Chapter-a-Day

The Blessing

Leave a comment

“This is the blessing that Moses the man of God pronounced on the Israelites before his death….”
Deuteronomy 33:1 (NIV)

This past Sunday I delivered the morning message among our local gathering of Jesus’ followers. At the beginning of the message I showed a photograph of our family gathered on New Year’s weekend, just a few weeks ago. The entire crew was gathered at the table for a meal in all the glorious mess of three generations.

The table, the dining room floor, indeed the entire house – they get messy when the whole family gathers. And, I’m not just referring to food crumbs. That was the metaphor that carried through my message. Jesus invites the whole family to the table. It gets messy, and yet He asks us to stay.

In family (both nuclear and spiritual), every individual part contributes to the love of the whole.

Today’s chapter is Moses’ final act. His role as leader-judge-prophet-priest will end with him. His is not a box on the org chart to be filled. A succession plan was never a consideration. There’s no favored son groomed for elevation. Moses does not pout or demand a severance of legacy. He foreshadows and embodies the sentiment Paul would later express when he wrote, “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith.”

Moses’ final act is to bless the twelve Hebrew tribes one-by-one. As I meditated on the blessings. A couple of things stood out.

First, in Jewish tradition, blessings are less about forecasting the future and more about naming reality—calling forth what is already true beneath the surface. Moses is not predicting outcomes; he is bestowing identity.

Just as I look around the table from toddler grandchildren to adult daughters and sons. Each is unique. No two are the same. They each, in their own unique identity, bring themselves to the table and with each of them comes a part of the blessing of family.

And, this leads to the next observation.

No tribe is cursed. Even the complicated ones—and, honestly they each have their own “troubles”—are not shamed. Silence, yes. Erasure, no. Where earlier stories carried fracture, Moses now offers healing through words.

And, to me, most importantly: Israel is blessed together. No tribe receives fullness apart from the others. The blessing is communal—interdependent, embodied, shared.

In the quiet this morning, I find the chapter inviting me to do something wildly countercultural:

Receive blessing without scrambling to deserve it.

Moses blesses warriors and poets, priests and homebodies, the strong and the sheltered. Not because they nailed it—but because God chose them.

It’s easy for me to slip into “blessing is a performance review” mode. Others times, my Enneagram Type Four shame whispers to my soul that God’s blessing has been passed out and I was skipped altogether.

Moses says “no” to both lies.

I am blessed before I arrive.
I am carried even when I wander.
I am named even in the silence.

That’s the beauty, and the shalom, that I find in the Great Story. Moses exits stage left. The Story goes on, even to this.very.day.

The God who went before them…
is the God who goes before me.
Jesus invited me to the table, and asked me to stay.

If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.

Promotional graphic for Tom Vander Well's Wayfarer blog and podcast, featuring icons of various podcast platforms with a photo of Tom Vander Well.
These chapter-a-day blog posts are also available via podcast on all major podcast platforms including Apple, Google, and Spotify! Simply go to your podcast platform and search for “Wayfarer Tom Vander Well.” If it’s not on your platform, please let me know!
An orange square icon featuring an open book symbol in white, representing reading or education.
Chapter-a-Day

A Love Song that Aches

2 Comments

Jeshurun grew fat and kicked;
    filled with food, they became heavy and sleek.
They abandoned the God who made them
    and rejected the Rock their Savior.
Deuteronomy 32:15 (NIV)

If you hang out with Wendy and me for any length of time, you’ll soon notice that Wendy is not “Wendy” to me. She is “Luv,” or I more commonly prefer, “M’Luv.”

When I train clients on the art of customer service, I always talk about names. Names are important because names imply relationship, and customers typically desire more than a transaction when they find themselves in a tough spot – they want a personal service relationship.

One of the funny things about names is that the more intimate the relationship the more intimate the moniker we use for the “other” in relationship. An acquaintance might begin being referenced by a simple pronoun. (e.g. “him,” “her”). Relationship is established and names are learned and used (e.g. “John,” “Mary”). When relationship becomes intimate, we create pet names for one another (e.g. “Darling,” “Sweetheart”). Or, in the case of me and Wendy, “M’Luv.”

Here’s what is fascinating. When relationships break down, the cycle works in reverse. Amidst divorce, the woman I once referred to “Sweetheart” is easily reduced to “my children’s mother” or even back to the impersonal pronoun “her.”

In yesterday’s post/podcast I reference about this crazy idea God gives Moses, to give His people a song. In today’s chapter, Moses teaches the people the song. It’s a doozy. It’s less Love Me Do and more Symphonie Fantastique. Epic in length, it has five distinct movements:

  • God is introduced as The Rock—steady, faithful, just.
  • Israel is remembered as the one God carried, fed, and taught to walk.
  • Then comes the heartbreak: prosperity leads to forgetfulness; forgetfulness leads to idolatry.
  • Judgment follows—not as cruelty, but as consequence.
  • Yet the song does not end in wrath. It ends in vindication, mercy, and restoration.

