Deuteronomy 8-11

March 8, 2024

Deuteronomy 8

REMEMBER THE LORD
“Carefully follow every command I am giving you today, so that you may live and increase, and may enter and take possession of the land the Lord swore to your ancestors.
2 Remember that the Lord your God led you on the entire journey these forty years in the wilderness, so that he might humble you and test you to know what was in your heart, whether or not you would keep his commands. 3 He humbled you by letting you go hungry; then he gave you manna to eat, which you and your ancestors had not known, so that you might learn that man does not live on bread alone but on every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord. 4 Your clothing did not wear out, and your feet did not swell these forty years. 5 Keep in mind that the Lord your God has been disciplining you just as a man disciplines his son. 6 So keep the commands of the Lord your God by walking in his ways and fearing him. 7 For the Lord your God is bringing you into a good land, a land with streams, springs, and deep water sources, flowing in both valleys and hills; 8 a land of wheat, barley, vines, figs, and pomegranates; a land of olive oil and honey; 9 a land where you will eat food without shortage, where you will lack nothing; a land whose rocks are iron and from whose hills you will mine copper. 10 When you eat and are full, you will bless the Lord your God for the good land he has given you.

11“Be careful that you don’t forget the Lord your God by failing to keep his commands, ordinances, and statutes that I am giving you today. 12 When you eat and are full, and build beautiful houses to live in, 13 and your herds and flocks grow large, and your silver and gold multiply, and everything else you have increases, 14 be careful that your heart doesn’t become proud and you forget the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the place of slavery. 15 He led you through the great and terrible wilderness with its poisonous snakes and scorpions, a thirsty land where there was no water. He brought water out of the flint rock for you. 16 He fed you in the wilderness with manna, which your ancestors had not known, in order to humble and test you, so that in the end he might cause you to prosper. 17 You may say to yourself, ‘My power and my own ability have gained this wealth for me,’ 18 but remember that the Lord your God gives you the power to gain wealth, in order to confirm his covenant he swore to your ancestors, as it is today. 19 If you ever forget the Lord your God and follow other gods to serve them and bow in worship to them, I testify against you today that you will certainly perish. 20 Like the nations the Lord is about to destroy before you, you will perish if you do not obey the Lord your God.

Deuteronomy 9

WARNING AGAINST SELF-RIGHTEOUSNESS
“Listen, Israel: Today you are about to cross the Jordan to enter and drive out nations greater and stronger than you, with large cities fortified to the heavens.
2 The people are strong and tall, the descendants of the Anakim. You know about them and you have heard it said about them, ‘Who can stand up to the sons of Anak? ’ 3 But understand that today the Lord your God will cross over ahead of you as a consuming fire; he will devastate and subdue them before you. You will drive them out and destroy them swiftly, as the Lord has told you. 4 When the Lord your God drives them out before you, do not say to yourself, ‘The Lord brought me in to take possession of this land because of my righteousness.’ Instead, the Lord will drive out these nations before you because of their wickedness. 5 You are not going to take possession of their land because of your righteousness or your integrity. Instead, the Lord your God will drive out these nations before you because of their wickedness, in order to fulfill the promise he swore to your ancestors Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. 6 Understand that the Lord your God is not giving you this good land to possess because of your righteousness, for you are a stiff-necked people.

ISRAEL’S REBELLION AND MOSES’S INTERCESSION
7 “Remember and do not forget how you provoked the Lord your God in the wilderness. You have been rebelling against the Lord from the day you left the land of Egypt until you reached this place. 8 You provoked the Lord at Horeb, and he was angry enough with you to destroy you. 9 When I went up the mountain to receive the stone tablets, the tablets of the covenant the Lord made with you, I stayed on the mountain forty days and forty nights. I did not eat food or drink water. 10 On the day of the assembly the Lord gave me the two stone tablets, inscribed by God’s finger. The exact words were on them, which the Lord spoke to you from the fire on the mountain. 11 The Lord gave me the two stone tablets, the tablets of the covenant, at the end of the forty days and forty nights.

