Deu 8 | EE | STEP | Be careful! Obey every rule that I am giving to you today. If you do that, you will live. And you will have many children. You will be able to go into the country. It will become your country. This is the country that the LORD your God promised to your ancestors.

Deuteronomy 8

Moses talks about the careful love of God during 40 years

1 Be careful! Obey every rule that I am giving to you today. If you do that, you will live. And you will have many children. You will be able to go into the country. It will become your country. This is the country that the LORD your God promised to your ancestors. 2 Remember how the LORD your God led you all the way in the desert. He led you for 40 years and he sent many troubles to you. He did that for three reasons. He wanted to make you humble. He wanted to know whether you would obey him. And he wanted to know whether you would believe all his words. 3 He caused you to be hungry and then he fed you with special food called manna. Neither you nor your fathers had eaten this food before. By this, he taught you that a man does not live only on bread. A man also needs every word that God speaks to him. These words will teach him how to live a good life. ^{▼▼8:3 In Exodus 16:4, 5 we can read how God sent the manna. This was special bread from God’s home that fell like rain on to the desert for 6 mornings every week. On the 6th morning, the Israelites picked up twice as much. This was because God sent no manna on the Sabbath day.}

4 Your clothes did not become too old to wear. Your feet did not become too painful to walk on during all those 40 years. 5 So you can certainly know that the LORD your God is teaching you. And he is punishing you when you do the wrong things. He is doing that in the same way that a man teaches his son to do the right things.

6 Obey the rules of the LORD your God. Always do the things that will give him pleasure. Think about him all the time. 7 Do this because the LORD your God is bringing you into a good country. It is a country with many streams and pools of water. There is water that runs in the valleys and in the hills. 8 It is a country full of good food that grows in the fields. A lot of fruit is hanging on the trees. 9 It is a country where there is enough bread for everyone. You will have everything that you need. It is a country where the stones are full of iron. You can dig other metals out of the hills.

10 You can eat all the food that you want. Then remember to thank the LORD your God. He has given you this good country. 11 Be careful that you do not forget the LORD your God. Always remember to obey all his rules and decrees. I am giving them to you today. 12 In a future time, you will have all the food that you can eat. You will build beautiful houses to live in. 13 You will have many cows and sheep and a lot of gold and silver. You will have more and more things that are yours. 14 Then be careful! You may begin to think too well about yourselves. Then you will forget the LORD your God. He brought you out of Egypt, where you were slaves. 15 He led you through the large and frightening desert. There was no water to drink. The desert was full of dangerous snakes and insects. He made water rise out of a hard rock for you. 16 He gave manna to you to eat in the desert. That was something that your fathers never saw. He sent difficulties to you. He did that for two reasons. He wanted to make you humble. And he wanted to know whether you would obey him. He did those things because he wants to do good things for you in the end. 17 Perhaps you will say to yourself, ‘I have got all these good things by myself because I am strong!’

18 But you must always remember the LORD your God. It is he who is helping you to get many good things. He wants to do the good things that he promised to your ancestors. And that is what is happening today. 19 Do not ever forget the LORD your God. Do not look at other gods. Do not give things to them and do not worship them. If you do that, God will certainly kill you. That is what I am telling you today. 20 As the LORD killed the people in other nations, because of you, so he will kill you. This will happen if you do not obey the LORD your God.