EverydayWord · Pastor Derrick J Dawkins

“Chosen, Tested, and Taught”

April 9, 2026·1 hr 4 min·5 clips

Why does God choose his people not for their strength, but to humble and test them in the wilderness?

1. Everyday Word podcast 1,315, hosted by Pastor Derek Dawkins, covers Deuteronomy chapters 7 and 8 on Thursday, April 9, under the theme 'Chosen, Tested, and Taught.' 2. Pastor Derek Dawkins serves as teacher and host; named online participants include Sister Walter and Sister Dawkins. 3. The episode's thesis is that God's people are chosen by grace alone, tested through wilderness seasons, and taught through hardship to trust God rather than their own ability. 4. Deuteronomy 7:1-5 commands Israel to destroy seven nations — Hittites, Girgashites, Amorites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites, and Jebusites — make no treaties with them, avoid intermarriage with them, and burn every idol, Asherah pole, and sacred pillar. 5. Dawkins addresses the intermarriage prohibition as a spiritual guard rather than a racial command, explaining that Canaanite wives would draw Israelite husbands toward idol worship — applying it to a contemporary scenario of Christian men in Muslim interfaith marriages who 'stand by and compromise' when their wives pray to Allah. 6. Deuteronomy 7:6-11 explains God's basis for choosing Israel: not their numerical size ('for you were the fewest of all peoples') but his love for their ancestors and his faithfulness to his sworn covenant with them. 7. Verses 12-16 promise that if Israel obeys, God will bless their harvests, grant fertility, remove all sickness, and inflict on their enemies the diseases of Egypt that the Israelites themselves experienced — a conditional covenant of abundant provision. 8. Deuteronomy 7:17-21 addresses the fear of facing nations 'greater and stronger' than Israel, reminding them of the exodus — God's powerful track record — and stating that if God did it before, he will do it again. 9. Verses 22-26 command gradual conquest so wild animals will not multiply from depopulated land, and prohibit bringing gold or silver from pagan idols into the home — a warning Dawkins applies to himself as someone who enjoys thrift shopping and must now be careful what he brings through the door. 10. Deuteronomy 8:1-4 commands Israel to carefully follow every commandment so they may live, increase, and enter the land; Moses reminds them that the 40-year wilderness was a deliberate test 'to know what was in your heart, whether or not you would keep his commandments.' 11. The manna narrative is presented as the heart of the chapter: God let Israel go hungry before providing food they had never known, so they would learn that 'man does not live on bread alone but by every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord' (Deuteronomy 8:3). 12. The tangible signs of 40-year sustained care — clothing that did not wear out, feet that did not swell — are applied personally: Dawkins observes that believers' possessions seem to last longer and their cars get more mileage as modern evidence of God's constant care. 13. Deuteronomy 8:5-6 frames the wilderness as divine discipline, comparing God's testing to a father disciplining a son; Dawkins connects this to the decline of nuclear families and paternal discipline in contemporary society. 14. The promised land described in Deuteronomy 8:7-10 is a detailed landscape of brooks, fountains, wheat, barley, vines, figs, pomegranates, olive oil, honey, iron, and copper — presented as the destination of sustained obedience. 15. Deuteronomy 8:11-18 warns that prosperity is the primary spiritual danger: when every prayer is answered (house, land, vehicles, job), the temptation is to say 'my power and my own ability have gained this wealth,' forgetting the God who gave the power to produce that wealth. 16. Dawkins states directly: 'Don't walk around here thinking you did it on your own. Don't think you're self-made,' citing verse 17 as the error God prohibits before the people even enter the land. 17. Deuteronomy 8:19-20 closes with a life-and-death ultimatum: if Israel follows other gods, they will perish just like the nations God is about to destroy — presented as proportional consequence, not arbitrary punishment. 18. The episode is delivered in a Black Protestant preaching style with personal humor (describing Dawkins's mother's wet dishtowel disciplinary technique), personal testimony, rhetorical repetition, and direct social commentary on family breakdown and racial identity. 19. Christians seeking daily devotional teaching on election, wilderness testing, and the spiritual dangers of both poverty and prosperity will find this episode directly applicable. 20. Listeners preferring concise, academic, or nondevotional treatments of Deuteronomy will likely find the format too sermonic and the repetition excessive.

As heard by us

A direct morning reading on grace, testing, and the call to trust God without forgetting him.

It frames Deuteronomy 7 and 8 as a morning reading centered on grace, wilderness testing, and the steady lesson of dependence. The movement is devotional rather than analytical: it starts with praise, turns to lived application, and settles on humility, obedience, trust, and the…

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Press play if you want a praise-filled reading from Deuteronomy 7 and 8 about grace, testing, and trust.

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