In this message, Pastor Ben informs us of three distinctives about the true and living God.

1. He reveals his glory in one specific place

2. He gives good gifts of grace

3. His word and his work always align.

Introduction: A God Like No Other

Good morning. If I titled this message “A God Like No Other,” it’s because our God is incomparable to any deity, any idol, and any other religion that might come to mind as you look around the world.

Have you ever had to defend this belief? Or have you ever had to defend this idea of the incomparable God to someone you know? Perhaps when you’re talking with friends of yours, or perhaps enemies of yours, they might say, “Well, that God’s just like everyone else. Christianity and all the other religions, they’re all the same. They all teach the same thing. They all tell you to be a good person, don’t they? They all tell you that love is the main thing.”

And now, if you were to ask Israel how similar is the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob — the God who has made this great covenant with his people, the God who has ripped his people out of the clutches of Egypt and is about to bring them to the promised land — they’d probably say, “We have a very, very different God than the ones of Egypt or the idols of the people that we are going to have to put to death.”

I find that when we have known Christ much, or we have been around Christian people much, or in the church a long time, or in our faith a long time (or even not a very long time), we often miss this: the fact that the God we worship on a Sunday morning here at Valley Alliance and every moment of our lives is the God who is so much greater and mightier and powerful and holier and more righteous — the only true God instead of everything else around us.

And so today, as we dive into our text that confronts us with these truths, I want to talk about three distinctives of the true and living God. Three distinctives of the true and living God who has revealed himself to Israel and also has revealed himself to us.

(If you’re looking, there’s a little bullet insert in your bulletin with all these points if you wish to take notes and follow along.)

1. God Reveals His Glory in One Specific Place

First distinctive: God reveals his glory in one specific place. Second: God gives good gifts of grace. And thirdly: God’s word and work always align.

It’s fitting that as we unpack these truths about the true and living God, we’re doing it from Deuteronomy. Because Deuteronomy was actually written — one of its main themes — it’s an entire book arguing against idolatry. Why is idolatry not only something God is not pleased with, but something that is just incredibly foolish and naive and, if I dare use the word, perhaps even stupid.

As Moses preaches his last sermon — and if Matt or I got to preach something like this as our last sermon, we would be really happy — we hear Moses not only arguing about how foolish and fragile and false the idols of the nations are, but he does so in a way that reveals the might and glory of God. Because the idols of this world are dust, but the Lord has made the heavens.

So it’s fitting that in arguing against idolatry, we get to our first point: God reveals his glory in one specific place.

Starting in Deuteronomy 12:2, as Madonna read for us: “You shall surely destroy all the places where the nations whom you shall dispossess serve their gods, on the high mountains and on the hills and under every green tree. You shall tear down their altars and dash in pieces their pillars and burn their Asherim with fire. You shall chop down the carved images of their gods and destroy their name out of that place.”

Notice the command here is not just “pack them up in wooden crates and take them to a museum.” Grab your axe and swing. Get the bulldozer and plow over. You cannot leave anything behind. The Canaanites worshiped literally on every high hill and under every green tree. Wherever you looked in Israel, the land was literally covered — before the Israelites showed up — with idols.

And this is why the command is so intensive. It’s not like there are five places you have to tear down so you can build temples to God. No — this is everywhere. This is pervasive because idolatry was such a big part of the Canaanite way of life. Which is why God says, “Destroy their name out of that place.”

If you’ve been around your Bible long enough, you’ll understand that when Scripture talks about “name,” it’s not just erase the names of Baal and Asher from all these places. It’s the character and idea of Baal and Asher, because they’re more than idols. Worshiping them involves an entire way of life. The God you worship changes everything about you — what kind of sacrifice you give, how you love other people. In our modern day, it may dictate where you send your children to school. The God you worship affects everything about you.

And for the Canaanites, worshiping Baal and Asher and whatever false god affected their entire lives. So we’ll get to, at the end of the chapter, you shouldn’t worship them because one of the worst things they do is sacrifice their children to Molech. That changes how you live your life. It changes how you view your family and people around you.

Which is why God says, “I want nothing left of them. I want idolatry to be a distant memory — something that no one can remember, something that no one knows how to do because you have bulldozed their idols.”

But more than that, Deuteronomy 12:4: “You shall not worship the Lord your God in that way, but you shall seek the place that the Lord your God will choose out of all the tribes to put his name, to make his habitation there.”

