don’t I have silver and gold and houses? I have everything I need. I don’t need God.” So Jeshurun became independent and rebelled against the love and law of his covenant Lord. He started kicking against God.

The Manifestation of Kicking

What form did Jeshurun’s kicking take? In verse 15 we read, “He abandoned the God who made him. . . .” When Jeshurun was weak and powerless, God had come and helped him. But now that he was strong, sleek, and powerful, he did not need God anymore. In fact, Jeshurun was ashamed of God. God reminded Jeshurun of his weakness and dependency on someone other than himself. Isn’t this what children do? They say, “I don’t need my father. I don’t need my mother. I don’t need anyone. I am sufficient in myself.”

So Jeshurun abandoned God “and rejected the Rock his Savior.” Rock is a word used in Deuteronomy several times to refer to God. Rock means unchanging. Rock means protection. Rock means shadow. Rock even means food, because one could find honey in rock. Rock has become a metaphor for the everlasting, eternal, almighty God. But Jeshurun rejected the Rock his Savior.

Not only did Jeshurun abandon the true, living, eternal, personal, all-gracious God, but he also created his own idols and began to worship them, as we read in verses 16-17:

They made him jealous with their foreign gods and angered him with their detestable idols. They sacrificed to demons, which are not God-gods they had not known, gods that recently appeared, gods your fathers did not fear.

This behavior of God’s people is found throughout Scripture. In Jeremiah 2:11 we read, “Has a nation ever changed its gods? (Yet they are not gods at all.) But my people have exchanged their Glory for worthless idols.” Paul says the same thing in Romans 1:25, “They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator-who is forever praised. Amen.” In Jeremiah 2:13 God speaks through the prophet, saying, “My people have committed two sins: They have forsaken me, the spring of living water, and have dug their own cisterns, broken cisterns that cannot hold water.”

Like a father who is experiencing pain because his children do not love him anymore, God was offended at the idolatrous behavior of his people. Usually, people exchange one thing for something better. But God’s people exchanged their Glory for a lie and the work of man’s hands.

How can the people of God reject the living and true God and choose demons? They must become fools to do so. In Deuteronomy 32:6 we read, “Is this the way you repay the Lord, O foolish and unwise people?” In Deuteronomy 32:28-29 we read, “They are a nation without sense, there is no discernment in them. If only they were wise and would understand this and discern what their end will be!”

God’s people lost their minds: They lost their ability to reason and deduce, to put two and two together. They became fools. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom but these people became corrupt in their minds. Higher education does not make us spiritual. Wealth will never make us spiritual. Good health will never make us spiritual. Youth will never make us spiritual. Luther said a full stomach does not promote piety.

In Revelation 3 we read about the Laodicean church, who said, “I am rich; I have acquired wealth and do not need a thing.” But what was God’s analysis of their spiritual state? “You do not realize that you are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked.” Don’t we do the same thing?

The Idolatry of Jeshurun

In Deuteronomy 32:10 we read that God found his people in the desert and led them into the land of Canaan. Finally, these people got some money-silver and gold and houses and land and wells. Where did they get all these things? From God. But now materialism is in, God is out; new gods are in, the true God is out; demons are in, the Lord of the covenant is thrown out. This is what is meant by “Jeshurun grew fat and kicked.” Jeshurun became idolatrous.

The Bible has something to say about idolatry:

1. It is forbidden. In Deuteronomy 32:16 we read, “They made him jealous with their foreign gods.” Idolatry to God is the same as a wife or a husband committing adultery. It causes great jealousy. The first commandment states that God forbids worship of other gods. Whether they are gods of ideas or gods of things, all idols are God-substitutes.
2. It is detestable. In verse 16 we also read, “[they] angered him with their detestable idols.”
3. It is demonic. In verse 17 we read, “They sacrificed to demons, which are not God. . . .” The worship of anything other than the true and living God is the worship of demons. When we worship anything other than God, we are honoring Satan.
4. It is the worship of new gods. In verse 17 God identifies the idols of these people as new gods, as gods-come-lately, which God says are no gods. Those who worship new gods are really worshiping the products of their corrupt minds and imaginations.
5. It is futile and worthless. In Jeremiah 2:5 we read, “This is what the Lord says: ‘What fault did your fathers find in me, that they strayed so far from me? They followed worthless idols and became worthless themselves.'” We become like what we worship.

