Chronological

Love and obey the Lord

11 Love the Lord your God. Do what he tells you to do. Always obey his rules, his laws and his commands. ² Remember that today I am speaking to you who have seen his powerful acts! Your children did not see the great things that the Lord your God did to teach you. You saw for yourselves how great, strong and powerful he is. ³ But your children did not see the great miracles that he did in Egypt. He punished Pharaoh, king of Egypt, and all his people. ⁴ You saw how God destroyed Egypt's army, with all their horses and chariots. They were chasing after you to catch you. But God caused the water of the Red Sea to cover them, so that they drowned. ⁵ Your children did not see all the things that the Lord did in the desert as he brought you here. ⁶ They did not see how he punished Dathan and Abiram, Eliab's sons, from Reuben's tribe. God caused the earth to open up in the middle of the Israelites' camp. These men fell down into the hole and they disappeared. Their families, their tents and everything that they had all disappeared in the hole. ⁷ Remember that I am speaking to you, the people who have seen the Lord's powerful acts.

God's blessings in Canaan

⁸ So you must obey all the commands that I am giving to you today. If you do that, you will be able to go across the Jordan River into Canaan. You will be strong enough to take the land for yourselves and live there. ⁹ Then you will enjoy a long life in that land. It is the land that the Lord promised to give to your ancestors and to their descendants. It is a land where there is plenty of food and drink, enough for everyone.

¹⁰ The land that you are going into is not like the land of Egypt, where you lived before. There, when you planted seeds, you had to take water to them. It was like a garden where you grow vegetables. ¹¹ But now you are going across the Jordan River into a different kind of land. It has hills and valleys. Rain falls from the sky and makes the ground wet. ¹² The Lord your God takes care of the land there. He watches over it every day, through the whole year.

¹³ So listen carefully to the commands that I am giving to you today. Love the Lord your God and serve him in everything that you think and in everything that you do. ¹⁴ If you do that, he makes this promise to you: ‘I will send rain on your land at the right time each year. There will be rain in autumn and rain in spring.^[a] Then your crops will give you food. You will also have grapes to make wine and olives to make oil. ¹⁵ I will make grass grow in your fields for your animals to eat. You will have as much food as you want to eat.’

¹⁶ But be careful! Do not turn away from the Lord so that you worship other gods. Do not let those things deceive you. ¹⁷ If you do that, the Lord will be very angry with you. He will not send rain down from the sky. The land will no longer give you food to eat. Then you will soon die. You will no longer be able to live in the good land that the Lord is giving to you.

¹⁸ Continue to think carefully about these commands in everything that you do. Tie them as signs onto your hands so that you remember them. Also tie them around your heads. ¹⁹ Teach them to your children. Talk about them when you sit together at home. Talk about them as you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. ²⁰ Write them on the wood beside the doors of your houses and on your gates. ²¹ Do these things so that you and your descendants will live long lives in the land. It is the land that the Lord promised to give to your ancestors. You will continue to live there while there is still a sky above the earth.

²² Be careful to obey these commands that I am giving to you. Love the Lord your God. Live in a way that pleases him. Be faithful to him.

²³ If you do that, the Lord will chase out all those nations as you move into the land. They are greater and stronger than you are, but you will take the land from them. ²⁴ Every piece of ground that you walk on will belong to you. The borders of your land will go from the desert in the south as far as Lebanon in the north. They will go from the Euphrates river in the east to the Mediterranean Sea in the west. ²⁵ Nobody will be able to stop you. The Lord your God will cause everyone in the other nations to be afraid of you. They will shake with fear. He has promised to do that, everywhere that you go in the land.

²⁶ Today I am telling you to choose. Do you want God to bless you? Or do you want God to curse you? ²⁷ The Lord your God will bless you if you obey his commands that I am giving to you today. ²⁸ But he will curse you if you refuse to obey his commands. If you turn away from him and you serve other gods that are new to you, he will curse you! ²⁹ When the Lord brings you into the land where you will live, do this: Speak aloud God's blessings from Mount Gerizim. Speak his curses from Mount Ebal. ³⁰ You know where these mountains are. They are west of the Jordan River, in the land of the Canaanites who live in the Jordan Valley. They are near Gilgal town, where the oak trees of Moreh are.

