Galena Bible Church
Sunday, November 23, 2025
  • Song
  • Song
  • I'd Rather Have Jesus
  • How Great is Our God
  • You Are My All In All
  • Open The Eyes Of My Heart

  • INTRO

    Good morning, church!
    Have you ever had an experience where your affections, your beliefs, and your understanding seem to be at odds with each other? Some of you who are self-reflective might know what I’m talking about, but those of you who can’t put your finger on it, let me give you a couple of examples.
    Have you ever said:
    “I’ll do anything, but don’t ask me to do _______”
    For example, your son, whom you love and feel like you’ve grown distant with, comes to you and says to you.
    “Dad, I feel like we’ve grown apart, and I don’t like it. I want to spend more time with you and reconnect. I love you, Dad. What do you say, we go on an outing just you and me.”
    How would you feel? Pretty great, right? This is what you’ve wanted, it’s what your heart desires, right?
    What if he comes back and says, I booked us a skydiving trip for just the two of us next weekend.
    That would be where I would invoke the:
    “I’ll do anything with you, but don’t ask me to go sky diving.”
    My heart might be with him, but I can’t in my right mind go through with that.
    Here is another example: Say you've been studying and reading about him, and you realize that maybe you’d be better off not eating after a certain time in the evening. You know that is better for you, you know that you want to be healthier, but you occasionally go for the cookie jar at 10-11 PM to fulfill your craving.
    My point with these illustrations is that we are complex beings. We aren’t computers where you input something, and then you produce in reference to what you’ve put in. No, we are much more complex than that. We are a mixture of:
    Will
    Thoughts/beliefs
    Affections
    And while it would be easy for us to think that one leads to another, like if I love my son enough, it will be easy to go sky diving, or if I just study health more, it will stop me from getting into the cookie jar late at night. We don’t work that way.
    I mention this because as we get into our text, we need this point of reference that is common of all humans after Genesis 3.
    We need this point of reference to understand the charge in Deuteronomy 6 to choose God’s way over our own. Moses, in this chapter, gives a charge to choose God’s way, prepares the people for the obstacles against choosing God’s way, and even gives them the script to learn, memorize, and pass on to the next generation so that they would remember to choose God’s way.
    Yet, at the end of the book of Deuteronomy, Moses tells them, flat out: YOU WILL FAIL! And they do fail, just read the book of Judges to find out.
    So what we need for Deuteronomy 6 is to see how it fits into the whole book, and have the reference of how our “hearts” work (will, thoughts, affections) to understand what the message of this chapter is.
    Deuteronomy 6 reveals that the covenant life demands a choice from us and necessitates that God change our hearts.
    Let us commit our time to the Lord and ask Him to help us understand and apply His word. Let us PRAY.

    THE PROBLEM WITH THE GREATEST COMMANDMENT (5:28-29)