The idolatry of Jeshurun demonstrated his unspeakable ingratitude to God. Not only did he abandon the true God, but he began to worship creation, meaning demons who could do nothing for him. These new gods did not seek Jeshurun or care for him.

This is just what ungrateful children do to their parents. Although their parents gave them birth, fed them, clothed them, and raised them, having taken care of their every need despite the parents’ own pain, suffering, and lack of sleep, some children grow to hate their parents. They have new friends; why talk to their father and mother or show them any respect? This is what Jeshurun did to God.

The Discipline of Jeshurun

The third point is the discipline of this ungrateful Jeshurun. God is powerful and he knows how to handle his people when they don’t want to obey him. The Bible says, “Wives, be submissive to your own husbands,”and “Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church,” and “Children, obey your parents.” But suppose the wife says, “I don’t want to be submissive to anybody,” and the husband says, “I don’t want to love my wife,” and the child says, “I don’t want to do any of these things.” If God chooses and predestinates such wives and husbands and children, he will deal with them. God will not tolerate such defiance of his word.

The covenant Lord was mighty to deal with the rebellion and apostasy of Jeshurun. So in verse 19 we read, “The Lord saw this and rejected them because he was angered by his sons and daughters.” God gets angry with his people when they reject him. In verse 20 God says, “I will hide my face from them.” This is the opposite of the great benediction that we find in Numbers 6:25-26: “The Lord make his face shine upon you and be gracious to you; the Lord turn his face toward you and give you peace.” When you reject God, you will not experience the smile of his face, and, therefore, you will have no blessing, no peace, no security, and no provision. God will withdraw from you and you will be left to fend for yourself,

In verse 23 God says, “I will heap calamities on them and spend my arrows against them,”and in verse 24 he says, “I will send wasting famine against them, consuming pestilence and deadly plague. . . .” Jeshurun had been arrogant, but now, all of a sudden, there was famine. Oh, God’s people trusted in their money, yet now there was no money. Additionally, there was disease-consuming pestilence and deadly plague. In verse 24 God also says, “I will send against them the fangs of wild beasts, the venom of vipers that glide in the dust.” All of a sudden nature itself behaved differently and wild beasts rose up against God’s people. In verse 25 we read that there was war; the sword was outside and terror within. And, finally, in verse 26, God said he would send his people into exile.

Did you say you were sufficient? Did you say you had money? Did you say you had muscle? All of a sudden God will say to you, “All right. Go ahead,” and he will send on us disease, plagues, famine, financial problems-every kind of trouble. Paul writes about such discipline of God’s people in 2 Corinthians 11:30: “That is why many among you are weak and sick, and a number of you have fallen asleep.”

The purpose of this discipline is revealed in verse 36. Did you say you are like a powerful wild ox? In verse 36 we read, “The 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.” Here is a promise that God will save his people. But when does this happen? When God sees that their strength is gone. PGM Remember how God touched the hip of Jacob? Jacob was wrestling with God, and winning, until, all of a sudden, God touched him and he fell to the ground. God waits until our strength is gone because only then will we lean on him.

Jacob learned this lesson and so did the apostle Paul. He was kicking against God, but God arrested him. Remember, Jesus said, “It is not good for you to kick against the pricks.” But Paul learned his lesson and in 2 Corinthians 12:10 he wrote, “For when I am weak, then I am strong.”

In verse 37-38 we read, “He will say: ‘Now where are their gods, the rock they took refuge in, the 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!'” It is sheer mocking. Then God says in verse 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.”

This is the lesson God teaches us. He will make us weak, limp, and lame. He will make us lean onto him until, all of a sudden, we become fascinated with him and declare, “You are God! Everything else is false. These gods are are idols. They are nothings. They cannot help.”