The ancient Hebrews were all about structure in math, literature, poetry, and music. When it comes to song lyrics, the center of the lyrics is almost always the thematic hub and everything expands outward on either side of it. So, notice the center bullet of the summary above. The center of Moses’ Song is:

Jeshurun grew fat and kicked…

As I went down the rabbit hole of meditation and study on Moses’ Song in the quiet this morning, two important things emerged for me.

First, the prophesied rebellion of God’s people does not happen out of suffering, trial, or condemnation. It happens when things go well.

Blessing increases wealth.
Wealth brings abundance.
Abundance breeds comfort…
and comfort makes us fat.

It is not in adversity we forget God, but in prosperity.

Yet notice how God addresses them at this central moment He calls them out: Jeshurun.

This is a name that is rarely used in the Great Story, and names are important.

Jeshurun can be translated “My beloved, upright people.” It’s not the common and neutral every day name “Israel.” This is a pet name — a covenantal endearment. It is an intimate moniker whispered between lovers, not shouted in public.

And, that is what makes its use here so devastating.

Despite His beloved’s forgetfulness, rebellion, and infidelity that is at the center of this love story, God does not address her with watered down formality or impersonal pronouns. He doesn’t shift to courtroom language foreshadowing divorce court. He doubles down and addresses her with a pet name reserved for the most intimate of moments.

Jeshurun.

It does three things…

Recalls Identity
This is who you were named to be.
Highlights Irony
The Upright One has developed scoliosis.
The straight one has grown crooked through comfort.
Deepens the Betrayal
This isn’t rebellion by strangers.
This is infidelity by the beloved.

At the heart of it, Moses is saying: “You did not forget God because you were oppressed. You forgot Him because you were satisfied.”

That is the ache of the song.

It is also, for me, a sobering spiritual reminder. Here in the quiet of my office I sit in prosperity and abundance smack dab in the middle of the wealthiest most affluent empire that has ever risen on the face of the earth in all of human history.

If there’s anyone at high-risk for forgetting God, it’s me.

A good reminder for me to carry into my day. A good conversation to unpack over coffee and breakfast with M’Luv.

If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.

Promotional graphic for Tom Vander Well's Wayfarer blog and podcast, featuring icons of various podcast platforms with a photo of Tom Vander Well.
These chapter-a-day blog posts are also available via podcast on all major podcast platforms including Apple, Google, and Spotify! Simply go to your podcast platform and search for “Wayfarer Tom Vander Well.” If it’s not on your platform, please let me know!
Logo featuring an open book icon on an orange background.
Chapter-a-Day

“Give Them a Song”

3 Comments

“Now write down this song and teach it to the Israelites and have them sing it, so that it may be a witness for me against them.”
Deuteronomy 31:19 (NIV)

I was scrolling through all the playlists in my Spotify music library the other day. I have a lot of them. I came across the playlist I’d made for my mom towards the bottom. This coming St. Patrick’s Day will be three years since we gathered to celebrate her heavenly homecoming. In a funny way, music became the last language my mother and I shared.

I made a short playlist of favorite songs from her youth. I and my siblings were taking turns caring for her while our dad was in the hospital, and I would play the list while we were in the car driving. Her Alzheimer’s was so advanced that by the time we got to the songs at the end of the playlist she had forgotten that we’d even played the songs at the beginning.

I drove and she sang repeatedly through the short playlist. She remembered every word of the lyrics even as she announced with every repeated song. “Oh! I haven’t heard this song in a long time. This is a ‘goldy oldy!'”

In her final days at the care center she would be visited in her room by music therapists.

“Do you know the the song…,” the therapist would ask.

Mom always shook her head.

Then she proceeded to sing right along with them.

In all of creation, God infused music with a secret super power. It embeds itself in our minds. It sinks into our souls. It attaches itself to memories. As soon as I hear the opening guitar riff of Long Cool Woman by the Hollies I am immediately transported to the summer of 1975. I’m in Cabin #3 at Camp Idlewood on a rainy afternoon listening to music on the 8-track with my sister and the other kids from the camp. I can see it. I can hear the laughter.

There’s just something about a song.

We’re in the homestretch of Deuteronomy. Moses has finished reminding the next generation of God’s Law. He’s written it all down so there’s a permanent record that can be read and remembered. He begins to pass the torch of leadership to Joshua.

“Wait a minute,” God says to Moses. It enters the moment almost like an interruption. “I want to give you a song, and I want you to teach it to all the people.”