    We are in Deuteronomy 6, but we need a running start before we jump into it.
    At the end of Deuteronomy 5, we have the retelling of the story when Israel after escaping from Egypt, having seen the power of God in the 10 plagues, and in the splitting of the Red Sea. I mean, just imagine, they walk across dry land, and then moments later, Pharaoh, who was behind them, also walking on dry land, gets engulfed by the Red Sea. I mean, that could have been them at any moment, they were walking on dry land, but really they were walking by faith that God wasn’t going to let the waters come over them.
    So, they witnessed the power of God, who freed them from slavery and brought them to Mount Sinai. Remember from last week’s sermon how they were afraid to come up on the mountain. So they tell Moses to go up for them because they were fearful of God. They knew that if God willed it, they would be gone from the face of this world. Look at what they say as Moses retells the story at the end of Deuteronomy 5. As we read verses 28-29, I want you to think about what these verses tell us about God’s character.
    Deuteronomy 5:28–29 ESV
    “And the Lord heard your words, when you spoke to me. And the Lord said to me, ‘I have heard the words of this people, which they have spoken to you. They are right in all that they have spoken. Oh that they had such a heart as this always, to fear me and to keep all my commandments, that it might go well with them and with their descendants forever!
    God tells Moses that they are right in their decision not to come up the mountain. They had the correct thinking about God and the right kind of reverent fear of God. Yet verse 29 is so insightful and essential for understanding Deuteronomy.
    God says, “Oh that they had such a heart as this always.”
    This phrase alone tells us at least three things about God and His people.
    First, it tells us that God knows that they won’t have a heart like this always. He knows that the status of their heart is so temporary. In fact, if you remember the story, Moses took to long up on the mountain and so they built themselves a golden calf to worship. It didn’t last long. My point is this, God knew and knows that their problem was a heart problem. It was their heart that needed change in order that they might fear Him rightly and keep his commandments.
    Second, not only does it reveal the problem that keeps them from keeping the commandments, but it also reveals God’s character. He takes pleasure when His people have a heart for him, as Israel said to Moses in verse 27.
    Deuteronomy 5:27 ESV
    Go near and hear all that the Lord our God will say, and speak to us all that the Lord our God will speak to you, and we will hear and do it.’
    I mean, God takes pleasure when we heed to His word. A phrase that has been going around the Guerra household has been,
    “all the way, right away, and with a happy heart.”
    We say this to our kids when they aren’t listening to us rightly. Like when we say, eat three more bites before you can leave the dinner table, knowing that if they don’t eat, they will call us throughout the night telling us that they are hungry. Or when we tell them that they have put their coat on before we walk out of the house, but they keep thinking of other things to do. We say:
    “all the way, right away, and with a happy heart.”
    I as an earthly father take pleasure when my kids obey me, not because it boosts my ego, but because what I am asking them to do is for their own good.
    I think it is right and good to read that tone from God in verse 29 of Chapter 5.
    Deuteronomy 5:29 ESV
    Oh that they had such a heart as this always, to fear me and to keep all my commandments, that it might go well with them and with their descendants forever!
    Lastly, we have to ask, what was unique about this moment that God acknowledged their heart as being right? Despite it being so momentary, what was about this moment that placed God in the right place in their hearts?
    My thesis, which I think Deuteronomy 6 supports and elaborates, is that because they had the right view of God literally front and center of their mind, they were ready to choose God’s way. They were ready to say, “whatever God tells you, Moses, that we need to do, we will do it.”
    The problem is that their hearts, infected with Sin could not stay in that status very long.
    So our running start reveals that the problem lies in the hearts of these people.

    WE MUST CHOOSE THE GREATEST COMMANDMENT (6:1-9)

    With an understanding of the key problem, we can then jump into Deuteronomy 6, where Moses, in preparing God’s people to enter and take the Land of Promise, charges them to follow/choose the first and greatest commandment. We are going to re-read the first three verses, and I want you to see how Moses speaks of both the affections and the will. They are to choose to obey, which Moses says will make you fear the Lord (pointing us back to that moment in Deuteronomy 5).
    Deuteronomy 6:1–3 ESV
    “Now this is the commandment—the statutes and the rules—that the Lord your God commanded me to teach you, that you may do them in the land to which you are going over, to possess it, that you may fear the Lord your God, you and your son and your son’s son, by keeping all his statutes and his commandments, which I command you, all the days of your life, and that your days may be long. Hear therefore, O Israel, and be careful to do them, that it may go well with you, and that you may multiply greatly, as the Lord, the God of your fathers, has promised you, in a land flowing with milk and honey.
    Notice verse 2, how are they to develop this right fear of the LORD their God? How are they and their sons and their grandchildren to develop this fear of the Lord? … by keeping all his statutes and his commandments.
    This is key! The keeping of the “ten words” that God gave to Moses to give to Israel was supposed to have an internal effect on them. Yet, Romans 8, will tell us that it was insufficient to actually change the heart, but nevertheless, God’s word tells us that in the keeping of the “ten words,” that is, in allowing them over and over and over to drive them back to God when they were to break them, it was suppose to do something to them. It was supposed to instill the right fear in their heart. To remember that the one they have offended in breaking one of the “ten words” was God, who brought them out of Egypt, who could have destroyed the whole nation when they walked across the Red Sea by letting the waters consume them. It was supposed to do something to them internally; instill reverence toward God.