The Restoration of Jeshurun

The fourth point is the restoration of Jeshurun. As we said, Jeshurun stands for God’s people. It is a high crime for the people of God to treat God with contempt because they have received greater light of the gospel. The sin of a Christian is more serious than the sin of a pagan who never heard the gospel.

God was not under obligation to restore them, as he is not under obligation to restore anybody. In fact, in verses 26-27 God himself says, “I said I would scatter them and blot out their memory from mankind.” He was saying he could destroy them, which God has the right to do. But God said something else: “But I dreaded the taunt of the enemy, lest the adversary misunderstand and say, ‘Our hand has triumphed; the Lord has not done all this.'” In other words, God was saying, “Because the enemies may misinterpret my destruction of my people, I am going to show mercy-not because of any merit in Jeshurun, but because of my own mercy, for my own glory.”

This is the idea of a remnant. God shows mercy to his people, not because of anything they have done, but because of his own covenant faithfulness. By his own mercy he refuses to blot out his own people.

Therefore God disciplined Jeshurun. The discipline had two purposes. First, it was designed to deal with Jeshurun’s strength. He had grown fat and sleek, like a wild ox, but his strength made him think that he was self-sufficient. So God said, “I am going to deal with you and render you weak. I am going to touch you until your strength is gone.” Oh, God is sovereign. He is almighty. He knows how to accomplish his purposes. So he will touch us until we fall down, until we limp and have to lean on him.

But God’s discipline has another purpose: to bring us to confess that God alone is God and all idols are lies. God will not save anyone without proper confession. To worship God, we must despise our idolatry and acknowledge that the true and living God alone is worthy of worship.

The Problem of Sin

How, then, can Jeshurun be restored? Or, to put it differently, how can any sinner be saved? This is the time of year to buy gifts for your children so that you can make them happy. But the greatest gift you can give your children is our Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. That is why you must tell them that they are sinners, under the wrath of God, and that God is angry at sinners every day. They must know that the wrath of God is being revealed against them and they have no reason to be happy. Encourage them to weep and cry and be convicted of their sin so that they will cry out to God, ‘O God, have mercy upon me!”

Unless we are born again, we are under a sentence of death-not only physical death but eternal death. In fact, it is here in Deuteronomy 32:35 that we find the statement, “in due time their foot will slip,” which was the text for Jonathan Edwards’ great sermon, “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God.”

Sinners, whether children or adults, should not be happy outside of Christ. Rather than seeking entertainment, they should cry out every day, confessing their sin and asking God to show mercy to them and save them. Only when people have been saved by Jesus Christ can they truly be happy. Every other worldly joy is only masking reality. We have no right to be happy because we are all born sinners who sin every day. All are under the wrath of God until that day when we are born again. Therefore, we should beat upon our breasts and cry out to God, confessing, “I am a sinner, under the wrath of God, condemned. By divine revelation I am condemned. I am a sinner in my thinking, in my willing, in my affection. I am a sinner every day. I do nothing that pleases God. Have mercy on me, O God!”

In other words, if your children are not Christians, they shouldn’t be celebrating anything. They have no right to. They should be weeping and crying, and as parents you should help them to be convicted of their sins through the gospel until they come before God and are born of God and trust in Jesus Christ alone for salvation.

How Can a Sinner Be Saved?

So the question how can Jeshurun be restored is really how can a sinner be saved. I hope we will appreciate the salvation God offers to us.

In Deuteronomy 32:36 we read, “The Lord will judge his people. . . .” If God is going to judge his people, who shall stand? Can anybody stand when God judges them? Here the idea of justice is brought out. God is going to judge his people because he is holy. When we study about the outline of gospel evangelism, one of the first points is that God is holy and just. In fact, he is the Jeshurun because he is the upright one by nature. In him there is no darkness.

Because of God’s holy nature, he cannot look on sin approvingly. In fact, he is angry with sin. How, then, can he judge his people? The truth is, we are all condemned. By nature we were all sinners. Having kicked God Almighty, we worshipped demons and violated God’s laws. Even a little child, when he disobeys his father, is manifesting his nature of sin.

But here it says he is going to judge his people. So my question is, how can he judge us savingly? Can he say, “It’s all right. You don’t have to go to hell. You are all right. I will just close my eyes and let you in”? No. God will not do that because he cannot do that. He is just.

