Blessings and Curses -- the Heart of the Pentateuch in Deuteronomy 28
- mww
- Nov 12
- 15 min read
Our relationship with God is revealed by obedience and disobedience.
Bible Study Ideas and Commentary for Deuteronomy 28
Moses boils down the entire covenant between God and His people in this week's passage. Obedience on the part of the people will lead to blessings in the form of abundant living; disobedience will lead to that abundance being taken away (as a curse). The choice is theirs. Likewise, we have a similar choice to make as Christians today (with a similar stake).
Now if you faithfully obey the Lord your God . . . (28:1)
There's not much to explain in this week's passage. The blessings and curses are as straightforward as they get. Just make sure your group understands how these blessings and curses play out in Christians' lives today.
Getting Started: Things to Think About
How Does This Thing Work?
What's something you own that has to be operated in a very specific, careful way? I recently rented a piece of equipment that turned out to be very picky about the choke. I learned quickly, but my lesson was that it was going to tell me how it wanted to be operated, and not the other way around.
If you can do this safely, bring that thing into your Bible study and invite someone else in your group to try to use it. Then, when they can't, show off your skill by making it look easy.
If that's not an option, ask a more general question of "when was the last time you had to call someone for help using a piece of equipment?" In another sign that civilization is crumbling around us, I'm the IT guy for our church. And most of the time, I can figure out how to make whatever work. (And when I can't, I have to call somebody who charges an absurd amount of money per hour.) But there are so many "tips and tricks".
To me, there are very few things more frustrating (and upsetting) than not being able to make something work right. (Close behind is trying and failing to use an incomprehensible user manual.) Conversely, it's a feeling of great reward when you do finally figure it out.
So, follow up with what's your story of triumph? What's a time when you learned how to use a thing the right way, and do you still remember that lesson?
In this week's passage, God reveals the truth that would change the world if people would learn it: God designed life to work a certain way; when people follow His rules, it works, and when they don't, it doesn't.
Famous Fictional Curses
First, let's clarify something -- "curse" can refer to a vulgar or blasphemous word, or it can refer to a "supernatural incantation" with the intent of harm. When I use the word "curse" this week, I'm talking about that second option.
"Curses" have always been an important part of storytelling. They create narrative tension and interest the listener in the outcome. What "curse" has stuck in your memory, and why?
Here are a few that came to my mind. If you don't know anything about them, feel free to look them up. But remember -- these are all superstitions, and I hope you remember what I think about superstitions.
"The Curse of the Bambino" and "The Curse of the Billy Goat". Every baseball fan knows these "curses". What has fascinated me is how much power they have over those two fan bases. Go digging around, and you'll find "curses" of some kind over many, many sports franchises.
"The Curse of the Black Spot". I don't remember the first time I read Treasure Island, but I completely bought into its mythology. The black spot isn't so much a supernatural curse as a pronouncement of doom. Still awesome for a 10-yr-old.
"The Curse of King Tut's Tomb". What a brilliant manipulation of people's natural tendency toward superstition. I would have been 10 or 11 when I discovered this one, and it captivated me right up until I learned about, you know, research and facts.
"The Curse of Sleeping Beauty". Come on, could it be any other? Is this not the most overly-dramatic pronouncement by the more over-the-top villain in movie history? And remember, this movie was made for children! (!!)
What's your "favorite" curse and why?
In this week's passage, we will learn that curses are real, but only those pronounced by God.
Make Good Choices
If you work with children (or adults?), you know that eventually they have to make choices, and you want them to make good choices. How do you teach and encourage good choices?
Let the schoolteachers in your group go to town on this one. There are so many philosophies about this -- if people in your group disagree about which philosophy to follow, redirect them by saying that they have proven why making choices is so difficult.
And then have some sneaky fun -- how do things change when we try to get adults to make good choices? It's obviously harder -- adults have more freedom, more volition, and more perceived independence. But how different is it? Is it not still carrots and sticks?
This topic might be one way your group can begin to appreciate what God was doing with His people through Moses. The Jews looked around them and saw people living life however they felt. Self-indulgence, greed, power -- things that strongly appeal to our sinful nature. But that's not how God designed life to work. To live life fully, God designed us to produce, well, the fruit of the Spirit -- love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Those qualities stand utterly against the sinful desires of the world, and so God had to tell His people not only how to live properly but also what would happen to them if they didn't.
