Deuteronomy 7:7

7 Not because ye were more than the other peoples has the LORD desired you and chosen you; for ye were the fewest of all the peoples;

Deuteronomy 7:7 Meaning and Commentary

Deuteronomy 7:7

The Lord did not set his love upon you, nor choose you
He had done both, and the one as the effect and evidence of the other; he loved them, and therefore he chose them; but neither of them,

because ye were more in number than any people;
not for the quantity of them, nor even for the quality of them:

for ye were the fewest of all people;
fewer than the Egyptians, from whence they came, and than the Canaanites they were going to drive out and inherit their land, ( Deuteronomy 7:1 ) . Those whom God has loved with an everlasting love, and as a fruit of it has chosen them in Christ before the world began to grace and glory, holiness and happiness, are but a small number, a little flock; though many are called, few are chosen; nor are they better than others, being by nature children of wrath even as others, and as to their outward circumstances the poor of this world.

Deuteronomy 7:7 In-Context

5 But thus shall ye deal with them: ye shall destroy their altars and break down their images and cut down their groves and burn their graven images in the fire.

6 For thou art a holy people unto the LORD thy God; the LORD thy God has chosen thee to be a special people unto himself, different from all the peoples that are upon the face of the earth.

7 Not because ye were more than the other peoples has the LORD desired you and chosen you; for ye were the fewest of all the peoples;

8 but because the LORD loved you and because he would keep the oath which he had sworn unto your fathers, has the LORD brought you out with a mighty hand and ransomed you out of the house of slavery from the hand of Pharaoh, king of Egypt.

9 Know, therefore, that the LORD thy God, he is God, the faithful God, who keeps covenant and mercy with those that love him and keep his commandments to a thousand generations