Verse 36 tells us something else about God. There we read, “and have compassion on his servants.” First we read, “The Lord will judge his people,” which speaks of the justice and holiness of God, but then we find, “I will have compassion on his servants.” So there is justice and there is love. You may have heard that God is holy and therefore he must condemn us and send us to hell, but that God is also love; therefore, he doesn’t want to condemn us and send us to hell. But how can we resolve this problem? That is the heart of the gospel. How can there be a resolution of these two attributes of God?

A solution is found here in the last line of Deuteronomy 32:43 where we read: “and make atonement for his land and people.” What a wonderful word-atonement! Another word the Bible uses is propitiation. God says that he himself will make atonement for his people.

We find a picture of atonement, of the shedding of the blood of another in behalf of a sinner, in the sacrificial system of ancient Israel. For example, in Exodus 12 we read that to celebrate Passover, each family had to take a lamb, kill it, and sprinkle its blood upon the lintels and doorposts of their house, and then stay inside. At midnight a destructive angel came, looking for only one thing: Is there blood applied to the door? If there was blood, the destructive angel would pass over that house. In other words, there would be no judgment and no one would die in that place. The firstborn, who represented all the people in the house, would live. God passed over on the basis of blood.

Later we read that on the Day of Atonement an animal would be killed in behalf of the whole nation. Now we are speaking about forgiving the sins, not just of a family, but of a whole nation. So on the Day of Atonement, Yom Kippur, the high priest would take the blood of the animal into the Holy of Holies and sprinkle it upon the mercy seat and in front of it. Here we find the idea that God from above the mercy seat looks upon the law, which we have broken, inside the ark, and yet covers our sins because of the blood atonement.

Thus are these two propositions-that God is holy and he must condemn us, and that God is love, so he does not condemn us-brought to resolution. That is why, when Jesus Christ came, John the Baptist introduced him, saying, “Look, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!” Jesus atones for the sin of the whole world.

Sin is a very serious issue. The cost of salvation is so high that every time we sin we are depreciating the atonement of Christ.

God’s Way of Salvation

Now we can understand how God saves sinners. He says, “There has to be a covering of sin. I myself will make atonement, propitiation, for my people’s sins. The blood of bulls and goats cannot do it, although that sacrificial system was pointing forward to Christ’s atonement.”

Christmas celebrates the coming of the Son of God to make atonement. It is when the second person of the Trinity became incarnate. Why did God become man? That he could die. God as God cannot die, so God became man so that he could die for his people.

Jesus Christ is God and man. As man, he was without sin-the perfect Jeshurun. But this Jeshurun kicked, not against the Father, but against the devil. In Genesis 3:15 we are told that the seed of the woman will crush the head of the serpent. In the same way, if you want to kick, I urge you to kick, not God, but the devil by resisting him and disobeying him. Rebel against the devil, as Jesus Christ did.

What did Jesus Christ do on the cross? He who knew no sin freely took upon himself our sin, and then he gave us his Jeshurun character of righteousness. It was a permanent double transaction. In Psalm 85:10, we read, “Righteousness and peace kiss each other.” Righteousness and peace were reconciled in the death on the cross of Jesus Christ, our representative, mediator, and substitute. That is how God can be just and the justifier of those who kick him.

All rebels who say, “Let us break their chains and throw off their fetters,” must kiss the Son and be saved. Saul of Tarsus kicked against this King, but he was taught to kiss him and be saved. He became a great proclaimer of the gospel, glorying in it and declaring, “Christ died for our sins.”

In Luke 7 we read about a rich Pharisee named Simon. Although Jesus visited him, Simon refused to kiss the Son; thus, he was not saved. But a sinful woman came in, weeping, and her tears fell on Jesus’ feet. She began to wipe his feet with her hair and to pour perfume on them. Then she began to kiss them. Why do you think she did that? Having been forgiven much, she loved much. And Jesus commended her, saying, “Your faith has saved you. Go home in peace.”

