Deuteronomy 15:1-6 – Stay true to God and be blessed

In Deuteronomy 14, God had already shown His desire to see a caring community among His people. He wanted them to be a closely knead society where each one is the concern of the other. No one should come to a point where he would be nonchalant about the needs of others in the community. Every three years, they were expected to bring their tithes to a store located in the town where they dwell. This was to provide for the Levites, the poor and needy. He would not have their orphans and widows among them to be deprived of their necessity in life.

In Deuteronomy 15, He spoke about making provision for their fellowmen who for some reason had been impoverished. In verses 1-6, God first dealt with debts the needy had incurred. Anything they owed a fellow Israelite should be waived on the seventh year. The seventh year is also known as the Sabbath year. It was to be a year where any debts owed to each one by fellowmen would be overlooked and the debtors were to be released from their obligation to repay their debts.  

God gave them two reasons why this generosity ought to be practiced. Firstly, it was because they as God’s chosen people, belong to each other. They were brethren in the Lord. And to show kindness and generosity to one another was something good and proper.  Secondly, it was because God would be blessing them bountifully in the land that they were going in to possess. God expected them to share the blessings that He would give to them.  

Verse 4 seems to be a contradiction. If there would be no poor among them then why would someone need to borrow? But there is no contradiction. Because to stay in the blessed state of having no poor among them was conditional. Verse 5 states that only if they obeyed God’s commandments would such a situation be possible. Knowing human propensity, God knew that there would always be some that would violate His instruction, thus leading to poverty. Ideally, there should be no poor among them but realistically there would be those who would disobey God and end up in poverty. While the promise of God to be richly blessed stood, how they conducted their lives could cut short those blessings. Underpinning the promise of blessing is the call to responsible and committed living. The blessing in life is dependent on our willing commitment to God by trusting and obeying Him. So we need to trust and obey, for there’s no other way to be happy in Jesus, but to trust and obey.