Then God says, “It will be a witness for me against them.”

It’s easy to forget laws and regulations written on a scroll that only gets read every seven years.

A song embeds itself in the mind.
It sinks into the soul.
It attaches itself to memory in a way that even Alzheimer’s disease finds itself powerless to erase the tape.

“Give them a song,” God says.

He knows that in forty years when they’ve settled into the land their hearts and lives are going to wander. They will forget God. They will forget what He taught them through Moses. The song, however, will transport them immediately back to this moment on this day by the River Jordan. They’ll see the people assembled. They’ll be able to smell the river. They’ll feel the sun on their face.

God, Moses, Joshua, Torah, and covenant.

When my mother had forgotten my name, she still knew all the lyrics to Sh Boom (Life Could Be a Dream) by the Crew Cuts.

If you want someone to remember. Give them a song.
God did.

If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.

Promotional graphic for Tom Vander Well's Wayfarer blog and podcast, featuring icons of various podcast platforms with a photo of Tom Vander Well.
These chapter-a-day blog posts are also available via podcast on all major podcast platforms including Apple, Google, and Spotify! Simply go to your podcast platform and search for “Wayfarer Tom Vander Well.” If it’s not on your platform, please let me know!
Icon of an open book on an orange background
Chapter-a-Day

Teshuvah

1 Comment

Even if you have been banished to the most distant land under the heavens, from there the Lord your God will gather you and bring you back.
Deuteronomy 30:4 (NIV)

As a parent, I always expected that somehow, in some way, my daughters would rebel. I hoped that I was wrong, but I’ve observed the human condition for too long to harbor any pipe dreams. As I contemplated the eventuality of their wandering — whatever that might look like — I came to a realization.

When it comes to what my young adult children do, the only thing I really control is my response.

I figured that I’d better give that some thought ahead of time. I’m glad I did. Yes, both girls had their season of wandering each in their own way, but those are their stories to tell. What I learned along the way was that my best example for parenting was Father God.

Deuteronomy has had some really tough chapters to slog through. It contains some of the most difficult and challenging of the ancient texts. But today’s chapter stands like a breath of fresh air because it gets at the heart of who God is and what God is all about. In short, God tells His Hebrew children that He knows they’re going wander. It’s not a matter of “if” but “when.” In light of this, He wants them to know teshuvah.

Teshuvah is a Hebrew word we translate into English as “return,” but like many Hebrew words one simple English word cannot contain its meaning.

Teshuvah is “return” as in go back where you belong.

It assumes something breathtaking:

You had a place.
You wandered.
That place still exists.
You are still wanted there.

Teshuvah has a rhythm.

First, there is an awakening. Something stirs. There’s discomfort. “Wait a minute. This isn’t who I want to be.” Clarity – not condemnation.

Next comes the turning. It’s not just a change in thought, it’s physical. You’ve reached second base and are as far from home as possible. You’re facing the centerfield fence. You physically make the turn toward third and the path home is right there waiting.

Then there’s naming. This isn’t a wallow in shame, but the moment of truth telling. It’s the first step of the Twelve Steps. “My life has gotten out of control. This isn’t manageable.”

The way is now open to repairing. Own it. Apologize. Make things right. You carry responsibility without drowning in it.

With that, you return home.

Today’s chapter lays out the theology of teshuvah. Jesus turned it into a love story we know as the Prodigal Son. As a young parent reflecting on how I should respond when my daughters wander, I took note of three things about the Prodigal’s father (aka Father God).

  1. He didn’t go to the distant land to condemn his son and drag him home.
  2. He was sitting on the front porch, eyes on the road, waiting for his son.
  3. He ran down the road to greet his son, and escort him home.

Not a bad example to follow, I thought to myself. Trust teshuvah. Love knows the way home. If I’m wise, I’ll even keep my mouth shut. Directions aren’t necessary.

One of our daughters lived in a commune for a season with a very diverse community of individuals from all over the globe. One day she shared with me that as her comrades shared their stories most of them had no home, no support system, and they lived perpetually on the brink of hopelessness.

They had no where else to go.

“I realized,” my daughter said, “that I will never know that reality. I always have a home I can return to where I am loved and will be cared for.”

Bingo. That’s what Father God wants His children to know with all their heart and soul.

Teshuvah.

Shalom.

If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.

