10:12-13 “So now, Israel, what does Yahweh your God ask from you, but to fear Yahweh your God, to walk in His ways and love Him, and to serve Yahweh your God with all your heart and with all your soul, to keep the commandments of Yahweh and His statutes which I am commanding you today for your good?”

After recounting the journey from Egypt and Israel’s failures, Moses reiterates the Ten Commandments and the covenant that establishes this nation as Yahweh’s priesthood entity to the world. The main theme is that as God’s people, we recognize all the ways God loves and provides for us, and in response we love Him by keeping His commandments. When we obey Him, we honor Him as supreme authority, we thank Him for all that we have, and we trust Him to continue to protect and provide in this corrupted world. This leads to an ever-growing relationship that produces a life of joy and strength. 

So why do we ourselves not experience this? We can discern this by the warnings and exhortations that follow. Primarily, Moses warns “lest you forget…” We enjoy good things and we do not focus on the God who “gave us the power” (8:17-18) to enjoy this. We prosper and we do not think about our former weakness, so we think we are strong. And we see others rejoicing in things God hates, and we join them, forgetting we belong to God. So Moses commands the people to “keep yourselves very carefully” (4:9, 15) and speak and teach the words of God everywhere and at all times, lest we forget (6:4-9, 20-25). This is what it means to love God, and incidentally, we can apply this to loving others as well.