    10=1=1

    So what were they supposed to keep? What was it that, in keeping, would begin to affect them internally? Moses summarizes the “ten words” in “one word.”
    Here is some Bible math for you, 10=1=2.
    I know that there are a number of engineers and mathematicians among us, but you don’t have to be a mathematician to know that this equation doesn’t add up. And yet, that’s the equation the Bible gives us.
    Let me show you.
    First, 10=1.
    Moses, who had about 40 years to reflect on all that he had seen, gives us a theological summation of the “ten words.” Moses gives us the bottom line. And it is this. Read verses 4-5 with me.
    Deuteronomy 6:4–5 ESV
    “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might.
    We could spend a lot of time on just these two verses. Whole sermons have been devoted to these two verses. But I’d like to stay on this line of thinking that we began in Deuteronomy 5:28-29. Moses summarizes the “ten words” with the beginning of the first word (Deut. 5:6). He says, Yahweh, is our God.
    When someone was to ask a Jew, Who is God, they were supposed to say, “Yahweh is our God, Yahweh is one.” In the Hebrew Bible, it reads more literally as, “Yahweh one” there is no “is.” Some translations, therefore, translate it as “Yahweh is our God, Yahweh alone.” I’m not good enough with Hebrew to argue with the Hebrew syntax, but I do think that the statement was not supposed to answer, “How many is God?” (although, we know there is only one triune God). Rather, it was more concerned with answering, “Who is God?” or “Who is your God?”
    To that, the answer is Yahweh is our God.
    Then we have the command. Listen, this command is a hefty one. Love God, with what? EVERYTHING. Heart, soul, and might are meant to communicate “with all that you are and have.” You love Him with everything.
    Now, remember, what is the problem? Our heart?! So, how could they ever fulfill this command to love God with all?
    In the context of Deuteronomy, which is a long charge to choose life or death, blessing or curse. I think we ought to read that into this charge. Choose to love God. Our hearts are broken but they are able to choose. They may not, and will not follow through with that choice, but the call is to choose. Choose to love God with all that you are.
    So, 10=1=2.
    Jesus, in Matthew, gets asked by the Pharisees to “test him.” They ask what is the greatest commandment? What does Jesus say?
    Matthew 22:37–40 ESV
    And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.”
    WE MUST CHOOSE THE GREATEST COMMANDMENT (6:1-9)
    10=1=2
    Jesus summarizes the “ten words” with Moses’ words and gives a second one. He says, “The second is like it.” Meaning, the second one of loving one's neighbor is connected to, or in relation to, the first.
    In other words, when you do the first, you can do the second.
    More specifically, when you love God, your love for Him will lead you to contentment, satisfaction, and rest, which keeps you from stealing, from adultery, from coveting, and from idolatry.
    We also see Jesus’ words here categorized as the “ten words.” Those that pertain to God and those that pertain with one another.
    10=1=2.
    Coming back to our text in Deuteronomy, Moses tells Israel to put these words (his summary of the “ten words”), on their heart. He even tells them how to do that.
    To summarize what he tells them, he says speak of it all the time, teach it and pass it on to your kids and grandkids, write it where you will see it, and where others will see it.
    Essentially, let the reminder to choose to love God with everything you are and have be constant in your home. Notice that this isn’t just personal, but he charges parents and grandparents to pass on this choice, this command to love God with everything.
    Sharing this command with others is mutually beneficial. Many of our FBH teachers if you ask them why they like to teach, they wil often say, that it’s good for them. Not only is it good for them to dig into the scriptures, but it is good for our church as we benefit from their ministry. When we share God’s truth, we are reminded of that very truth.
    Something for all of us to think about as we enter the holiday season. How can we share our faith with our kids or grandkids at Thanksgiving and at Christmas? It doesn’t have to be complicated, but we ought to show it and remind those around us of the call to love God with everything we are and have.

