Deuteronomy 33:23-29 Bible Study | Episode 961

June 16, 2025

Hope Alive: Applying God’s Word to Your Daily Life

Deuteronomy 33:23-29  Bible Study | Episode #961

I am Chad Harrison, and I am the teaching pastor of Lake Community Church and had been serving as a pastor for 25 years. I'm also a practicing attorney. This podcast is designed to help you study God's word and find God's will for your life. The purpose of studying scripture is that you might know the character of Jesus Christ, and that you might see the world from the Father's perspective. That you gain wisdom that changes your life. I pray in the name of Jesus right now that God would open His word to you and allow you to see Him and to know Him. To know His will, that you might glorify Him and that you might walk in faith and power each day, especially today. In Jesus name.

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Transcript

This is Chad Harrison and you're listening to Hope Applying God's word to your daily life.

Hi, this is Chad Harrison and I am the teaching pastor of Lake Community Church and have been serving as a pastor for 25 years.

I'm also a practicing attorney. This podcast is designed to help you study God's word and find God's will for your life.

I pray in the name of Jesus right now that God would open up.

His word to you and allow you.

To see him and to know him and to know his will, that you might glorify him and that you might walk in faith and power each and every day, especially today in Jesus name.

What we're dealing with this morning is we're dealing with the, with the tribes that Moses is pronouncing blessings on. And notice they're all, they are all blessings. Now, some of them are not the same blessings as others, but they are blessings.

And the blessings matter because it kind of identifies,

as we've been doing through this Bible study of this chapter, it identifies certain church people,

New Testament Christians, and it identifies, probably just like in Revelation 2 and 3,

the churches that we find there and the blessings and the cursings that God gives them and the warnings God gives them. And when I say cursings, they're not cursings, they're warnings what to do to fix their problems.

Here you don't find the warnings. What you do is you can read in the background why they're not receiving the blessings of others, but you don't see the straight up God giving them that warning that he does in Revelation chapter two and three.

And the final warning is to remove their lampstand, meaning that to remove their ability to be the light that God has made us to be in the world. And that's why we're here.

And so to have your lampstand removed is literally to have the reason for you to be in the world removed,

the purpose for the church and the body of Christ.

And so there have been churches that have had their lampstand removed. And if you'll notice, they tend to dwindle down to nothing really quickly.

And so when that happens,

it's a terrible thing to not be doing,

not be involved in the reason for you to be here, the reason for your existence. And so when I study through this,

I always want to make sure that I am looking for the things that God desires for me to do and make sure that I'm not involved in the things that,

that are gonna cause me not to be like to the world. And so we're gonna deal with Naphtali and Asher.

And you'll notice Naphtali has one verse, and then Asher has six verses. So there's a distinct. Gonna be a distinct difference between them. Just like Dan in the last Bible study, we kind of leaked over into verse 22.

Dan's a line whelp, he shall leap from Bashan.

Now that seems like a nice thing. Cause he's a lion and he's leaping, and that seems so good. But the truth is a lion whelp means that he never really grows up, never really becomes who he should be.

And he leaps from Bashan being a, you know,

pagan God.

Leap means to get away from, but it does not mean to overcome.

And so this, this in some ways seems like a really,

a really, really good, good thing. Because, you know, there are people who, in the church who stay away from paganism. They don't, they don't involve themselves in, in, in things that are just that ungodly and worldly,

but that's all they really do.

That. I mean, that's it.

So you can see how that, that doesn't.

That's, that's not a, that's not a taking of the promises of God that the promised land is promising.

It's not a taking of that. It's a, it's.

Well, it's,

it's a missing out, really. It's a missing out on the promises of God. And so when we get to Naftali said, oh, Naftali.

Now I want you to notice none of the other ones start out with,

oh, Naphtali satisfied with favor.

And notice what he says there. Satisfied with favor.

Meaning they're just satisfied that God loves them and that they have the favor of God and full of the blessing of the Lord. Meaning they're, they're, they're blessed people.

They're. They're, they're going to get good stuff.

You know, their part possess the west and the south.

Now, that's a, that's just a general statement.

He's saying, we're going to give you land in the west and near the south.

And so they're going to be near.

Really what they're going to be is they're going to be near Jerusalem. They're going to be near Judah and Benjamin, who are going to be the,

the places where God really, really ultimately builds his.

His.

His eternal kingdom.

They're going to be a part of that.

They're going to be involved in it. They're going to be satisfied with the favor of The Lord, and they're going to get the favor of God.

They're going to be. They're going to be full of his blessing because they have his favor.

But note. And they're going to possess what God's given them,

but they're not overcomers. There's. That's just kind of the end of it. And let me say this. This is not a bad place to be.

It's. It's not. I'm not diminishing this at all, because it's. It is. I mean, it is. They are taking what God's promised. They are.

They are full of his favor and his blessing and they're getting all the. All the good stuff. They're getting all the good stuff. Now, they might not be getting.

They may not be really taking territory that's not theirs. They're not. They're not overcoming great obstacles. They're. They're not.

I mean, you know, they are, but, you know, it's one of those things where it's good.

It's. It's really good.

It's not great.

And you go, well,

do you always want great? And you know, I don't know. Some people don't. And that's true. Some people just don't.

