Many unsaved people practice astrology (i.e., horoscopes) and other unscriptural use of the signs in the heavens. Believers should reject these practices.
God provided Israel with qualities they should desire in a king. In short, when the king ceased to be right with God, he ceased to be right for the people.
Rebellion is identified in a variety of ways, but the Lord often associates it to someone with a stiff neck. Society should find this concept easily grasped. A stiff neck impedes the head from bowing. Moses directly associated the stiff neck with rebellion when he said, “For I know thy rebellion, and thy stiff neck” (Deuteronomy 31:27). Like Moses, the Lord identified the rebellion of the children of Israel when He stated that they were “a stiffnecked people” (Exodus 32:9). Isaiah likewise attested to this truth by stating that rebellious people had a neck of iron sinew and a brow of brass (Isaiah 48:4). These descriptive terms demonstrate that rebellion is exemplified by an individual who refuses to bow and allow the mind to be changed. He has an unyielding spirit.
The Bible is not meant to be read merely for the sake of reading. God intends for the Bible to be read with a deliberate purpose! Sometimes that purpose may be learning, while at other times it may be for purification. There will be times when one might not know the purpose for reading, but there can be no doubt that the Lord has a purpose. In Deuteronomy 17:18-19, the Lord states that His king should spend time in the law of God so that “he may learn to fear the LORD his God” and “keep all the words of” God’s law “to do them.” In Ephesians 5:26, the Lord describes one of these purposes when He speaks of “the washing of water by the word.” God’s purposes may be missed when one indiscriminately hastens through the scriptures.
