An Ammonite or Moabite shall not come into the congregation of Jehovah; even their tenth generation shall not come into the congregation of Jehovah for ever;
Deuteronomy 23 lists who may and may not enter the assembly of the LORD, which older translations call the congregation. Here the door is shut on two neighbouring nations, and not for a season but "forever." The verses that follow give the reason. Scripture later shows what happened when grace met a woman born under this ban.
This assembly is God's own. One writer names what fits it and what does not, and draws a line between two ways God acts.
Here Jehovah names certain things that cannot fit with their place and relationship to Him. They must behave in a way that suits His congregation... Jehovah does not forget where it is a matter of government. He does forget — and that is exactly what He does — when it is a question of grace... So we see that this is not a question of hatred on our part. It is a question of being subject to God, taking the direction of our thoughts from His word, and forming our judgments and our conduct by it.
The next verses give the reason. These nations hired Balaam to curse Israel. That is why the ban falls on them, and why other nations fare better.
They are not condemned for their birth as such. They are condemned for their hostility to the true people of God, and for hiring Balaam to curse. But in the same way the false professing Christian, like an Ammonite or a Moabite, shows his birth today. The Edomite is the simple natural man, and for him there is more hope. The Egyptian is placed with him. Yet only in the third generation — dead and risen with Christ — could they enter the congregation of the Lord.
This word still bound Israel a thousand years later. One writer explains why time changed nothing.
These things had happened about a thousand years earlier. The passing of time in no way lessened the guilt of Ammon and Moab. God's sentence against them still stood, because God does not change, and because a thousand years are as one day to Him. We often think that a past sin against Christ and against His people simply drops out of sight, as it would in human affairs. Why bring these things up, we ask? They happened so long ago that no one remembers them... But we forget that we must look at the question from God's point of view. This was a case of not counting these two peoples as part of the congregation of the Lord.
Ruth was a Moabite woman. Her name stands in the family line of David and of Christ. One writer asks which woman in that line the law barred.
Ruth lay under the ban of the law. It is striking that it was this devoted, this lovely woman to whom the law applied — not Rahab, nor even Tamar. In this way God showed clearly what the law is like. It was not brought in to condemn the sinner and the prostitute, where people's minds would have put it. It was brought in as the very thing that would have shut out a Ruth, even with all her devotion to God. This taught plainly that it was man as man who was shut out from God — not merely in his sins, but in his righteousness.
But the ban did not have the last word. In her case the count of generations ran the other way.
But the law does not keep Ruth out. Moabite as she is, she does enter into the congregation of the Lord. The law is set aside on her behalf. Her descendants are not shut out to the tenth generation. Instead, her child of the third generation sits on Israel's throne.
One writer turns this law on the reader. Ruth had no claim on Boaz's kindness, and neither has anyone else on God's.
What then could she have expected from Boaz but to be rebuked and driven out of his field? That same stern law cursed the Moabites and shut them out of blessing. It curses us all too, and shuts heaven against us... But thank God! The law "given through Moses" condemns the sinner. Yet "grace and truth" came through Jesus Christ, and they save him when he trusts that gracious Saviour... By nature she was a cursed Moabite, but her faith had saved her. The law condemned her, and faith justified her.
- Government — God shuts this door as ruler over His own assembly. In grace He acts another way: there He forgets.
- Ground — The ban rests on hostility to God's people, not on bloodline. Edomites and Egyptians met more hope, and could enter in the third generation.
- Memory — A thousand years later the guilt stood unchanged. Time does not shrink a wrong done to God.
- Reversal — Ruth the Moabite was the very person this law shut out. Grace brought her in, and her third generation sat on the throne.
- Ourselves — The same law that closed the congregation to Moab shuts heaven against us all. What opened it for Ruth opens it now: trust in a Saviour who saves those with no claim.
because they met you not with bread and with water on the way, when ye came forth out of Egypt, and because they hired against thee Balaam the son of Beor, of Pethor of Mesopotamia, to curse thee.
