Tag Archives: Faith

Open Heart, Open Hands

December 24, 2025 Tom Vander Well Leave a comment

If anyone is poor among your fellow Israelites in any of the towns of the land the Lord your God is giving you, do not be hardhearted or tightfisted toward them. Rather, be openhanded and freely lend them whatever they need.
Deuteronomy 15:7-8 (NIV)

It is Christmas Eve Day as I write this in the quiet of my home office. Wendy and I will prepare for the arrival of family this evening. It’s the start of what will be eleven days of festivity and celebration.

Sometimes on this chapter-a-day journey there are moments of unmistakable and unexpected synchronicity. So it is with today’s chapter. Moses speaks to his children and grandchildren, reminding them of God’s heart, and God’s ways. He speaks that they might not only hear them, but embrace them, live them, and pass them down through the generations.

Today’s chapter comes with a simple but physical metaphor.

We can live with open hearts and open hands,
or we can live with clenched hearts and closed fists.

Moses then speaks of God’s open-hand prescription for His people:

Cancel debts every seven years.
Release servants who have indentured themselves to survive.
Do not send anyone away empty-handed—fill their hands generously.
Set apart the firstborn and firstfruits for the Lord, for dedication and celebration.

Along the way, God provides some attitudinal warnings:

“Do not be hard hearted and tight-fisted…” (vs. 7)
“Be careful not to harbor this wicked thought (when considering whether or not to lend): ‘The seventh year, the year for cancelling debts, is near.’” (vs. 8)
“Give generously…without a grudging heart.” (vs. 10)
“Do not consider it a hardship to set your servant free…” (vs. 18)

I have learned over six decades of this earthly journey that generosity is not first a financial issue, but a heart issue. It is, perhaps, the most accurate barometer of spiritual health. Open-handed generosity is a sign that I have internalized two essential spiritual truths.

First, that God has been generous. Moses has been reminding his children and grandchildren of this for fifteen chapters. It is God who approached your ancestors and made a covenant. It is God who showed up and made Himself known. It is God who delivered you from your chains. It is God who has made you a promise. It is God who has led you, protected you, and provided for you.

God’s message through Moses is this: “I did not release you from your physical chains only to watch you shackle yourselves with spiritual ones.”

Second, that nothing I have is mine. I brought nothing into the world. Every earthly thing I think I possess or own will be left behind. Everything I think I possess or own flowed to me from God, and everything will ultimately flow back to God. When I am generous, I am being generous with God’s things. The more God has a hold on me, the less the things of this world have a hold on me. A hard heart and tight fists are a sign that both are bound by unseen spiritual cords—quiet chains I might not even realize are there.

Which brings me in the quiet back to Christmas Eve Day.

It is God who so loves that He gives—generously—His one and only Son.
It is God who shows up to reveal Himself to us.
It is God who shows up to cancel our eternal debts.
It is God who shows up to free us from our spiritual chains.
It is God who does not leave us empty-handed, but fills us with His Spirit and every good thing.

At Christmas, God provides an eternal object lesson of what Deuteronomy 15 is all about.

The proof of receipt is not in a church membership certificate, but in my joyful extension of that selfless generosity with every one every day.

Open heart. Open hands.

Freedom.

Taking the rest of the week off to celebrate. See you on Monday, Dec 29.

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

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Chapter-a-Day

Holiness, Heart, & Hearth

December 23, 2025 Tom Vander Well Leave a comment

…then exchange your tithe for silver, and take the silver with you and go to the place the Lord your God will choose. Use the silver to buy whatever you like: cattle, sheep, wine or other fermented drink, or anything you wish. Then you and your household shall eat there in the presence of the Lord your God and rejoice.
Deuteronomy 14:25-26 (NIV)

Year-end approaches. For Wendy and me, the already busy holidays are layered with even more good things. Wendy’s birthday on the 21st and our wedding anniversary on New Year’s Eve means the three biggest gift giving events of the year for my wife all happen in 10 days. Believe me, I’ve learned to think ahead. And there’s more than just the holidays.

Year-end also brings decisions that have to be made in the area of our business and personal finances. Giving, savings, and future planning must all be discussed and decided in meetings with various professionals who assist with those things. The dizzying world of taxes and finance produces endless questions. Navigating our labyrinthine tax code feels less like stewardship and more like trial by minotaur. Ugh! Underneath the Spirit and meaning of Christmas and New Years there remains the grind and realities of how life is managed day-to-day.

Speaking of finances and how life is managed, Wendy and I are looking forward our annual tradition of watching Guy Pearce’s dark and intense portrayal of Scrooge in FX’s version of A Christmas Carol. I highly recommend you put it at the top of your Christmas movie watch list. It cuts like a knife to the heart of the matter. What do matters of daily life, personal finance, and relationship look like when the Message and Spirit of what God did at Christmas fail to penetrate the human heart?

That same question lies at the heart of today’s chapter. God through Moses reminds his children and grandchildren that their identity as God’s treasured people is made visible in how they live, what they do with their appetites, how they manage their finances, their generosity, and how they do community each day, each season, each year.

