Leviticus 26
26
Rewards for Obeying God
1“‘Don’t make idols for yourselves. Don’t set up statues or memorials. Don’t put stone statues in your land to bow down to. This is because I am the Lord your God.
2“‘Remember my Sabbaths, and respect my Holy Place. I am the Lord.
3“‘Remember my laws and commands, and obey them. 4If you do these things, I will give you rains at the right season. The land will produce crops. And the trees of the field will produce their fruit. 5Your threshing will continue until the grape harvest. And your grape harvest will continue until it is time to plant. Then you will have plenty to eat. You will live safely in your land. 6I will give peace to your country. You will lie down in peace. No one will make you afraid. I will keep harmful animals out of your country. And armies will not pass through your country.
7“‘You will chase your enemies and defeat them. You will kill them with your sword. 8Five of you will chase 100 men. And 100 of you will chase 10,000 men. You will defeat your enemies and kill them with your sword.
9“‘Then I will show kindness to you. I will let you have many children. I will keep my agreement with you. 10You will have enough crops to last for more than a year. You will harvest the new crops. And you will have to throw out the old crops to make room for the new ones. 11Also I will place my Holy Tent among you. I will not turn away from you. 12I will walk with you and be your God. And you will be my people. 13I am the Lord your God. You were slaves in Egypt. You were bent low from the heavy weights you carried as slaves. But I broke the heavy weights that were on your shoulders. I let you walk proudly again.
Punishment for Not Obeying God
14“‘But you must obey me. You must obey all my commands. 15If you refuse to obey all my laws and commands, you have broken our agreement. 16If you do that, I will cause terrible things to happen to you. I will cause you to have disease and fever. They will destroy your eyes and kill you. You will not have success when you plant your seed. And your enemy will eat your crops. 17I will be against you, and your enemies will defeat you. These enemies hate you. And they will rule over you. You will run away even when no one is chasing you.
18“‘If you still do not obey me, I will punish you seven times more for your sins. 19And I will also break the great cities that make you proud. The skies will not give rain. The earth will not produce crops. 20You will work hard, but it will not help. Your land will not grow any crops. Your trees will not give their fruit.
21“‘If you still turn against me and refuse to obey me, I will beat you seven times harder. The more you sin, the more you will be punished. 22I will send wild animals to attack you. They will take your children away from you. They will destroy your cattle. They will make you so few in number the roads will be empty.
23“‘If you don’t learn your lesson after all these things, and if you still turn against me, 24I will also turn against you. I will punish you seven more times for your sins. 25You broke my agreement, and I will punish you. I will bring armies against you. You will go into your cities for safety. But I will cause diseases to spread among you. Then your enemy will defeat you. 26There will be very little bread to eat. Ten women will be able to cook all your bread in one oven. They will measure each piece of bread. You will eat, but you will still be hungry.
27“‘If you still refuse to listen to me, and if you still turn against me, 28I will really show my anger. I will punish you seven more times for your sins. 29You will eat the bodies of your sons and daughters. 30I will destroy your places where false gods are worshiped. I will cut down your incense altars. I will pile your dead bodies on the lifeless forms of your idols. I will hate you. 31I will destroy your cities. I will make your holy places empty. I will not smell the pleasing smell of your offerings. 32I will make the land empty. Your enemies who come to live in it will be shocked at it. 33I will scatter you among the nations. I will pull out my sword and destroy you. Your land will become empty. Your cities will become waste. 34You will be taken to your enemy’s country. So your land will finally get its rest. It will enjoy its time of rest all the time it lies empty. 35During the time the land is empty, it will rest. It will have the rest you should have given it while you lived in it.
36“‘Those who are left alive will lose their courage in the land of their enemies. They will be frightened of everything. They will be frightened by even the sound of a leaf being blown by the wind. They will run as if someone were chasing them with a sword. They will fall even when no one is chasing them. 37They will run as if someone were chasing them with a sword. They will fall over each other, even though no one is chasing them. You will not be strong enough to stand up against your enemies. 38You will die among other nations. You will disappear in your enemies’ countries. 39So those who are left alive will rot away in their enemies’ countries. They will rot away because of their sins and their ancestors’ sins.
