Deuteronomy 32:19-43

19The Lord saw this and rejected them, because his own sons and daughters had made him angry.

20He said, “I will turn away from them and find out what will happen to them. They are devious people, children who can’t be trusted.

21They made him furious because they worshiped foreign gods and angered him because they worshiped worthless idols. So I will use those who are not my people to make them jealous and a nation of godless fools to make them angry.

22My anger has started a fire that will burn to the depths of hell. It will consume the earth and its crops and set the foundations of the mountains on fire.

23I will bring one disaster after another on them. I will use up all my arrows on them.

24They will be starved by famines and ravaged by pestilence and deadly epidemics. I will send vicious animals against them along with poisonous animals that crawl on the ground.

25Foreign wars will kill off their children, and even at home there will be horrors. Young men and young women alike will die as well as nursing babies and gray-haired men.

26I said that I would cut them in pieces and erase everyone’s memory of them.

27But I didn’t want their enemies to make me angry. I didn’t want their opponents to misunderstand and say, ‘We won this victory! It wasn’t the Lord who did all this!’ ”

28My people have lost their good sense. They are not able to understand.

29If only they were wise enough to understand this and realize what will happen to them!

30How could one person chase a thousand or two people make ten thousand flee? Their rock used these people to defeat them and the Lord gave them no help.

31Their rock isn’t like our rock. Even our enemies will agree with this.

32Their grapevines come from the vineyards of Sodom and from the fields of Gomorrah. Their grapes are poisonous, and their clusters are bitter.

33Their wine is snake venom, the deadly poison of cobras.

34Isn’t this what I’ve stored under lock and key in my storehouses?

35I will take revenge and be satisfied. In due time their foot will slip, because their day of disaster is near. Their doom is coming quickly.

36The Lord will judge his people and have compassion on his servants when he sees that their strength is gone and that no one is left, neither slaves nor free people.

37Then he will ask, “Where are their gods? Where is the rock they took refuge in?

38Where are the gods who ate the fat from their sacrifices and drank the wine from their wine offerings? Let them come to help you! Let them be your refuge!”

39See, I am the only God. There are no others. I kill, and I make alive. I wound, and I heal, and no one can rescue you from my power.

40I raise my hand toward heaven and solemnly swear: As surely as I live forever,

41I will sharpen my flashing sword and take justice into my own hands. Then I will take revenge on my enemies and pay back those who hate me.

42My arrows will drip with blood from those who were killed and taken captive. My sword will cut off the heads of the enemy who vowed to fight.

43Joyfully sing with the Lord’s people, you nations, because he will take revenge for the death of his servants. He will get even with his enemies and make peace for his people’s land.