Today’s chapter also has an interesting connection to Jesus’ Story. Moses tells his people that someday, when there is a permanent Temple established it may be that it will be far away from where they live. Transporting all of their stored up tithes and offerings may not be practical. So, there was a provision to sell those tithes and offerings for silver. They could then bring the silver (easy to carry with you) to the Temple. There the silver could be used to buy what you needed for your prescribed offerings and sacrifices.

By Jesus day, the religious establishment had discovered in Moses’ rather simple financial principle a money making scheme. Poor Hebrew pilgrims making the long journey to the Temple did bring with them silver to buy what was needed for their offerings and sacrifices. The Temple established its own currency which the establishment demanded for the purchase of offerings and sacrificial animals. The local currency the pilgrims brought would need to be exchanged. With that exchange came fees and taxes and an entire industry of moneychangers. Jesus approached the Temple—meant to be a place of community, celebration, generosity, and feasting—only to find it had become a spiritual subsidiary of Scrooge and Marley, Inc.

[Cue: Jesus picks up a whip He sees lying on the ground next to the cattle pen.]

Today’s chapter is easily read as simple prescriptive rules regarding diet and religious offerings. But the directives were intended to point to matters of heart and Spirit. God through Moses is teaching his toddler nation that holiness is anchored in restraint.

Desire without boundaries becomes chaos; desire with limits becomes intimacy.

Clean and unclean are not moral categories but symbolic ones—teaching God’s people to pause, to choose, to remember God even in the most ordinary act: eating. The tithe is especially striking: food given to God is not burned, but eaten—by people—with God present. Holiness tastes like wine, bread, and belonging. God is saying “You don’t drift into holiness. You practice it daily, with fork and cup.“

Tent to Temple to Table.

Which, in the quiet, brings me back to Christmas…and anniversary…and New Year’s…and year-end decisions of business and finance. Today’s chapter whispers to me of God’s heart: generous, selfless, and servant-hearted. From the beginning God’s prescription for Life flowed from His Spirit of intimacy, community, and generosity in the simple acts of gathering, celebrating, and eating.

In the coming days as Wendy and I gather with loved ones, as we watch A Christmas Carol, as we finalize business matters, I pray that it is that Spirit that rules my heart.

I have no need for the ghosts of Past, Present, and Future to awaken me in the wee hours.

God bless us, every one.

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

Chapter-a-Day

The Knife, the Cradle, and the Cross

December 22, 2025 Tom Vander Well Leave a comment

It is the Lord your God you must follow, and him you must revere. Keep his commands and obey him; serve him and hold fast to him.
Deuteronomy 13:4 (NIV)

For twelve chapters Moses’ deathbed message for his people has lovingly poured out of his heart. Remember, remember, remember the God who introduced Himself to you, the God who made a covenant with you and your ancestors, the God who delivered you from your chains, the God who miraculously provided and protected you, and the God who has promised you hope and a future.

Moses reminds his children and grandchildren through these twelve chapters that their relationship with God is a marriage. God has perpetually wooed, courted, delivered, provided, protected, and guided. What He asks of His bride is faithfulness. This is Moses at his most intense.

Moses poses three scenarios.

A prophet arrives with signs and wonders that appear to be the calling card of divine authority. Bedazzlement then gives way to the whisper of seduction. The prophet suggests they worship other gods.

An intimate family member whom you love deeply and trust implicitly suggests that together you worship other gods.

An entire community of people within your tribe chooses to follow and worship other gods and it becomes part of the community’s acceptable culture.

Notice that none of these seductions come from outside. They arise from within—religion, family, and community.

The response prescribed is uncompromising: resist, expose, remove. Loyalty to YHWH is not negotiable, not sentimental, not softened by affection or awe. The chapter ends with a repeated refrain: “So all Israel will hear and be afraid, and no one among you will do such an evil thing again.”

Today’s chapter is jarring, especially at the beginning of the week of Christmas as I hum O Little Town of Bethlehem. Yet one of the things that I’ve discovered about this Great Story is that everything connects.

It is easy sitting in my 21st century context listening to soft Christmas piano music on my computer to think that today’s chapter is the antithesis of Jesus. Only if I’m selective in my hearing of Jesus’ words. The reality is that Jesus embraced and extended the covenant as marriage metaphor. He repeated an uncompromising demand for fidelity, and warned of the consequences of faithlessness. He repeatedly channeled the serious, uncompromising truth of Deuteronomy 13.

Whether it’s prophets:

“For false messiahs and false prophets will appear and perform great signs and wonders to deceive, if possible, even the elect.See, I have told you ahead of time. “So if anyone tells you, ‘There he is, out in the wilderness,’ do not go out; or, ‘Here he is, in the inner rooms,’ do not believe it. For as lightning that comes from the east is visible even in the west, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. Wherever there is a carcass, there the vultures will gather.”
Matthew 24:24-28 (NIV)

Or intimate family members:

“Anyone who loves their father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; anyone who loves their son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.”
Matthew 10:36-38 (NIV)

Or community:

Then Jesus began to denounce the towns in which most of his miracles had been performed, because they did not repent. “Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida!For if the miracles that were performed in you had been performed in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes. But I tell you, it will be more bearable for Tyre and Sidon on the day of judgment than for you.”
Matthew 11:20-22 (NIV)

Or even myself:

“If your right eye causes you to stumble, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. And if your right hand causes you to stumble, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to go into hell.”
Matthew 5:29-30 (NIV)

Jesus does not dilute the command to love God alone; He intensifies it.

