For your eyes have seen all the great work of Jehovah which he hath done.
Moses has just listed what God did — the plagues in Egypt, the sea closing over Pharaoh's army, forty years in the desert, the ground splitting open under two rebels. He ends by pointing not at those events but at the men listening: their own eyes saw it all, and on that fact he builds everything he asks of them.
This verse is the last link in a chain of reasoning that began several verses earlier and ends in a command to love.
The main teaching of this book is obedience that springs from love to Jehovah, and this chapter develops it further. It begins with a "therefore." ... Then Moses reviews the mighty acts of Jehovah once more. His miracles and acts in Egypt, what He did at the Red Sea, what He did to them in the wilderness — therefore you shall love the LORD your God. They were also to love Him and keep His words in view of the land they were about to possess. What He had done and what He was going to do for them called for the love and obedience of His people.
What their eyes had seen was not only God's power against Egypt. The last item on Moses' list happened inside the camp, among their own people.
Deuteronomy 11 sums up the whole matter. It gives the practical conclusion that the lawgiver keeps before their eyes. They were to remember what rebellion must end in. So he points to what happened to Dathan and Abiram. The earth swallowed them up because they openly abandoned God and fought against Him.
One detail here is easy to miss: which names Moses chooses for the example.
In the account given in Numbers, Korah the Levite is the prominent character. Here Moses leaves him out and names the two Reubenites instead. They were two members of the congregation. Moses is seeking to work on the whole body of the people by setting before them the terrible consequence of self-will in two of their own number — two ordinary members, as we should say, and not just a privileged Levite.
It seems strange that a man who watched the sea swallow an army would need reminding of it. Moses knew better.
Moses felt it was of the highest importance to keep all the mighty acts of Jehovah before the hearts of the people, engraved deeply on their memory. The human mind wanders and the heart is unsteady. Israel had seen God's solemn judgments on Egypt and on Pharaoh, yet they were still in danger of forgetting them. They could lose the impression those judgments were designed and well fitted to make on them.
The next verse joins keeping the commandments to being strong enough to take the land. That link raises a question about which commands we keep.
Note the beautiful moral link between those two clauses: "Keep all the commandments" — "that you may be strong." Unreserved obedience to the word of God brings great strength. It will not do to pick and choose. We are prone to this. We take up the commandments and rules that suit us. But that is self-will. What right have we to select certain rules from the word and neglect others? None whatever. What business has a servant to decide which of his master's commands he will obey? None at all. Each commandment carries the master's authority, and so it claims the servant's attention.
Nobody alive today watched the Red Sea divide. Yet one writer holds that the appeal still reaches us, through a different way of seeing.
"When He bares His arm, who can stand against His might?" The chariots and the horsemen of Egypt, and the waters of the Red Sea, were as nothing to the Lord. He "brought the sea upon them and covered them." "Your eyes," said the Lord, "have seen what I have done in Egypt." Yes, cries the Christian, our eye of faith has also seen His power and His grace. He has delivered us from the present evil world. We once groaned under its bondage and almost despaired of freedom.
- Seen — Moses speaks to the generation that watched God act. Their own memory is the ground of his appeal.
- Therefore — what God had done, and what He was about to do, called for love first and obedience flowing out of it.
- Warned — the list ends close to home. Dathan and Abiram were two ordinary men, and their fate shows the whole congregation where self-will leads.
- Forgotten — the human heart is unsteady and loses even the deepest impressions, so these acts must stay in view.
- Strengthened — unreserved obedience is what makes a people strong enough to go in and take the land God promised.
Keep then all the commandment which I command you this day, that ye may be strong, and enter in and possess the land, whither ye pass over to possess it;
Moses is ending his long review of Israel's history, and this command rests on all of it. The people before him had seen God act in Egypt, at the Red Sea, in the wilderness, and at home, where the earth swallowed the rebels Dathan and Abiram.
One writer explains why Moses ends here with rebellion and its outcome:
Deuteronomy 11 sums up the whole matter. It is the practical conclusion that Moses keeps before their eyes. They were to remember what rebellion must end in. So he points to the fate of Dathan and Abiram. The earth swallowed them up because they openly turned away from God and fought against Him... The rest of the chapter is full of the most earnest warnings and bright promises. In the land, everything would turn on whether they obeyed or disobeyed.
Another writer names the one aim behind the whole review:
In a word, Moses pointed them to what God did abroad and to what He did at home. It all had one purpose: to impress on their hearts and minds how morally important obedience is... He presses the whole story on the conscience of the people, with remarkable force and clearness. It strengthens the ground of Jehovah's claim on their unqualified obedience to His holy commandments.
The verse joins two things: keeping the commandment, and being strong. One writer works out what that link rules out. (He quotes an older translation, "all the commandments"; ESV reads "the whole commandment".)
Notice the beautiful moral link between those two clauses: "Keep all the commandments" — "That you may be strong." Unreserved obedience to the word of God brings great strength. It will not do to pick and choose. We are prone to this. We take up the commands and rules that suit us; but this is really self-will... What business has a servant to decide which of his master's commands he will obey? Surely none whatever; each commandment stands clothed with the master's authority... and the more closely he obeys every command, however small, the stronger his position becomes. He also grows in his master's confidence and esteem.
The land was already promised. They still had to go in and take it, and obedience was the condition.
