GIve Credit Where Credit Is Due

Deuteronomy 8:10-18 10When you have eaten your fill, praise the LORD your God for the good land he has given you. 11"But that is the time to be careful! Beware that in your plenty you do not forget the LORD your God and disobey his commands, regulations, and laws. 12For when you have become full and prosperous and have built fine homes to live in, 13and when your flocks and herds have become very large and your silver and gold have multiplied along with everything else, 14that is the time to be careful. Do not become proud at that time and forget the LORD your God, who rescued you from slavery in the land of Egypt. 15Do not forget that he led you through the great and terrifying wilderness with poisonous snakes and scorpions, where it was so hot and dry. He gave you water from the rock! 16He fed you with manna in the wilderness, a food unknown to your ancestors. He did this to humble you and test you for your own good. 17He did it so you would never think that it was your own strength and energy that made you wealthy. 18Always remember that it is the LORD your God who gives you power to become rich, and he does it to fulfill the covenant he made with your ancestors. The above was a reminder to the children of Israel to not forget that God blessed them and their prosperity was NOT a result of anything that they did on their own. I think we can learn from this as well. It seems too often in today's "Me" society that we are all to quick to marvel at how someone made themselves rich or how they were able to accomplish a difficult goal. We then seem to make these amazing people celebrities and even idols. We want to know how they did it and how can we do it, thus endless infomercials on "how to" topics. I see these shows and think yeah, if I get thousands of people to pay $19.95 for my tape I could be rich also. It makes me want to promote a video or book that says the way to get rich is to tell people like you to buy my product that tells you to tell others to buy your product, etc. Let's not forget that EVERYTHING we have and accomplish is from God. We can do nothing on our own. If we gain riches or success it was through God given talents and/or resources. It's like the old story of the scientist that go to God and say they can do anything he can do, without using anything he has made. The Lord looks at them and says ok, we'll try something simple. Let's make a human, they all smile and watch God as he takes some dirt, forms clay and makes a man. The team of scientist begin gathering a few buckets full of dirt and God says WAIT! Get your own dirt! The point is , we can look as long as we wish, but will never find anything that God didn't make. Anything we produce or manufacture has to use some substance that was first made by God. Most importantly, when we begin to fail to thank God or acknowledge him for the blessings he gives us, we lose that blessing. When we begin to think or boast that we accomplished something on our own, then God is not pleased. We are in fact mocking him. We are also in danger of thinking of ourselves as God's equal. God commanded "Thou shall have no other gods before me" that includes our god of self. It's easy to forget we need God when things are going well, however let the first little difficulty come into our lives and we go running to Him for help. Remember to praise God in the good times and the bad. Do not forget to thank him for blessing you each day , and as those blessings grow don't lose sight of where they came from.