But here is the turn that happens at Bethlehem. Jesus, the Bridegroom of heaven, leaves heaven behind and comes to humanity. He arrives, not only to woo and court His bride, but also to pay the bride price.

Where Deuteronomy polices faithfulness from the outside, Jesus transforms it from the inside.

The battle moves from execution to examination. From purging towns to purifying hearts. The idol is no longer a carved figure—it’s whatever claims ultimacy. Whatever replaces affection and fidelity. Whatever becomes that which I care about more than the One who cared so much for me:

Power. Nation. Certainty. Distraction. Entertainment. Even religion itself.

And instead of destroying the seducer, Christ absorbs the cost of human unfaithfulness into His own body.

The knife becomes a cross.
The warning becomes a wound.
Love bleeds instead of legislates.

Deuteronomy 13 is not asking me whom I would stone.
It is asking me what I would refuse—even if it came wrapped in love, success, or certainty.

Deuteronomy demands clarity.
Christmas whispers comfort.

Together they ask a single, piercing question:

What has the power to lead my heart away – even gently?

This week as I stand at the manger, the text invites a holy audit:

What voice do I trust because it dazzles?
What affection do I excuse because it’s familiar?
What belief do I protect because it flatters me?

The babe wrapped in swaddling clothes will not compete for my loyalty.
He will simply lie there—vulnerable, unarmed—waiting to see if my love still knows His name.

And if I listen closely, beneath both Moses’ warnings and a chorus of angels, I hear the same ancient invitation of a Bridegroom:

Choose life.
Choose love.
Choose the One who refuses to seduce—and instead, saves.

And so, I enter this week of Christmas with a heart that is not just floating with sentimentality, but anchored in the sobriety of a Love who’s sacrifice “demands my life, my soul, my all.”

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

Chapter-a-Day

Gathering

December 19, 2025 Tom Vander Well Leave a comment

But you are to seek the place the Lord your God will choose from among all your tribes to put his Name there for his dwelling. To that place you must go…
Deuteronomy 12:5 (NIV)

A few weeks ago I was working on a personal project assembling photographs of Wendy and me through the years. A little something for our 20th wedding anniversary on New Year’s Eve. As I was going through the photos I laughed when I got to the Covid years. I let my hair grow during the pandemic. It was the longest it had ever been in my life. Oh, the ways that the pandemic lock downs changed our lives. So many rhythms of life were interrupted.

One of those rhythm interruptions was certainly weekly gatherings for worship. Everything moved online for a while, and I will confess that there was something novel and enjoyable about cuddling in on the couch with Wendy in our pajamas to watch worship online. I know I was not alone. I observed that some people never returned to physical gathering.

This came to mind this morning as I meditated on today’s chapter. For eleven chapters Moses has been teaching Israel how to remember. Today, he teaches them how to desire. The mantra of “remember” has been his constant refrain. In today’s chapter, Moses shifts his gaze to the future.

Someday, when the Hebrews have taken possession of the land and settled down, God will name the place where they are to bring all of the prescribed sacrifices and offerings. The chapter communicates three important concepts for their spiritual health.

First, they are to rid the land of other gods and their forms of worship. Why? These other religions were appetite indulgence masquerading as religion—desire without discipline, pleasure without protection. God even calls out their practice of child sacrifice.

“This is not who I am. This is not who you are.”

Second, God prescribes centralized worship. The traveling tent temple known as the Tabernacle has been with them for forty years as they wandered. The Tabernacle was always at the center of their camp. Someday, Moses says, God will name a place in the land for a permanent location for His name.

Third, God makes a distinction between daily appetites and sacred offering. You may eat meat freely wherever you live—but sacrifice belongs only in God’s chosen place. Appetite is allowed. Worship is consecrated. Desire is honored—but not deified and indulged in unhealthy ways.

God’s prescription isn’t prudish. It’s ordered. It is God’s invitation to learn how to desire rightly, how to worship with our whole bodies without letting our appetites run the show. God doesn’t outlaw pleasure – in fact He created it and celebrates it. He shuns exploitation, however. Holiness protects from the unhealthy consequences of appetites run amok. It shields bodies from being used in the name of spirituality.

The prescriptive rhythm that I see in today’s chapter is God’s desire for gathering. You can have your daily life at home, but I want you to gather together with me and your people at a central location. We are one. We need one another. The entire Great Story leads to one final and eternal gathering of God and His people in one City. Jesus said He was going to prepare that place and would return to gathering everyone there.

After Jesus ascension to begin those preparations, God sent His Holy Spirit to indwell those who believe and receive. God’s presence shifts from tent to temple to the bodies of believers. My body is God’s Temple, His Spirit dwelling within me.

It’s tempting to think, therefore, that worship can be centralized wherever I happen to be. After all, I discovered during Covid that sitting on the couch in my pajamas is quite comfortable and enjoyable. Bedside Baptist. Pillowcase Presbyterian. Lounge Chair Lutheran. Recliner Reformed. I kinda like the ring of all of them.

Please don’t read what I’m not writing. I’m grateful for technology that allows people who are shut-in to feel like they are a part of things from afar in real time. That is, however, different than me choosing to do so because it’s easy, comfortable, and requires little or nothing from me. I observed during the pandemic that this can easily become a return to appetite indulgence wrapped in a blanket of spirituality.