12“The Lord said to me, ‘Get up and go down immediately from here. For your people whom you brought out of Egypt have acted corruptly. They have quickly turned from the way that I commanded them; they have made a cast image for themselves.’ 13 The Lord also said to me, ‘I have seen this people, and indeed, they are a stiff-necked people. 14 Leave me alone, and I will destroy them and blot out their name under heaven. Then I will make you into a nation stronger and more numerous than they.’

15“So I went back down the mountain, while it was blazing with fire, and the two tablets of the covenant were in my hands. 16 I saw how you had sinned against the Lord your God; you had made a calf image for yourselves. You had quickly turned from the way the Lord had commanded for you. 17 So I took hold of the two tablets and threw them from my hands, shattering them before your eyes. 18 I fell down like the first time in the presence of the Lord for forty days and forty nights; I did not eat food or drink water because of all the sin you committed, doing what was evil in the Lord’s sight and angering him. 19 I was afraid of the fierce anger the Lord had directed against you, because he was about to destroy you. But again the Lord listened to me on that occasion. 20 The Lord was angry enough with Aaron to destroy him. But I prayed for Aaron at that time also. 21 I took the sinful calf you had made and burned it. I crushed it, thoroughly grinding it to powder as fine as dust, and threw its dust into the stream that came down from the mountain.

22“You continued to provoke the Lord at Taberah, Massah, and Kibroth-hattaavah. 23 When the Lord sent you from Kadesh-barnea, he said, ‘Go up and possess the land I have given you’; you rebelled against the command of the Lord your God. You did not believe or obey him. 24 You have been rebelling against the Lord ever since I have known you.

25“I fell down in the presence of the Lord forty days and forty nights because the Lord had threatened to destroy you. 26 I prayed to the Lord:

Lord God, do not annihilate your people, your inheritance, whom you redeemed through your greatness and brought out of Egypt with a strong hand. 27 Remember your servants Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Disregard this people’s stubbornness, and their wickedness and sin. 28 Otherwise, those in the land you brought us from will say, ‘Because the Lord wasn’t able to bring them into the land he had promised them, and because he hated them, he brought them out to kill them in the wilderness.’ 29 But they are your people, your inheritance, whom you brought out by your great power and outstretched arm.

Deuteronomy 10

THE COVENANT RENEWED
“The Lord said to me at that time, ‘Cut two stone tablets like the first ones and come to me on the mountain and make a wooden ark.
2 I will write on the tablets the words that were on the first tablets you broke, and you are to place them in the ark.’ 3 So I made an ark of acacia wood, cut two stone tablets like the first ones, and climbed the mountain with the two tablets in my hand. 4 Then on the day of the assembly, the Lord wrote on the tablets what had been written previously, the Ten Commandments that he had spoken to you on the mountain from the fire. The Lord gave them to me, 5 and I went back down the mountain and placed the tablets in the ark I had made. And they have remained there, as the Lord commanded me.”

6 The Israelites traveled from Beeroth Bene-jaakan to Moserah. Aaron died and was buried there, and Eleazar his son became priest in his place. 7 They traveled from there to Gudgodah, and from Gudgodah to Jotbathah, a land with flowing streams.

8 “At that time the Lord set apart the tribe of Levi to carry the ark of the Lord’s covenant, to stand before the Lord to serve him, and to pronounce blessings in his name, as it is today. 9 For this reason, Levi does not have a portion or inheritance like his brothers; the Lord is his inheritance, as the Lord your God told him.

10“I stayed on the mountain forty days and forty nights like the first time. The Lord also listened to me on this occasion; he agreed not to annihilate you. 11 Then the Lord said to me, ‘Get up. Continue your journey ahead of the people, so that they may enter and possess the land I swore to give their ancestors.’

WHAT GOD REQUIRES
12“And now, Israel, what does the Lord your God ask of you except to fear the Lord your God by walking in all his ways, to love him, and to worship the Lord your God with all your heart and all your soul? 13 Keep the Lord’s commands and statutes I am giving you today, for your own good. 14 The heavens, indeed the highest heavens, belong to the Lord your God, as does the earth and everything in it. 15 Yet the Lord had his heart set on your ancestors and loved them. He chose their descendants after them ​— ​he chose you out of all the peoples, as it is today. 16 Therefore, circumcise your hearts and don’t be stiff-necked any longer. 17 For the Lord your God is the God of gods and Lord of lords, the great, mighty, and awe-inspiring God, showing no partiality and taking no bribe. 18 He executes justice for the fatherless and the widow, and loves the resident alien, giving him food and clothing. 19 You are also to love the resident alien, since you were resident aliens in the land of Egypt. 20 You are to fear the Lord your God and worship him. Remain faithful to him and take oaths in his name. 21 He is your praise and he is your God, who has done for you these great and awe-inspiring works your eyes have seen. 22 Your ancestors went down to Egypt, seventy people in all, and now the Lord your God has made you numerous, like the stars of the sky.