What about you? Are you learning to kick? Everyone is learning something every day. Are you learning to kick against the kingdom of God and against the King, Jesus Christ, God’s Son, our only Savior? Do you consider his rule a chain and a fetter? Do you ally yourself with the kings of the earth who said, “Let’s break his chains and tear off his fetters!”? The kingdom of God is not a fetter or a chain: It is righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit. To enter into the kingdom of God is to enter into eternal life, and this life is in the Son. Liberation from God means nothing but to come under Satan’s tyranny. Satan came to steal, kill, and destroy, but Jesus Christ came to give life.

The Rejoicing of Jeshurun

So there is justice, there is love, and there is atonement. What is the fourth point? Rejoicing. So in verse 43 we read, “Rejoice, O nations, with his people.” Because of the gospel, we have reason to rejoice. Notice, God says all nations should rejoice with his people. The gospel is the power of God unto salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first, but also to the Greek.

Only Christians who love Jesus Christ have the right to rejoice, and to do so always. Everything else is phony, artificial rejoicing that has nothing to do with reality. “Rejoice, O nations, with his people,” God says. Why should they rejoice? Because atonement has been made and we are saved. Because God has forgiven our sins and justified us forever. As we read in Romans 8:29-30, “[t]hose God foreknew he also predestined. . . .those he predestined, he also called; those he called, he also justified; those he justified, he also glorified.”

The Example of Asa

Finally, we want to look at an example of someone who experienced God’s goodness, yet later kicked against God. In 2 Chronicles 14-16 we read about King Asa of Judah.

Asa began his reign with great trust in God. In 897 B.C. a general named Zerah the Cushite came with a multitude of army against Jerusalem. Asa realized he was a nobody before this vast army, so he cried out to God, “O God, we rely on you.” That showed Asa’s understanding of God’s covenant faithfulness. He knew that the Lord of the covenant must fight and win the battle in behalf of his little vassal king Asa. We are told God heard Asa’s prayer and did fight the battle for him. The people of Judah did not have to do anything but collect the spoils after the battle.

Later in Asa’s reign King Baasha of Israel came against King Asa, as we read in 2 Chronicles 16. Since the time of God’s great victory over Zerah, Asa had grown powerful. So when Baasha, who was a minor political force at the time, came against Asa, Asa did not seek God. So Asa gave silver and gold to the king of Syria, telling him, “Make a treaty with me and break your treaty with Baasha; then he will retreat.” What was Asa’s rationale? Asa thought he was strong and self-sufficient enough to handle anything. So he kicked God away.

This is a clear illustration of Jeshurun growing fat and kicking. Asa took the gold and silver God has blessed him with and made it into an idol by trusting in it. And Asa’s plan worked! Ben-Hadad allied himself with Asa and drove Baasha back to Israel. I am sure Asa was proud of the way he was able to handle this situation without God.

Kick or Kiss?

God wanted Asa to trust in him and defeat both Samaria and Syria. That was God’s plan, which was already revealed in 2 Chronicles 16. But Asa trusted in himself and carried out his own plan instead of God’s. What a tragedy it is, when we grow fat and kick! But when we kick, we are not really kicking God, but ourselves. Every kick against God comes back against us. The Bible tells us that God disciplined Asa with a disease in his feet. But Asa refused to kiss God in surrender and so he died.

I hope we will think on these things, abandon all rebellion, and learn to kiss the Son, who died on the cross for us that we may be saved. God is angry at every sinner every day and his wrath is being revealed against all ungodliness and wickedness of men. He has no obligation to save us. But praise God for the atonement of Jesus Christ! Christ died for our sins, and what he requires is complete surrender to him. All that we are and all that we have must be submitted to the Lord Jesus Christ, and he will save us. He said, “Come unto me; I will give you rest. I will save you.”

What about you? Are you still kicking against God? But if you are chosen from the foundation of the world to be saved, I guarantee that God will deal with you until you fall down in weakness and kiss his feet.

May God help us to be weak before him and stop kicking. May we kiss the feet of God’s Son, the only Savior of the whole world, who made atonement for our sins. Then may we live our lives-all of life-in thankfulness to him for the great salvation he has given us in Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.