Retirement Plan - Deuteronomy 29-31

Deuteronomy 31:1-3 (ESV)
So Moses continued to speak these words to all Israel. And he said to them, “I am 120 years old today. I am no longer able to go out and come in. The LORD has said to me, ‘You shall not go over this Jordan.’ The LORD your God himself will go over before you. He will destroy these nations before you, so that you shall dispossess them, and Joshua will go over at your head, as the LORD has spoken.

God knows our limits. In fact, God sets our limits.  Mankind believes they have no limits.  When their bodies begin to fail them they act surprise that time has caught up with them.  The rich turn to medicine to heal that problem.  The poor turn to substances to heal that problem.   In the above passage, Moses tells Joshua (the future leader of Israel) that he is old and can no longer come in and out.  The solution for that problem is to prepare for death and create a succession plan, that continues God’s work.  Most Christians do not ever think of a succession plan for their life to carry on the work of Christ they are doing.   We mostly think about retirement, not the continuation of our work.   In a church, when a long time servant of Christ, stops serving, do they think of a succession plan for the work in the church?     This is what Moses is doing.   

In the above passage we read that Moses is 120 years old.  Apparently that was God’s retirement age for him.   Notice that in the Bible there is not retirement plan actually outlined.   When Joshua would later try to get Caleb (the one person who was with Joshua during the coming out of Egypt) to take the easy route in securing the land, this is what the eighty-plus year old said: 

Joshua 14:11 (ESV)
I am still as strong today as I was in the day that Moses sent me; my strength now is as my strength was then, for war and for going and coming.

No matter our age or our strength, we ought to fight for God’s Kingdom to the end.  When we reach that “end” (whatever that means for each person’s walk with God), we ought to find someone to carry out the work we are doing for the Kingdom.  That is a great retirement plan.