Deuteronomy 23:4 gives the reasons Ammon and Moab were shut out of the assembly of the Lord. One charge is a kindness they withheld. The other is a curse they paid for.
The verse names a failure first, then an attack. One writer takes them in that order.
God has a twofold controversy with Moab concerning the people of Israel. First, they did not meet Israel with bread and water on the way out of Egypt. Second, they hired Balaam to curse Israel (Deut. 23:4). We learn from this that sin can be negative as well as positive. He who neglects to do the will of God is as real a sinner as he who openly defies it.
But Moab did more than withhold food and water. The same writer shows what was really at stake in the hire of Balaam.
But these enemies went further. There was not mere neglect but also open hostility... So Balak and Balaam, stirred up by Satan, raised a great question against the people of Israel. It is important that we understand it, for it touches us closely... What was the record of those forty years? On Jehovah's part, goodness, faithfulness and patience; on the people's part, unbelief, ingratitude and persistent disobedience. With such a record, could the people be cursed? Could Jehovah be persuaded to cast Israel aside? This was the question raised and answered in the plains of Moab.
The word "hired" points to a man who could be bought. Balak paid before a word was spoken.
Balak's messengers went to Mesopotamia "with the fees for divination in their hand" (Num. 22:7). Balak knew that the false prophet "loved gain from wrongdoing" (2 Peter 2:15). So he made sure of him by sending cash in advance. But the treacherous deceiver brought Jehovah's name into it. He kept the messengers overnight, pretending to seek the mind of God.
The curse never touched Israel. The loss fell on the people who paid for it.
There is no divination or enchantment against Israel. And there is no angel, principality, or power that can separate the believer from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. If God has taken up a people for blessing, and to make them a blessing, He will carry out in power what He has purposed in love... Moab was frustrating their own blessing, not the purpose of God, in hiring Balaam. Because of that they lost the privilege of entering the congregation of the Lord.
One writer separates how God governs from how He shows grace. He then points to what God says about the Edomite and the Egyptian.
Jehovah does not forget where it is a matter of government. He does forget (and it is precisely what He does) when it is a question of grace... But it is remarkable too that when speaking about the Edomite... He says, "He is your brother." And of those who once opposed Israel He says, "You shall not abhor an Egyptian, because you were a sojourner in his land." So this is not a question of hatred on our part. It is a question of being subject to God. We take the direction of our thoughts from His word, and form our judgments and our conduct by it.
Long after Moses, God's people took up this instruction and acted on it.
They had even hired Balaam to curse Israel, which curse God changed into a blessing. But the Jews obeyed this instruction and separated from the mixed crowd. Mixtures of believers and unbelievers are also forbidden in the New Testament (2 Cor. 6:14-18)... yet evil keeps pushing its way in among the people of God, and it must be faced, as it was here.
Yet one woman from the nation this verse shuts out did enter.
But the law does not keep Ruth out. Moabitess as she is, she does enter into the congregation of the Lord. The law is set aside for her. It does not shut out her descendants to the tenth generation; instead, her child of the third generation sits on Israel's throne.
Notice which woman the ban fell on.
It is striking that it was to this devoted, to this lovely woman that the law applied — not to Rahab nor even to Tamar... This taught in the clearest way that man as man was shut out from God — not only in his sins, but in his righteousness.
- Neglect counts. Moab's first charge is bread and water not given. Failing to do God's will is as real a sin as defying it.
- Hostility follows. Neglect hardened into a hired curse. Balak bought a prophet who loved gain from wrongdoing.
- The curse rebounds. Moab frustrated its own blessing, not God's purpose. Moab lost entry into the assembly.
- Government remembers. God does not forget in matters of government. He does forget when it is a question of grace. So the command calls for obedience, not hatred.
- Grace opens the door. Ruth the Moabitess still enters, and her child of the third generation sits on Israel's throne. The law shuts out man even at his best. Grace lets him in.