12. You are all here to enter into an agreement and a promise with the Lord your God. The Lord is making this agreement with you today.
13. This will make you today the Lord’s own people. He will be your God. This is what he told you. He promised it to your ancestors Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.
14. But the Lord is not just making this agreement and its promises with you.
15. You are standing here before the Lord your God today. But he is also making it with those who are not here today.
16. You know how we lived in Egypt. You know how we passed through the countries when we came here.
17. You saw their hated idols made of wood, stone, silver and gold.
18. Make sure no man, woman, family group or tribe among you leaves the Lord. Don’t let them go and serve the gods of those nations. That would be like a plant that grows bitter, poisonous fruit.
19. That kind of person might hear these curses. But he blesses himself. And he thinks, “I will be safe. I will continue doing what I want to do.” That person might destroy all of your land, both wet and dry.
20. The Lord will not forgive that person. His anger will be like a burning fire against that man. All the curses written in this book will come on him. And the Lord will destroy any memory of him on the earth.
21. The Lord will separate him from all the tribes of Israel for punishment. All the curses of the agreement will happen to him. They are written in this Book of the Teachings.
22. Your children who will come after you will see this. And foreigners from faraway lands will see this. They will see the disasters that come to this land. And they will see the diseases the Lord will send on it. They will say,
23. “The land is nothing but burning cinders and salt. Nothing is planted. Nothing grows. Nothing blooms. It is like Sodom and Gomorrah, and Admah and Zeboiim. The Lord destroyed them because he was very angry.”
24. All the other nations will ask, “Why has the Lord done this to the land? Why is he so angry?”