Because once all these old remnants of the old religion are cleared away, Israel will worship the Lord as he chooses. Idolatry is convenient. You can stop and offer your sacrifice wherever. There are no rules. There aren’t really regulations. Just, “Hey, here’s an altar to Asher — sacrifice. Done deal. We’re good to go.”

That’s not how God commands his people to worship. It’s not a matter of convenience. It’s a matter of when people go to the place that God will choose (hint: it’s the tabernacle or the temple). Everything there is done according to God’s word, God’s rule, God’s commands, so that his people will see who he is.

Idolatry is tricky because if the God we worship is not very demanding, we can do according to our heart’s desire. But when God’s people come to the tabernacle, God says, “Seek the place the Lord your God will choose. There you will go, and there you shall bring your offerings and your sacrifices, your vows, your freewill offerings, and there you shall eat before the Lord, and you shall rejoice, you and your households, in all that you undertake in which the Lord your God has blessed you.”

How Israel worships and how they’re commanded to worship is designed to reveal and manifest God’s name and presence. When his people go to the tabernacle, they know God is there in his glory. As they approach him, they see his holiness. They see his glory. They see so much about the character of God and how he commands them to worship him.

And this isn’t to say they only worshiped God at the temple. Certainly not. But what does become clear is that worship at that place is unique and valuable to the Lord. There are things that Israel could do to worship God that they didn’t have to do at the temple. Certainly, you don’t have to pray at the temple. But when you bring your sacrifice and your offerings, don’t do it in the field. Bring it before the Lord. When you want to make atonement, when you have a skin disease and you have to consult the priest, you have to do it there.

There’s a uniqueness to the worship that goes on there because worshiping in that place is designed to recall God’s glory.

This is a Sunday school lesson in itself. But how God has commanded worship, especially at the tabernacle, is designed to remind people of their salvation. Every time you go to offer a sacrifice, every time Passover or one of the feasts comes around, you’re doing it to remember this covenant God has made with his people. It’s not just the three things we do a year. It’s to remember the covenant and the salvation God has brought to them.

And worship is literally centered around God himself. When we worship however we want, worship centers around us. We’ve had a sermon on this. But when we worship centered around God — how he reveals himself, how he shows who he is, what his word says — then worship is about God and not about us.

For the Israelites, the tabernacle is how they did this. But for you and I, we don’t get a tabernacle. We get a better tabernacle. For John 1:14 says this: “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us.” (You could say “tabernacled among us” actually.) “And we beheld his glory.”

In Christ, we have a different center of worship — not so much a place, but the incarnate Son of God directing our worship and our prayers and our sacrifices to Christ. Because in Christ, we are pleasing to God. And if we direct those things toward him, God is pleased with us. Because who has made a new and better covenant with us? Who has made atonement for us? Who has saved us? It is Jesus Christ, the one full of grace and truth.

So we go from directing worship to a specific place to a specific person.

That’s the first distinctive about our true and living God.

2. God Gives Good Gifts of Grace

Our second distinctive about the true and living God is this: He gives good gifts of grace. Underline “grace” — and then underline it again and again.

Because there’s an interesting thing in Deuteronomy: how Israel worships the Lord is actually quite connected to the place they are. Deuteronomy 12:10–11 says this: “But when you go over the Jordan and live in the land that the Lord your God is giving you to inherit, and when he gives you rest from all your enemies around, so that you live in safety, then to the place that the Lord your God will choose to make his name dwell there, there you shall bring all that I command you.”

Have you ever considered this? In the wilderness, it’s never recorded — arguably, Israel is never really recorded to be sacrificing on a regular basis in the wilderness. You don’t see them stopping to set up the tabernacle and celebrate a feast. And there are also things they can’t do while they’re in the wilderness. They can’t give a sacrifice of grain in the wilderness. They can’t give a sacrifice of oil in the wilderness. They may not even have had salt to salt their sacrifices in the wilderness.

So when they get to the promised land, they look this way and they look that and they say, “There’s grain, there’s wine, there’s oil, there’s all these things that God has given us that we can now give back to him.”

Is that not remarkable? That an act of obedience comes only because God has shown grace? Because God has kept his word? You can’t have sacrificed in the wilderness when there’s only manna coming from the sky. God must be the one to bring them to the place he’s promised them and bless them according to his word.

