Study Desk

'The LORD your God who goes before you will fight for you Himself, just as He did for you in Egypt before your [very] eyes,

and in the wilderness where you saw how the LORD your God carried and protected you, just as a man carries his son, all along the way which you traveled until you arrived at this place.'

"Yet in spite of this word, you did not trust [that is, confidently rely on and believe] the LORD your God,

"Then you answered and said to me, 'We have sinned against the LORD. We will go up and fight, just as the LORD our God has commanded us.' So you equipped every man with weapons of war, and regarded it as easy to go up into the hill country.

"For the LORD your God has blessed you in all that you have done; He has known about your wanderings through this great wilderness. These forty years the LORD your God has been with you; you have lacked nothing."'

just as the sons of Esau, who live in Seir, and the Moabites, who live in Ar, did for me, until I cross the Jordan into the land which the LORD our God is giving us.'

"But Sihon king of Heshbon was not willing for us to travel through his land; for the LORD your God hardened his spirit and made his heart obstinate, in order to hand him over to you, as he is today.

"So the LORD our God handed him over to us [and gave us the victory], and we defeated him and his sons and all his people.

"From Aroer, which is on the edge of the Arnon Valley, and from the city which is in the valley, as far as Gilead, there was no city [whose wall was] too high and too strong for us; the LORD our God handed over everything to us.

"Only you did not go near the land of the sons of Ammon, all along the river Jabbok and the cities of the hill country, and wherever the LORD our God had forbidden us.

"So the LORD our God also handed over Og king of Bashan, and all his people, into our hand and we struck him until no survivor was left.

"Then I commanded you [Reuben, Gad, and the half-tribe of Manasseh] at that time, saying, 'The LORD your God has given you this land to possess; all you who are brave men shall cross over [the Jordan] armed before your brothers, the sons of Israel.

until the LORD gives rest to your fellow countrymen as [He has] to you, and they also possess the land which the LORD your God has given them beyond the Jordan. Then each of you may return to the land (possession) which I have given to you.'

"I commanded Joshua at that time, saying, 'Your eyes have seen everything that the LORD your God has done to these two kings [Sihon and Og]; so the LORD shall do the same to all the kingdoms into which you are about to cross.

'Do not fear them, for it is the LORD your God who is fighting for you.'

'O Lord GOD, You have only begun to show Your servant Your greatness and Your mighty hand; for what god is there in heaven or on earth that can do such works and mighty acts (miracles) as Yours?

"Now, O Israel, listen and pay attention to the statutes and the judgments (God's legal decisions) which I am teaching you to do, so that you may live and go in and take possession of the land which the LORD, the God of your fathers, is giving you.

"You shall not add to the word which I am commanding you, nor take away from it, so that you may keep the commandments of the LORD your God which I am commanding you.

"Your eyes have seen what the LORD did at Baal-peor; for all the men who followed [and participated in the worship of] Baal of Peor, the LORD your God destroyed them from among you,

but you who held tightly to the LORD your God are alive today, every one of you.