Jesus gathered His followers around the table. Even when He sent them out on missions He sent them in twos, never alone. Then, He always had them return. They gathered. They shared a meal. They broke bread together. They passed a cup. They sang together. They prayed together. Being alone has never been God’s paradigm. Gathering and doing Life and Spirit together has always been the prescription and the plan from tent to temple to table.

On Sunday Wendy and I will join our own local gathering of Jesus’ followers as we do pretty much every week. Yes, we will sing, we will pray, and we will follow an ordered form of worship. But that’s just the surface motions. They are good, instructive, and beneficial. It’s what really happens in the gathering over the weeks and months and years that is where the good stuff happens. These are our people. We know names and stories. They know ours. We do life together. We walk through life’s struggles. We support one another, encourage one another, and serve one another. We break the bread. We pass the cup.

Each week becomes a communion of Life and Spirit—something that only happens when bodies gather, voices rise, and stories intertwine.

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

Chapter-a-Day

A Land That Drinks Rain

December 18, 2025 Tom Vander Well Leave a comment

https://open.spotify.com/episode/0xRclnGJ6BIS5zescdesgG?si=dAN3qhtQSfiLuN9Et294SQ

The land you are entering to take over is not like the land of Egypt, from which you have come, where you planted your seed and irrigated it by foot as in a vegetable garden. But the land you are crossing the Jordan to take possession of is a land of mountains and valleys that drinks rain from heaven.
Deuteronomy 11:10-11 (NIV)

It’s not even Christmas and our driveway has required shoveling more times already than a few entire winters of recent memory. Last weekend Wendy and I were driving through a snow storm.

“Well, the farmers will be happy,” Wendy said.

That is such an Iowa thing to say. When you live in a state that drives nearly $50 billion dollars in annual revenue from crop production, agriculture is always part of the conversation. But for children of Iowa, it’s more than just money. We know that the fertile fields of Iowa feed the world. Closer to home and hearth, we know that farming is the life-blood and legacy of families.

Growing up in Iowa, you quickly learn that weather isn’t just about comfort or recreation, it’s an essential element of life, provision, and prosperity.

On a macro level, Moses’ words to the Hebrews crossing into the Promised Land in today’s chapter are about the blessings of love, legacy, and loyalty contrasted with the curses of apathy, forgetfulness, and hearts that wander. Right in the middle of the chapter (ancient Hebrew writers loved to put the most important bits in the center of the text), is a fascinating reference. Meteorology as metaphor: rain.

Back in Egypt, Moses reminds his people, water had to be industrially stored and channeled. Irrigation systems required. Humans digging, tunneling, manufacturing ways to make water work for them—that’s human empire. Human ingenuity finding ways to do what God does naturally by divine means. Humans have been doing that since the Tower of Babel.

The Promised Land, Moses tells his children, is God’s country. It is a land God Himself waters with rain from heaven. Rain is God’s blessing on the land and the people. God’s blessing, however, requires…

Faith, not function
Trust, not contraptions
Love, not labor.

This is God through Moses laying another layer of metaphor to lovingly communicate what He’s been saying all along. I’ve chosen and called you to be different than this world and the kingdoms of this world. Not because you deserve it or earned it but because of my love, grace, and mercy. Love me, trust me, follow me and rain will fall from heaven and you will be blessed with abundance and prosperity you can scarcely imagine.

Then comes the hard side of love. It isn’t punishment, it’s consequence.

There is a consequence, a curse, that comes if love, trust, and fidelity fade and fail. The skies close up. Drought conditions set in. At some point things resort back to the function, labor, and contraptions. When that happens, God’s people will be just like all the other kingdoms of this world.

The message I found flowing through the chapter in the quiet this morning was that the danger is not rebellion or disobedience. The danger is forgetting. Moses’ mantra thus far in his deathbed message has been the steady rhythmic beat of Zakhor: remember, remember, remember. Remembering what God has done is the crucial first step and activating ingredient in Life and blessing. Forgetting leads down a very different path.

“Believe me,” Moses urges his children, “you don’t want to go there.”

In a little divine wink, I’ve been hearing waves of heavy rain hitting the window of my office as I’ve been writing these words. I pulled up the radar. It’s a chilly Iowa winter morning, but well above freezing. A heavy rain is melting the snow from last weekend’s storm and soaking the slumbering earth.

In coffee shops all over Iowa, farmers sitting patiently through the death of winter and looking to the promise of Spring are smiling. A soaking winter rain. It’s a good thing. Gotta love it. But, it’s not a guarantee. Gotta have faith, too. Spring is still a long season away.

Rain is a gift.
So is remembering.
And faith, like spring, is something we wait for—but also something for which we prepare.

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

Chapter-a-Day

“Because You Were Foreigners”

December 17, 2025 Tom Vander Well Leave a comment

https://open.spotify.com/episode/197CLi9z4WqJ7VPm9awLgX?si=39wNyYaNSOedb18SahiMHQ

He defends the cause of the fatherless and the widow, and loves the foreigner residing among you, giving them food and clothing. And you are to love those who are foreigners, for you yourselves were foreigners in Egypt.
Deuteronomy 10:18-19 (NIV)

I dropped my car off to be serviced yesterday. I was given a ride home and had a very enjoyable conversation with the young man who was tasked with driving me. He was raised in a very different place and culture and was obviously getting used to the quirks of living in a community built by Dutch settlers. He asked if I was from Pella.

