Scripture Daily

Context No. 1379 of 4322 · Deuteronomy

Context · Reflection

Deuteronomy 6:10-19: in context

10It shall be, when the LORD your God brings you into the land which he swore to your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give you, great and goodly cities which you didn’t build, 11and houses full of all good things which you didn’t fill, and cisterns dug out which you didn’t dig, vineyards and olive trees which you didn’t plant, and you shall eat and be full; 12then beware lest you forget the LORD, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. 13You shall fear the LORD your God; and you shall serve him, and shall swear by his name. 14You shall not go after other gods, of the gods of the peoples who are around you, 15for the LORD your God among you is a jealous God, lest the anger of the LORD your God be kindled against you, and he destroy you from off the face of the earth. 16You shall not tempt the LORD your God, as you tempted him in Massah. 17You shall diligently keep the commandments of the LORD your God, and his testimonies, and his statutes, which he has commanded you. 18You shall do that which is right and good in the LORD’s sight, that it may be well with you and that you may go in and possess the good land which the LORD swore to your fathers, 19to thrust out all your enemies from before you, as the LORD has spoken.

Moses looks ahead to the day Israel will be settled and prosperous in the promised land. The LORD will bring you into great and good cities you did not build, he says, and houses full of good things you did not fill, wells you did not dig, vineyards and olive trees you did not plant; and you will eat and be full. And then the warning, right at the point of plenty: take care lest you forget the LORD, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. Fear him, serve him, do not go after other gods; do what is right and good in his sight.

The danger Moses names is a surprising one: not the danger of hardship but the danger of comfort. He does not warn them to remember God when they are afflicted and in need; he warns them to beware of forgetting God when they are full, settled, and prosperous. Prosperity, it turns out, is spiritually more dangerous than want, because it so easily breeds forgetting. When we have eaten and are full, surrounded by good things, it is fatally easy to lose the sense that any of it was given, to slide into taking the credit and forgetting the Giver. And Moses drives the point home by stressing how much of their plenty they did not produce: cities they did not build, houses they did not fill, wells they did not dig, vines they did not plant. Nearly everything they would enjoy was received, not achieved, handed to them by God; and the temptation, once comfortable, would be to forget that entirely and imagine they had made their own security. It is a warning that lands with particular force on those of us who live in relative plenty. The full and comfortable life quietly tempts us to forget God, to treat his gifts as our own accomplishments, to lose in prosperity the dependence we felt in need. The remedy is to remember, deliberately, that the cities we did not build and the good things we did not make were given, and that the Giver is not to be forgotten in the enjoyment of his gifts.

Has my own comfort and plenty quietly tempted me to forget God and to take credit for what was given, and can I remember deliberately that the good things I did not make came from his hand, so that I do not lose in prosperity the dependence I would feel in need?

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