Deuteronomy 8:13
And when thy herds and thy flocks multiply, and thy silver and thy gold is multiplied, and all that thou hast is multiplied; And when thy herds and thy flocks multiply, and thy silver and thy gold is multiplied, and all that thou hast is multiplied;
The multiplying of herds and flocks and of silver and gold and of all possessed, together with eating and being full and living in fine houses, pictures the prosperity promised and given as Israel was favored. That increase in livestock and riches and in everything owned was blessing from leading and provision, not a self-made condition. Obedience was for prosperity and happiness, and the promised agreement could be fulfilled only as the law was kept.
Such continual blessing brings the danger of a lifted-up heart in pride, forgetting the Lord and dependence on Him, and claiming success as one's own. It tempts even a holy, chosen, special people to forget dependence and to fail in keeping commandments, statutes and judgments. Constant watch over the heart is therefore required, for unbelief springs up from blessing.
The increase must not be credited to human power, piety, or righteousness, for God gives people the power and ability to gain wealth. The blessings come from His undeserved mercy and lovingkindness and from His delivering, sustaining, leading and provision. Remembering the Lord who delivered and sustained is the safeguard against pride.
Prosperity is therefore conditional on obedience and calls for remembering God, heeding His judgments, and keeping His commandments, statutes and judgments and walking in His ways. Possessions blessed by God are to be held and used in service to Him rather than for self-glorification. Remaining obedient to His covenant keeps dependence living amid abundance.
Forgetting God leads to disobedience to His voice and to walking after other gods and serving and worshiping them in idolatry. That course brings certain perishing like the nations destroyed before them, with judgment and loss of His blessing. Disloyalty, selfishness, and failure to keep His law meant the promised agreement could not be fulfilled.
Later reverses exposed the inability of idolatrous connections to help, so that in distress the people remembered His works and cried to Him. The same danger of unbelief springing up from blessing remains today. The words in Deuteronomy 1, 7, and 8 stand to be read and heeded as written for admonition upon whom the ends of the world are come.
That heeding requires full following of the Lord's guidance rather than following only to the point that agrees with human judgment and then holding to one's own ideas. It requires viewing everything in the light of Christ's example and truth, copying His self-denial and self-sacrifice, and living not to please self. By His merits rather than by feeble human standards, character is to be molded after His similitude to perfection.