Therefore, choose life

Here is the message of Deuteronomy in a nutshell, culminating in the statement, "For Yahweh is your life, and he will extend your days in the land he swore to give to your forefathers, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob" (my translation).

The life or death choice of Deuteronomy is, in essense, a choice between trusting Yahweh or rejecting him. To choose life means accepting the Mosaic account of God's actions in the past, recognizing the wisdom of his prescriptions for life in the present, and, above all, putting faith in the solution promised in the distant future. The text as we now have it insists that nothing less than this wholehearted commitment will do, for the God who demands is the Lord of heaven and earth...

The sustained exposition of the authority of the God of Moses, whose words and acts demand a response, must surely cause all sorts of problems for those who want to avoid any claim of truth in the text. One cannot read this book without coming face-to-face with the outrageous claims of God on the lives of his people. Once more, the choice is between taking the text seriously (and therefore the God who stands behind the text seriously) or dismissing it. It is hard to see where there might be any middle ground.

• J. Gary Millar, "A Faithful God Who Does No Wrong" in The Trustworthiness of God: Perspectives on the Nature of Scripture (pp. 15-17)