Force the Other Nations Out of the Land

(Exodus 34.11-16)

Moses said:

7 ^(A) People of Israel, the Lord your God will help you take the land of the Hittites, the Girgashites, the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites. These seven nations have more people and are stronger than Israel, but when you attack them, ² the Lord will force them out of the land. Then you must destroy them without mercy. Don't make any peace treaties with them, ³ and don't let your sons and daughters marry any of them. ⁴ If you do, those people will lead your descendants to worship other gods and to turn their backs on the Lord. That will make him very angry, and he will quickly destroy Israel.

^5 (B) So when you conquer these nations, tear down the altars where they worship their gods. Break up their sacred stones, cut down the poles that they use in worshiping the goddess Asherah, and throw their idols in the fire.

The Lord's Chosen People

Moses said:

^6 (C) Israel, you are the chosen people of the Lord your God. There are many nations on this earth, but he chose only Israel to be his very own. ⁷ You were the weakest of all nations, ⁸ but the Lord chose you because he loves you and because he had made a promise to your ancestors. Then with his mighty arm, he rescued you from the king of Egypt, who had made you his slaves.

^9 (D) You know that the Lord your God is the only true God. So love him and obey his commands, and he will faithfully keep his agreement with you and your descendants for a thousand generations. ¹⁰ But if you turn against the Lord, he will quickly destroy you. ¹¹ So be sure to obey his laws and teachings I am giving you today.

The Lord Will Bless You if You Obey

(Deuteronomy 28.1-14; Leviticus 26.3-13)

Moses said to Israel:

^12 (E) If you completely obey these laws, the Lord your God will be loyal and keep the agreement he made with you, just as he promised our ancestors. ¹³ The Lord will love you and bless you by giving you many children and plenty of food, wine, and olive oil. Your herds of cattle will have many calves, and your flocks of sheep will have many lambs. ¹⁴ God will bless you more than any other nation—your families will grow and your livestock increase. ¹⁵ You will no longer suffer with the same horrible diseases that you sometimes had in Egypt. You will be healthy, but the Lord will make your enemies suffer from those diseases.

Destroy the Nations and Their Gods

Moses said to Israel:

¹⁶ When the Lord helps you defeat your enemies, you must destroy them without pity! And don't get trapped into worshiping their gods.

¹⁷ You may be thinking, “How can we destroy these nations? They are more powerful than we are.” ¹⁸ But stop worrying! Just remember what the Lord your God did to Egypt and its king. ¹⁹ You saw how the Lord used his tremendous power to work great miracles and bring you out of Egypt. And he will again work miracles for you when you face these enemies you fear so much. ²⁰ Some of them may try to survive by hiding from you, but the Lord will make them panic, and soon they will be dead.^{[a] 21} So don't be frightened when you meet them in battle. The Lord your God is great and fearsome, and he will fight at your side.

²² As you attack these nations, the Lord will force them out little by little. He won't let you get rid of them all at once—if he did, there wouldn't be enough people living in the land to keep down the number of wild animals. ^23-24 But when you attack your enemies, the Lord will make them panic, and you will easily destroy them. You will defeat their kings one after another until they are gone, and no one will remember they ever lived.

²⁵ After you conquer a nation, burn their idols. Don't get trapped into wanting the silver or gold on an idol. Even the metal on an idol is disgusting to the Lord, ²⁶ so destroy it. If you bring it home with you, both you and your house will be destroyed. Stay away from those disgusting idols!

The Lord Takes Care of You

Moses said:

8 Israel, do you want to go into the land the Lord promised your ancestors? Do you want to capture it, live there, and become a powerful nation? Then be sure to obey every command I am giving you.

² Don't forget how the Lord your God has led you through the desert for the past 40 years. He wanted to find out if you were truly willing to obey him and depend on him, ^3 (F) so he made you go hungry. Then he gave you manna,^[b] a kind of food that you and your ancestors had never even heard about. The Lord was teaching you that people need more than food to live—they need every word that the Lord has spoken.

⁴ Over the past 40 years, your clothing hasn't worn out, and your feet haven't swollen. ^5 (G) So keep in mind that the Lord has been correcting you, just as parents correct their children. ⁶ Obey the commands the Lord your God has given you and worship him with fear and trembling.

⁷ The Lord your God is bringing you into a good land with streams that flow from springs in the valleys and hills. ^8-9 You can dig for copper in those hills, and the stones are made of iron ore. And you won't go hungry. Wheat and barley fields are everywhere, and so are vineyards and orchards full of fig, pomegranate,^[c] and olive trees, and there is plenty of honey.

Don't Forget the Lord

Moses said to Israel:

¹⁰ After you eat and are full, give praise to the Lord your God for the good land he gave you. ^11 (H) Make sure that you never forget the Lord or disobey his laws and teachings that I am giving you today. If you always obey them, ¹² you will have plenty to eat, and you will build good houses to live in. ¹³ You will get more and more cattle, sheep, silver, gold, and other possessions.

¹⁴ But when all this happens, don't be proud! Don't forget that you were once slaves in Egypt and that it was the Lord who set you free. ¹⁵ Remember how he led you in that huge and frightening desert where poisonous snakes and scorpions live. There was no water, but the Lord split open a rock, and water poured out so you could drink. ¹⁶ He also gave you manna,^[d] a kind of food your ancestors had never even heard about. The Lord was testing you to make you trust him, so that later on he could be good to you.

¹⁷ When you become successful, don't say, “I'm rich, and I've earned it all myself.” ¹⁸ Instead, remember that the Lord your God gives you the strength to make a living. That's how he keeps the promise he made to your ancestors.

