This is the promise God gave to the Israelites that if they obey His commandments, He will bless them abundantly in many ways. But if they disobey, they will be punished for their disobedience. It also describes the consequences for the disobedient.

In verses 1- 6, He begins with His promise to bless them. He will make them into a great nation, the leader of all nations of the world (v. 1 cf. v. 13). Then He describes the kind of blessings He will bless them with (v. 2). First, wherever they may be, in the city or the field, He will bless them (v. 3). He will bless their crops abundantly, increase their cattle and flocks, and the food they grow. (vv. 4-5). He will also bless them when they return home or when they go out of their home (v. 6).

In every aspect of their lives whether as a nation or as an individual, He will bless them if they were to obey Him and all that He commanded of them to do, they will lack nothing and everywhere they go He will be watching and protecting them. In other words, they will succeed in all that they do and lack nothing as they can be certain of it as God has promised them. The only condition was that they must obey all His commandments.

In verses 7-14, God also promised them that He will give them victory over their enemies (v. 7). If God is on our side, no one can come against us. Again,He promised to bless them with plenty of food in the barns and success in all that they do but this condition is to obey His commandments must not fail (vv. 8-9). Everything they do God will bless us, and we can be sure that we will not lack anything because we have kept His commands.

God promised them that even the nations would fear them when they saw God prospering them as a nation (vv. 10-11). He promised to pour out from His treasury from heaven and bless the work of their hands until they become lenders not borrowers as a nation (v. 12). So, everywhere they go and everything they need, God’s promise was that He will give it to them and success to accomplish what they do. He will raise them to the top as a nation. Israel will become the leader of all the nations. She will only climb up and not go down if she faithfully obeys God and all His commandments and do not turn away to worship other gods (vv. 13-14).

Obedience will lead to God’s blessing us. As parents, we also make promises to our children to reward them if they listen and do what we tell them. For example, I remember I promised my youngest child when he was in elementary school that for every “A” he gets I would reward him monetarily. As a result, he became motivated to do his best and I began to see him getting “As” for most of his subjects.

However, I hardly see any of us motivated to obey God even with such promises from our Lord as we keep reading that God’s chosen people disobeying Him and being punished by Him instead of being blessed by Him, from Genesis to Revelations even today in today’s era. But in times they obeyed Him, He rewarded them just as He promised. Thus, I pray and hope that we will be motivated by His promises to obey Him instead of obeying the world.

Reflection and Prayer: Father, I commit myself to obey You instead of disobeying You and love the world instead. Help me to be faithful to obey all that You commanded me to do in the scripture, and to love You more than I love myself or the world ! In Jesus’ name I pray, Amen.