Deuteronomy 23

4. Before the kingdom of grace comes into us we are spiritually illegitimate, of the bastard brood of the Old Serpent (John 8:44). To be illegitimate is the greatest infamy (Deuteronomy 23:2). A bastard shall not enter into the congregation of the Lord to the tenth generation.

The Scripture confutes it. When you come into the standing corn of your neighbor's, you shall not move a sickle to your neighbor's corn (Deuteronomy 23:25). Property must be observed.

Covetousness causes uncleanness. You read of the hire of a whore (Deuteronomy 23:18). An adulteress for money sets both conscience and chastity to sale.

Fourthly, from this root of covetousness comes uncleanness. You read of the hire of a whore (Deuteronomy 23:18): for money she would let both her conscience and chastity be set to sale. O if you would be kept from the evil of sin, beware of covetousness which is the inlet to so…

First, in the toleration of houses of prostitution, flat against the commandment of God. Deuteronomy 23:17: There shall be no prostitute of the daughters of Israel, neither shall there be a male prostitute of the sons of Israel. And this toleration is an occasion of uncleanness…

Mark the equity of this law: and that is, that things evil and accursed, are to be removed from the eye and sense of man. This charge the Lord gives of lesser matters, namely, of sights indecent, and unseemly (Deuteronomy 23:15). Again, we are commanded not so much as to name fo…

Whoever does evil, must fear: because the magistrate bears the sword to punish (Romans 13:4). And the commandment of God was, that there must be no whore in Israel (Deuteronomy 23). Therefore the permission of the Stews in Rome is without warrant: and the rather, because there t…

3. for men of the same country. Thus all the Jews are called brethren one to another (Deuteronomy 17:15), From among your brethren shall you make a king over you, and (Deuteronomy 23:19), You shall not give to usury to your brother, and (Romans 9:1), Paul says, he could wish him…

But the curse causeless (says Solomon) shall not come. And we may say to England as Moses did to Israel concerning Balaam's curse (Deuteronomy 23:5): Nevertheless the Lord your God would not hearken to Balaam: but the Lord your God turned the curse into a blessing to you, becaus…

As when the sea has made [] breach into the land, if it cannot possibly be stopped, the best course is, to make it as narrow as may bee. Such was the law concerning vsurie, Deut. 23. 20. permitting the Iewes to exercise it upon a stranger, but not towards a brother: and the like…

Hence the Prophet compares adulterers to fed horses, every one neighing after his neighbor's wife (Jeremiah 5:8). And God joins such impure persons with the vilest and most detestable of brute beasts (Deuteronomy 23:18): You shall not bring the hire of a whore, nor the price of…

And God was so strongly set upon revenge of this people, that because Saul spared Agag, and the fat of the cattel, though in pity, though under pretense of Sacrifice, the Lord therefore rejected him, and accounted his sin as rebellion and witchcraft, so as he would not have Samu…

Indeed, the Scripture compares them to the filthiest of beasts. even to Dogs: When Ishbosheth charged this sin upon Abner, 2 Samuel 3:8. Am I a Dogs head, (says he) that you chargest me with a fault concerning this woman? And in Deuteronomy 23:18. The hire of a whore, and the pr…

If it be temporal, whatever pains us, is but a flea-biting to eternal torments. Whatever pleases or delights, it is but a may game to eternal joys; so for use too, it is but for a season (Deuteronomy 23:24), the Law gave an indulgence to eat of his neighbor's grapes for refreshm…

Thus he lays their sin and danger before them pretty roundly, and yet, says God, he restrained them not — there was an omission and neglect of more severe discipline; and this omission cost him dear, as dear almost as the sins of commission did cost his sons, which was not to be…

Ninth, it is the cause of unchastity. The Scripture mentions the hire of a prostitute (Deuteronomy 23:18). For money, both conscience and chastity are set for sale.

And if God establish David's seed forever (Psalm 89:4) and the seed of his people shall possess the gates of their enemies (Genesis 24:60) and if he pour his Spirit upon the seed of Jacob (Isaiah 44:3) and circumcise the heart of the seed of his people (Deuteronomy 30:6) and put…

The Saints live suitably to their high birth, they breathe after God's love, they aspire after glory, they set their feet where worldly men set their heart; they display the Banner of the Gospel, lifting up Christ's Name and interest in the world. 7. The godly are happy persons:…

3rd Commandment: You shall not take the name of the Lord, etc. He breaks this commandment: who does irreverently use God's titles in his talk (Philippians 2:10); who swears to do a thing lawful and good and yet does it not (Matthew 5:23); who swears rashly (Jeremiah 4:2); who us…

He answered, they are the King’s, and are planted here for his own delight, and also for the solace of pilgrims. So the gardener had them into the vineyards, and bade them refresh themselves with the dainties (Deuteronomy 23:24); he also showed them there the King’s walks and ar…

And accordingly we find that God remembered it a long time after (1 Samuel 15:3). And how highly did God resent it in the Moabites and Ammonites, that they did not lend a helping hand, and encourage and promote the affair? (Deuteronomy 23:3-4): "An Ammonite or Moabite shall not…