Promotional graphic for Tom Vander Well's Wayfarer blog and podcast, featuring icons of various podcast platforms with a photo of Tom Vander Well.
These chapter-a-day blog posts are also available via podcast on all major podcast platforms including Apple, Google, and Spotify! Simply go to your podcast platform and search for “Wayfarer Tom Vander Well.” If it’s not on your platform, please let me know!
An orange square icon featuring a simple white outline of an open book.
Chapter-a-Day

Of Covenant and Mystery

Leave a comment

The secret things belong to the Lord our God, but the things revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may follow all the words of this law.
Deuteronomy 29:29 (NIV)

One of the most painful and difficult seasons of my earthly journey was the dissolution of my first marriage. It’s not a dull, focused pain, but a sharp one that branches in many directions. There are so many places it touches. There are my own personal failings and poor choices. There is the 20-20 hindsight of the many things I could have and should have said and/or done – things to which I was woefully blind at the time. There are the painful consequences and ripple effects that the end of the marriage thrust upon one another, our daughters, and those in our circles of relationship.

I remember two very strong and honest reactions from our young teen daughters at the time. I found these two to be ironic opposites. On one hand, they had seen and perceived more than I realized. A piece of them was not surprised. On the other hand, there was a desire — shot out like a demand — to know everything. A teenager’s personal Freedom of Information Act petition, proclaiming her right to know everything about the breakdown of her parents’ marriage.

What was received was disappointment. Some things might be shared and understood with time, maturity, and life experience. Time and distance is required for some things to be viewed in proper context. And, there are other things that will remain hidden, things understood only by the two who shared them.

On this life journey, not everything is meant to be known.

In today’s chapter, Moses stands before all of the Hebrews and ratifies God’s covenant with them. The Jordan River flowing behind him and the Promised Land in the distance, the ancient leader says, “Before you cross, look back.”

This chapter ratifies the covenant anew—not just for those who saw Egypt crack open, but for everyone standing there… and everyone yet unborn.

Blessing and curse are laid bare. Obedience brings life like rain on dry ground; rebellion brings rot, exile, and future nations asking, “What happened here?”

And then comes the line that purrs and growls at the same time:

“The secret things belong to the Lord our God, but the things revealed belong to us and to our children forever…”

Mystery stays veiled. Responsibility does not.

One of the most profound truths I’ve had to learn to embrace as a follower of Jesus is that mystery is intimately woven into the journey.

Some eyes see but don’t perceive.
Some ears hear but don’t understand.
Some things are hidden, even from God’s own Son.

“But about that day or hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father.”
Matthew 24:36 (NIV)

Some things remain a mystery. The angsty teenager within me filing my own personal Freedom of Information Act petitions with my heavenly Father had to learn to live with disappointment.

Further in my journey, I found that disappointment eventually gave way to humility and faith. As I attempt to follow in Jesus’ footsteps I find in His own example a peace and complete trust to leave certain knowledge with the Father, despite what I might argue is His divine right to demand it.

That final verse of today’s covenant renewal falls like a gentle, holy hand on my shoulder this morning:

I am not required to solve God.
I am required to respond to Him.

Some things remain veiled. That’s okay.
But what has been revealed—love God, walk humbly, choose life—that belongs to me. Today. Right now.

So with humility and faith, I sign my name again in the quiet.
And I walk into a new work week embraced by covenant and mystery.

If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.

Promotional graphic for Tom Vander Well's Wayfarer blog and podcast, featuring icons of various podcast platforms with a photo of Tom Vander Well.
These chapter-a-day blog posts are also available via podcast on all major podcast platforms including Apple, Google, and Spotify! Simply go to your podcast platform and search for “Wayfarer Tom Vander Well.” If it’s not on your platform, please let me know!
An icon featuring an open book on an orange background.
Chapter-a-Day

Bad Motorcycle, Better Covenant

Leave a comment
https://open.spotify.com/episode/5ZJESYyjKSgNI5ynr06Jz3?si=lvzs8LXvS9a7zYAHu7PgRw

“However, if you do not obey the Lord your God and do not carefully follow all his commands and decrees I am giving you today, all these curses will come on you and overtake you…”
Deuteronomy 28:15 (NIV)

Yesterday at breakfast, Wendy and I discussed an article she’d read about a string of women who became adulterous lovers of a serial adulterer. When later on life’s road the serial adulterer gained a certain amount of notoriety, the women determined to make their former lothario into their scapegoat. They are determined to ruin his life as they blame him for ruining theirs.

Fascinating.

As I meditated on the situation, what I saw in between the lines of the news article was the chaos and the unraveling of life that comes with journeying down the road of infidelity and adultery. The line I love to quote about the path of adultery is from Bob Dylan. He sings that it’s “like a bad motorcycle with the devil in the seat, going 90 miles-and-hour down a dead end street.”

Believe me, you don’t want that ride.

Today’s chapter is arguably as tough as it gets when it comes to harsh Old Testament language. It’s the kind of chapter that causes modern readers to close the book and walk away. There’s so much going on beneath the surface of this chapter that I could write an entire book unpacking it—but let me try to do it succinctly.