Deuteronomy 11

REMEMBER AND OBEY
“Therefore, love the Lord your God and always keep his mandate and his statutes, ordinances, and commands.
2 Understand today that it is not your children who experienced or saw the discipline of the Lord your God:

His greatness, strong hand, and outstretched arm; 3 his signs and the works he did in Egypt to Pharaoh king of Egypt and all his land; 4 what he did to Egypt’s army, its horses and chariots, when he made the water of the Red Sea flow over them as they pursued you, and he destroyed them completely; 5 what he did to you in the wilderness until you reached this place; 6 and what he did to Dathan and Abiram, the sons of Eliab the Reubenite, when in the middle of the whole Israelite camp the earth opened its mouth and swallowed them, their households, their tents, and every living thing with them.

7 Your own eyes have seen every great work the Lord has done.

8 “Keep every command I am giving you today, so that you may have the strength to cross into and possess the land you are to inherit, 9 and so that you may live long in the land the Lord swore to your ancestors to give them and their descendants, a land flowing with milk and honey. 10 For the land you are entering to possess is not like the land of Egypt, from which you have come, where you sowed your seed and irrigated by hand as in a vegetable garden. 11 But the land you are entering to possess is a land of mountains and valleys, watered by rain from the sky. 12 It is a land the Lord your God cares for. He is always watching over it from the beginning to the end of the year.

13“If you carefully obey my commands I am giving you today, to love the Lord your God and worship him with all your heart and all your soul, 14 I will provide rain for your land in the proper time, the autumn and spring rains, and you will harvest your grain, new wine, and fresh oil. 15 I will provide grass in your fields for your livestock. You will eat and be satisfied. 16 Be careful that you are not enticed to turn aside, serve, and bow in worship to other gods. 17 Then the Lord’s anger will burn against you. He will shut the sky, and there will be no rain; the land will not yield its produce, and you will perish quickly from the good land the Lord is giving you.

18“Imprint these words of mine on your hearts and minds, bind them as a sign on your hands, and let them be a symbol on your foreheads. 19 Teach them to your children, talking about them when you sit in your house and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. 20 Write them on the doorposts of your house and on your city gates, 21 so that as long as the heavens are above the earth, your days and those of your children may be many in the land the Lord swore to give your ancestors. 22 For if you carefully observe every one of these commands I am giving you to follow ​— ​to love the Lord your God, walk in all his ways, and remain faithful to him ​— ​23 the Lord will drive out all these nations before you, and you will drive out nations greater and stronger than you are. 24 Every place the sole of your foot treads will be yours. Your territory will extend from the wilderness to Lebanon and from the Euphrates River to the Mediterranean Sea. 25 No one will be able to stand against you; the Lord your God will put fear and dread of you in all the land where you set foot, as he has promised you.

A BLESSING AND A CURSE
26“Look, today I set before you a blessing and a curse: 27 there will be a blessing, if you obey the commands of the Lord your God I am giving you today, 28 and a curse, if you do not obey the commands of the Lord your God and you turn aside from the path I command you today by following other gods you have not known. 29 When the Lord your God brings you into the land you are entering to possess, you are to proclaim the blessing at Mount Gerizim and the curse at Mount Ebal. 30 Aren’t these mountains across the Jordan, beyond the western road in the land of the Canaanites, who live in the Arabah, opposite Gilgal, near the oaks of Moreh? 31 For you are about to cross the Jordan to enter and take possession of the land the Lord your God is giving you. When you possess it and settle in it, 32 be careful to follow all the statutes and ordinances I set before you today.

— Deuteronomy 8:1-11:32 (CSB)