While the people of Israel were camped beside the Jordan River, waiting to go across. Moses spoke to them for the last time. He knew he couldn’t go into Canaan with them, because he had angrily struck the rock with his rod instead of just speaking to it as God had told him to.
He was afraid the people would forget God’s laws when he was gone. In this last talk to them, Moses told them again how kind the Lord had been. He reminded them of the time forty years before when they were so close to Canaan, but they had refused to go in because the spies told them the people in Canaan were too strong to fight against. He reminded them of how angry the Lord had been with them and how God had sent them back into the wilderness for forty years.
Moses told the people that he had begged the Lord to let him cross the river with them, to enter the good land there in Canaan. But the Lord had said no, he must speak of it no more.
But the Lord told him he could see the Promised Land even though he couldn’t go into it. So he climbed a high mountain and saw it far away in the distance.
Moses asked the Lord to give the people of Israel another leader to take his place. Otherwise, he said, the people would have no one to guide them and care for them. They would be scattered and lost, like sheep without a shepherd. The Lord announced that He had chosen Joshua as the new leader, so all the people must obey him just as they had Moses.
Moses told the people to teach God’s commandments to their children. They must talk about these laws in their homes, and when they were out for walks, and before going to sleep at night, and when waking again in the morning. Everyone must talk about God’s laws many times each day and remind each other about how great and good God is.
They must be careful not to forget about the Lord after He had brought them safely into Canaan. He would give them great and beautiful cities that others had built, and would give them houses full of good things, and wells already dug, and vineyards and olive trees which they had not planted. When they had all these things, they must be careful not to forget that it was the Lord who gave everything to them.
They must never forget how God had led them through the wilderness for forty years and fed them with manna. In all that time their clothes had not worn out, and their feet had never become sore from travelling. God had led them through that lonely wilderness to a better land where streams ran through the fields and where springs of water poured down from the hills. In that good land across the river the grain grew plentifully and there were huge crops of juicy grapes; there were fig trees and pomegranates and olive trees, food enough to spare. And there was iron and copper in the hills, which they could dig out and use to make many wonderful things. They must never become proud and say that they had gotten these things by themselves, for it was the Lord alone who gave everything to them. The Lord said that if they forgot about Him and worshipped other gods, they would be killed.
When the Lord gave them the victory over the people living in Canaan, the people of Israel must never say God had done this for them because they were so good! No, they weren’t good at all. Rather it was because the people living in Canaan were so wicked. And it was because God had {Promised Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob that He would give the land of Canaan to the Israelites.
No, the people of Israel certainly weren’t good; they had often disobeyed the Lord from the time when they left Egypt until the time when they arrived there beside the river.
Moses told them that the Promised Land was not like the land of Egypt from which they had come. In Egypt it scarcely ever rained. A river called the Nile ran through the land. Once every year this river rose higher and higher until it flooded the fields and gardens near it. But everywhere except near the river the people had to carry water out to their fields or nothing would grow. This was hard, hard work.
But in Canaan, rain watered all the land. If the people of Israel would love God and obey Him. He would send them as much rain as they needed to make corn, the grapevines, and the olive trees grow, and to make the grass green in the fields for the cattle to eat.
The People co Canaan worshipped idols on the mountains and hills and under the trees. They built altars to sacrifice to these idols; they even killed their baby sons and daughters by burning them on altars as sacrifices to their false gods. Moses again told the people of Israel that they must destroy every place where idols were worshipped, and knock down all the altars.
If anyone ever tried to get them to sacrifice to other gods, they must take him out and throw great stones at him until he died.
The Lord told His people that everyone must be kind to the poor and lend them whatever they needed, even if the poor person might never be able to pay them back again. Everyone should lend willingly, not feeling sorry about doing it or wishing that they didn’t have to. Because of their kindness to the poor, the Lord would bless His people in everything they did.
Questions:
Who was Israelis’ new leader?
Why did God choose him?
Tell some of the things Moses said to his people?
What did the people then living in the Promised Land sometimes do to their boys and girls?
Did God help the Israelis because they were so good?
How were the Israelite’s supposed to treat poor people?
Are there still poor people today?
Try to think of something you can do to help one of them?
"Only Life Changes" 