Today’s chapter follows a well-established pattern of what we call an Ancient Near Eastern suzerainty treaty. A suzerainty was a dominant king who, in expanding his empire, would take over foreign cities and people groups. They became his vassals. The suzerainty treaty was one the king would make with vassals he’d conquered and who were now under his sovereignty and protection. These treaties had a distinct pattern they followed, and one of the pieces of that pattern was to briefly explain the blessings the vassals would experience by being faithful to their new king followed by a long host of agonizing consequences they would experience if they were unfaithful.

Today’s chapter follows the exact pattern of these suzerainty treaties, with God as the suzerain and the Hebrews as the people he’s entering into a covenant with. It was intended by the ancients to act like a prenuptial agreement. It briefly highlights the blessings the bride could expect in the relationship (life, abundance, provision, blessing) and then goes to great lengths describing in the harshest terms the unraveling that comes with infidelity and disobedience (death, destitution, poverty, chaos).

The suzerain was saying “You don’t want to hop on the back of that motorcyle.”

Now, hang with me because it gets better. I know that in the Great Story everything is connected, and today’s chapter is no different. The primary difference between typical suzerain treaties and today’s chapter is that the suzerain was typically a distant monarch sitting on his foreign throne. God has drawn up the covenant in the covenant language the Hebrews were used to, but He isn’t distant. He’s right there in the middle of their camp. He showed up and introduced Himself. He delivered them from Egypt then joined them on their wilderness journey. The blessings and curses presented are not from a distant, conquering foreign king but a divine suitor who for 40 years has been wooing them. God wants a good marriage with this people.

By the time you reach Deuteronomy 28, Israel already has a problem baked into the dough.

The covenant assumes:
A faithful people
A loyal vassal
A nation that listens, obeys, trusts

But Scripture immediately begins narrating the truth:
The Hebrews cannot sustain covenant faithfulness.

The blessings are glorious – but the curses become prophetic autobiography.

The Old Testament tension is not:
“Will God be faithful?”
It’s:
“Can Israel be?”
And the answer—generation after generation throughout the Great Story—is a weary, sheepish “no.”

When the Son of God appears on the scene, He doesn’t come as the suzerain King but as an every day carpenter — just another one of the vassals. As a human being, Jesus walks the same path as the Hebrews, but with fidelity.

Hebrews —> 40 years in the wilderness grumbling, testing God
Jesus —> 40 days in the wilderness, tempted but faithful

And when Jesus responds to the devil’s temptation, He quotes — wait for it — Deuteronomy.

He doesn’t invent a new covenant language. He fulfills the old one.

Suzerainty treaties assumed:
Loyalty
Exclusive allegiance
Submission to the greater king

Jesus refuses:
Political shortcuts
Coercive power
Empire without obedience

He won’t reach for an earthly throne.
He won’t grasp.
He won’t rebel.
That restraint?
That’s vassal faithfulness.

In today’s chapter:
Obedience earns blessing
Disobedience triggers curse

Jesus:
Lives perfect obedience
Deserves full blessing
Receives the curse anyway

Exile. Shame. Abandonment. Death outside the city. The faithful vassal takes the consequences of the unfaithful people. That’s not legal trickery.
That’s covenant love with skin on.

Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us, for it is written: “Cursed is everyone who is hung on a pole.”
Galatians 3:13

This means my relationship with God is not sustained by:
Perfect obedience
White-knuckled faithfulness
Fear of slipping into curse

It’s sustained by participation—showing up at the table, taking a seat, and choosing to stay.

It’s not about performance. I don’t earn blessing.
I inhabit it—because Jesus already stood where I couldn’t.
Obedience becomes response, not requirement.
Faithfulness becomes gratitude, not terror.
And Deuteronomy 28 stops sounding like a threat…

…and starts sounding like a story that finally found its hero.

If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.

Promotional graphic for Tom Vander Well's Wayfarer blog and podcast, featuring icons of various podcast platforms with a photo of Tom Vander Well.
These chapter-a-day blog posts are also available via podcast on all major podcast platforms including Apple, Google, and Spotify! Simply go to your podcast platform and search for “Wayfarer Tom Vander Well.” If it’s not on your platform, please let me know!
Icon of an open book on an orange background.
Chapter-a-Day

The Rocks Remember

Leave a comment
https://open.spotify.com/episode/6TlGZ9WN8c5ieqpzSr5QUP?si=TPbbPcokR7C7_iUXi3tpoQ

When you have crossed the Jordan, these tribes shall stand on Mount Gerizim to bless the people: Simeon, Levi, Judah, Issachar, Joseph and Benjamin. And these tribes shall stand on Mount Ebal to pronounce curses: Reuben, Gad, Asher, Zebulun, Dan and Naphtali.

