Deuteronomy 7:7, commentary and pictures

Spoken by Christ in the pillar of cloud to Israel as they stood to enter the promised land, the verse declares that God did not set His love upon them nor choose them for greatness in number, for they were the fewest of all peoples. He chose them freely because He loved them and to keep the oath sworn to their fathers, redeeming them by a mighty hand from slavery under Pharaoh. By that choosing He made them a holy and special people above all others, to reveal His character and glory as a kingdom of priests and a witness to the world and to angels. That privilege stood joined to obedience, for the faithful God keeps covenant and mercy to a thousand generations with those who love Him and keep His commandments and Sabbaths, blessing and exalting them, while He repays persistent hatred and rebellion with judgment. The same choosing rests upon His people in the last days, who though few and peculiar are called to separate from the world, keep His commandments, and bear a living witness until probation closes.

Speaker, Words and Setting

The one who spoke was Christ, enshrouded in the pillar of cloud, Israel's invisible leader and guide and protector, the same physician who healed the sick in Palestine, giving His words through Moses to God's chosen people.

They were spoken to Israel as they were about to pass over Jordan to possess the promised land, presenting the claims of God's law and enjoining obedience as the condition of prosperity. He had educated them for forty years in the wilderness that they might glorify His name and become a great nation in the sight of the peoples round them.

The words belong to the instruction in Deuteronomy 4 through 8 showing what God required that Israel might be a holy people unto Himself. The whole seventh chapter is to be read carefully with an attentive heart, together with Deuteronomy 7:6 and Deuteronomy 1 and 8. They are written for admonition upon those on whom the ends of the world are come.

Notwithstanding their errors and disobedience and rebellion, He honored their chosen standing by coming down from His holy habitation upon Mount Sinai in majesty and glory and awful grandeur. He spoke the Ten Commandments in the audience of all the people and wrote them with His own finger on tables of stone.

The passage is to be studied and read with profit now, because the day of God's great final review is near when all the people of this world must stand before the Judge of all the earth to answer for their deeds. The present is the time of investigation when every character will have been investigated and every case decided for eternity. It sets forth the possibilities and probabilities before the people of God, calling every Christian to give close attention to reading and hearing the Word and to be an earnest practical worker together with God. It recalls God's past dealings with His people to revive faith and encourage hope.

Reason for Divine Choice

The Lord did not set His love upon Israel nor choose them because they were more in number than any people, for they were the fewest, smallest and least numerous of all peoples. His love and choice rested on no claim of numerical superiority, size, strength, power, status or merit, and give no grounds for pride. He chose them because He loved them, as a voluntary act of goodness and love and grace and purpose rather than a reward for Israel's size or merit. His choice was out of love, not because they were numerous or powerful.

He chose them because He would keep the oath sworn unto their fathers, in faithfulness to His covenant, promise and mercy. His choice rested on His love and His faithfulness to the oath He had made to their fathers and to His faithful covenant. In that love and faithfulness He brought them out with a mighty hand and redeemed them out of the house of bondmen and slavery from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt. Their deliverance from Egypt by God's mighty hand was an act of that love and faithfulness and showed His faithfulness to that covenant.

As a people newly freed from Egyptian slavery He would educate, train, defend and honor them as God. He rescued them from slavery in Egypt and from bondage to Pharaoh king of Egypt to make them His own.

Identity as Holy People

By that choice Israel became a holy people and a special people unto Himself above all peoples upon the face of the earth, His peculiar treasure separated from all peoples and distinct from rebellious nations, not because they were more in number than any people, for they were the fewest, smallest and least numerous of all peoples. That standing rested on no claim of numerical superiority, size, strength, power, status or merit, but on His love and on His purpose to keep the oath sworn unto their fathers, bringing them out with a mighty hand and redeeming them out of the house of bondmen and slavery from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt. Their prosperity was therefore bound to the conditions of loving God and keeping His commandments and statutes and judgments, walking in His ways and hearkening to His voice.

They were chosen to reveal His glory, majesty, power and character, to bear a living witness for Him as long as probation lasts, to restore His moral image in humanity, and to show forth His praises as those called out of darkness into marvelous light. They were made a kingdom of priests and princes, a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a peculiar people and a peculiar treasure, a spectacle unto the world and to angels and to men, set in a different sense of peculiarity from that in which the world regards them as peculiar. Every facility was given them for becoming the greatest nation on the earth and for being exalted among the nations and made high above all nations in praise and in name and in honor, with spiritual advantages, continued teaching, wisdom and skill, and marvels of prosperity before the nations. God has not left the world without witness but has loyal, chosen people who do not make this world their home, though Satan and his angels with evil men confederate against them to counteract their testimony and destroy them.

He retains especial regard for His still-chosen people notwithstanding their errors, disobedience and rebellion, and honored their chosen standing by coming down from His holy habitation upon Mount Sinai in majesty and glory and awful grandeur to speak the Ten Commandments in the audience of all the people and writing them with His own finger on tables of stone. Though they were murmurers, complainers and fault-finders who made the work hard to manage, and though humble and persevering, they were precious to Him, and He patiently cared for them and worked with them as His vineyard. Their special privileges brought greater responsibility to obey Him and remain pure, for disobedience dishonored Him and delayed entry into Canaan, yet humble, persevering faith and obedience revealed hearts filled with His grace.