³¹ Soon you will go across the Jordan River. You will take for yourselves the land that the Lord your God is giving to you. It will belong to you as your home. ³² When you are there, be careful to obey his laws and his teaching that I am giving to you today.

One special place to worship the Lord

12 These are the laws and the rules that you must obey. Be careful to obey them when you live in the land that the Lord your God has given to you. He is the God that your ancestors worshipped. Obey these laws all the time that you live in that land.

² You will chase out the nations who live there. Then you must destroy completely all the places where those people worship their gods. Those places are on the tops of mountains and hills, and under big green trees. ³ You must break into pieces their altars and stone pillars. Burn their Asherah poles. Knock down the images of their gods. Destroy those places so that nobody remembers the false gods.

⁴ Do not worship the Lord your God in the same way that those people worship their gods. ⁵ The Lord will choose one place from the land where all your tribes live. That is the place where people must go to worship him. That is his special home. ⁶ That is where you must take your burnt offerings and other sacrifices to offer to the Lord. Take your tithes and offerings to him there. Take the gifts that you have promised to give, and the gifts that you choose to give. Take the firstborn animals from your cows, sheep and goats. ⁷ You and your families will go there to meet with the Lord your God. You will be happy as you eat together there. You will enjoy the results of all your work, because the Lord has blessed you.

⁸ At this time, all of you now do what you think is right. But when you are in the land, you must worship God in a different way. ⁹ You have not yet reached the place where you can rest. That is in the land that the Lord your God is giving to you as your home. ¹⁰ But when you go across the Jordan River, that land will become your home. The Lord will protect you from all the enemies who are around you. You will live safely. ¹¹ At that time, the Lord your God will choose one special place for his people to worship him. You must take there everything that I have told you. Take your burnt offerings and other sacrifices to offer to the Lord. Take your tithes and special offerings. Take the special gifts that you have promised to give to him. Take everything to the place that God will choose. ¹² Go there to enjoy time with the Lord your God. Take with you your children and your servants. Also take with you the Levites who live in your towns. Remember that they have not received any land for themselves, as you have.

¹³ So be careful! Do not offer your burnt offerings in any place that you choose for yourself. ¹⁴ Only make offerings to the Lord in the place that he chooses. That will be in the land that belongs to one of your tribes. It is the place where you must do all the things that I am commanding you to do.

¹⁵ But you may kill your animals and eat the meat in any of the towns where you live. When the Lord your God blesses you and he gives you animals, you may eat them as often as you want. It is the same as if you are eating meat from deer. Anyone may eat it. That includes people who are clean and people who are unclean. ¹⁶ But you must not eat the blood of any animal. You must pour it on the ground like water. ¹⁷ Do not eat any of your offerings to the Lord in the places where you live. Do not eat the tithes that you have taken from your grain, your new wine or your olive oil. Do not eat at home the firstborn animals from your cows, sheep or goats. Do not eat the gifts that you have promised, the gifts that you choose to give or any other special gifts. ¹⁸ You may only eat these offerings in the place that the Lord will choose as his special home. That is true for you, your children, your servants and the Levites who live in your towns. At that place, you should meet with the Lord your God and you should enjoy the results of all your work. ¹⁹ As long as you live in the land, be careful to take care of the Levites.^[b]

²⁰ The Lord your God has promised to give you more and more land. When he does that, perhaps you will say, ‘I would like to eat some meat.’ Then you may eat as much meat as you like. ²¹ The place that God chooses as his special home may be far away from you. If it is, you may kill any of the animals that the Lord has given to you. You may eat the meat at your own town, in the way that I have told you. ²² You should eat them in the same way that you eat deer. People who are unclean may eat them, as well as people who are clean. ²³ But never eat the blood. The blood of an animal gives it life. You must not eat the life together with the meat! ²⁴ You must not eat the blood. You must pour it on the ground like water. ²⁵ Do not eat it! Then you will be doing what the Lord says is right. You will enjoy a happy life and so will your children.