The Levites shall recite to all the people of Israel in a loud voice…
Deuteronomy 27:12-14a (NIV)

In the years that Wendy and I spent summers at our house on the lake we would sit on the deck for hours overlooking the water. Especially in the morning when the world was quiet the acoustics of the water and the terrain allowed you to clearly hear conversations taking place between people on the on the other side of the cove. It was eerie.

The further I get in my earthly journey, the more I’ve realized my ignorance regarding creation’s role in the Great Story. Creation is filled with fascinating wonder that we humans continue to discover. God celebrates His creation throughout the Great Story. Creation is alive. It has a voice. It hears. It bears witness. It is a participant in all that God is doing.

When Jesus was criticized for allowing His followers to shout in celebration proclaiming He was the Messiah, He replied that if His followers didn’t shout it, the rocks would cry out. Creation itself cries out in worship.

Creation plays a central role in today’s chapter. Moses has finished reminding his children and grandchildren of the Law. Now, he gives them instructions. When they enter the Promised Land, they are to write the Law clearly on stones covered in plaster. The Law is not to be a tribal secret, it’s a public declaration to the whole world. Then God has them do something strange. Half the people are to climb Mount Ebal. The other half are to climb Mount Gerazim. Not just the priests…everyone.

The Levites and tribes on Mount Gerazim are to pronounce the blessings God promises for faithfulness and obedience (interestingly, these are not recorded in the text). The Levites and tribes on Mount Ebal are to pronounce curses and consequences for breaking God’s Laws. Interestingly, the laws prescribed to be proclaimed include behaviors that are easily the most secret and personal of sins.

This whole thing sounds really strange to our modern sensibilities, but this is where things get really cool. This is where creation plays a role in the public ratification of God’s Law.

Mount Gerazim and Mount Ebal have a really strange and unique formation. The mountains and the valley between them create a natural acoustic amphitheater and echo chamber. Even today, people standing on one mountain can hear what’s being spoken on the opposite. It gets even better. Your voice not only carries across the valley to the top of the other mountain, but it echoes back to you.

When the Levites proclaim the curses, the sound doesn’t dissipate into open wilderness. It bounces, returns, wraps around the people.

The Law doesn’t just go out.

It comes back.

Every “Amen” would echo—not theatrically, but bodily. Chest. Bones. Breath.

This is communal consent.

No one is hidden in this ceremony. Everyone participates. Everyone agrees. The people are the chorus. Accountability has a voice. And creation bears witness. The mountains hear the people shouting “Amen.” Their sound waves leave an impression. The mountains may not speak, but they remember.

Long after Moses is gone.
Long after Joshua dies.
The hills still stand there saying, “We heard you.”

God could have delivered the Law in silence for the people to accept by faith. He could have delivered it with lightning and thunder and to force the people on their knees in terror. He might have simply slipped Moses and the High Priest a parchment as they stood privately in God’s tent tabernacle.

Instead, God wanted His people to ratify His Law in a public way. He chose a place where your own voice would come back to you.

Because covenant isn’t just something you believe.

It’s something you have to hear yourself say.

There is no solo spirituality in this valley.
No quiet loopholes.
No private reinterpretations whispered into a pillow at night.

Just this aching, honest moment:

“Yes. I heard it. I said it. I agreed.”

Once I’ve heard my own voice echo off the stones, it’s awfully hard to pretend I never spoke.

And, the rocks remember.

If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.

Promotional graphic for Tom Vander Well's Wayfarer blog and podcast, featuring icons of various podcast platforms with a photo of Tom Vander Well.
These chapter-a-day blog posts are also available via podcast on all major podcast platforms including Apple, Google, and Spotify! Simply go to your podcast platform and search for “Wayfarer Tom Vander Well.” If it’s not on your platform, please let me know!
An orange square icon featuring an open book outline in white.
Chapter-a-Day

Trust the Story, Tell the Story

Leave a comment

Then you shall declare before the Lord your God: “My father was a wandering Aramean, and he went down into Egypt…”
Deuteronomy 26:5a (NIV)

For many years I presented a quarterly one-hour orientation training for one of our clients. It gave new hires a basic understanding of the research, quality assessment, and coaching our team provided. There were two front-line team managers who faithfully attended the orientation. The content of the orientation training never changed, yet the two managers were there every – single – time.

Their regular attendance didn’t bother me, but it did make me curious. Eventually, I asked why they were always there. They laughed.

“We want to hear your stories,” they replied. “The ‘gas station story,’ the ‘swing set story,’ all of them. We just love hearing your stories.”