You know, some people are satisfied with being a professional athlete. Some. Some guys that are good enough to be. That are satisfied being it. Some of them are satisfied with being able to play in the league seven, eight years and be really,

really good at it. Some are not satisfied with anything but the greatest and winning every game they win.

And, you know, there is a difference between those. There. There is a,

you know,

cognizable difference between those.

And so some people want to see the greatness of God around them their whole life and they seek after it their whole life.

And they find it.

They do.

And God desires to give you his great overcoming power and he desires to show you great things in your life.

And so there's a difference between Naphtali and Asher.

And it's a subtle difference.

It is a subtle difference, but it is a difference.

And the reason is, is because they're just some that they don't have that, you know,

take everything that God has for you instinct. And you know the difference. You've seen the difference.

And you know, some would say the Ashers are radicals.

Well, you know,

radical for God. Yes.

You know, the. There was a song by DC Talk when I was a youth minister back 30 years ago. They're Jesus freaks.

Ashers, definitely Jesus freaks. Naftali.

They know what it is to be a Jesus freak. I mean, they do,

but. But not. They're not going to totally. I mean, they're not going nuts about it. And that's probably the difference. That. That is the difference. Asher is the most blessed of sons.

It said says in verse 24, let him be favored by his brothers and let him dip his foot in oil.

He's not only going to be anointed with oil, he's going to walk around and spread it everywhere. When he dips his foot in it,

he.

Everywhere he goes, things get changed. Your sandals shall be of iron and bronze,

and your days,

so shall your strength be.

Notice he is a part of all the work of God. He is spreading the oil of God. The iron and the bronze is even God's judgment, meaning because of who he is.

It's obvious that there is a difference between him and the others. There is a difference between.

God judges him to be the best.

I mean, that's really what this is telling us there. God. God is. God uses him as the example and proof that God does big things.

That God. God, you're not. You're not receiving God's best.

As your day, so shall your strength be.

He's saying every day of his life he's going to be powerful.

There's no one like the God of Jeshuran who rides the heavens to help you. And. And His Excellency on the clouds. What he's saying is he's got the full backing of God.

He's got the full backing of the Lord.

The eternal God is your refuge and underneath are the everlasting arms.

He will thrust out the enemy before you and will say destroy.

Notice he's victorious. I mean, you know, I guess that's the word probably we ought to use when we're making the difference between Naphtali and Asher.

He.

He is victorious.

He's a victorious person.

He walks not only in the blessings, he not only walks in the favor. He doesn't just take what God has given him. He's victorious and he destroys the enemy.

Then Israel shall dwell in safety in the fountain of Jacob alone in the land of grain and new wine. His heavens shall also drop dew.

What he's saying is he totally drives out the enemy.

It isn't just a place of blessing, it's in just a place of hope.

He makes it his. He takes control over it.

He dominates the area that's his and what comes from it? Well, Jacob is alone. Jacob doesn't have to worry about the enemy around them.

He gets the Grain, which is the fellowship and the new wine,

which is the new blessings of God, the new goodness of God.

Remember, wine stands for the, the, the, the goodness of God. And new wine stands for. He gets his. For his time, for his season. Not just, not just wine itself, but he gets the new wine that comes from,

comes from his faith.

And the heaven shall drop do, meaning God's sustaining him in supernatural ways. This is, it's a, it's a picture of, you know, God, God watering the, watering the earth without,

without the rain.

Rain's wonderful rains. A beautiful picture of God's blessing. But, but dew is a picture of God doing it in a way that they couldn't, they didn't know how that worked.

I mean, how does God make the grass wet in. At nighttime? I mean, how does he do that?

Well, that's that secret blessing of God that you can't see but you know is there. You know, and that's what he's saying here. You know, he's going to give them safety.

They're not going to have any of the enemy around them. They're going to have fellowship with God. They're going to have the wine that comes from their own faith, the goodness that comes from their own faith.

And they're going to have that secret blessing that, that do that you, you don't know what to do with. He says, happy are you, O Israel, who is like you, a people saved by the Lord.

Now we're transitioning to a general blessing from God.

And he says, who is like you, a people saved by the Lord. Now notice they're saved by God. So that's salvation.

The shield of your help. God protects them.

The sword of your majesty. I always put the W in because of my dyslexia. And reading letter by letter, the sword of your majesty, meaning God uses them for victory.

Your enemies shall submit to you and you shall tread down their high places.

So God's saying, I'm going to give you the promised land.

I'm gonna give you the promised land. Now, some take it in different ways and we see that and how they take it and how they receive the blessing of God is determinative on how it's going to go from then on.

And so as you're kind of studying through this,

I've said this before,

this is a great chapter. It seems like not, you know, I just.

Who wants to read the last song? And the, and the, and you know, the,

the blessings for each tribe?

I do. I really do. Why? Because God is showing us how he deals with the different types of people,

which really is a picture of the New Testament church.

And so,

you know, obviously, I'd love to be Naftali,

but Asher is.

That's the goal.

Asher's the goal to. To be totally victorious because.

Because of the radical faithfulness of God,

faithfulness to God, and God's faithfulness back to you.

And so it's good to kind of look through this and study it. I would. I would recommend that you go through it a couple of times and consider where you are and consider where you.

As you go today.

I pray that the Lord will bless.

You and keep you, that he'll make his face to shine upon you, and that he will give you hope and peace today in Jesus name.