    THE THREATS TO THE GREATEST COMMANDMENT (6:10-19)

    Moses seeks to prepare God’s people for the land of promise not only by giving them the command, the summary of the “ten words,” but also by equipping them by telling them about the potential threats to the greatest commandment.
    In verses 10-19, I find that Moses gives three warnings of potential threats that would distract God’s people from choosing to love God with everything.
    The Threat of Abundance (6:10-13)
    The Threat of Surrounding Idolatry (6:14-15)
    The Threat of Hardship (6:16-19)
    The first one is the threat of abundance.
    Moses tells Israel that when they possess the land, they will be tempted to forget God. Read Deuteronomy 6:10-13
    Deuteronomy 6:10–13 ESV
    “And when the Lord your God brings you into the land that he swore to your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give you—with great and good cities that you did not build, and houses full of all good things that you did not fill, and cisterns that you did not dig, and vineyards and olive trees that you did not plant—and when you eat and are full, then take care lest you forget the Lord, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. It is the Lord your God you shall fear. Him you shall serve and by his name you shall swear.
    It’s ironic, isn’t it? The very blessing of the Promised Land is at the same time a threat to forgetting the greatest commandment. Moses says, TAKE CARE LEST YOU FORGET!
    We all tend to forget, even the things that are constant. Like your teenager’s curfew, always the same, but you do well in reminding them, because they are prone to forget.
    Or like our home, Laura reminds me every Thursday night, that it’s trash night. Every Thursday, it has been that way since we moved in, but she still reminds me, because I forget! We are prone to forget.
    Yet Moses’ warning here is a serious one. DON’T FORGET GOD WHO BROUGHT YOU OUT OF EGYPT.
    You know, you might have forgotten the exact words of your wedding vows, but you ought never to forget the commitment of loyalty you made to your spouse. Yet, that’s Moses’ warning: the comforts you will enjoy from God are the very thing that threatens your continual choice to love God. It’s serious because the problem with our hearts is serious.
    Second, there is the threat of surrounding idolatry.
    Israel is to go into Canaan, but not become Canaanites. They are to go in and possess the land, and not worship their idols and false gods. Look at how Moses says it in Deuteronomy 6:14-15
    Deuteronomy 6:14–15 ESV
    You shall not go after other gods, the gods of the peoples who are around you— for the Lord your God in your midst is a jealous God—lest the anger of the Lord your God be kindled against you, and he destroy you from off the face of the earth.
    The warning here goes back to the second commandment: not having any other gods before Yahweh, because our God is a jealous God who will take offense at this kind of disloyalty. Moses is saying, He who made you into a nation, who brought you out of slavery, who gave you the land, where you enjoy the fruit, the luxuries that you did not even build! God takes idolatry very seriously, as we see here.
    Listen, these words from Moses aren’t like the words we read in the book of Revelation; there is no imagery or allegory. It’s plain. Do not become a Canaanite. YAHWEH IS YOUR GOD.
    Church, I fear we sometimes play with this line, leaving it unclear to whom we belong. Instead of being concerned with God’s mission, we adopt the “idols” of this world. The idols of comfort and safety. May we take care lest we do whatever is necessary to worship these idols and those like it.
    Church, let us be careful not to become Canaanites; let it be clear to all, YAHWEH IS OUR GOD.
    Lastly, there is the threat of hardship (6:16-19)
    Just read with me verse 16.
    Deuteronomy 6:16 ESV
    “You shall not put the Lord your God to the test, as you tested him at Massah.
    Maybe you remember the story in Massah. Israel, on their way to Mount Sinai, is in a very dangerous situation of having no water. This is dangerous for them, for the livestock. It was serious, but God provided, yet in God’s provision, we see in Exodus 17:7 that the problem was not the water but their hearts.
    Exodus 17:7 ESV
    And he called the name of the place Massah and Meribah, because of the quarreling of the people of Israel, and because they tested the Lord by saying, “Is the Lord among us or not?”
    The Threat of Abundance (6:10-13)
    The Threat of Surrounding Idolatry (6:14-15)
    The Threat of Hardship (6:16-19)
    Here we have the diagnosis from God of the situation. The people questioned God’s faithfulness. How could they say or think that about God, after all that He has done and promised them? They would test God by overlooking His character. That is testing Him.
    So, the threat that Moses warns God’s people about in recalling this incident in Massah is that although they can expect to experience hardship, they ought never to question or lack trust in God’s faithfulness.
    All of these threats, as presented by Moses, are to be combatted by the reminder of who God is. That’s the defense against these threats.
    If you remember the story of Jesus in the wilderness, when He is being tempted by Satan. Two of the three responses from Jesus to Satan come from Deuteronomy 6.
    When Satan tempts Jesus to jump off the top of the temple and have His angels catch him. Jesus responds, quoting Deuteronomy 6:16, “you shall not put God to the test.”
    When Satan brings Jesus to the top of the mountain and offers Him all of the kingdoms of the world… Jesus quotes Deuteronomy 6:13 “it is God you shall fear (reverence/worship) and serve Him only.”
    Jesus defended himself against the hardships, the idols, and the temptation of abundance with Moses’ words to Israel, all of which are references to God’s holy character. He is Yahweh our God.
    Jesus’ defense was supposed to be Israel’s defense, but unlike Jesus, Israel failed to love God above everything else.