There is a common obstacle I have observed in young and fledgling preachers I’ve had the privilege of mentoring. They fear that they are going to look and sound ignorant so they pack their message full of iron-clad knowledge of the text, chapter-and-verse. I have reviewed outlines for a thirty-minute message that had enough content for an all-day seminary workshop. That’s a problem, because my 45 years of preaching experience has taught me one important truth:

What people want is a good story.

Today’s chapter wraps up a major section of Moses’ final message to his people. He’s reminded them of God’s commands and requirements. Now, he gives them an assignment for the day they finally find themselves settled in the promised land. They are to take ten-percent of the “first fruits” of their harvest and take it to the Temple. Once there, they are to gratefully present their gift. Then, they are to tell the story of their people.

  • “My father was a wandering Aramean…”
  • Slavery.
  • Crying out.
  • Deliverance.
  • Land.
  • Abundance.

The story is packed with meaning. The story is personal and compelling. The story holds an infinite number of lessons.

Don’t recite a list of lessons.

Just tell the story.

In fact, Jesus used the same pedagogy. He told stories. And when Jesus ascended into heaven He told His followers to be “witnesses.” What does a witness do? A witness gets up on the stand and tells their story. And the story Moses tells his people to share is connected to the story Jesus wants me to share.

Slavery → Cry → Deliverance → Gifted Land
Sin → Desperation → Christ → New Life

Very rarely has anyone recited back to me the content of a training session or message I’ve delivered. It is very common for people to tell me, “I remember that story you told.”

In the quiet this morning, I find God echoing the simple foundation of His message throughout the entire Great Story from Genesis to Revelation.

Trust the Story. Tell the Story.

So, my friend, let me tell the Story of what Jesus has done for me…

If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.

Promotional graphic for Tom Vander Well's Wayfarer blog and podcast, featuring icons of various podcast platforms with a photo of Tom Vander Well.
These chapter-a-day blog posts are also available via podcast on all major podcast platforms including Apple, Google, and Spotify! Simply go to your podcast platform and search for “Wayfarer Tom Vander Well.” If it’s not on your platform, please let me know!
Icon depicting an open book with an orange background.
Chapter-a-Day

Same Table, Same Measure

1 Comment

Do not have two differing weights in your bag—one heavy, one light. Do not have two differing measures in your house—one large, one small. You must have accurate and honest weights and measures, so that you may live long in the land the Lord your God is giving you.
Deuteronomy 25:13-15 (NIV)

I have mentioned over this past year that I’m working on writing a book. The project is now in the home stretch. We’re designing a cover and in the final editing stage. I’m excited for the launch which should be in the next 4-6 weeks.

I’ve had a lot of people ask me about the book. It’s entitled This Call May Be Monitored (What Eavesdropping on Corporate America Taught Me About Business and Life). The book is not only about the lessons I’ve learned while listening to and assessing over 100,000 business phone calls. It is also my personal story—my early belief that my life’s calling was pastoral ministry, and how God led me down an unexpected path. Along the journey, I discovered something surprising: my faith informed my business—and my business, in turn, refined my faith.

With the content of my book spinning ceaselessly in my head, today’s chapter certainly dovetailed. God through Moses doesn’t flirt with abstractions when it comes to the justice of every day life and business. It rolls up its sleeves, plants its feet in the dust, and whispers, 

“Justice is not an idea. It’s how you treat the body in front of you…every one….every day.”

Deuteronomy 25 is a collection of case laws—not lofty theology, but law with calluses. Each vignette is small, but together they form a human braid of justice, dignity, memory, and restraint.

  • Fair punishment: Justice must be measured, not excessive. Even the guilty remain human.
  • The ox and the grain: Don’t muzzle the ox while it treads the grain—labor deserves sustenance.
  • Levirate marriage: A dead man’s name matters—to his children, the community, and to God. Family continuity is an act of mercy.
  • Honest weights and measures: Cheating corrodes the soul of a community.
  • Amalek remembered: Never forget cruelty that preys on the weak.

Today’s chapter pulses with a single heartbeat: God cares deeply about how power touches flesh.

That heartbeat was channeled into the foundation of my business when our founders, a married couple, established it back in 1987. Though the name of the business has changed, the mission statement they etched as a cornerstone of who we are as a company remains:

Intelligentics designs and implements customer-centered systems to measure and enhance customer experience. By applying the principles of God’s Word to our lives and work we become examples of servant leadership and integrity, bring measurable value to our clients, and profitably build our lives.

Doing right by clients, team members, and community is at the heart of our mission. It is merely an extension of what God established through Moses thousands of years ago in today’s chapter. It has pulsed at the core of my career with every customer survey, every analyzed phone call, and every client coaching session.