The verse reveals Him as the faithful God who keeps covenant and mercy to a thousand generations with them that love Him and keep His commandments, and repays them that hate Him to destroy them, so His chosen few are to keep His commandments and statutes and judgments, including His Sabbaths as the sign that He sanctifies them. He is the Almighty Protector and Jehovah God whose love and mercy were shown in deliverance from Egypt, and who is to be known, honored, and served with character brought into harmony with Him. Election therefore rests on God's faithful love rather than on greatness in number, and obedience brings its reward while disobedience brings retribution, qualifying His people by positive instruction and positive restrictions to stand as overcomers before the heavenly universe and the fallen world.

Obedience, Blessing and Warning

The choosing declares its purpose and its conditions, for true prosperity was made to depend on loving God and keeping His commandments and statutes and judgments, on walking in His ways and hearkening to His voice. Safety and strength were to rest not on numbers or power, since Israel was the smallest of nations, but on obeying and serving God with wholehearted love and consecration, with careful obedience to all His directions as the privilege joined to responsibility. His blessing rests upon those who keep His covenant, and He has respect unto those that are obedient.

To such obedient ones He shows Himself the faithful God who keeps covenant and mercy to a thousand generations with them that love Him and keep His commandments, loving and blessing and multiplying them. He blesses them above all people and sets them high above all nations in praise and in name and in honor as a holy people. Their obedience was for their good and preservation, and would make them marvels of prosperity before the nations, with spiritual advantages, continued teaching, wisdom and skill, preservation from the diseases that afflicted other nations, and vigor of intellect. By positive instruction and positive restrictions He thus gives His people perfect experience in His service to qualify them to stand before the heavenly universe and the fallen world as overcomers, for obedience brings its reward and disobedience its retribution.

Keeping His commandments includes keeping His Sabbaths as the sign that He sanctifies them. The Sabbath is His memorial of creation and His sign and seal for His separate and distinctive people who proclaim the third angel's message and keep His commandments.

The same faithful God repays them that hate Him to destroy them to their face. His patience does not remove the consequences of continued rebellion, for when people persist in disobedience and pass the boundary, punishment follows. So it was when ancient Israel rebelled, bringing His wrath and judgments when thousands were slain, and their disobedience dishonored Him and delayed entry into Canaan, teaching that obedience brings blessing and disobedience brings punishment.

Keeping His commandments lasts to a thousand generations, and at the end of those generations the living who served God will be translated and the dead raised to see the King in His beauty. Then the gates of the holy city will be opened for the nations that kept the truth to enter in to the mansions prepared. No one who would not keep His commandments in this world will be brought in to spoil the heavenly courts, for there was one rebellion and there will never be another, and only those who are tried commandment keepers, who love God supremely, will be welcomed by Christ Jesus into the golden city.

Application to Present People

The same choosing that set love upon ancient Israel rests upon the Israel of God in these last days, upon modern Israel, upon those trying to obey God and purify their souls through obedience to the truth, whom He is purifying unto Himself as a peculiar people. The words of the chapter are instruction for God's people today and in the last days, given to believers where the message is given, calling them to know the Lord as the faithful God who keeps covenant and mercy to a thousand generations and to keep His commandments and statutes and judgments. They are to heed the Lord's counsel rather than trust their own judgment, to proclaim the third angel's message and keep His commandments, with the seventh-day Sabbath as His sign and seal. That choice still rests on love and faithfulness to the oath sworn to the fathers and on redemption with a mighty hand from the house of bondage, not on number or power.

God has not left the world without witness but has loyal, chosen people who do not make this world their home and who bear a living witness for Him as long as probation lasts. Satan and his angels with evil men confederate against them to counteract their testimony and destroy them. Being few, small, peculiar and distinct is no reason for shame or for abandoning God's law when faithfulness requires separation from the majority to obey and serve God. Their distinctiveness follows from worshiping God alone and refusing sin, and small size under pressure such as Sunday laws is no reason to abandon His law but calls for faithful obedience even when it makes them seem singular and opposed by the multitude. Their calling is bound up with keeping the Sabbath as God's memorial of creation and the sign that He sanctifies His people.

That calling requires separation from the world and refusal to mingle, confederate or unite with the nations around them, with idolaters, and with those who have no respect for the truth. It forbids alliances that draw away from worshiping and obeying God and forbids uniting in politics with unbelievers and parading political beliefs as worldlings do. Such a course weakens the hold on God and creates division, strife and jealousy, and God cannot and will not prosper those who follow it. They must instead work distinctly in God's lines, refusing worldly practices, looking to heavenly agencies for guidance and direction, proclaiming the third angel's message and keeping His commandments. To depart from Him and mingle provokes Him and brings His wrath and judgments, as when ancient Israel rebelled and thousands were slain.

The privilege is joined to solemn responsibility as stewards of sacred truth, for it is a solemn thing to be entrusted with it. Every Christian is to give close attention to reading and hearing the Word and to be an earnest, practical worker together with God, serving Him with wholehearted love and consecration and carefully obeying His directions. They must know the Lord and have everything arranged in a manner approved of God, to show forth the praises of Him who called them out of darkness into marvelous light as a spectacle unto the world and to angels and to men. These words set forth possibilities and probabilities before the people of God and are to be distinctly stamped upon every soul, since obedience brings reward and disobedience retribution and by positive instruction and restriction God qualifies His people to stand as overcomers before the heavenly universe and the fallen world. The same conditions of all true prosperity — loving God, keeping His commandments, statutes and judgments, walking in His ways and hearkening to His voice — must be fulfilled by institutions that carry out His purpose today.