19. Yet in your great mercyyou did not forsake them in the desert.By day the column of cloud did not cease to lead them on their journey,by night the column of fire did not cease to light the way they were to travel.
20. Your good spirit you bestowed on them,to give them understanding;Your manna you did not withhold from their mouths,and you gave them water in their thirst.
21. Forty years in the desert you sustained them:they did not want;Their garments did not become worn,and their feet did not swell.
22. You gave them kingdoms and peoples,which you divided among them as border lands.They possessed the land of Sihon, king of Heshbon,and the land of Og, king of Bashan.
23. You made their children as numerous as the stars of the heavens,and you brought them into the landwhich you had commanded their ancestors to enter and possess.
24. The children went in to possess the land;you humbled before them the Canaanite inhabitantsand gave them into their power,Their kings and the peoples of the land,to do with them as they wished.
25. They captured fortified cities and fertile land;they took possession of houses filled with all good things,Cisterns already dug, vineyards, olive groves,and fruit trees in abundance.They ate and had their fill,fattened and feasted on your great goodness.
26. But they were contemptuous and rebelled against you:they cast your law behind their backs.They murdered your prophetswho bore witness against them to bring them back to you:they were guilty of great insults.
27. Therefore you gave them into the power of their enemies,who oppressed them.But in the time of their oppression they would cry out to you,and you would hear them from heaven,And according to your great mercy give them saviorsto deliver them from the power of their enemies.
28. As soon as they had relief,they would go back to doing evil in your sight.Again you abandoned them to the power of their enemies,who crushed them.Once again they cried out to you, and you heard them from heavenand delivered them according to your mercy, many times over.