Every interaction between a business and their customer is human. Every interaction between me and my client is human. When business dehumanizes customers, clients, or its own team members in order to profit or gain power, God is offended. It’s a spiritual issue. God wants His people to lead with love-charged integrity both at home and in the marketplace. It’s foundational to building community that thrives.

It’s time for me to start the daily transition from sitting at the table in the quiet with God to sitting at the desk to serve our clients. Guess what?

It’s the same table, and the two are inexorably intertwined.

If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.

Promotional graphic for Tom Vander Well's Wayfarer blog and podcast, featuring icons of various podcast platforms with a photo of Tom Vander Well.
These chapter-a-day blog posts are also available via podcast on all major podcast platforms including Apple, Google, and Spotify! Simply go to your podcast platform and search for “Wayfarer Tom Vander Well.” If it’s not on your platform, please let me know!
Icon of an open book on an orange square background.
Chapter-a-Day

Stories and Choices

Leave a comment

If the neighbor is poor, do not go to sleep with their pledge in your possession. Return their cloak by sunset so that your neighbor may sleep in it. Then they will thank you, and it will be regarded as a righteous act in the sight of the Lord your God.
Deuteronomy 24:12-13 (NIV)

Along this chapter-a-day journey, I have often referenced being a historian of my family. I was a young man when I began really digging into the past and peeking into the dusty corners of the proverbial family attic. At that point in my life journey I was on a quest of self-discovery.

My quest has revealed many things over the years. I discovered plenty of the things families don’t talk about. Most all of the flaws of everyday humanity were lurking there. I learned stories of addiction, adultery, divorce, suicides, illegitimate children, and individuals leading secret second lives.

There was also plenty of dark tragedy that was brought to light. One of my great-great grandmothers was farmed out to be a live-in housekeeper for a distant family. When one of the sons of the family got her pregnant and refused responsibility, she was left with few options. Her own sister took her in, but forced her to live in Cinderella-like seclusion not wanting anyone to know she was there.

I learned that one of my great-grandmothers was a gold digger whose many failed marriages reaped tragic results for her and two of her children.

What I also witnessed in learning my family stories, however, is a lot of human decency. My grandparents for years took care of an elderly widow who lived down the block and had no one else to care for her. I had a grandfather who gave his deadbeat alcoholic brother a second chance. He quietly did the right thing by his family even after his family unjustly gave him the shaft. There are stories of financial generosity, giving friends a place to live, helping friends and neighbors with goodness and loving kindness.

“Remember” is a word Moses uses three times in today’s chapter. He returns to what Jewish teachers called zakhor, memories that help build moral muscle.

Today’s chapter is a collection of rules Moses gives his children and grandchildren as he prepares to send them off into life while he himself lies on his deathbed. The thread that I found running through Moses’ directives is basic human decency.

Divorce with decency for the woman who has zero power or standing in the culture of that day.

Don’t take a millstone—someone’s livelihood—as collateral, and leave them with no means to earn a wage.

Don’t treat your own people with contempt.

A person may owe you money and give you their cloak as collateral, but you return that cloak before nightfall. Don’t leave the poor soul cold at night.

You don’t kill children as justice for their parent’s wrongdoing, nor kill a parent for their child’s wrongdoing. Justice is for the offender, not their family.

Pay your employees promptly. Do right by those who work for you.

Do right by the poor and needy, as well. Leave harvest leftovers in the field and on the limbs and vines for the stranger, orphan, and widow to pick and eat.

As I meditated on all these things, I realized that today’s chapter was the foundation on which Jesus’ built His teaching. It’s doing right by others. It’s treating others the way I’d want to be treated. It’s using whatever authority, power, and means God’s blessed me with to love, serve, and provide – not just to those I know and love, but to those in need, even strangers, foreigners, and enemies.

In the quiet, my own zakhor memory rummaged through all of my family stories. Those stories include examples of individuals who, by faith, embodied the loving-kindness and generosity Moses (and Jesus) prescribe in today’s chapter – and those who didn’t.

This leaves me with the realization that I have a choice.

I can join one group or the other in the collective legacy of zakhor memories my great-great grandchildren will inherit. My choice is determined in a million daily thoughts, words, and actions.

If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.

Promotional graphic for Tom Vander Well's Wayfarer blog and podcast, featuring icons of various podcast platforms with a photo of Tom Vander Well.
These chapter-a-day blog posts are also available via podcast on all major podcast platforms including Apple, Google, and Spotify! Simply go to your podcast platform and search for “Wayfarer Tom Vander Well.” If it’s not on your platform, please let me know!
An orange icon featuring an open book with a white outline, representing reading or educational content.

Just another wayfarer on life's journey, headed for Home. I'm carrying The Message, and I'm definitely waiting for Guffman.