What does the LORD require of you?

Yesterday I quoted a verse of the Bible without the reference and asked if anyone could identify the reference. There was no deep, underlying lesson in that. I was just curious if anyone would recognize this verse.

The verse is Deuteronomy 10:12...

And now, Israel, what does the LORD your God require of you, but to fear the LORD your God, to walk in all his ways, to love him, to serve the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul.

I chose this verse to identify because if you don’t know God is speaking to Israel, then you could just as easily think He was speaking to Matthew or Peter or Paul or Timothy.

In other words, this Old Testament teaching is the same teaching we hear throughout the New Testament.

There are many people who think that the God of the Old Testament is different from the God of the New Testament or that people were saved differently in the OT vs. the NT. But this is not true. What God required of his people before Christ came is the same He requires of us today. God required/requires…

1. Fear the LORD = revere his holiness (1 Peter 3:15)

2. Walk in his ways = obey Him (John 14:15)

3. Love Him = well… love Him (Matthew 22:37)

4. Serve the LORD = again… serve the LORD (Romans 12:11)

5. All your heart, etc = all your heart (Mark 12:30)

God is the same yesterday, today and forever. What He required in the OT is the exact same He required in the NT.

However, some would object and say that these things listed may be the same, but what about salvation? Didn’t Jesus come and die to put an end to the sacrificial system and change the way people are saved?

Yes and no.

Jesus did put away the sacrifice of animals because He is the perfect sacrifice offered once for all for our sins (Hebrews 9:11-28). He has fulfilled all righteousness (Matthew 3:15). So, there is no need for sacrificing animals because the perfect sacrifice has come.

He did not change how people get saved, though. David, Moses, Abraham, every OT “saint” was saved the same way we are today: by faith. They were saved by belief in the promise of God. So are we. God promised Abram that he would have a great many offspring. Abram believed that, and God credited it to him as righteousness (Genesis 15:6). He was saved by faith. It was a “forward” looking faith where ours is a “backward” looking faith. Paul makes this point in Romans 4 and Galatians 3. The works of the law do not save us. We are saved by faith in God’s Anointed One who fulfilled the righteous requirements of the law, sacrificed his blood for our transgressions, and counted us righteous based on his work not ours.

So, what does the LORD require of you? Fear Him, follow Him, love Him, and serve Him with all your being. We do this by faith in the only One who did all these things perfectly: Jesus Christ. It is his righteousness we are to display to the world.