^19-20 But I'm warning you—if you forget the Lord your God and worship other gods, the Lord will destroy you, just as he destroyed the nations you fought.

Why the Lord Will Help Israel

Moses said:

9 Israel, listen to me! You will soon cross the Jordan River and go into the land to force out the nations that live there. They are more powerful than you are, and the walls around their cities reach to the sky. ² Some of these nations are descendants of the Anakim.^[e] You know how tall and strong they are, and you've heard that no one can defeat them in battle. ³ But the Lord your God has promised to go ahead of you, like a raging fire burning everything in its path. So when you attack your enemies, it will be easy for you to destroy them and take their land.

^4-6 After the Lord helps you wipe out these nations and conquer their land, don't think he did it because you are such good people. You aren't good—you are stubborn! No, the Lord is going to help you, because the nations that live there are evil, and because he wants to keep the promise he made to your ancestors Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

When Israel Made an Idol

(Exodus 32)

Moses said to Israel:

⁷ Don't ever forget how you kept rebelling and making the Lord angry the whole time you were in the desert. You rebelled from the day you left Egypt until the day you arrived here.

⁸ At Mount Sinai^[f] you made the Lord so angry that he was going to destroy you. ^9-11 (I) It happened during those 40 days and nights that I was on the mountain, without anything to eat or drink. He had told me to come up there so he could give me the agreement he made with us. And this agreement was actually the same Ten Commandments^[g] he had announced to you when he spoke from the fire on the mountain. The Lord had written them on two flat stones with his own hand. But after giving me the two stones, ¹² he said:

Moses, hurry down the mountain to those people you led out of Egypt. They have already disobeyed me and committed the terrible sin of making an idol.

¹³ I've been watching the Israelites, and I've seen how stubborn and rebellious they are. ¹⁴ So don't try to stop me! I am going to wipe them out, and no one on earth will remember they ever lived. Then I will let your descendants become an even bigger and more powerful nation than Israel.

Moses said:

¹⁵ Fire was raging on the mountaintop as I went back down, carrying the two stones with the commandments on them. ¹⁶ I saw how quickly you had sinned and disobeyed the Lord your God. There you were, worshiping the metal idol you had made in the shape of a calf. ¹⁷ So I threw down the two stones and smashed them before your very eyes.

^18-20 I bowed down at the place of worship and prayed to the Lord, without eating or drinking for 40 days and nights. You had committed a terrible sin by making that idol, and the Lord hated what you had done. He was angry enough to destroy all of you and Aaron as well. So I prayed for you and Aaron as I had done before, and this time the Lord answered my prayers.^[h]

²¹ It was a sin for you to make that idol, so I threw it into the fire to melt it down. Then I took the lump of gold, ground it into powder, and threw the powder into the stream flowing down the mountain.

^22 (J) You also made the Lord angry when you were staying at Taberah,^[i] at Massah,^[j] and at Kibroth-Hattaavah.^{[k] 23 (K)} Then at Kadesh-Barnea the Lord said, “I am giving you the land, so go ahead and take it!” But since you didn't trust the Lord, you rebelled and disobeyed his command.^{[l] 24} In fact, you've rebelled against the Lord for as long as he has^[m] known you.

²⁵ After you had made the idol in the shape of a calf, the Lord said he was going to destroy you. So I lay face down in front of the Lord for 40 days and nights ²⁶ and prayed:

Our Lord, please don't wipe out your people. You used your great power to rescue them from Egypt and to make them your very own. ²⁷ Israel's ancestors Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob obeyed you faithfully. Think about them, and not about Israel's stubbornness, evil, and sin. ²⁸ If you destroy your people, the Egyptians will say, “The Lord promised to give Israel land, but he wasn't powerful enough to keep his promise. In fact, he hated them so much that he took them into the desert and killed them.” ²⁹ But you, our Lord, chose the people of Israel to be your own, and with your mighty power you rescued them from Egypt.

¹⁹ That evening, Jesus and the disciples went outside the city.

A Lesson from the Fig Tree

(Matthew 21.20-22)

²⁰ As the disciples walked past the fig tree the next morning, they noticed that it was completely dried up, roots and all. ²¹ Peter remembered what Jesus had said to the tree. Then Peter said, “Teacher, look! The tree you put a curse on has dried up.”

²² Jesus told his disciples:

Have faith in God! ^23 (A) If you have faith in God and don't doubt, you can tell this mountain to get up and jump into the sea, and it will. ²⁴ Everything you ask for in prayer will be yours, if you only have faith.

^25-26 (B) Whenever you stand up to pray, you must forgive what others have done to you. Then your Father in heaven will forgive your sins.^[a]

A Question about Jesus' Authority

(Matthew 21.23-27; Luke 20.1-8)

²⁷ Jesus and his disciples returned to Jerusalem. And as he was walking through the temple, the chief priests, the nation's leaders, and the teachers of the Law of Moses came over to him. ²⁸ They asked, “What right do you have to do these things? Who gave you this authority?”

²⁹ Jesus answered, “I have just one question to ask you. If you answer it, I will tell you where I got the right to do these things. ³⁰ Who gave John the right to baptize? Was it God in heaven or merely some human being?”

³¹ They thought it over and said to each other, “We can't say that God gave John this right. Jesus will ask us why we didn't believe John. ³² On the other hand, these people think that John was a prophet. So we can't say it was merely some human who gave John the right to baptize.”

They were afraid of the crowd ³³ and told Jesus, “We don't know.”

Jesus replied, “Then I won't tell you who gave me the right to do what I do.”