“God’s Freedom, God’s Purpose” is a sermon I preached at Preakness Valley United Reformed Church in Wayne, NJ, in November 2010. The text is Deuteronomy 7:1-16.

Here is the MP3 audio (29:34, 27MB), and an excerpt:

God himself is completely sufficient to meet his people’s needs. Remember, we talked about the fertility cults of the Canaanites? Well, in the Ancient Near East, one of the things you did when you conquered another tribe, another country, is you would adopt their local gods as your own. The idea is that your gods help you in your country, but now you need to appease these new gods of this territory, so that you don’t make them angry like the people you just conquered made them angry. After all, that’s why you were able to conquer them, right?

But YHWH God is saying to Israel in this passage, “You don’t need these other gods, these idols of wood and stone and clay. I will provide for you—I, YHWH, the one true God, the almighty God, the giver of all fertility.”

Audio and text: ©2010 by Benjamin D. Giffone. Reproduction and distribution are permitted, providing that the author is properly credited and that no fee is charged.