    THE BASIS FOR THE GREATEST COMMANDMENT (6:20-25)

    Moses prepares Israel with the command to love God, the potential threats when they get to the land, and now, in the last five verses of our passage, gives us the basis of the greatest commandment. Moses presents it in the form of a question.
    Let’s read the last 5 verses together.
    Deuteronomy 6:20–25 ESV
    “When your son asks you in time to come, ‘What is the meaning of the testimonies and the statutes and the rules that the Lord our God has commanded you?’ then you shall say to your son, ‘We were Pharaoh’s slaves in Egypt. And the Lord brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand. And the Lord showed signs and wonders, great and grievous, against Egypt and against Pharaoh and all his household, before our eyes. And he brought us out from there, that he might bring us in and give us the land that he swore to give to our fathers. And the Lord commanded us to do all these statutes, to fear the Lord our God, for our good always, that he might preserve us alive, as we are this day. And it will be righteousness for us, if we are careful to do all this commandment before the Lord our God, as he has commanded us.’
    What a great answer! What is the meaning of these statutes?
    Moses instructs the people to answer first by stating what God did. He rescued them from slavery. He made a whole nation out of them, and gave them this land. Moses makes the script personal. He says to tell your sons, you saw the wonders God did “before our eyes.” Meaning, I saw God, I witnessed God save me, and bring me to this place.
    So, in light of what God has done, the script continues with the command. They are to do all the statutes, to fear the Lord, FOR OUR GOOD ALWAYS.
    The heavenly father has made them His covenant people, and blessed them, and the commands are for their good! The script Moses gives is to teach the next generation, GOD’S WAY IS BETTER THAN OUR WAY.
    Listen, church, I know that sometimes turning the other cheek when someone strikes you doesn’t seem like the better way.
    I know that Jesus’ words about when a person sues you for your tunic, that you are to give them your cloak as well, doesn’t seem like the better way.
    I know that loving your enemies and praying for those who persecute you doesn’t seem like the better way.
    The better way for us is to hit back hard enough that they think twice about coming back for more. The better way to us to fight back. The better way for us is to take vengeance ourselves.
    Church, YAHWEH IS OUR GOD, and His way is better than our way.

