Deut is a series of exhortations from Moses to Israel. He’s exhorting the people to love God, to serve him alone, and to obey his commandments.

As you read through the book of Deut, you’ll notice that Moses repeats himself, especially regarding Israel’s need to love and obey God. Much of what Moses says here he’s already said.

Someone mentioned that Moses’ hammer-like repetitive style shows the intensity of the Lord’s desire to remold his people to prepare them for the conquest and settlement of Canaan.^[1]

In chapters 8-9, Moses had cited a whole list of sins that Israel was guilty of—stubbornness, rebellion, idolatry, independence, and self-righteousness. And so he is emphasizing the need for that to change as they face the prospect of conquering the PL. Their track record for faithfulness was not very good. In light of their previous failures, he’s exhorting them toward personal spiritual revival.

Moses asks a question at the beginning of this passage (10:12): “what does the Lord your God require of you?” This is a very profound question that we can apply to ourselves—what does God want of me? All of us should spend some time thinking about and answering that question—what does God require?

Moses is asking this question of the nation of Israel. We must remember that what God requires of Israel as a nation is not necessarily the same thing that he requires of us as Christians in the church age. However, many of these requirements are the same; God still has a set of requirement for his people today. As we read through the passage, we should consider whether we are meeting these requirements. Perhaps we need some personal spiritual revival ourselves.

What does God require of Israel, and what can we learn from this set of requirements?

^[1] Earl S. Kalland, “Deuteronomy,” in The Expositor’s Bible Commentary: Deuteronomy, Joshua, Judges, Ruth, 1 & 2 Samuel, ed. Frank E. Gaebelein, vol. 3 (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House, 1992), 87.