Deuteronomy 9

All 29 verses in the Clear Bible Translation. Tap a verse to compare the KJV and read what it means.

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1. 1Listen, Israel! Today you are about to cross the Jordan to take over nations that are bigger and more powerful than you. Their cities are massive, with walls that seem to reach the sky.
2. 2The people living there are tall and strong — the descendants of the Anakim. You know about them, and you've heard people say, "Who can stand against the sons of Anak?"
3. 3But understand this today: the LORD your God is going ahead of you like a consuming fire. He will destroy them and bring them down in front of you, so you will drive them out and wipe them out quickly, just as the LORD promised you.
4. 4After the LORD your God has driven them out ahead of you, don't tell yourself, "The LORD gave me this land because I deserved it." No — the LORD is driving these nations out because of their wickedness.
5. 5It's not because of your righteousness or your good heart that you're going in to take their land. The LORD your God is driving them out because of their wickedness, and to keep the promise the LORD made to your ancestors — Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
6. 6Know then, that the LORD your God is not giving you this good land to possess because of your righteousness; for you are a stubborn people.
7. 7Remember — and don't you ever forget — how you provoked the LORD your God to anger in the wilderness. From the day you left Egypt until you arrived here, you have been rebelling against the LORD.
8. 8Even at Horeb you made the LORD so furious that he was ready to destroy you.
9. 9When I climbed the mountain to receive the stone tablets — the tablets of the covenant the LORD made with you — I stayed there for 40 days and 40 nights without eating any food or drinking any water.
10. 10The LORD gave me 2 stone tablets inscribed by the finger of God himself. Written on them were all the words the LORD had spoken to you from the fire on the mountain, on the day you were all assembled there.
11. 11At the end of those 40 days and 40 nights, the LORD handed me the 2 stone tablets — the tablets of the covenant.
12. 12Then the LORD told me, "Get up and go back down immediately! Your people that you brought out of Egypt have already corrupted themselves. They've quickly abandoned the path I commanded them to follow. They've made an idol out of melted metal."
13. 13The LORD also said to me, "I have observed this people, and indeed, they are a stiff-necked people."
14. 14Leave me alone, so that I may destroy them and erase their name from under heaven. Then I will make you into a nation mightier and greater than they are.
15. 15So I turned and came back down the mountain while it was still blazing with fire, carrying the 2 covenant tablets in my hands.
16. 16When I looked, I saw it for myself — you had sinned against the LORD your God. You had made yourselves a molten calf. You had already turned away from the path the LORD had commanded you to follow.
17. 17I grabbed the 2 tablets and hurled them from my hands, smashing them to pieces right in front of you.
18. 18Then I threw myself facedown before the LORD for another 40 days and 40 nights, just like the first time, without eating food or drinking water. I did this because of all the sin you had committed — the evil you had done that provoked the LORD to anger.
19. 19I was terrified of the LORD's fierce anger, because he was furious enough to destroy you. But the LORD listened to me that time as well.
20. 20The LORD was also angry enough with Aaron to destroy him, so I prayed for Aaron at the same time.
21. 21Then I took that sinful thing you had made — the calf — and burned it in the fire. I crushed it and ground it into powder as fine as dust, then threw the dust into the stream that flowed down from the mountain.
22. 22You also provoked the LORD to anger at Taberah, at Massah, and at Kibrothhattaavah.
23. 23And when the LORD sent you from Kadeshbarnea, saying, "Go up and take possession of the land I've given you," you rebelled against the command of the LORD your God. You didn't trust him, and you didn't listen to him.
24. 24You have been rebelling against the LORD for as long as I've known you.
25. 25So I lay facedown before the LORD for those 40 days and 40 nights, because the LORD had declared that he would destroy you.
26. 26I prayed to the LORD and said, "Lord GOD, please don't destroy your people — your own inheritance that you rescued through your greatness and brought out of Egypt with your mighty hand.
27. 27Remember your servants Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Don't focus on how stubborn this people is, or on their wickedness and sin.
28. 28Otherwise, the land from which you brought us out will say, 'The LORD was not able to bring them into the land he promised them, and because he hated them, he brought them out to kill them in the wilderness.'
29. 29But they are still your people — your own inheritance — the ones you brought out of Egypt by your great power and your outstretched arm."