The Wilderness Years

Loue ye therefore the stranger: for ye were strangers in the land of Egypt.

Thou shalt feare the Lord thy God: thou shalt serue him, and thou shalt cleaue vnto him, and shalt sweare by his Name.

He is thy praise, and hee is thy God, that hath done for thee these great and terrible things, which thine eyes haue seene.

Thy fathers went downe into Egypt with seuentie persons, and now the Lord thy God hath made thee, as ye starres of ye heauen in multitude.

Therefore thou shalt loue the Lord thy God, and shalt keepe that, which he commandeth to be kept: that is, his ordinances, and his lawes, and his commandements alway.

And consider this day (for I speake not to your children, which haue neither knowen nor seene) the chastisement of the Lord your God, his greatnesse, his mighty hande, and his stretched out arme,

And his signes, and his actes, which hee did in the middes of Egypt vnto Pharaoh the King of Egypt and vnto all his land:

And what he did vnto the hoste of the Egyptians, vnto their horses, and to their charets, when he caused the waters of the red Sea to ouerflowe them, as they pursued after you, and the Lord destroied them vnto this day:

And what he did vnto you in the wildernesse, vntill yee came vnto this place:

And what he did vnto Dathan and Abiram the sonnes of Eliab ye sonne of Reuben, when the earth opened her mouth, and swallowed them with their housholds and their tents, and all their substance that they had in the middes of al Israel.

For your eyes haue seene all the great actes of the Lord which he did.

Therefore shall ye keepe all the commandements, which I commaund you this day, that ye may be strong, and go in and possesse the land whither ye goe to possesse it:

Also that ye may prolong your daies in the land, which the Lord sware vnto your fathers, to giue vnto them and to their seede, euen a lande that floweth with milke and honie.

For the land whither thou goest to possesse it, is not as the lande of Egypt, from whence ye came, where thou sowedst thy seede, and wateredst it with thy feete as a garden of herbes:

But the land whither ye goe to possesse it, is a land of mountaines and valleis, and drinketh water of the raine of heauen.

This land doth the Lord thy God care for: the eies of the Lord thy God are alwaies vpon it, from the beginning of the yeere, euen vnto the ende of the yeere.

If yee shall hearken therefore vnto my commandements, which I commaund you this day, that yee loue the Lord your God and serue him with all your heart, and with all your soule,

I also wil giue raine vnto your land in due time, the first raine and the latter, that thou maist gather in thy wheat, and thy wine, and thine oyle.

Also I will send grasse in thy fieldes, for thy cattel, that thou maist eate, and haue inough.

But beware lest your heart deceiue you, and lest yee turne aside, and serue other gods, and worship them,

And so the anger of the Lord be kindled against you, and he shut vp the heauen, that there be no raine, and that your lande yeelde not her fruit, and yee perish quickly from the good land, which the Lord giueth you.

Therefore shall ye lay vp these my words in your heart and in your soule, and binde them for a signe vpon your hand, that they may be as a frontlet betweene your eyes,

And ye shall teach them your children, speaking of them, whe thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest downe, and when thou risest vp.

And thou shalt write them vpon the postes of thine house, and vpon thy gates,

That your daies may be multiplied, and the daies of your children, in ye land which the Lord sware vnto your fathers to giue them, as long as the heauens are aboue the earth.