³ Go up to the land flowing with milk and honey.^(A) But I will not go with you, because you are a stiff-necked^(B) people and I might destroy^(C) you on the way.”

⁹ “I have seen these people,” the Lord said to Moses, “and they are a stiff-necked^(A) people. ¹⁰ Now leave me alone^(B) so that my anger may burn against them and that I may destroy^(C) them. Then I will make you into a great nation.”^(D)

⁸ So I have come down^(A) to rescue them from the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up out of that land into a good and spacious land,^(B) a land flowing with milk and honey^(C)—the home of the Canaanites, Hittites, Amorites, Perizzites, Hivites^(D) and Jebusites.^(E)

⁶ Understand, then, that it is not because of your righteousness that the Lord your God is giving you this good land to possess, for you are a stiff-necked people.^(A)

The Golden Calf

⁷ Remember this and never forget how you aroused the anger^(B) of the Lord your God in the wilderness. From the day you left Egypt until you arrived here, you have been rebellious^(C) against the Lord.^{(D) 8} At Horeb you aroused the Lord’s wrath^(E) so that he was angry enough to destroy you.^{(F) 9} When I went up on the mountain to receive the tablets of stone, the tablets of the covenant^(G) that the Lord had made with you, I stayed on the mountain forty days^(H) and forty nights; I ate no bread and drank no water.^{(I) 10} The Lord gave me two stone tablets inscribed by the finger of God.^(J) On them were all the commandments the Lord proclaimed to you on the mountain out of the fire, on the day of the assembly.^(K)

¹¹ At the end of the forty days and forty nights,^(L) the Lord gave me the two stone tablets,^(M) the tablets of the covenant. ¹² Then the Lord told me, “Go down from here at once, because your people whom you brought out of Egypt have become corrupt.^(N) They have turned away quickly^(O) from what I commanded them and have made an idol for themselves.”

¹³ And the Lord said to me, “I have seen this people^(P), and they are a stiff-necked people indeed!

⁵¹ “You stiff-necked people!^(A) Your hearts^(B) and ears are still uncircumcised. You are just like your ancestors: You always resist the Holy Spirit!

⁵ Then I will fulfill the oath I swore^(A) to your ancestors, to give them a land flowing with milk and honey’^(B)—the land you possess today.”

I answered, “Amen,^(C) Lord.”

¹⁵ Then Moses said to him, “If your Presence^(A) does not go with us, do not send us up from here. ¹⁶ How will anyone know that you are pleased with me and with your people unless you go with us?^(B) What else will distinguish me and your people from all the other people on the face of the earth?”^(C)

¹⁷ And the Lord said to Moses, “I will do the very thing you have asked,^(D) because I am pleased with you and I know you by name.”^(E)

¹³ “Hear this and testify^(A) against the descendants of Jacob,” declares the Lord, the Lord God Almighty.

¹³ If I tell a righteous person that they will surely live, but then they trust in their righteousness and do evil, none of the righteous things that person has done will be remembered; they will die for the evil they have done.^{(A) 14} And if I say to a wicked person, ‘You will surely die,’ but they then turn away from their sin and do what is just^(B) and right— ¹⁵ if they give back what they took in pledge^(C) for a loan, return what they have stolen,^(D) follow the decrees that give life, and do no evil—that person will surely live; they will not die.^{(E) 16} None of the sins^(F) that person has committed will be remembered against them. They have done what is just and right; they will surely live.^(G)