Deuteronomy 11:8

"Therefore shall ye keep all the commandment which I command you this day, that ye may be strong, and go in and possess the land, whither ye go over to possess it; and that ye may prolong your days in the land, which Jehovah sware unto your fathers to give unto them and to their seed, a land flowing with milk and honey. For the land, whither thou goest to possess it, is not as the land of Egypt, from whence ye came out, where thou sowedst thy seed, and wateredst it with thy foot, as a garden of herbs; but the land, whither ye go over to possess it, is a land of hills and valleys, and drinketh water of the rains of heaven, a land which Jehovah thy God careth for: the eyes of Jehovah thy God are always upon it, from the beginning of the year even unto the end of the year."

It is mandatory to see in these verses that, "God's blessing is not automatic, nor linked to descent, but depends upon obedience."[7] Not only did ancient Israel fail to understand this vital truth, but countless Christians all over the world today look upon their eternal salvation as a thing already achieved and settled because of their claim to have "faith" in Christ, relegating "obedience" to the status of something nobody does anyway, and which is, in fact, impossible!

This paragraph sets forth a favorable contrast of Palestine with Egypt. In Egypt, the agriculture depended upon extensive irrigation, whereas in Palestine God watered the land by the annual rainfall. The mention of watering the crops "with thy foot" could refer either to the devices for pumping water from the Nile "by means of pumps worked by foot,"[8] or to the channeling of irrigation water to successive parts of a field by piling up little mounds and removing them with the feet as the irrigation progressed from one row to another, "thus directing the water from one furrow to another,"[9] a device still known where fields must be irrigated from a common source.

Oberst was certainly correct when he pointed out that today "Agriculture in Palestine depends upon vast irrigation projects, but that is not the way it was when Moses wrote this."[10] There are examples in North America of similar dramatic changes. Frijoles Canyon was once a lush rain valley and supported a prosperous tribe of Indians, but today it is a desert waste land. What made the difference? The blessing of God is a blessing always contingent upon the OBEDIENCE of the people.