We call these things "curses" (because that's what God calls them), but in truth, they're much more like consequences. God might supernaturally manipulate the outcomes to accentuate the curse, but the truth is that when we live life according to our sinful desires, these disastrous outcomes predicted in this week's passage are inevitable.
This Week's Big Idea: Blessings and Curses in the Bible
In its simplest form, a "blessing" is a desire for a benefit on someone else, and a "curse" is a desire for trouble on someone else. (Both words can be used for the actual doing of the thing -- you can "bless" somebody by giving them a tangible benefit, or you can "curse" somebody by doing them actual harm. But in this week's passage, the words refer to the prediction of a future event based on the person's behavior, so that's how I'm going to use the words in this week's post.)
The words for "blessing" in the Bible can mean "praise / speak well of" (barak, eulogeo) or "have peace / satisfaction / happiness" (shalom, makarios). In the New Testament (see the Beatitudes), the emphasis is on the joy of being a child of God.
The words for "curse" in the OT (arar, qalal) emphasize judgment and falling away from God, and in the NT (katara, anathema) emphasize a more general invocation of evil.
The OT speaks much more frequently about curses, and this week's passage illustrates that pretty easily. Deuteronomy 28 should make one thing very clear -- Moses lists waaay more curses than blessings. This is actually pretty common, especially in treaties from that day and part of the world. Why do you think that is? Why do you think treaties would emphasize curses more than blessings?
Assignment: search an online Bible for "blessing" and "curse". The list to the right is the word "curse" in the CSB -- it's much more frequent in the OT, and it's more frequent in Deuteronomy than anywhere else.
How are the words used? In what context are they used?
(Btw, Logos, which has a great set of free online bible study tools, dispels the mystery of a word study:
If we can summarize God's blessings as being able to enjoy the fullness of life, then God's curses are the opposite -- not being able to enjoy that, or worse, having that fullness taken away.
When you read the curses in the OT, particularly in Deuteronomy 28, you'll see a lot of what I've heard called "rhetorical flourishes". The authors (particularly Moses) really get into describing how terrible the curse will be. Deuteronomy 28 is rather over-the-top. Consider the final few verses:
66 Your life will hang in doubt before you. You will be in dread night and day, never certain of survival. 67 In the morning you will say, ‘If only it were evening!’ and in the evening you will say, ‘If only it were morning!’—because of the dread you will have in your heart and because of what you will see. 68 The Lord will take you back in ships to Egypt by a route that I said you would never see again. There you will sell yourselves to your enemies as male and female slaves, but no one will buy you.
Yikes!
But if you slow down and read these curses just for what they say, you'll see that God is slowly unwinding all of the blessings He gave His people, eventually taking them back to Egypt to be slaves again. But this time, no one will even want them as slaves. What will happen to you if you can't even sign on as someone's slave?
Obviously, this is for dramatic effect, but it should have given the Jews some very unsettling thoughts.
And just as obviously, we're supposed to wonder the same things today -- where would you be if God all of a sudden withheld His blessings from you and your family?
So remove from your mind all thought of witches and fortune tellers and superstitious pagan curses. The blessings and curses you need to be thinking about are the ones that actually have power -- those from God Almighty.
About Superstitions. To be safe, let me quickly remind you why Christians should have nothing to do with superstitions of any kind. A superstition is a belief that a thing has power in and of itself, and even God is obligated to recognize it. Find a four-leaf clover and, what?, God has to give you good luck? Walk under a ladder and, what?, God has to let something bad happen to you? Seriously? Jesus Confronts the Self-Centered Superstitions of Man -- a study of John 5:1-18
Well, the pagan approach to "blessing" and "curse" is just that -- the belief that a certain word has power in and of itself to accomplish something. (Think about what Balak hired Balaam to do. I'm also looking at you, Word-Faith movement.) Whose words are actually powerful in that way? God Almighty. And God alone.
Where We Are in Deuteronomy
This is the last of our three lessons in Moses' second (and longest) speech in Deuteronomy,
The Importance of Obedience
Introduction (4:44-49)
The Ten Commandments (5:1-33)
The Shema (6:1-25) - WEEK 1
Drive out the inhabitants (7:1-26)
Remember to obey (8:1-20)
Remember the failure of the golden calf (9:1-29)
Fear the Lord (10:1-22)
Obey the Lord (11:2-32)
What the Ten Commandments Look Like in Practice
I-III - proper worship (12:1-14:29) - WEEK 2
IV - holy time (15:1-16:17)
V - respect for authority (16:18-18:22)
VI - human life (19:1-22:12)
VII - sexuality (22:13-23:14)
VIII - theft and society (23:15-24:7)
IX - justice and society (24:8-25:4)
X - covetousness (25:5-26:15)
Consequences: Blessings and Curses
Mount Ebal (27:1-26)
Obedience and disobedience (28:1-68) - WEEK 3
In chapter 27, Moses requests that the people renew the covenant when they enter the Promised Land, and he gives some instructions -- namely that the people (the 12 tribes) recite the blessings and curses for obedience and disobedience (27:12-13).
