The Old Landmarks
Deuteronomy 19:14
A while back, when we were looking at putting in the new entrance and driveway here at the church, we ran across a little problem.
We did not know where the property markers were along the highway.
Nowadays, you pay a surveyor to go out and mark the corners of your property.
It is usually a metal stake and sometimes they can get buried.
We tried metal detectors with no luck.
We finally dug and found them.
We marked them with pain on the east entrance and bricks on the west entrance.
You don’t need to know where they are at most of the time, but there are times like when you are doing construction work or putting up a fence that you need to know where those boundary markers are.
If you go down to the Texas Rangers Museum in Waco, they have a display about how the early Rangers helped guard the surveyors that laid out the original land grants in Texas.
When we went there the first time I thought that was one of the least exciting parts.
I think I understand better now.
It is important to correctly survey property and accurately mark its boundaries.
I was told about a little country church here in our county.
It’s been there since the 1870s.
There are fences around the church house that have been there as long as anyone can remember.
One of the neighbors was preparing to sell their property and had a surveyor come out.
Turns out not a single one of those fences were in the right place.
Half of the church’s well house was not on church property!
I believe they were able to come to an understanding about it, but it goes to show you the importance of knowing where your property boundaries are.
That is what our text is talking about.
When Moses gives them this law, they are just about to enter the land of Canaan.
The tribes would have territory allotted to them, and each tribe would divide their territory into tracts of land for each family.
There were already leaders put in charge of this in Numbers 34:16-29.
Eleazar the High Priest and Joshua were in overall command of the project and a leader from each tribe was named to oversee their own territorial divisions.
The tracts were to be distributed by lot
No favoritism, leaving it up to God.
You can jump forward into Joshua and see this happen.
Jos 14:1 And these are the countries which the children of Israel inherited in the land of Canaan, which Eleazar the priest, and Joshua the son of Nun, and the heads of the fathers of the tribes of the children of Israel, distributed for inheritance to them.
Jos 14:2 By lot was their inheritance, as the LORD commanded by the hand of Moses, for the nine tribes, and for the half tribe.
Jos 14:3 For Moses had given the inheritance of two tribes and an half tribe on the other side Jordan: but unto the Levites he gave none inheritance among them.
Jos 14:4 For the children of Joseph were two tribes, Manasseh and Ephraim: therefore they gave no part unto the Levites in the land, save cities to dwell in, with their suburbs for their cattle and for their substance.
Jos 14:5 As the LORD commanded Moses, so the children of Israel did, and they divided the land.
What follows are descriptions of the territory given to each tribe, until you read this conclusion in Joshua 19:51:
Jos 19:51 These are the inheritances, which Eleazar the priest, and Joshua the son of Nun, and the heads of the fathers of the tribes of the children of Israel, divided for an inheritance by lot in Shiloh before the LORD, at the door of the tabernacle of the congregation. So they made an end of dividing the country.
By the way, how did the Israelites know how to do this?
Well, they had just come from Egypt, who had been surveying land for over a 1,000 years before this.
The Egyptians had to resurvey land frequently because the Nile constantly flooded and changed courses.
I don’t completely understand how they did it, lots of math and geometry, maybe a little witchcraft, I don’t know.
I don’t completely understand how they do it now.
Anyway, as the Israelites surveyed each tract they placed markers to designated one lot from another.
Like I said, today we use metal rods, but back then they used large rocks.
These were probably marked in some fashion to identify them.
I don’t know of any that have been identified from Joshua’s time, but hundreds of them from the days of the Greeks and Romans have been found.
Why have this command about moving those markers?
Before we get into this, I want to acknowledge that this is a theme throughout the Old Testament, so it must have been a real problem.
Job is the oldest book to mention it, maybe 200 years before Moses spoke about it.
Job 24:2 Some remove the landmarks; they violently take away flocks, and feed thereof.
It is repeated in the strongest terms possible in Deuteronomy 27:14
Deu 27:17 Cursed be he that removeth his neighbour’s landmark. And all the people shall say, Amen.
Solomon writes about it Proverbs, about 450 years after Moses.
Pro 22:28 Remove not the ancient landmark, which thy fathers have set.
Pro 23:10 Remove not the old landmark; and enter not into the fields of the fatherless:
The prophet Hosea even talks about it over 700 years after Moses:
Hos 5:10 The princes of Judah were like them that remove the bound: therefore I will pour out my wrath upon them like water.
So, why was this a big deal?
