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Deuteronomy 17:12-13   Anyone who shows contempt for the judge or for the priest who stands ministering there to the LORD your God is to be put to death.  You must purge the evil from Israel.  All the people will hear and be afraid, and will not be contemptuous again.

As the LORD’s Covenant People were about to enter the Promised Land and settle among the residents there, there was a very big risk that they would adopt, or at least be influenced by, their established culture and religious practices involving other gods.  It was because of these practices that the LORD’s wrath and judgement was coming upon the Canaanites, etc, to remove them from their land and replace them in it with his own Covenant People.

From our perspective we can see that God’s concerns were not unfounded.  To prevent this happening they had to be given very strict rules about how to deal decisively with the slightest defection from what God laid down, because of the potential spread of the error throughout the community, and the harm this would bring them.  Because of his great love for us, his discipline is always for our own ultimate good.As the author of Hebrews says, quoting Proverbs 3:11-12, “And have you completely forgotten this word of encouragement that addresses you as a father addresses his son?  It says, ‘My son, do not make light of the Lord’s discipline, and do not lose heart when he rebukes you, because the Lord disciplines the one he loves, and he chastens everyone he accepts as his son.’” (Hebrews 12:5-6)

This side of the cross, where we see God’s compassion, grace, love and mercy so clearly displayed, we see the instructions given through Moses to be too harsh for our modern sensitivities, and therefore we have legislated against capital punishment, and even to place strict restrictions on the use of corporal punishment.  Whereas the use of capital, and especially corporal, punishment can be too readily abused in our fallen world, there is a cost to our leniency and we now live in a society where discipline and authority are almost non-existent, which makes teaching and parenting much more difficult and stressful than they were in the ‘good old days’.  (Nostalgia isn’t what it used to be!).

We might contend that our understanding is now more developed and sophisticated, but at least in the light of our present experiences we can appreciate the value of God’s instructions to Moses, and of Solomon’s wisdom in Proverbs 22:15 – “Folly is bound up in the heart of a child, but the rod of discipline will drive it far away.”

– Bruce Christian