15 Now remembering that you didn’t see any form at Mt. Sinai (Horev) when Yahweh spoke to you all from the middle of the fire, 16 so don’t corrupt yourselves by making an idol to be your god—don’t make anything in the likeness of a man or a woman,[ref] 17 or of any animal that’s on the earth or bird that flies in the sky,[ref] 18 or any reptile that creeps along the ground or any fish from the deep oceans. 19 Don’t look up to the sky and be tempted to bow down to the sun or the moon or the stars and serve them—your god Yahweh made them to serve every people group in the world. 20 Yahweh has brought you all out of the iron-smelting furnace of Egypt to be a people that would belong to him (as you are today),[ref] 21 but then Yahweh got angry at me because of your parents and determined that I would never enter the land that he’s giving to all of you.[ref] 22 Instead, I’ll die here in this place. I won’t cross the Yarden river, but you will, and then you’ll all take possession of that good land. 23 Take great care that you all don’t forget the agreement with your god Yahweh. Don’t make any idols for yourselves in the form of anything that your god Yahweh has ordered you all not to, 24 because your god Yahweh is a consuming fire—he’s a god who gets jealous.[ref]

25 Even after you’ve had children and grandchildren and then grown old in the land, don’t make an idol in the form of anything, and don’t be corrupt or do evil things that your god Yahweh dislikes and so which will make him angry. 26 If you do, I call the heavens and the earth as witnesses against you all today, that you’d die over there in the land that you’re crossing the river to possess. You wouldn’t live there very long, but instead would end up getting destroyed. 27 Then Yahweh would scatter the remainder among the nations where you’d remain as a small minority.[ref] 28 There you would be forced to worship gods that humans have made out of wood or stone and which can’t see, hear, smell, or eat. 29 From there you’ll search for your god Yahweh, and you’ll find him when you search for him with determination and total sincerity.[ref] 30 It’s in the future when you end up in distress there that you’ll return to your god Yahweh and listen to what he tells you, 31 because your god Yahweh is a merciful god. He won’t abandon you or destroy you, and he won’t forget what he promised to your ancestors.

32 Now, please, consider past times before you were alive, i.e., from when God first created people here on the earth. You could search all through human history and you wouldn’t find anything else as incredible as what Yahweh has done for your ancestors. 33 Has any other people group heard God talking from the middle of a fire like you have, and then lived to tell about it? 34 Or is their any other nation that God has attempted to take out from the middle of another nation, using miracles and war, and power and terrifying actions, like your god Yahweh did for you all when you were in Egypt? 35 You were shown all that so you’d know that Yahweh is the one and only god.[ref] 36 He allowed you to hear his voice from the skies to instruct you, and on earth you heard his words from the incredible fire that he showed you. 37 Because he loved your ancestors, he chose their descendants as his people and used his power and strength to lead you out of Egypt 38 and then to drive out nations ahead of you that were greater and more powerful than you—bringing you here today so that you could occupy their land as your inheritance. 39 So today you should acknowledge that Yahweh is god of the heavens above and the earth below, and there’s no other god. 40 Follow his instructions and obey his regulations that I’m giving you today so that everything will go well for you and your descendants, and so that you’ll live a long time in the land that your god Yahweh is giving you as a permanent possession.”