Relational Wisdom (Deuteronomy 13:6–8)

If your brother, the son of your mother, or your son or your daughter or the wife you embrace or your friend who is as your own soul entices you secretly, saying, ‘Let us go and serve other gods,’ which neither you nor your fathers have known, some of the gods of the peoples who are around you, whether near you or far off from you, from the one end of the earth to the other, you shall not yield to him or listen to him, nor shall your eye pity him, nor shall you spare him, nor shall you conceal him.
—Deuteronomy 13:6–8

Wow, what a warning this is. God is speaking about the power of close friendships—even family relationships—to either spur us on toward serving, worshiping, loving, and following Him, or to pull us away from serving, loving, worshiping, and following Him.

This is part of God’s design for close friendships. Think about passages such as Hebrews 10:24–25, where we see the picture of gathering closely with other brothers and sisters in Christ to spur one another on toward love and good works and to encourage one another in faith. Proverbs says, “As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another.” God has designed our closest relationships to help us draw closer to Him.

But the warning here in Deuteronomy 13 is that it is possible for those close relationships—for people who are as close as your own soul—to entice you in ways that pull you away from intimacy with God and lead you to serve other gods.

All of this cries out: guard your closest relationships.

There are many different ways Deuteronomy 13:6–8 leads us to pray. O God, we pray first and foremost for our own lives—as sons and daughters, brothers and sisters, wives and husbands, and friends. God, we pray that you would help us never to entice those closest to us—or anyone else, especially those closest to us—to pull away from you.

God, we pray that our lives today would spur the people closest to us toward you; that we would encourage them in their faith; and that they would be closer to you as a result of being in friendship or family with us. May they know you, love you, follow you, worship you, enjoy you, and exalt you more because of our influence in their lives. God, we pray for this.

We also pray that you would help us guard our closest relationships and ensure that those influencing us most are spurring us on toward you. God, give us wisdom in relationships with people we love—friends and family members who may not know you, may not love you, and who may be pulling us away from you in small or significant ways.

God, help us to love them well. Please help us love them in ways that point them to you. But guard us from being enticed in any way—even toward indifference, casualness before you, or apathy in our relationship with you. God, we pray that our closest relationships would never pull us away from you.

A Prayer for the Dzala People

As we pray this for our own lives and those around us, we also pray for unreached peoples like the Dzala people of Bhutan. To think that none of them have family members or friends who know you and can spur them on toward you—

God, we pray for the spread of the gospel among the Dzala people of Bhutan and among thousands of other people groups like them, so that there might be friends and families centered around you and spurring one another on toward you, instead of entire groups of people enticing one another to serve other gods.

God, may it not be so. Cause the gospel, we pray, to spread among the Dzala of Bhutan. Help us guard our closest relationships in ways that spur those closest to us toward you and lead us into deeper love for and enjoyment of you, so that we may walk more closely with you.

May it be so, we pray, in Jesus’ name. Amen.