God intervenes in our lives in various ways. He has revealed Himself to us as our Healer, Deliver, Defender, Helper, Shepherd, and Savior. In every way that He has intervened, God has shown us His grace, mercy, and power.
We are all in desperate need of His intervention to help and save us from our diseases, distresses, and sins. We need His intervention when the enemy comes in to steal, kill, and destroy. The history of mankind has proven that we face troubles on every side, conflicts all around, and fears within.Isaiah 40 tells us, we are weak and need strength, but God gives power and increases strength. Throughout all of our situations and distresses, God has proven to be a very present help. God has chosen to come to our aid through personal and powerful intervention.
In Deuteronomy 29, God made a covenant with His people.Moses was standing before the whole congregation of Israel. He started talking to them about everything the Lord did before their eyes in the land of Egypt. He reminded them of the signs and wonders that were done to bring them out of captivity and bondage. Then Moses declared how God walked with them 40 years in the wilderness and kept them clothed and fed. Then he told them about an everlasting covenant of blessing that God was making with them.
Deuteronomy 29:9-15 NKJV Therefore keep the words of this covenant, and do them, that you may prosper in all that you do. All of you stand today before the Lord your God: that you may enter into covenant with the Lord your God, and into His oath, which the Lord your God makes with you today, that He may establish you today as a people for Himself, and that He may be God to you, just as He has spoken to you, and just as He has sworn to your fathers, to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. “I make this covenant and this oath, not with you alone, but with him who stands here with us today before the Lord our God, as well as with him who is not here with us today
It is important for us to understand what God is saying. God was making a covenant to intervene in our lives. God was making a covenant and oath with those who were standing before God and with those who were not there.
The wording of God’s covenant was extensive.
- God committed all of His resources to bless and prosper His people.
- He would keep them from all of the diseases that came upon Egypt.
- He would bless their labors and defeat their enemies.
- He would ensure all of His promises and perform them.
Then God warned that if they failed to keep the covenant, and persisted to go their own way, disaster would come. God’s warning was very clear. If they forsook the Lord and His covenant, all of the curses written in the Book of the Law would come on them. The judgment would be severe and devastating.
In the abundance of grace and mercy, God made a promise to intervene in Deuteronomy 30. God is establishing a Biblical pattern and promise to intervene in our lives. This is a good word of God’s promise for each of us when we do the right and when we do wrong.
Deuteronomy 30:1-3 NKJV Now it shall come to pass, when all these things come upon you, the blessing and the curse which I have set before you, and you call them to mind among all the nations where the Lord your God drives you, and you return to the Lord your God and obey His voice, according to all that I command you today, you and your children, with all your heart and with all your soul, that the Lord your God will bring you back from captivity, and have compassion on you…
God is telling His people, “When you remember what I have promised and start walking in obedience to the faith, I will intervene in your lives.” God is laying some wonderful promises before His people. He promised that these events would be the natural consequences of their actions.
God told them that wars, pestilence, disease, and exile from their homeland would come. Then God said, “When all those things happen, I want you to remember what I am saying.”These kinds of things are happening all around our world. God said, “I want these events to be a wakeup call.” He said, “I want you to take them to heart!” These things are exactly what the Lord said would happen.
God is saying, “I want to make things right again.” What does that mean? God is ready to intervene with grace, mercy and power. He wants to be close to you and have wonderful fellowship. He wants to bring you into the fullness of His joy.
God wants to intervene in your life. God is telling us to take a look around and see how things are going.
The first step in receiving the blessing of God’s covenant is for us to return to the Lord our God and obey His voice. When we begin seeing troubles and distresses, we need to remember God’s covenant and cry out to God and return to Him.
Deuteronomy 28:1-2 NKJV “Now it shall come to pass, if you diligently obey the voice of the Lord your God, to observe carefully all His commandments which I command you today, that the Lord your God will set you high above all nations of the earth. And all these blessings shall come upon you and overtake you, because you obey the voice of the Lord your God…
Is it time to say: “We don’t have to live this way?” God has made a covenant of blessing. He promised that when we return to Him, blessings would overtake us. In other words, “You cannot outrun God’s blessing.” God promised to bless you in the city and in the country. He will bless your storehouses and everything in which you set your hand.
You see, the Lord said, “You do not have to settle for disaster and plague.” Our God is a turnaround God. Perhaps it is time to remember what He has promised.
God made a specific promise in Deuteronomy 30 that will help us in any situation that we face. You need to remember that this is God’s plan for His blessing. God wants to have our undivided attention. We are to love the Lord our God with all of our heart, mind and soul and serve Him. When God made this covenant with His people, He told them when they returned to Him, He would have compassion. In Jeremiah 33:3, God said, “Call to Me, and I will answer you, and show you great and mighty things, which you do not know.”