    THE SOLUTION TO THE GREATEST COMMANDMENT

    Do you believe that? If not, let me encourage you to write Deuteronomy 6:4-5 on a note card and put it on your bathroom mirror. Memorize it and recite it daily. Talk to your kids and grandkids about it. We need to make the constant decision to choose to love God more than breathing. This choice to love him is then expressed in our trust that His way is better than our way.
    But, choosing something that we can’t keep perfectly does not solve the problem we presented at the beginning. The problem of our hearts.
    As we end here, let me invite you to turn your Bibles to Deuteronomy 30. Moses gets to the end of his series of sermons and tells the people, not “if” they fail, but “when you fail.” Moses knows that they will fail; they cannot fulfill the greatest commandment as God desires them to, because their hearts are infected by Sin and so therefore they will choose death instead of life.
    So in Deuteronomy 30, when they fail, Moses tells them the way back. After they fail, they are to turn back to God, and Moses tells them something key. Look at what Moses writes in Deuteronomy 30:6
    Deuteronomy 30:6 ESV
    And the Lord your God will circumcise your heart and the heart of your offspring, so that you will love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul, that you may live.
    Here it is! Here is the solution to the heart problem. Circumcision of the heart. We need a heart transplant that will allow us to love God with everything we are and have. Where and when does this happen?
    THE SOLUTION TO THE GREATEST COMMANDMENT
    In a much more significant way than the miracles that Israel witnessed in their journey from Egypt to the acquisition of the Promised Land.
    In a much more significant way than the eloquence of Moses in delivering his final sermons to Israel to prepare them for the promised land and deliver to them the law on two tablets.
    Jesus came and rescued us from the bondage of sin and death, which is far more marvelous than the 10 plagues and the crossing of the Red Sea.
    Jesus came and did not deliver the law on tablets, but wrote them in the tablets of our hearts.
    Paul writes in Colossians 2:11
    Colossians 2:11 ESV
    In him also you were circumcised with a circumcision made without hands, by putting off the body of the flesh, by the circumcision of Christ,
    BLANK
    Our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, in paying for our sins, and displaying God’s immense love for you and me, has changed our hearts by faith. Not that we love God with everything perfectly, but that we grow in our love for Him. In Christ, through His Spirit, our inner man is changing so that Christ may take up permanent residence in our hearts, as Paul prays in Ephesians.
    The message of Deuteronomy 6 reveals that the covenant life demands a choice from us and necessitates that God change our hearts.
    We started by talking about our hearts in terms of:
    Will
    Thoughts/beliefs
    Affections
    You see, although Sin has affected every aspect of our heart, because of being in Christ, and having the Holy Spirit dwelling in us by faith in Him, we are able to change. That change brought about by the Holy Spirit enables us to choose the greatest commandment, to love God with all that we are, and to share that choice with those around us.

    OUTRO

    One way we demonstrate the choice we’ve made to love and obey him to those around us is by celebrating the Lord’s Supper.
    I’m going to invite the brothers to come up and pass the bread now.
    If you are visiting and you have placed your faith in Christ for salvation, we invite you to join us in partaking in the bread and the cup. But if you are unsure of where you stand with God, we ask that you let the elements pass.
    Colin Williams will come and pray for the bread.
    READ: 1 Cor 11:23-24
    1 Corinthians 11:23–24 (ESV)
    that the Lord Jesus on the night when he was betrayed took bread, 24 and when he had given thanks, he broke it, and said, “This is my body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.”
    (PAUSE)
    Tom O’Toole will now come up to pray for the cup.
    READ: 1 Cor 11:25-26
    1 Corinthians 11:25–26 ESV
    25 In the same way also he took the cup, after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.” 26 For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes.
    Amen!
    Please stand as Pastor Gary comes now for the closing prayer and benediction.

      • Hebrews 12.5-6ESV

      • Hebrews 12.7-8ESV

      • Hebrews 12.9-10ESV

      • Hebrews 12.11ESV

      • Deuteronomy 8.17-18ESV

      • Revelation 3.17ESV

      • Revelation 3.18-19ESV

      • Deuteronomy 8.19-20ESV

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