There Is Always Hope
40“‘But maybe the people will confess their sins and the sins of their ancestors. Maybe they will admit they turned against me and sinned against me. 41That made me turn against them. So I sent them into the land of their enemies. These disobedient people might be sorry for what they did. They might accept punishment for their sin. 42If they do, I will remember my agreement with Jacob. I will remember my agreement with Isaac and Abraham. And I will remember the land. 43The land will be empty. It will enjoy its time of rest. Then those who are left alive will accept the punishment for their sins. They will learn that they were punished because they hated my laws. And they refused to obey my rules. 44They truly sinned. But if they come to me for help, I will not turn away from them. I will listen to them even in the land of their enemies. I will not completely destroy them. I will not break my agreement with them. This is because I am the Lord their God. 45For their good I will remember the agreement with their ancestors. I brought their ancestors out of the land of Egypt. I did it so I could become their God. The other nations saw these things. I am the Lord.’”
46These are the laws, rules and teachings the Lord gave the people of Israel. He gave these laws to the Israelites through Moses. This was at Mount Sinai.
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Leviticus 26: ICB
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Copyright © 2015 by Tommy Nelson™, a Division of Thomas Nelson, Inc. All rights reserved. Used by permission.
Leviticus 26
26
Blessings of Obedience
1 # 26:1 Through Moses God explains clearly how He will bless the Israelites for their faithful obedience and repeatedly emphasizes that His blessings are contingent on Israel’s responsiveness. If the Israelites want God’s blessings, they must not take Him for granted. ‘You shall not make idols for yourselves, nor shall you erect an image, a sacred pillar or an obelisk, nor shall you place any figured stone in your land so that you may bow down to it; for I am the Lord your God. 2You shall keep My Sabbaths and have reverence for My sanctuary. I am the Lord. 3If you walk in My statutes and keep My commandments and [obediently] do them, 4then I will give you rain in its season, and the land will yield her produce and the trees of the field bear their fruit. 5And your threshing season will last until grape gathering and the grape gathering [time] will last until planting, and you will eat your bread and be filled and live securely in your land. 6I will also grant peace in the land, so that you may lie down and there will be no one to make you afraid. I will also eliminate harmful animals from the land, and no sword will pass through your land. 7And you will chase your enemies, and they will fall before you by the sword. 8Five of you will chase a hundred, and a hundred of you will put ten thousand to flight; your enemies will fall before you by the sword. 9For I will turn toward you [with favor and regard] and make you fruitful and multiply you, and I will establish and confirm My covenant with you. [2 Kin 13:23] 10You will eat the old supply of [abundant] produce, and clear out the old [to make room] for the new. 11I will make My dwelling among you, and My soul will not reject nor separate itself from you. 12I will walk among you and be your God, and you shall be My people. 13I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt so that you would not be their slaves; and I broke the bars of your yoke and made you walk upright [with heads held high as free men].
Penalties of Disobedience
14‘But if you do not obey Me and do not [obediently] do all these commandments, 15if, instead, you reject My statutes, and if your soul rejects My ordinances, so that you will not [obediently] do all My commandments, and in this way break My covenant, 16I, in turn, will do this to you: I will appoint over you sudden terror, consumption, and fever that will waste away the eyes and cause the soul to languish also. And you will sow your seed uselessly, for your enemies will eat what you plant. 17I will set My face against you so that #26:17 These verses specify the penalties for disobedience. The Scripture references indicate where the fulfillments of these prophecies are recorded. God keeps His word, whether a blessing or a judgment.you will be struck down before your enemies; those who hate you will rule over you, and you will flee when no one is pursuing you. [1 Sam 4:10; 31:1] 18If in spite of all this you still will not listen to Me and be obedient, then I will punish you seven times more for your sins. 19I will break your pride in your power, and I will make your sky like iron [giving no rain and blocking all prayers] and your ground like bronze [hard to plow and yielding no produce]. [1 Kin 17:1] 20Your strength will be spent uselessly, for your land will not yield its produce and the trees of the land will not yield their fruit.
