August 16: Deuteronomy 34:1-5

Key Verse: Deuteronomy 34:4
Then the Lord said to him, ‘This is the land I promised on oath to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob when I said, “I will give it to your descendants.” I have let you see it with your eyes, but you will not cross over into it.’

Devotion:
How many times in your life have you done something, not for yourself but for others or for your family further down the generations? Too often we focus on the here and now and do not think about how what we do affects others around us or after us. The world is not in a good state at the moment because too many have driven for short term profit and have neglected the long term effects of what they do on the planet!

When God mad the promise to Abraham, it was a promise for generations to come, not for Abraham himself. This promise of giving the people a land which they can call home was to the people of Israel and not just to whomever was leading at the time. Moses was told in no uncertain terms here he would not be crossing into the lands, but the promise was being kept for his descendants, the descendants of Abraham, to possess the land as far as the eye could see!

So what is the lesson? It is not all about me or you. It is more about us, but further than that it is about the people who come after us. God has a long term view on everything and we need to understand that. We cannot keep looking at our own situations and forgetting about the long term effects of what we do. We need to think about how we affect the world around us, people, animals and ever living thing included!

God gave us dominion of the world in the very beginning; but that came with an instruction to treat the world properly as we should a very special gift being given to us. We need to be good stewards of everything around us and stop living life as if we are entitled to everything.

Points to Ponder:
What have you done today?

How much of that was for other people?