It’s not because of you
Therefore, understand that the Lord your God is not giving you this good land to possess because of your righteousness, for you are a stiff-necked people. ~ Deuteronomy 9:6
Have you ever caught yourself quietly believing that your progress, your open doors, or your spiritual growth happened because you finally “got it right”? As if some how you made it all work out for you? Even after you prayed and asked for God’s help, but when it finally happens you think you got there by your great strength? We all have at some time or another. Most people remember to call out to God for help when they are in the battle, but when the smoke clears and they land on top, suddenly they think they did it on their own.
Today’s scripture reading talks about this type of subtle pride. Moses reminded Israel that the Promised Land was not a reward for perfection. It was an expression of God’s promise and mercy. In today’s world, where achievement is celebrated and self-made success is praised, this chapter calls us back to humility. Everything you have in Christ Jesus and everything you accomplish in this world is because of His great empowering grace. Every opportunity to lead, to serve, to grow is mercy.
Below are three ideas to help you consider the condition of your own heart as you read this chapter in Deuteronomy. Moses was preparing the people for increase, but he first prepared them with truth. Blessing without humility can lead to distance from God. Growth without gratitude can create spiritual pride. The reminder of grace is not meant to diminish you, it is meant to anchor you.
1. Remember that blessing is rooted in God’s faithfulness, not your performance
Israel was entering a land flowing with promise, but Moses made it clear that their righteousness was not the reason. It was because God was fulfilling the promise He made to them.
When ministry grows, when your business flourishes, when doors open that you prayed for, it is easy to take quiet credit. Instead, practice gratitude that names God as the source. When something goes well this week, pause and verbally thank God before you share the news with anyone else. Write down one recent blessing and trace it back to His faithfulness, not your effort. This keeps your heart soft and dependent.
2. Guard your heart against spiritual forgetfulness
Deuteronomy 9 recounts Israel’s rebellion, including the golden calf. Even after experiencing miracles, they quickly turned away and forgot the great miracles God did to bring them out of Egypt.
In today’s culture, distractions compete constantly for your devotion. Success can make you comfortable. Busyness can make you prayerless. Create a daily schedule that keeps you grounded. Set a specific time to read Scripture before checking your phone. Keep a short gratitude list. When you sense frustration or entitlement rising, ask yourself if you have drifted from daily dependence on God. Small daily obedience protects your heart from gradual compromise.
3. Stand in the gap through prayer
Moses interceded for the people when they sinned. He did not excuse their failure, but he sought God’s mercy on their behalf.
As a child of God today, you are surrounded by people who struggle, doubt, and wander. Instead of criticizing, you are called to pray. Think of one person who feels far from God. Commit to pray for that person for seven days. Ask God to soften their heart and open opportunities for truth and love. Prayer shifts your posture from judgment to compassion.
There have been moments in my own journey when I saw growth in leadership, influence, and opportunity. It would have been easy to assume it was the result of hard work or preparation alone. Yet each time I look back honestly, I can see God’s hand carrying me through each time of weakness, stretching me through mistakes, and opening doors I could not have opened on my own. Those reminders humble me and bring me back to gratitude. Deuteronomy 9 is not a chapter of shame, it is a chapter of perspective. It reminds us that grace is the foundation of our story. We are not sustained by perfection, we are held up by His promises.
Today I want to encourage you to walk in humility, to remember that every blessing flows from God’s mercy, love and grace, and to respond with gratitude, obedience, and intercession. Let this truth steady your heart in a world that exalts self-effort, because your life is built on grace, not performance.
Today’s scripture reading: Deuteronomy 9
1 “Hear, O Israel: You are to cross over the Jordan today, and go in to dispossess nations greater and mightier than yourself, cities great and fortified up to heaven,
2 a people great and tall, the descendants of the Anakim, whom you know, and of whom you heard it said, ‘Who can stand before the descendants of Anak?’
3 Therefore understand today that the Lord your God is He who goes over before you as a consuming fire. He will destroy them and bring them down before you; so you shall drive them out and destroy them quickly, as the Lord has said to you.