21‘If then, you act with hostility toward Me and are unwilling to obey Me, I will increase the plague on you seven times in accordance with your sins. 22I will let loose the [wild] animals of the field among you, which will bereave you of your children and destroy your livestock and make you so few in number that your roads will lie deserted and desolate. [2 Kin 17:25, 26]
23‘And if by these things you are not turned to Me, but act #26:23 Lit contrary to and so throughout the chapter.with hostility against Me, 24then I also will act with hostility against you, and I will strike you seven times for your sins. 25I will bring a sword on you that will execute vengeance for [breaking] the covenant; and when you gather together in your cities, I will send pestilence (virulent disease) among you, and you shall be handed over to the enemy. [Num 16:49; 2 Sam 24:15] 26When I break your staff of bread [that is, cut off your supply of food], ten women will bake your bread in one oven, and they will ration your bread; and you will eat and not be satisfied. [Hag 1:6]
27‘Yet if in spite of this you will not [attentively] listen to Me but act with hostility against me, 28then I will act with hostility against you in wrath, and I also will punish you seven times for your sins. 29You will eat the flesh of your sons and the flesh of your daughters. [2 Kin 6:28, 29] 30I will destroy your high places [devoted to idolatrous worship], and cut down your incense altars, and heap your dead bodies upon the [crushed] bodies of your idols, and My soul will detest you [with deep and unutterable loathing]. [2 Kin 23:8, 20] 31I will lay waste your cities as well and will make your sanctuaries desolate, and I will not smell your sweet and soothing aromas [of offerings by fire]. [2 Kin 25:4-10; 2 Chr 36:19] 32I will make the land desolate, and your enemies who settle in it will be appalled at it. 33I will scatter you among the nations and draw out the sword [of your enemies] after you; your land will become desolate and your cities will become ruins. [Ps 44:11-14]
34‘Then the land [of Israel] will enjoy its Sabbaths as long as it lies desolate, while you are in your enemies’ land; then the land will rest and enjoy its Sabbaths. 35As long as it lies desolate, it will have rest, the rest it did not have on your Sabbaths, while you were living on it. [2 Chr 36:21] 36As for those who are left of you, I will bring despair (lack of courage, weakness) into their hearts in the lands of their enemies; the sound of a scattered leaf will put them to flight, and they will flee as if [running] from the sword, and will fall even when no one is chasing them. 37They shall stumble over one another as if to escape from a sword when no one is chasing them; and you will have no power to stand before your enemies. 38You will perish among the nations; the land of your enemies will consume you. 39Those of you who are left will rot away because of their wickedness in the lands of your enemies; also because of the wickedness of their forefathers they will rot away like them.
40‘If they confess their wickedness and the wickedness of their forefathers, in their unfaithfulness which they have committed against Me—and also in their acting with hostility toward Me— 41I also was acting with hostility toward them and brought them into the land of their enemies—then if their uncircumcised (sin-filled) hearts are humbled and they accept the punishment for their wickedness, [2 Kin 24:10-14; Dan 9:11-14] 42then I will remember My covenant with Jacob, and also My covenant with Isaac, and also My covenant with Abraham, and remember the land. [Ps 106:44-46] 43But the land will be abandoned by them and will enjoy its Sabbaths while it lies desolate without them; and they will accept the punishment for their wickedness and make amends because they rejected My ordinances and their soul rejected My statutes. 44Yet in spite of this, when they are in the land of their enemies, I will not reject them, nor will I so despise them as to destroy them, breaking My covenant with them; for I am the Lord their God. [Deut 4:31-35; Jer 33:4, 5, 23-26; Rom 11:2-5] 45But I will, for their sake, [earnestly] remember the covenant with their forefathers, whom I have brought out of the land of Egypt in the sight of the nations, that I might be their God. I am the Lord.’ ”
46These are the statutes, ordinances, and laws which the Lord established between Himself and the Israelites through Moses at Mount Sinai.
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