That brings us to the second half — the Lord’s promise to intervene.
Deuteronomy 30:3-5 NIV84 Then the Lord your God will restore your fortunes and have compassion on you and gather you again from all the nations where he scattered you. Even if you have been banished to the most distant land under the heavens, from there the Lord your God will gather you and bring you back. He will bring you to the land that belonged to your fathers, and you will take possession of it. He will make you more prosperous and numerous than your fathers.
God has promised to intervene and restore. He will restore what has been lost because of sin. He told Joel, “I will restore to you the years that the swarming locust has eaten.” God knows how to restore what the enemy has stolen and destroyed. He will restore what has been eaten up by the plague.
Many people have lost a vital part of their relationship with God and do not know that it is missing. God wants to restore what is missing in believer’s lives. He wants to restore the joy, peace, and rejoicing. The Lord said through the Prophet Joel: “I will repay you for the years the locusts have eaten,” (Joel 2:25).
When things are right between you and God, everything begins to work better. God begins showering His blessings on us in natural and supernatural ways.
The second phase of God’s intervention is renewal.
Deuteronomy 30:6 NLT The Lord your God will change your heart and the hearts of all your descendants, so that you will love Him with all your heart and soul and so you may live!
The emphasis is internal. Romans 12:2 talks about the renewing of your mind. God is ready to bring an increase of joy, peace and love. In Deuteronomy 30:2, God calls on us to return to Him with all our heart and soul. He promised that when we do that, He will have compassion and will intervene for us.
God does not want to merely intervene externally, He wants to overflow your innermost being with His joy. God is offering the incomparable riches of divine heart surgery. God is enabling us to love Him and serve Him. He is enabling us to live in peace with Him and with other believers. He is prepared to pour His Spirit upon us. He is going to cut out the things in us that need to go.
When God intervenes in our lives, He will give us a new heart that is full to overflowing with the joy of the Lord. When we return to Him, He sets our hearts free. God knows how to get rid of the things that bind and hurt us. He knows how to break the chains that have bruised and wounded our spirit, mind, and soul. He renews us to the purpose we were intended.
The last response of the Lord is… Rejoicing
Deuteronomy 30:9 NKJV The Lord your God will make you abound in all the work of your hand, in the fruit of your body, in the increase of your livestock, and in the produce of your land for good. For the Lord will again rejoice over you for good as He rejoiced over your fathers…
Did you hear what He said? God is going to rejoice and be full of delight over you. Did you know that when God restores us He rejoices? Have you ever considered that God rejoices over you? God your heavenly Father rejoices over us.God is ready for times of rejoicing. Every time we return to Him, there is rejoicing in heaven.
The rejoicing that we experience is an overflow of God’s rejoicing. God’s joy just spills over into our lives. His joy becomes our strength.
- Have you looked around at the condition of things in your life and your family?
- Have you seen the state of our community and nation?
- Have you seen what is going on around you?
- Are you ready for something more?
It is time to REMEMBER God’s promise of intervention.
It is time to RETURN to the Lord.
The Lord is ready to RESTORE your life.
He is ready to RENEW your heart and your spirit.
He wants to REJOICE over you.
What can we do?
Acts 3:19-21 NKJV Repent therefore and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out, so that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord, and that He may send Jesus Christ, who was preached to you before, whom heaven must receive until the times of restoration of all things, which God has spoken by the mouth of all His holy prophets since the world began.
Restoration, renewal, and rejoicing are part of this refreshing that comes from the presence of the Lord. We cannot afford to forget God’s refreshing.
- When refreshing comes, you will have joy in your soul.
- When refreshing comes, you will have a new song.
- When refreshing comes, life smells new.
- Refreshing chases the clouds and darkness away.
- Refreshing removes the stain and the pain.
- Refreshing conquers the quilt.
- Refreshing brings victory.
- Refreshing deals with doom and gloom.
- Refreshing brings renewal and revival.
Every believer needs refreshing. Your soul, spirit, and body needs refreshing. When the rivers of refreshing flow, love abounds and joy is increased! Weariness of the way ends when the river of refreshing flows! The hardness and distress melts away when we are refreshed!
He said the refreshing would come from the presence of God when we repent.
Here is what needs to happen.
We need to present ourselves to the Holy Spirit for inspection. Here I am Holy Spirit, do your work on me. Don’t stop until you have searched me thoroughly. Don’t stop with the trivial things that I am willing present. Dig deeply into my life. Find everything I have hidden and excused. Find anything I have overlooked or justified. Search me, O God, and know my heart today. If you find anything that should not be, take it out and cleanse me.