You'll note, though, that when you read chapter 27, it's all curses. Nothing but curses.
Well, those are read by the Levites (27:14). So the theory goes that the curses in chapter 27 are related to "secret sins", which is why the Levites pronounce those. Then in chapter 28, the people pronounce the "normal" blessings and curses.
The point is that God didn't just want people to control their behavior -- He wanted them to control their heart. (Yes, even in the Old Testament, God is clear about the people's hearts.)
But the list of curses in chapter 27 is concerning:
15 ‘The person who makes a carved idol or cast image, which is detestable to the Lord, the work of a craftsman, and sets it up in secret is cursed.’
16 ‘The one who dishonors his father or mother is cursed.’
17 ‘The one who moves his neighbor’s boundary marker is cursed.’
18 ‘The one who leads a blind person astray on the road is cursed.’
19 ‘The one who denies justice to a resident alien, a fatherless child, or a widow is cursed.’
20 ‘The one who sleeps with his father’s wife is cursed, for he has violated his father’s marriage bed.’
21 ‘The one who has sexual intercourse with any animal is cursed.’
22 ‘The one who sleeps with his sister, whether his father’s daughter or his mother’s daughter is cursed.’
23 ‘The one who sleeps with his mother-in-law is cursed.’
24 ‘The one who secretly kills his neighbor is cursed.’
25 ‘The one who accepts a bribe to kill an innocent person is cursed.’
26 ‘Anyone who does not put the words of this law into practice is cursed.’
You can see the relationship with the Ten Commandments, but this is a pretty reprehensible set of behaviors. Four of the twelve curses are related to ugly sexual sin. These are singled out because Moses expected this behavior from the people.
In fact, I've seen it argued that Moses overemphasized the curses because he was so cynical about the people's ability to keep their act together. "I don't have a lot of faith in you people, so I'm going to grossly overdo it on the warnings in hopes that some of you take this to heart."
Have you ever done that with your own kids? Or maybe with the kids at school?
Now that I think about it, my mom used this tactic on me more than once. "Putting the fear of God in you." And at least some of the time, it worked. What do you think? Was Moses simply trying to put the fear of God in the people?
Part 1: Blessings for Obedience (Deuteronomy 28:1-6)
“Now if you faithfully obey the Lord your God and are careful to follow all his commands I am giving you today, the Lord your God will put you far above all the nations of the earth. 2 All these blessings will come and overtake you, because you obey the Lord your God: 3 You will be blessed in the city and blessed in the country. 4 Your offspring will be blessed, and your land’s produce, and the offspring of your livestock, including the young of your herds and the newborn of your flocks. 5 Your basket and kneading bowl will be blessed. 6 You will be blessed when you come in and blessed when you go out.
I really don't have much to add this week. Moses is not asking the people to think very hard. This is pretty simple.
I love the phrase "come and overtake you" in verse 2. The image is that the people couldn't miss out on the blessings if they tried. The blessings would come and find them wherever they were and overwhelm them with God's generosity.
Ask your group to analyze these blessings -- what is their scope? What is their result?
If you didn't do your word study on "blessing" and "curse" yet, you should do it here. If you agree with me that "blessing" in a covenantal context refers to God enabling people to enjoy the fullness of life, then 28:1-6 is a powerful summary of that. The Israelites would enjoy the fullness of life in ways they never dreamed possible. (If you read verses 7-14, you'll find more of the same. Just because Moses emphasized the curses doesn't mean that he neglected the blessings!)
When I think about Moses' words in a Christian context, I'm reminded of something Jesus said:
Truly I tell you, I am the gate for the sheep. 8 All who came before me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep didn’t listen to them. 9 I am the gate. If anyone enters by me, he will be saved and will come in and go out and find pasture. 10 A thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I have come so that they may have life and have it in abundance. (John 10:7-10)
If I can talk you into it, do a second word study on the use of the word "abundance" or "fullness" in the New Testament. What is the fullness of life that Jesus talks about for His people?
