#47. When God's Word is Preached, He Holds Us Accountable to Listen

Deuteronomy 18:18–19 — ‘I will raise up a prophet from among their countrymen like you, and I will put My words in his mouth, and he shall speak to them all that I command him. 19 ‘It shall come about that whoever will not listen to My words which he shall speak in My name, I Myself will require it of him.

God speaks to Moses at the giving of the 10 Commandments, promising that He would send a prophet to His people, who would be like Moses.  From this time on, the Jews were looking for the coming of "The Prophet" - the one like Moses.  In his sermon in Acts 3:17-26, Peter clearly tells his hearers that Jesus Christ is none other than "The Prophet" promised all those years ago by God to Moses and the people at Mount Horeb.

Just as it is the function of a priest to represent people before God, to speak to Him and make offerings to Him on their behalf, so it is the role of a prophet to speak to His people on behalf of God.  In our salvation, Jesus fulfills the types of the Old Covenant priests and prophets by becoming The Priest and The Prophet - the one mediator between God and man.

It is interesting that God says "The Prophet" will be like Moses.  In others words, as we look at the character and the life of Moses, we will see in them similarities to the character and the life of Christ Himself.  Here are a few striking aspects in which we may say that Jesus was like Moses.  Note that in every case, Moses was a shadow or type of Christ, Who possesses the fullness of the characteristic first seen in Moses:

• Moses, we are told, had a closer relationship with God than any man - God dealt with him as a friend, face to face (Exodus 33:11) or "mouth to mouth" (Numbers 12:8).  Jesus is the God-man, the eternally begotten of the Father, the One God often refers to in Scripture as "The Beloved".
• Moses was the most humble man on earth in his day (Numbers 12:3).  Jesus, too, is "gentle, and humble in heart" (Matthew 11:29)
• After meeting with God, Moses' face would shine with the glory of God, but it was a borrowed glory which faded away.  On the mount of transfiguration, something of the glory that was rightfully Christ's shone through and was seen by Peter, James and John, so that John would later write this: "And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us, and we saw His glory, glory as of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth."
• Moses was the mediator of the Old Covenant, but Christ was mediator of a better Covenant, inaugurated in His own blood and founded on better promises, as the writer to the Hebrews informs us.

Why does this matter?  Because God held the people accountable if they disregarded His words delivered to the people through Moses, and in our text He declares that He will require it of those who do not listen to the words of The Prophet Who was yet to come.  We saw earlier in this series that it is Christ Himself Who still speaks when the Word of God is faithfully preached.  He is still discharging the role He was given as The Prophet, declaring the Truth of God to the people.  He speaks of life and death, of heaven and hell. He speaks of the Father's love, of His mercy, of His grace - of His willingness to save to the uttermost all who come to Him through Jesus.

If people were held accountable for disregarding God's word through Moses, should we expect there to be no consequences for turning a deaf ear to The Prophet of Whom Moses was a type, a shadow?

In this day and age we are daily trained to be inattentive when someone is speaking.  When a person speaks to us on television, it is not considered rude to talk over the top of that person or to get up and make a cup of coffee.  The problem is that we bring that same behavior with us into church.  We get up and wander about in the sermon, perhaps grab a coffee, or whisper to our neighbor about something.  This is very dangerous behavior in the light of our text.  We have the unspeakable privilege that God speaks to us through His Word.  If we are present for that activity, may our text today be an encouragement to us to pay very close attention to what our King says to us, and to be quick to put it into practice!