Deuteronomy 7:16-26

The Voice

¹⁶ You are to destroy all the nations the Eternal, your True God, puts in your power. Don’t show them any pity! You must not worship their gods—that behavior is a deadly trap!

¹⁷ You might say to yourselves, “Those nations are so much more powerful than we are! How can we ever displace them in the land?” ¹⁸ But don’t be afraid of them! Remember what the Eternal, your True God, did to Pharaoh and to all of Egypt. ¹⁹ You saw with your own eyes how the Eternal your God brought you out of there by testing the Egyptians with great plagues, warning them with signs and omens, and fighting against them with overwhelming power. He is your God and will do the same thing to all the nations you’re so afraid of right now. ²⁰ The Eternal your God will even send swarms of hornets against them. Those hornets will finish off anyone who escapes from you and tries to hide from the death you bring. ²¹ So don’t be so terrified of these other nations—the Eternal your God is with you. He’s a great and awesome God! ²² But He will drive out these nations ahead of you only little by little. You won’t be able to finish them off all at once because if you did, the wild animals would reproduce rapidly in the empty land and that would be dangerous. ²³ But the Eternal your God definitely will defeat these nations in front of you. He will throw them into a great panic until they are all destroyed. ²⁴ He’ll put their kings in your power, so you will be able to wipe out all their names. No one under heaven will ever know they existed! Not a single person will be able to resist you; you’ll destroy them all. ²⁵ Then you must burn up all of their carved idols in the fire. Don’t admire them because the silver and gold in them are so valuable. If you take those metals, you’ll fall into a deadly trap because He abhors these idols! ²⁶ You must not bring these horrible things into your house. If you do, you’ll be doomed to destruction, just as they are. You should be totally horrified and disgusted by these idols—they are doomed to destruction!