4 “Do not think in your heart, after the Lord your God has cast them out before you, saying, ‘Because of my righteousness the Lord has brought me in to possess this land’; but it is because of the wickedness of these nations that the Lord is driving them out from before you.
5 It is not because of your righteousness or the uprightness of your heart that you go in to possess their land, but because of the wickedness of these nations that the Lord your God drives them out from before you, and that He may fulfill the word which the Lord swore to your fathers, to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
6 Therefore understand that the Lord your God is not giving you this good land to possess because of your righteousness, for you are a stiff-necked people.
7 “Remember! Do not forget how you provoked the Lord your God to wrath in the wilderness. From the day that you departed from the land of Egypt until you came to this place, you have been rebellious against the Lord.
8 Also in Horeb you provoked the Lord to wrath, so that the Lord was angry enough with you to have destroyed you.
9 When I went up into the mountain to receive the tablets of stone, the tablets of the covenant which the Lord made with you, then I stayed on the mountain forty days and forty nights. I neither ate bread nor drank water.
10 Then the Lord delivered to me two tablets of stone written with the finger of God, and on them were all the words which the Lord had spoken to you on the mountain from the midst of the fire in the day of the assembly.
11 And it came to pass, at the end of forty days and forty nights, that the Lord gave me the two tablets of stone, the tablets of the covenant.
12 “Then the Lord said to me, ‘Arise, go down quickly from here, for your people whom you brought out of Egypt have acted corruptly; they have quickly turned aside from the way which I commanded them; they have made themselves a molded image.’
13 “Furthermore the Lord spoke to me, saying, ‘I have seen this people, and indeed they are a stiff-necked people.
14 Let Me alone, that I may destroy them and blot out their name from under heaven; and I will make of you a nation mightier and greater than they.’
15 “So I turned and came down from the mountain, and the mountain burned with fire; and the two tablets of the covenant were in my two hands.
16 And I looked, and behold, you had sinned against the Lord your God—had made for yourselves a molded calf! You had turned aside quickly from the way which the Lord had commanded you.
17 Then I took the two tablets and threw them out of my two hands and broke them before your eyes.
18 And I fell down before the Lord, as at the first, forty days and forty nights; I neither ate bread nor drank water, because of all your sin which you committed in doing wickedly in the sight of the Lord, to provoke Him to anger.
19 For I was afraid of the anger and hot displeasure with which the Lord was angry with you, to destroy you. But the Lord listened to me at that time also.
20 And the Lord was very angry with Aaron and would have destroyed him; so I prayed for Aaron also at the same time.
21 Then I took your sin, the calf which you had made, and burned it with fire and crushed it and ground it very small, until it was as fine as dust; and I threw its dust into the brook that descended from the mountain.
22 “Also at Taberah and Massah and Kibroth Hattaavah you provoked the Lord to wrath.
23 Likewise, when the Lord sent you from Kadesh Barnea, saying, ‘Go up and possess the land which I have given you,’ then you rebelled against the commandment of the Lord your God, and you did not believe Him nor obey His voice.
24 You have been rebellious against the Lord from the day that I knew you.
25 “Thus I prostrated myself before the Lord; forty days and forty nights I kept prostrating myself, because the Lord had said He would destroy you.
26 Therefore I prayed to the Lord, and said: ‘O Lord God, do not destroy Your people and Your inheritance whom You have redeemed through Your greatness, whom You have brought out of Egypt with a mighty hand.
27 Remember Your servants, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; do not look on the stubbornness of this people, or on their wickedness or their sin,
28 lest the land from which You brought us should say, “Because the Lord was not able to bring them to the land which He promised them, and because He hated them, He has brought them out to kill them in the wilderness.”
29 Yet they are Your people and Your inheritance, whom You brought out by Your mighty power and by Your outstretched arm.’
Journal:
- Where have I quietly taken credit for what God has done in my life
- What daily habit can I strengthen to keep my heart close to God
- Who is one person I can begin praying for consistently this week
The Daily Dose 