I laughed.

With the last name Vander Well, I told him that he had made a safe assumption. Then I informed him that when I moved into the community over 20 years ago, it was obvious that everyone who was from Pella knew that Vander Well is not a Pella Dutch name. My great-grandfather settled in northwest Iowa.

I am of the third generation of a Dutch immigrant in America. I live in a community settled and created by Dutch immigrants. As I’ve studied the history of the great Dutch migration in the 19th century and the history of our community, I’ve discovered a double-edged sword.

On one hand, there is a lot for which to be grateful. There is a legacy of faith, industriousness, frugality, and pride. These are the foundation of an amazing community and heritage we perpetually honor and celebrate. On the other edge of the sword is self-righteousness religiosity, legalism, judgement, and prejudice. I’ve heard many painful stories. Individuals outcast and ostracized. Divisions leading to hatred and resentment. Outsiders unwelcome.

Welcome to humanity.

Moses is leading a similarly human people, which is why in yesterday’s chapter he reminded them three times that God’s choosing them and giving them the Promised Land was not because they earned it or deserved it. Quite the opposite, they had perpetually proven themselves stubborn, whiny, ungrateful, disobedient, and faithless. Which is why today’s chapter is so powerful.

God tells Moses to chisel out two stone tablets to replace the ones he’d smashed. It’s God saying, “Come back up the mountain. I’ll make you a copy of the Ten Words. Oh, and bring a box, an ark, to provide a womb for my Words.”

Second chances. Their brokenness and failure does not negate God’s love, His covenant, or His gracious faithfulness. He is going with them. He will live among them, smack-dab in the middle of their camp. He will fulfill His plans for them, work His purposes through them, and deliver on His promises to give them possession of the land. All this despite them being stubborn, whiny, ungrateful, disobedient, and faithless.

This is the gospel before the Gospel.

The chapter then shifts. In light of God’s grace and mercy what does He ask of His people?

This is the heart of God and the heartbeat of His Great Story. This chapter is what Jesus channels and quotes repeatedly.

Circumcise your hearts. This isn’t about religious observation, but about transformation of spirit that leads to grateful love of God and the tangible love of others.

Love God. Love others. Jesus said those two commands summed up the whole of the Law of Moses.

Then God reminds His people – again – that if they are going to truly love others they need to love the ones He loves. The orphan. The widow. The outcast. The foreigner. The immigrant. The outsider.

Moses is building on zachor – moral memory – that flowed through yesterday’s chapter. God whispers: “Remember your chains. Remember your story – your history – being foreigners and slaves in the land of another people. Treat foreigners among you with the love, grace, and hospitality you wished Egypt had shown you. Be different. Follow my ways, not the ways of the world.”

As I meditated on these things in the quiet this morning, I was amazed at how much it resonated with our current culture and headlines. Borders, immigration, ICE raids, deportations, foreigners, and migrant workers fill never ending news cycles. Ancient Hebrews. 19th century Dutch settlers. 21st century foreigners and immigrants. What goes around comes around.

Welcome to humanity.

I don’t control national policy. I live far from my country’s borders. But, I can take to heart what God asks of me. The very thing He asked of His people through Moses. Love Him. Love others. Especially those who aren’t like me.

As we pulled into the driveway of our home, I thanked my young chauffeur sincerely. I wished him well. He was from a very different place, a very different people, and a very different heritage. He was a fine young man. I liked him a lot. He’s going to do really well here in our community. We’re fortunate he’s here, even if his name makes it obvious that he’s not from around here.

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

Chapter-a-Day

Stiff-Necked, Still Chosen

December 16, 2025 Tom Vander Well 1 Comment

Understand, then, that it is not because of your righteousness that the Lord your God is giving you this good land to possess, for you are a stiff-necked people.
Deuteronomy 9:6 (NIV)

Yesterday’s post faded to black with me and Wendy sitting at the breakfast table naming our blessings and whispering after-meal blessing of gratitude. If I’m not careful, this chapter-a-day journey too easily compartmentalizes each chapter. While I love the rhythm of letting one chapter speak in to my day, I try not to forget that there is a flow to the text. Yesterday’s chapter and today’s chapter are connected.

Yesterday’s chapter and my meditations fit hand-in-glove with the Christmas season. My soft heart loves Christmas. Every day brings cards and photos of family and friends we don’t see often enough. With each one are fond memories and good feelings. Wendy and I have been watching beloved Christmas movies (yes, Die Hard is a Christmas movie) and feeling all the feels. Family gatherings are planned. I can feel the desire to be together, to name our blessings, and to feel the gratitude.

This is sentimental remembering. Warm feelings, meaningful memories, and full hearts that feed the positive emotional endorphins. That’s where I exited yesterday’s post.

Today’s chapter, however, channels a very different kind of remembering.

Moses stands at the Jordan River with this next generation of Hebrews gazing across at the Promised Land. They are about to cross over and take possession of it while Moses stays behind and takes his final earthly breath. They will take the land. They will be blessed. They will prosper. But, Moses tells them, there is a truth that needs to sink deep into their hearts before they set out. It is a truth so spiritually vital that Moses repeats it three times like Jesus asking Peter three times: “Do you love me?”