Because even entering into the promised land is an act of grace. How often have we read in Deuteronomy: God loves these people, but he’s keeping a promise that he promised not first to them, but the oath he swore to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob. That because of them — your fathers — I will bring you into this good and spacious land I have promised you.

This is a clear demonstration that their salvation and their promised inheritance comes from grace.

Even this large passage that talks about eating meat (which seems really weird when we first look at it — why does it matter that they can eat meat? Why does it matter that they’re allowed to cut the throat of their goat at home and enjoy some supper?) — it matters for this reason: because the act of eating meat wherever they live is a sign of God’s blessing and grace.

The only time they ate meat in the wilderness was quail. They complained about manna. “That’s this manna we eat.” God says, “Okay, you’re complaining. I will show you just how wrong your hearts are.” Cue quail flooding the skies, coming to his people, and they eat until quail comes out of their nostrils. And then many of them die. And one of the coolest place names in the Bible is the place where those rebels are buried: Kibroth-hattaavah. What does that mean? “Graves of craving.” You craved meat and you ate and you died.

So where meat used to be a sign of faithlessness and complaining, eating meat in the promised land is now the sign of blessing and grace. It’s like God has given us livestock and they can graze and I can eat my goat in good conscience that God is a God of grace and mercy. That tangible sign that God is a God of grace.

3. God’s Word and Work Always Align

Thirdly, what’s this last distinctive about the true and living God? The third is this: that God’s word and work always align.

I had to quote “A Mighty Fortress Is Our God” here because I think it captures so well just the temptations and snares that come from living in this world. We know the line: “And in this world with devils filled that threatened to undo us, we will not fear, for God hath willed his truth to triumph through us. The prince of darkness grim, we tremble not for him. His rage we can as do endure, for lo, his doom is sure. One little word shall fell him.”

Because when we read in chapter 13 at the start here, we see a sign and a wonder is done. This prophet shows up perhaps to a village or to a particular person in Israel. Miracle, cool sign. “Hey, he must be from the Lord.” And then the whisper comes: “Let us follow after false gods.”

And the Israelite would look and say, “But he’s a powerful guy. He’s done the sign, but he’s telling me to turn away from the God who’s made covenant with me. What do I do?”

Well, Scripture is quite clear. Verse 5: “But that prophet or dreamer of dreams shall be put to death because he has taught rebellion against the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt and redeemed you out of the house of slavery to make you leave the way in which the Lord your God commanded you to walk. So you shall purge the evil from among you.”

I’ve found that mankind is attracted to miraculous things, powerful things, beautiful things above a lot of things. We’re very curious people, immensely curious, and sometimes we’re curious about what we have not seen before.

Deuteronomy 12:29 actually warns Israel against this. It says, “Take care that you be not ensnared to follow them [that is, false gods] after they have been destroyed before you, and that you do not inquire about their gods, saying, ‘How did these nations serve their gods that I may also do the same?’”

If Israel wants to do archaeology, it’s a bad idea. “It belongs in a museum” is not what their heart should be. They’re not supposed to be Indiana Jones and uncover what shouldn’t be uncovered.

But there’s this curiosity — sometimes you have this curiosity. Like I don’t know, for myself I’ve often been (on darker days, more challenging days) curious about sin, certain sins, because I was a great child in certain ways — not curious about evil things when I was a boy. But as I got older and started to face the trials of life, I’m like, “You know, I wonder what that would be like. I wonder.” Never been courageous enough to try things, mind you, but I’m still curious.

And eventually you find curiosity growing and growing and growing until you find yourself in a place you do not want to be and a place you might be surprised to be. And you say, “Lord, how far have I gone without even knowing it? How far have I gone into sin or falsehood without realizing how far I’ve slipped?”

God’s word and work always align. Because there will never be something so powerful or so mighty or even so beautiful as Christ himself as seen in his word.

So you know, no matter if some man comes to our church — you know, he can tame poisonous snakes and have them wrapped all around his arms and they never bite him — but he tells us, “You know, you shouldn’t worship Jesus. You should worship me, crazy snake prophet guy.” We have a problem here. We have a problem because again, the work and the word are not aligning.

And one of the things as we look to the Lord’s second coming (depending on how you read the book of Revelation), even the devil himself or the false prophet or the beast demonstrate remarkable power — remarkable power that you and I would probably have only attributed to God. And we know that the devil does not want us to seek, worship, love, or obey Christ, for he is his enemy.