That’s what I want to speak about this morning, and I hope to draw some conclusions that we can apply to our own lives.
Why would someone go out and move the markers around their land?
What would happen is that someone sneak out in the night and move the boundary marker to gain a little more land.
If they were patient, they would move it only a few inches at a time so that it was not obvious.
Why would someone do this?
I. It is evidence of Covetousness.
Someone who did this was not satisfied with their own property, but sought to gain their neighbor’s land.
Exo 20:17 Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour’s house, thou shalt not covet thy neighbour’s wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is thy neighbour’s.
I know it is tempting to say this is the Eighth Commandment – Thou shalt not steal – instead of the tenth.
But the theft started with covetousness.
You did not do this to pick up worthless desert or swamp land.
No, you would slowly encroach on someone’s farmland.
Someone once said that there are two ways to be rich:
Have all you want
Want all you have.
Illus. – Someone asked John D. Rockefeller how much was enough – “just a little bit more”.
That is never enough!
Human greed is a bottomless pit.
You may say, “I just cannot be happy until I have __________”
That will last for a few moments, days, months, maybe even years.
Then the excitement wears off and you have got to have more.
1Ti 6:6 But godliness with contentment is great gain.
1Ti 6:7 For we brought nothing into this world, and it is certain we can carry nothing out.
1Ti 6:8 And having food and raiment let us be therewith content.
1Ti 6:9 But they that will be rich fall into temptation and a snare, and into many foolish and hurtful lusts, which drown men in destruction and perdition.
1Ti 6:10 For the love of money is the root of all evil: which while some coveted after, they have erred from the faith, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows.
II. It shows dissatisfaction with God’s care.
God gave the land of Canaan to Israel.
It was so promised it Abraham.
Remember that the land was divided by lot – that is not just trusting to chance, it is letting God decide.
In that thinking, the land your family received was the land God wanted you to have.
And not just you, your children and their children and so.
You could not sell the land because every 50 years at the Year of Jubilee it reverted back to the original family – see Leviticus 25.
That land was your family’s.
You were to tend it, till it, keep it.
Through that land God was blessing you and caring for your needs.
So, that being the case, to seek out and take more land is the same as telling God that His care is not enough.
Godliness and Contentment go hand in hand – we just read that in I Timothy 6:8.
True blessing does not lie in abundance, but in acceptance.
God saw it fit that I was not born a millionaire.
I am sure it would have ruined me.
Someone said that if money can’t make you happy, then they would take just enough to be slightly miserable.
There are countless verses we could look at here – from Proverbs to the Sermon on the Mount.
We should always be thankful for God’s generous care and blessing in our lives.
III. It hurts others.
One of the easiest ways to tell if something is right is to ask if it harms or takes advantage of someone else.
Not only would moving landmarks be a crime against self in covetousness and a crime against God in thankfulness, it is a crime against our neighbor.
By the way, remember these are family tracts – your neighbor could be a close relation, especially a few generations later.
I gave you six verses including our text that talk about moving land markers.
If you pay attention to them and look at them in their surrounding context, there is something interesting you will observe.
Lets look at a couple:
Here is the passage in Job with some context:
Job 24:2 Some remove the landmarks; they violently take away flocks, and feed thereof.
Job 24:3 They drive away the ass of the fatherless, they take the widow’s ox for a pledge.
Job 24:4 They turn the needy out of the way: the poor of the earth hide themselves together.
Here is the passage in Proverbs 22:
Pro 22:26 Be not thou one of them that strike hands, or of them that are sureties for debts.
Pro 22:27 If thou hast nothing to pay, why should he take away thy bed from under thee?
Pro 22:28 Remove not the ancient landmark, which thy fathers have set.
Pro 22:29 Seest thou a man diligent in his business? he shall stand before kings; he shall not stand before mean men.
See a pattern?
Moving landmarks is linked with theft, shady business dealings, and abuse of the needy.
The theft of land was literally taking food out of children’s mouths.
It hurt not only the present generation, but generations to come.
In this it is as heinous a crime as you can find.
Friends, if getting ahead in life means putting others down it is not worth it.
In God’s economy we all work together and help each other and celebrated the Lord’s blessings on those around us.
We should wish not ill on others, nor should we seek it.
CONCLUSION
1. Are we truly satisfied with God’s provision?
2. Are we harming others in our quest to improve our lot.
There is nothing wrong with getting ahead, so long as the cost is worth it.
3. One landmark that you cannot move is the Old Rugged Cross
You cannot move it.
It will always divide the saved and the lost.