Deuteronomy chapter 10, a continuation of Deuteronomy chapter 9, is basically God’s reaffirmation of the covenant that He had made with Israel. Indeed, much of this book is a kind of covenant renewal. That is, even after their terrible sin at Horeb, in which no sooner did Moses leave them for a little while than they fell into idolatry, the Lord still wasn’t done with them.

Read Deuteronomy 10:1-11. What is going on here that helps us to understand that God forgave His people their sin and was reaffirming the covenant promise made to them and their fathers?

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Moses smashed the Ten Commandment tablets (Deuteronomy 9:17) — a sign of the broken covenant (Deuteronomy 32:19). “To show his abhorrence of their crime, he threw down the tables of stone, and they were broken in the sight of all the people, thus signifying that as they had broken their covenant with God, so God had broken His covenant with them.” — Ellen G. White, Patriarchs and Prophets, p. 320.

Thus, the fact that God told Moses to hew new tables “like the first” and He would write on them the words that were on the first shows that God had forgiven the people and was not done with them, even then.

Read Deuteronomy 10:14-16. What is God saying to them? What is the meaning of the images that the Lord used here?

There’s a mixture of images here: the foreskin, the heart, the neck. Nevertheless, the point is clear. Circumcision was a sign of the covenant, but it’s only an outward sign. God wanted their hearts, that is, their minds, their affections, their love. The stiff-necked image simply pointed to how stubborn they were in their unwillingness to obey the Lord. And, basically, here and elsewhere, the Lord was telling them to stop with their divided loyalties and serve Him with all their heart and soul.

<–Sabbath Monday–>

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Sabbath Afternoon

Read for This Week’s Study: Mark 12:29-31, Deuteronomy 10:1-19, Psalm 146:5-10, Matthew 7:12, Deuteronomy 27:19, James 1:27-2:11.

Memory Text: “Therefore love the stranger, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt” (Deuteronomy 10:19).

As we read last week, when asked by a scribe about “the first commandment of all” (Mark 12:28), Jesus answered by giving the affirmation of God as one, and then He said: “And you shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength. This is the first commandment” (Mark 12:30).

However, Jesus continued, talking then about the “second, like it” (Mark 12:31), something that the scribe hadn’t asked about. Nevertheless, Jesus, knowing how important it was, said: “And the second, like it, is this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these” (Mark 12:31).

No commandment greater than these? Jesus linked love for God and love for one’s neighbor to each other as the two greatest commandments, and those commandments were the greatest of all.

Again, Jesus wasn’t coming up with something new, something that the Jews hadn’t heard before. Instead, the call to love Him supremely — the idea of loving one’s neighbor and of loving other people as a way to express our love for God was, yes, taken from the book of Deuteronomy.

Study this week’s lesson to prepare for Sabbath, October 30.

Sunday–>

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p>Support for the mission activities of the Seventh-day Adventist church has always been part of the Sabbath School program. This video is Mission Spotlight for this week.
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=/Ol-d4C-5Ajk]

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Power of a Book

By Kazuhiro Hiraga

Nine-year-old Saki loved to read on the Japanese island of Okinawa. She especially loved to read books sold to her family by a kind stranger who had knocked on their door. Again and again she read the set of five books, Uncle Arthur’s Bedtime Stories. Her favorite story was about a boy named Wilford and his Surprise Package Company. Wilford liked to surprise people with gifts. Saki felt happy imagining the joy of the people who received the gifts.

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The books also introduced Saki to Jesus. Her family was not Christian. Her parents, like many people in Japan, did not worship Jesus. In the books, she read that Jesus loves children and wants to make them happy.

Saki grew up and moved to Tokyo, the capital of Japan. She got married and became the mother of two little boys. Somewhere along the way she lost her favorite Bedtime Stories books.

When her eldest son was old enough, she began to look for a school for him. Near their home, she noticed a private school called Tokyo Saniku Elementary School. Curiously, she looked up the school on the Internet. She was surprised to learn that it was a Seventh-day Adventist school. She had never heard of Adventists, so she looked for more information online. To her surprise, she read that Adventists not only have many schools but they also publish many books for children, including her beloved Bedtime Stories. She knew that she wanted her son to study at the Adventist school.

But first she wanted to know more about the Adventist Church. An Adventist church was located on the property of the Adventist school, and she began to attend its Sabbath worship services. She felt great peace as she sang hymns and listened to sermons.

Saki got hold of a new set of Bedtime Stories and began to read them to her sons. The boys loved the stories. As Saki read to her boys, she began to read another Book on her own – the Holy Bible. Just as her son started the first grade, she joined a Bible study group at the school. Months later, she gave her heart to Jesus and was baptized.

Today, Saki Takahagi, 35, still reads Bedtime Stories to her young sons. She also shares the Bible with them. She loves the Bible, and she loves Jesus.

Saki learned about Jesus through the Bedtime Stories and later by searching for information on the Internet. Part of this quarter’s Thirteenth Sabbath Offering will go to a project to help many Japanese people, especially young people, learn about Jesus through the Internet. Thank you for planning a generous offering.

Produced by the General Conference Office of Adventist Mission. Find more mission stories at adventistmission[dot]org

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Further Thought:

“The cross of Christ will be the science and the song of the redeemed through all eternity. In Christ glorified they will behold Christ crucified. Never will it be forgotten that He whose power created and upheld the unnumbered worlds through the vast realms of space, the Beloved of God, the Majesty of heaven, He whom cherub and shining seraph delighted to adore — humbled Himself to uplift fallen man; that He bore the guilt and shame of sin, and the hiding of His Father’s face, till the woes of a lost world broke His heart and crushed out His life on Calvary’s cross.

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That the Maker of all worlds, the Arbiter of all destinies, should lay aside His glory and humiliate Himself from love to man will ever excite the wonder and adoration of the universe. As the nations of the saved look upon their Redeemer and behold the eternal glory of the Father shining in His countenance; as they behold His throne, which is from everlasting to everlasting, and know that His kingdom is to have no end, they break forth in rapturous song: ‘Worthy, worthy is the Lamb that was slain, and hath redeemed us to God by His own most precious blood!’” — Ellen G. White, The Great Controversy, pages 651, 652.

Discussion Questions:

<–Thursday

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