There are not that many uses of those terms, so you could read through all of them in just a few minutes. I was reminded that Jesus said this powerful thing in Luke 12: “Watch out and be on guard against all greed, because one’s life is not in the abundance of his possessions.” Or how about this world changing statement in John 1: "16 Indeed, we have all received grace upon grace from his fullness, 17 for the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ."
I take away from the New Testament that God intends an even greater blessing of the fullness of life for Christians than for Old Testament Jews, and this is accomplished through the Holy Spirit. What does this blessing mean for Christians today?
Part 2: Curses for Disobedience (Deuteronomy 28:15-19)
15 “But if you do not obey the Lord your God by carefully following all his commands and statutes I am giving you today, all these curses will come and overtake you: 16 You will be cursed in the city and cursed in the country. 17 Your basket and kneading bowl will be cursed. 18 Your offspring will be cursed, and your land’s produce, the young of your herds, and the newborn of your flocks. 19 You will be cursed when you come in and cursed when you go out.
Everything Moses said in the previous passage we studied is reversed here.
I don't blame Lifeway for sticking just to this passage -- the rest of the chapter is filled with curses, and they get pretty bleak. Again, remember that Moses is being (I believe) intentionally dramatic, hoping to stave off the inevitable betrayal. But if you have the stomach for it, have your group read a few of the other curses just so you can get a sense of how specific and concrete Moses gets.
But remember what I said above about this: God is unwinding all of the blessings He has given Abraham's descendants -- a land, a people, and a God -- by taking away the blessings of the land and even the land itself, by scattering the people in exile and death, and by leaving the people to their false gods and even taking them back to Egypt.
It's pretty horrifying.
This is also a little trickier to find the New Testament equivalent. It's not that the New Testament doesn't talk about curses! (Note: search for the word "woe" -- Matthew 23 and Luke 6 have some great examples.) It's that the source of our fullness of life as Christians (the Holy Spirit) will not be taken away from us. In other words, Christians cannot lose their salvation.
So, as long as everyone in your group understands that God will not remove salvation from someone who has come to Jesus for it, what does the modern equivalent of these curses look like for Christians?
I think our definition of blessing and curse as the giving and taking of the enjoyment of the fullness of life helps us here very much. Remember what we said about being filled with the Spirit when we studied Ephesians 5:
Paul's example gives us a possible understanding of what these curses look like to Christians:
And don’t get drunk with wine, which leads to reckless living, but be filled by the Spirit: (Eph 5:18)
In other words, Christians can be filled with the Spirit (passive -- we can't command the Spirit) or we can fill ourselves with something else, like wine. Anything else that we fill ourselves with will "displace the Spirit" -- not because the Spirit is controlled by our choices, but because the Spirit responds to our choices. If we choose to fill ourselves with something other than the Spirit, we likewise choose to dilute the blessings of the fullness of the life that the Spirit gives.
At its most extreme, we end up with a 1 Corinthians 3 situation:
11 For no one can lay any foundation other than what has been laid down. That foundation is Jesus Christ. 12 If anyone builds on the foundation with gold, silver, costly stones, wood, hay, or straw, 13 each one’s work will become obvious. For the day will disclose it, because it will be revealed by fire; the fire will test the quality of each one’s work. 14 If anyone’s work that he has built survives, he will receive a reward. 15 If anyone’s work is burned up, he will experience loss, but he himself will be saved—but only as through fire.
The "carnal Christian" will be saved, but his entire life's work will be burned up.
(Important Note: sometimes the experiences of God's curses are actually the revelation that a person is not actually saved. This person doesn't lose his salvation -- he was never saved in the first place.)
Here's where I would recommend guiding your discussion in the end:
What is your testimony of being blessed when you chose to live life according to God's instructions?
What is your testimony of being cursed (you might prefer a different word) when you chose to disobey God's instructions?
Because after all this time, people's relationship with God is still about obedience and disobedience. It begins with obedience to God's command on salvation through Jesus (and Jesus alone), but it continues for the rest of your earthly life.
Why does God still take our obedience and disobedience so seriously?
We've talked about that a lot; your group should have a pretty good answer. Just make sure that the discussion covers both (1) God's character, and (2) our role as Christ's ambassadors.
Encourage your group to be sensitive to the experience of God's blessings and curses. God uses blessings to reinforce our "good choices", and He uses curses to steer us away from sin. But none of that makes a difference if we aren't paying attention.