…do not say to yourself, “The Lord has brought me here to take possession of this land because of my righteousness.” (vs. 4)

It is not because of your righteousness or your integrity that you are going in to take possession of their land… (vs. 5)

Understand, then, that it is not because of your righteousness that the Lord your God is giving you this good land to possess, for you are a stiff-necked people. (vs. 6)

Moses then painfully and deliberately hits the rewind button:

Golden calf.
Stiff necks.
Tablets shattered like dropped china.
Tear-stained intercession that kept the nation from annihilation.

The message lands bare and unflattering:

You didn’t earn this.
You didn’t deserve this.
And you still don’t.

Which—oddly enough—is very good news.

This is what is known in Hebrew as zakhor—not memory as the emotional fog of sentimentality, but memory as moral restraint.

It is Cain remembering the stain of his own brother’s blood on his hands.

It is Abraham remembering the painful casting away of Hagar and his son Ishmael.

It is Israel remembering that he was a deceiver who stole his brother’s blessing.

It is Moses remembering his murder of an Egyptian overseer, fleeing for his life, and his years of living on the lam in Midian exile.

It is David remembering his adultery with Bathsheba, his murder of her husband, and the death of their first-born child.

It is Paul seeing the face of Stephen and all of the other believers he persecuted and had executed before he met Jesus on the road to Damascus.

It is me remembering my long list of moral failings. Failings that trace all the way back to being a five-year-old stealing all the envelopes of Christmas cash off of Grandma Golly’s Christmas tree and hiding them in my suitcase.

In the quiet this morning, sentimental twinkle-light memories get balanced with the sobriety of zakhor memories. Moral memory isn’t shame, it’s schooling. It’s not reproach, it’s reinforcement of reality.

All of this abundance of blessing that surrounds me each day? The blessing that is so abundant that I sometimes forget that’s it’s a blessing?

I didn’t earn this.
I didn’t deserve this.
And I still don’t.

“For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— not by works, so that no one can boast.”

Moses is channeling the Gospel of Jesus 1500 years before Bethlehem.

As I soak in a little moral remembering this morning, I find my heart humbled. Like the Hebrews standing on the border of the Promised Land, I find myself chosen, called, and blessed – not because of who I am and what I’ve done but despite it.

Sometimes the fog of sentimental remembering lulls me into thinking that blessing is an entitlement. Moral remembering cuts through the fog and grounds me in the reality of His grace.

As Bob Dylan sings,
“like every sparrow fallen,
like every grain of sand.”

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

Chapter-a-Day

The After-Meal Blessing

December 15, 2025 Tom Vander Well 1 Comment

When you have eaten and are satisfied, praise the Lord your God for the good land he has given you.
Deuteronomy 8:10 (NIV)

The first apartment I lived in during college was the upper level of an ancient house. There were roaches. A lot of roaches. Turn on a light at night and they would all scurry. Complaints fell on deaf ears. It was obvious that the landlord had given up trying to get rid of the pests. The deposit and first month’s rent took all the money on hand. The first week there was a loaf of bread and jar of peanut butter to get us through to pay day.

Every morning as Wendy and I gather for coffee, breakfast, and some quiet time we pray together. Quite often, those prayers include an extended time of gratitude. We don’t offer a simple, blanket “thank you.” We name our blessings. A wonderful home that is beyond anything I could have imagined when I was living in that Roach Motel. A pantry that is full. An unlooked for career that has blessed me on multiple levels. Loving family, children, grandchildren, intimate relationships, faithful friendships, and amazing community. Naming them and saying thank you for each and every one is a kind of spiritual chiropractic—small adjustments that realign the soul.

This regular exercise of gratitude brings our hearts into alignment. God has blessed us. I don’t ever want to get seduced into thinking that it’s all about what I’ve done, or what we’ve done. I don’t want to get spiritually lazy and forget the source of every breath, every day, and every blessing.

Many years ago I memorized Deuteronomy 8:10. It resonated deep within me. Here in Iowa, you grow up learning to appreciate the land. Iowa means “beautiful land,” and it is beautiful. It is also abundant with a perpetual harvest of life and blessing. But, there was something else that stirred as I meditated on the verse. Wendy and I love a good meal with good wine, good company, and good conversation that keeps you at the table for hours. There is a satisfaction of soul that I feel sitting at the table and experience the satisfaction of having both stomach and heart satiated. I began quietly quoting Deuteronomy 8:10 to myself as a post meal blessing.

I didn’t know it, but I had stumbled upon what Jewish tradition calls Birkat HaMazon. It means literally “blessing of the food,” but it’s the blessing after the meal, not before. Most prayers are uttered in emptiness and need, this prayer flows out of satisfaction. It’s not a prayer for when I’m empty, but when I’m full. And goodness, is my life full.

The Birkat HaMazon is a blessing like a loaf of bread broken into four pieces.

For Sustenance.
I have eaten because God is generous, not because I’m deserving.