When Israel was about to enter the promised land, Jehovah again required obedience to the word as the condition of victory (Deut. 11:22-23). He asked for more than obedience to the commandments. They also had to take actual possession (ver. 24, 25). It is the same for believers now. Obedience to the word, and entering spiritual blessings by faith, are both needed if they are to possess them in experience. God's sovereignty in blessing His people does not clash with their responsibility to obey His word. By grace God has made every spiritual blessing secure in Christ for all His people. Even so, every man reaps what he sows.
The blessing runs on into the next verse: long life in the land. But how much of the land they enjoyed depended on where they walked.
Once more, all this presses their responsibility home to them. They are the objects of God's delight and love. They should imitate Him and love Him in the obedience of practical holiness, as they remember His judgments on His enemies. In this way they would keep all the blessings and glories of their inheritance. Their years would be long, like the days of heaven on earth. God would give them the whole land, but only what their feet walked on would really be theirs in practice.
One writer turns the same call toward the reader's own Master today.
Now, should we not seek to refresh the heart of our blessed Master by a loving obedience to all His commandments? Only think, reader, what a privilege it is to give joy to the heart of that blessed One who loved us and gave Himself for us... He delights in our keeping His commandments. That thought should stir our whole moral being. It should lead us to study His word, to find out more and more what His commandments are — so that we may do them.
- Therefore — The command rests on what they had already seen God do. Memory, not bare authority, is the ground of obedience.
- Strong — Full obedience makes a person strong. Picking and choosing among God's commands is self-will in disguise.
- Go in — God promised the land, yet they still had to enter it. His gift and our obedience do not clash.
- Possess — Only the ground their feet walked on became theirs in practice. Owning is one thing; enjoying is another.
- Prolong — Obedience was the turning point in the land. It kept the inheritance, and made their years like the days of heaven on earth.
and that ye may prolong your days in the land which Jehovah swore unto your fathers to give unto them and unto their seed, a land flowing with milk and honey.
Moses is summing up everything he has told Israel. Then comes the practical conclusion: keep the commandments, and your days in the promised land will be long. The verse holds two things together — a land God swore to give, and a life in it that depended on how the people behaved.
The chapter pulls the whole argument together and sets a choice in front of the people.
Deuteronomy 11 sums up the whole matter. It is the practical conclusion which the lawgiver keeps before their eyes. They were to remember what rebellion must end in... The rest of the chapter gives the most earnest warnings, and bright promises too. Disobedience or obedience would be the turning point in the land. The mount of blessing and the mount of curse were there on the other side of Jordan.
The verse just before this one ends with the words "that you may be strong." Strength is tied to obedience. And the tie covers every command, not a chosen few.
There is great strength gained by unreserved obedience to the word of God. It will not do to pick and choose. We are prone to this, prone to take up certain commandments and precepts which suit ourselves; but this is really self-will. What right have we to select certain precepts from the word, and neglect others? None whatever. To do so is, in principle, simply self-will and rebellion. What business has a servant to decide which of his master's commands he will obey? Surely none. Each commandment carries the master's authority, and so it claims the servant's attention. The more fully the servant obeys... the more he strengthens himself in his position and grows in his master's confidence and esteem.
Notice what obedience secures here. Not the land itself — God had already sworn that — but the length of days spent enjoying it.
Moses sets obedience before them again. Obedience is the great end of this book: God placed Israel under the condition of obedience so that they would keep on enjoying the promises. He reminds them that by obeying they would prolong their days in the land they were going up to take.
The oath itself stands on different ground. God made it to Abraham long before the law, and its terms were wider than anything Israel has yet held.
In sovereign grace He appeared to Abraham and said, "In you all the families of the earth shall be blessed... all the land that you see I will give to you and to your offspring... To your offspring I give this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the river Euphrates." God has never yet fulfilled these promises in full. Israel has never lived in the whole stretch of land described here... Though they have been unfaithful to God, He will not be unfaithful to them, but will make good all His word.
The two words describing the land carry plain meanings. They also set it against the country Israel had left.
The land is a good land and a large one, flowing with milk and honey. It is not a land of narrowness, as Egypt is... There is all "fatness," which is the literal meaning of the word for milk, and all sweetness, as the honey implies. Salvation for us must issue in satisfaction, or it is not salvation.
Commentators differ on how far to press these images. One reads them as pictures of what feeds God's people now.
Milk speaks of the Word of God (1 Peter 2:2). Honey symbolises the ministry of the Word of God (Song of Songs 4:11) — the sweetness believers have gathered from the Word and pass on to others.
Everything in the chapter rests on one condition. One writer weighs what that condition asked of them.
It was not a heavy yoke laid upon them, but the sweet privilege of treasuring up the precious commandments of the Lord their God in their hearts, and breathing the very atmosphere of His holy word. All was to hinge upon this. Canaan was a good, highly favoured land, flowing with milk and honey. The Lord's eyes always rested on it in loving interest and tender care. All its blessings, all its precious fruits, all its rare privileges were to be theirs for ever, on the one simple condition of loving obedience to the word of their covenant God.
- Sworn first. The land came by an oath to Abraham — grace, not reward. God has not yet made it good in full.
- Held by obedience. Obedience did not buy the land. It kept Israel enjoying what God had already promised.
- Whole, not partial. Strength comes from obeying without reserve. Picking which commands to keep is self-will dressed up as service.
- Fat and sweet. "Milk" means richness and "honey" means sweetness. The land was wide, not narrow like the Egypt they had left.
- Light yoke. The condition was not a burden but a privilege: to keep God's word in the heart and live in its atmosphere.