And so we need to — no matter how beautiful or how amazing something might be — we must discern from the word and say, “Is this true? Is this leading me to worship and love Christ? Or is it leading me away?” Because something that may seem to be only curiosity at the start may end in your death.

It is never good to be curious about sin. But why be curious about sin anyway? Sin does not want to know you. The God who gave his life for you desires to know you and for you to know him more — the God who knows everything about you.

And the God who says in John 17:3, “This is eternal life: to know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent.” If that is eternal life, why would I not want that? Why would I not want to be known by the God who loves me?

For idols will fail. For when miraculous signs and miracles leave and we’re only left with the bitter lie, what have we lost? A whole lot.

This is why God has given us his very great and precious promises. Because when something looks attractive — like (not to use a false or bad example but think of a recent example) how many people fell under the spell of Nazism — hardworking Germans (not all of them who were unspeakable evil people) fell under the spell because this man promised and actually remarkably delivered some things that the world would admire, and supposedly a country rose from its knees and they said, “Wow, that guy and his politics, he’s a miracle worker.”

But what doctrine did Mr. Hitler share with the people? Let that sink in. That is the same experience we have and we can be tempted towards whatever false doctrine it may be.

When something mighty and miraculous happens, we must say, “Lord, is this based on the truth of your word?” Because as mighty and powerful as something may be, if it’s not of God, it’s going to lead to destruction and the wheels will fall off the wagon soon.

Conclusion: Cling to Christ

So let’s tie this all together here. We talked about these three distinctives of the true and living God:

• that he reveals his glory in one specific place (which is now, for the believer in Christ),
• secondly, God is the one who gives good gifts of grace and our worship is based on that grace — what he has given us,
• and thirdly, unlike the false prophets of any age, his word and his work always align. God never does something that contradicts his word. He’s always true and faithful.

And so, what are you and I to do about all this? Here’s my plea. Here’s my plea.

For in a world today that is filled with devils and falsehood, it is far too easy to think God’s small. It’s good to have brothers in the Lord that remind you of certain truths. And in the last week or so, I’ve been reminded how easy it is for us to have very small worlds — worlds that can get the size of our cell phones sometimes. Things that expose our selfishness.

You know, how many times are you impatient when someone hasn’t phoned you back? Or “I can’t — I didn’t pay for premium Candy Crush, so I can’t move on in the level.” Or more seriously, what information am I sharing with people? What’s the first thing that comes out of my mouth when stuff gets hard? Whether it be political trouble, natural disaster, issues in my family — what’s the first thing that comes out of my mouth? Is it “The world sucks”? Is it “That guy’s evil”? Is it “All my family’s dumb”? Or “Life is hard”? These are the afflictions of the world.

But I have a God in heaven who came to earth, who became flesh, who bled and died to save me. This gives me a Spirit to comfort, to convict, to guide.

And so rather than circulating around all the other discouragement and strange things that we might share (whether they be home remedies for sicknesses or worse), we know what’s true. Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, we know what is true.

So let us throw aside anything of dubious quality. Anything that we may not be certain of. Anything that detracts and makes our God small in comparison to the powers of this world. Let us not be like the Jews on Palm Sunday who said “Hosanna” and then crucified Jesus. Don’t be that guy or gal. Do not let your words conflict with your actions.

Be faithful to Jesus Christ — the glorious God. Sure, we don’t have a tabernacle, but if you want a clear picture of who God is, open your Bible. It couldn’t get clearer. He’s great and glorious.

And my heart aches that there’s a trend in many hearts in this world to cling to the worldly stuff and say, “I may have my hope in Jesus, but this occupies a lot more of my time because I can fix my problems this way.” And it’s a lot of things. Cling to Christ. That’s simplistic. Yes. But if we don’t start there, we can’t build anything else. Everything else will shatter if it’s not built on the gospel promise. If it’s not built on the one of whom all our lives and all our worship is centered around.

So does our life center around the incarnate Christ? The first thing out of my mouth — is it complaining or thanksgiving to God? When someone asks me for advice, am I willing to pray and share the hope of the gospel? Am I willing for my life to be inconvenient and filled with the needs of other people? Am I willing just to put controversy aside and love the person that I know with every bone in my body could be no more different or in more disagreement with me?

We have a glorious God. So I exhort you to cast away the old altars, not to be curious about the old sinful ways or new sinful ways you can discover, but to approach Christ. Go to the throne room of grace and know him, the true and living God.