For Land.
Not just food, but place. History. Inheritance. Story. In this Jewish prayer I see a reflection of Jesus. He is the Alpha-point from which everything in creation flows in Genesis. He is the Omega-point to which everything in creation will return in Revelation. Everything I seemingly have and possess, is gift not entitlement. Prosperity is entrusted, not earned outright. To bless the land is my confession: “I didn’t build the ground beneath my feet.”

For Jerusalem.
This is the part of the blessing that aches. It remembers loss even in abundance. Even at a full table, Jewish prayer makes space for longing—for justice unfinished, peace incomplete, restoration still coming. It refuses to give in to the illusion that comfort equals completion. Along my life journey, I’ve learned that holy ache keeps the heart supple.

For God’s Goodness.
The blessing’s final movement gathers everything and says, in essence: “God, you are good. You always have been. You always will be.”

Not because the meal was perfect. Not because life is tidy. But because God’s character is rock steady. Even when we are faithless, God remains faithful. It’s who He is, and He can’t be anything but who He is.

Once again, I find myself in the quiet this morning wishing I could bathe in the text. There is so much wisdom in Moses’ reflection. He remembered the manna. His people didn’t complain the loudest when they were starving. Their complaints hit the highest decibel level when God’s provision of manna became predictable.

Today’s chapter is a reminder of a roach filled apartment and week-long diet of peanut butter toast and peanut butter sandwiches. Looking back, that season wasn’t punishment, it was spiritual formation. In a few moments I will head downstairs for breakfast with Wendy. I will take her hand and we will name our blessings. We will enjoy breakfast. We will solve the problems of the world in about a half-hour. Then we will get up to start our day.

But before I do, I will thank the Lord our God for the good land He has given us.

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

Chapter-a-Day

What’s In a Name?

December 12, 2025 Tom Vander Well Leave a comment

https://open.spotify.com/episode/2i8w5uaaSLZsRs8CbW2Se6?si=ZxNL_HKBSDi-2kWPF65_Yw

For you are a people holy to the Lord your God. The Lord your God has chosen you out of all the peoples on the face of the earth to be his people, his treasured possession.
Deuteronomy 7:6 (NIV)

One of the things I love about living in a small town is being known. I love walking into a restaurant, a coffee shop, or the pub and being greeted by name. I suppose some people like to be anonymous, but research consistently shows that most of us truly want to know and be known. And the beginning of that relational journey is simply knowing one another by name.

The subject of names has been surfacing a lot in my conversations of late. My local gathering of Jesus’ followers is working on a short-term initiative intended to help people learn one another’s names. I just read a fantastic article about the neuroscience that proves just how powerful using a person’s name truly is. I talk about it in business all of the time as I deliver customer service training.

One of the things that I have learned about name-use over the years is that the deeper and more intimate the relationship the more likely we are to create nicknames and pet names for one another. Conversely, as relationships break down and marriages move toward divorce we stop using one another’s names and revert to using pronouns or impersonal descriptors like “my children’s mother.” Wendy is “my treasure.” From the very beginning of our relationship, it’s been a special moniker that is hers and only hers. Between the two of us it is a sign of affection, devotion, honor, and fidelity.

Today’s chapter is one of those chapters that is misunderstood in modern cultural context. It’s a love letter disguised as a battle plan. God reminds Israel that their chosenness isn’t about muscle or merit, but about affection and fidelity. They are to enter the land clear-eyed and clear-hearted—no half-measures, no flirtations with rival gods. Destruction of idols isn’t cruelty; it’s fidelity therapy.

God promises protection, fruitfulness, and flourishing—not as wages earned, but as the natural overflow of covenant intimacy. Obedience here is not stiff-backed compliance; it’s trust leaning its full weight into the arms of a faithful Lover.

In Jewish tradition, Deuteronomy 7 is foundational for the concept of segulah—Israel as God’s treasured possession (v.6). This chosenness is not superiority; it is purpose and calling. Israel is set apart for something: to bear God’s name and reveal Him and His character in the world.

This covenant love is a foreshadowing of Jesus, who loved the world so much that He left heaven behind and became one of us. He treasured us so much that He suffered and died to pay the penalty for our sin. Then He called us to bear witness of God’s Kingdom through our love of Him and others.

The contrast could not be clearer.

The world chooses powerful.
God prefers the weak.
The world finds security in big numbers.
God prefers faith in a few.
The world indulges in surface sensual appetites.
God prescribes deep, exclusive and intimate relationship.
The world values self-centered personal ambition.
God values faithfully putting others ahead of ourselves.

In both today’s chapter and Jesus’ example, it is God who loves first. It is God who makes the covenant. It is God who promises fidelity, provision, protection, and blessing. We are the object of His love and affection.

We are His treasure.

He whispers, “My life for yours.”

When God speaks of loving His people in verses 7 and 8, the Hebrew word is ‘ahav. It is not a giddy infatuation, it’s a choice and a volitional act. In verse 9 God’s ‘ahav blesses a thousand generations of those who ‘ahav Him. God’s love invites reciprocity. Not because it needs it, but because it awakens it. And notice: God’s covenant loyalty flows toward those who love him—not as payment, but as shared intimacy.

This is mutual devotion, not transactional obedience.

In the quiet this morning, I’m reminded that God says that those who choose to follow have their names written in the Book of Life. My name is there. God knows my name. But today’s chapter reminds me that my name being written in the Book of Life is far more than just a “Hello My Name Is” name tag knowledge. That’s just the record like Wendy’s and my marriage certificate in the safe downstairs. I am God’s “treasure.” He gave His life that I might live. That kind of love awakens love in me.