²⁶ It is only the holy things that you must take to the place that the Lord will choose for himself. Those are the gifts and sacrifices that you are offering to him. ²⁷ Offer the meat and the blood of your burnt offerings on the altar of the Lord your God. For the other sacrifices, you must pour out the blood beside the altar. But you may eat the meat. ²⁸ Be careful to obey all these commands that I am giving to you. Then you will be doing things that the Lord your God says are good and right. You and your children will enjoy a happy life.

²⁹ When you go into the land where the other nations live, the Lord your God will remove them. You will take their land and you will live on it. ³⁰ But after the Lord has destroyed them, be careful! Do not do the same wrong things as they do. Do not try to worship their gods. Do not say, ‘How do the people of these nations worship their gods? I would like to do the same thing!’

³¹ No! You must not worship the Lord your God in the same way that those people worship their gods. When they worship, they do wicked things that the Lord hates. They even burn their children with fire, to make sacrifices to their gods.

³² Be careful to do everything that I am telling you. Do not add anything to these commands. Do not remove anything from them.

False prophets

13 One day, you may have a prophet among you who tells you what will happen in the future. He may have dreams about what will happen. He may promise to do miracles to show that he is right. ² He may say that you should start to worship other gods that you did not know about before. The miracles may happen, as he promised, ³ but do not listen to that prophet's message. The Lord your God is using this person to test your thoughts. He wants to know if you really love him in everything that you think and everything that you do. ⁴ You must serve only the Lord your God and respect him with fear. You must obey his commands and serve him faithfully. ⁵ You must punish that false prophet with death. He has told you to turn against the Lord your God. The Lord rescued you from Egypt, where you were slaves. But the false prophet has tried to turn you away from the way of life that the Lord your God has commanded. So you must remove all evil things like that from among you.

⁶ Even someone in your own family may try to turn you away from the Lord. It may be your own brother, your son or your daughter. It may be your wife whom you love. It may be a friend that you like very much. They may say to you secretly, ‘We should worship other gods.’ Those are gods that you and your ancestors never knew about before. ⁷ They are gods that people who live around you may worship. They may be gods of people who live near to you. They may be gods of people who live anywhere on the earth. ⁸ But never agree with anyone who says that you should worship those gods. Do not even listen to him! Do not feel sorry for him. Do not try to protect him from punishment. ⁹ Instead, you must certainly kill him! You must be the first person to throw stones to kill him. Then everyone else must do the same thing. ¹⁰ You must throw stones at him until he dies. He tried to turn you away from the Lord your God. It was the Lord who rescued you from Egypt, where you were slaves. ¹¹ When you punish the false prophet with death, all Israel's people will hear about it. They will be afraid. No one will do evil things like that again.

¹² The Lord your God will give you towns to live in. When you are there, you may hear news of people who are causing trouble. ¹³ They may be turning the other people in their town away from the Lord. They may be saying, ‘We should worship other gods!’ Those are gods that you never knew about before.

¹⁴ Then you must check carefully that the news is true. You must discover whether people really have done this wicked thing in one of your towns. ¹⁵ If the news is true, you must attack that town. You must completely destroy it. Kill all the people and the animals. ¹⁶ You must put all the valuable things in a heap in the town's public place. Then burn down the whole town as an offering to the Lord your God. Leave the town as a heap of stones. Nobody must ever build it again. ¹⁷ You must not keep any of the valuable things for yourselves. They have been given to the Lord. If you destroy the whole town, the Lord will stop being angry. He will be kind to you and he will forgive you. He will cause you to grow into a big nation, as he promised your ancestors.

¹⁸ The Lord your God will bless you if you listen to what he says. You must obey all his commands that I am giving you today. You must do the things that he says are right.