Less Hallmark card, more keeping marriage vows at 3 a.m.

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

Chapter-a-Day

The Story We Tell With Our Lives

December 11, 2025 Tom Vander Well Leave a comment

Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.
Deuteronomy 6:4-5 (NIV)

As my family’s unofficial historian and pastor, I’ve become a repository for old family bibles.

“What should we going to do with great-grandma’s bible? Anyone want it?”

“Nah! Give it to Tom.”

Yes, I will take it. The first thing I will do is look to see what it contains besides the pages and the printed text. When a Bible is well-used it collects things. Ephemera of all kinds gets stuffed in the pages. It’s fascinating what people choose to keep. Handwritten notes are often found scribbled in the margins. It can be a window into an ancestor’s head and heart.

In my Bible there is a photograph. I don’t even remember putting it there. I think it randomly surfaced and I just shoved it inside the cover of my bible because it was convenient in the moment. It’s still there years later. The photograph is of my daughters and me at the breakfast table. They are about eight or nine years old and are eating their breakfast. I’m sitting there right where they found me when they got up, bible open. I’ve been doing this early morning meditation thing for a long time.

Today, our grandson Milo celebrates his eighth birthday. A generation has come and gone since that photograph in my bible was taken. When Milo comes to visit, his room is across the hall from my home office. Like me when I was his age, Milo is a morning person. So, amidst my quiet time I will hear the pocket door to my office slowly slide open and Milo will slide up on Papa’s lap. Just like my daughters used to do.

I could sit in today’s chapter for a long, long time. It is Moses at his most intimate and loving as a patriarch of his people. Remember, Deuteronomy is Moses’ final deathbed message. Today’s chapter is a loving father and grandfather’s heart fully open and on display.

Moses begins with what is known as the Shema in Jewish tradition. Shema means “hear” in Hebrew. This verse is recited morning and evening. It’s sung, whispered, shouted, taught to children as soon as they can speak. It’s what Jesus referenced as the greatest commandment. Love God with all your heart, soul, (Jesus added mind) and strength. God is one – not just a monotheism – but the unifying center of reality. Nothing exists outside of His oneness.

Moses begins with the Shema — the heartbeat of Israel. Then, like every wise elder, he moves from proclamation to formation – from hearing to teaching. Moses tells every Hebrew to share their family’s story with every child: Slavery, God’s deliverance, the miracles, the mess in the wilderness, God’s faithful provision, and the gracious promise and prosperity of the Promised Land.

“Tell them the Story,” Moses urges his children, “So they can trust the Story.”

Later in his message, Moses urges his children to action: “Do what is right and good in the Lord’s sight, so that it may go well with you…”

James echoes this same sentiment in his letter to Jesus’ followers:

“Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says.”
James 1:22 (NIV)

As I meditated on these things in the quiet this morning, I found myself focused on two intertwined thoughts.

First, the Hebrew word for “heart” intimates far more than just emotion. It is the wholeness of my inner self. It is the union of mind, will, and desire. To love God with my “heart” is to let Him sit enthroned on my decision-making center.

Second, I recognized that there is a flow to what Moses commands. The words can’t get from the ear to heart or hand – nor can they can’t be shared with the mouth – without passing through the mind. Perhaps that’s why our Lord added “mind” to the Shema.

Ear —> Head —> Heart —> Mouth/Hands/Feet

Along my life journey, I’ve observed individuals for whom the word has completely by-passed the heart. They hear the word. It enters the brain as plain text, rules, and religious commands. The hands might obey in legalistic fashion. The mouth regurgitates the text in heartless, rote, religious obedience.

But there’s no heart in it.

The words aren’t just laws, commands, and decrees. When channeled through grateful and believing hearts they’re paths to life, abundance, and longevity in all that God is providing in the future to which He is leading.

Here in the quiet, I find myself staring back at the photo of me at the table with my young daughters, my bible open to whatever chapter I was meditating on in the quiet that morning. I find myself looking forward to the next few weeks and the next time Milo slides open the pocket door of my office and staggers in on my lap, my bible open to whatever chapter of Deuteronomy we’ll be on that day. I look forward to sharing the Story in whatever way flows in our conversation.

My mornings in the quiet, this chapter-a-day trek, isn’t religious obedience. It’s my heartbeat. It’s my spirit breathing. It’s nourishment for my soul that fuels my day. It’s my personal embodiment of the heart of the Shema.

And so, I will tuck the photo back in my bible along with the other ephemera that I’ve mindlessly collected over the years. Perhaps one day a great-grandchild or great-great grandchild will inherit it. Perhaps it will whisper to a future generation about the pattern God established through Moses:

Hear the Story. Trust the Story. Tell the Story.

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

Wayfarer

Tag Archives: Faith

Open Heart, Open Hands

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Holiness, Heart, & Hearth

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The Knife, the Cradle, and the Cross

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Gathering

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A Land That Drinks Rain

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“Because You Were Foreigners”

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Stiff-Necked, Still Chosen

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The After-Meal Blessing

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What’s In a Name?

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The Story We Tell With Our Lives

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

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