16 Observe the month of Aviv and celebrate the Passover of the Lord your God, because in the month of Aviv he brought you out of Egypt by night. 2 Sacrifice as the Passover to the Lord your God an animal from your flock or herd at the place the Lord will choose as a dwelling for his Name. 3 Do not eat it with bread made with yeast, but for seven days eat unleavened bread, the bread of affliction, because you left Egypt in haste—so that all the days of your life you may remember the time of your departure from Egypt. 4 Let no yeast be found in your possession in all your land for seven days. Do not let any of the meat you sacrifice on the evening of the first day remain until morning.
5 You must not sacrifice the Passover in any town the Lord your God gives you 6 except in the place he will choose as a dwelling for his Name. There you must sacrifice the Passover in the evening, when the sun goes down, on the anniversary of your departure from Egypt. 7 Roastit and eat it at the place the Lord your God will choose. Then in the morning return to your tents. 8 For six days eat unleavened bread and on the seventh day hold an assembly to the Lord your God and do no work.
9 Count off seven weeks from the time you begin to put the sickle to the standing grain.10 Then celebrate the Festival of Weeks to the Lord your God by giving a freewill offering in proportion to the blessings the Lord your God has given you. 11 And rejoice before the Lordyour God at the place he will choose as a dwelling for his Name—you, your sons and daughters, your male and female servants, the Levites in your towns, and the foreigners, the fatherless and the widows living among you. 12 Remember that you were slaves in Egypt, and follow carefully these decrees.
13 Celebrate the Festival of Tabernacles for seven days after you have gathered the produce of your threshing floor and your winepress. 14 Be joyful at your festival—you, your sons and daughters, your male and female servants, and the Levites, the foreigners, the fatherless and the widows who live in your towns. 15 For seven days celebrate the festival to the Lord your God at the place the Lord will choose. For the Lord your God will bless you in all your harvest and in all the work of your hands, and your joy will be complete.
16 Three times a year all your men must appear before the Lord your God at the place he will choose: at the Festival of Unleavened Bread, the Festival of Weeks and the Festival of Tabernacles. No one should appear before the Lord empty-handed: 17 Each of you must bring a gift in proportion to the way the Lord your God has blessed you.
18 Appoint judges and officials for each of your tribes in every town the Lord your God is giving you, and they shall judge the people fairly. 19 Do not pervert justice or show partiality.Do not accept a bribe, for a bribe blinds the eyes of the wise and twists the words of the innocent. 20 Follow justice and justice alone, so that you may live and possess the land the Lord your God is giving you.
21 Do not set up any wooden Asherah pole beside the altar you build to the Lord your God,22 and do not erect a sacred stone, for these the Lord your God hates.
17 Do not sacrifice to the Lord your God an ox or a sheep that has any defect or flaw in it, for that would be detestable to him.
2 If a man or woman living among you in one of the towns the Lord gives you is found doing evil in the eyes of the Lord your God in violation of his covenant, 3 and contrary to my command has worshiped other gods, bowing down to them or to the sun or the moon or the stars in the sky, 4 and this has been brought to your attention, then you must investigate it thoroughly. If it is true and it has been proved that this detestable thing has been done in Israel, 5 take the man or woman who has done this evil deed to your city gate and stone that person to death. 6 On the testimony of two or three witnesses a person is to be put to death, but no one is to be put to death on the testimony of only one witness. 7 The hands of the witnesses must be the first in putting that person to death, and then the hands of all the people. You must purge the evil from among you.
8 If cases come before your courts that are too difficult for you to judge—whether bloodshed, lawsuits or assaults—take them to the place the Lord your God will choose. 9 Go to the Levitical priests and to the judge who is in office at that time. Inquire of them and they will give you the verdict. 10 You must act according to the decisions they give you at the place the Lord will choose. Be careful to do everything they instruct you to do. 11 Act according to whatever they teach you and the decisions they give you. Do not turn aside from what they tell you, to the right or to the left. 12 Anyone who shows contempt for the judge or for the priest who stands ministering there to the Lord your God is to be put to death. You must purge the evil from Israel. 13 All the people will hear and be afraid, and will not be contemptuous again.
14 When you enter the land the Lord your God is giving you and have taken possession of it and settled in it, and you say, “Let us set a king over us like all the nations around us,” 15 be sure to appoint over you a king the Lord your God chooses. He must be from among your fellow Israelites. Do not place a foreigner over you, one who is not an Israelite. 16 The king, moreover, must not acquire great numbers of horses for himself or make the people return to Egypt to get more of them, for the Lord has told you, “You are not to go back that way again.” 17 He must not take many wives, or his heart will be led astray. He must not accumulate large amounts of silver and gold.
18 When he takes the throne of his kingdom, he is to write for himself on a scroll a copy of this law, taken from that of the Levitical priests. 19 It is to be with him, and he is to read it all the days of his life so that he may learn to revere the Lord his God and follow carefully all the words of this law and these decrees 20 and not consider himself better than his fellow Israelites and turn from the law to the right or to the left. Then he and his descendants will reign a long time over his kingdom in Israel.
So God already knows that when the Israelites enter the land, even though He alone wants to be their king, they will reject His leadership for a man's leadership. Because of this He is giving guidelines for this Plan B. I am fairly good at predicting. After 35 years of delivering babies I can usually guess within 6oz. (now they changed to grams which I hate) how big the baby is and within an hour what time the baby will be born. The nurses are impressed but my wife isn't. Why? Because I will tell her what time I will be home and as she waits for me, she knows that I am wrong a lot. Especially it seems I am wrong on Sunday Mornings when I teach Sunday School and I say I will be there but I'm not and she has to fill in mostly unprepared.
God doesn't predict - He knows, which leads me to wonder and amazement that He would even create man and pick a chosen nation. He created paradise for us and put one tree in the garden as a prohibition knowing the moment He did that they would succumb to temptation and He would have to send His son to die for us. He picked a nation to represent Him to the world knowing they would misrepresent Him. He made a covenant with them saying if you obey these laws you will be blessed but if you disobey them you will be cursed, knowing full well they wouldn't obey, He would have to turn them over to other nations to be punished so they would cry out for mercy which He would give and then they would do it all over again. He gave stipulations for a king that He didn't want them to have knowing full well that Solomon would break every one of them.
Why does God even bother giving laws with blessings attached knowing they won't do them? Why does He keep "hoping" for the best knowing it won't happen? Maybe He doesn't "hope" for the best. Maybe it's all about giving us a chance to do the right thing so when we don't ,we get a greater glimpse of His character as do all the celestial beings.("His intent was that now, through the church, the manifold wisdom of God should be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly realms." Eph. 3:10) It shows His grace, His mercy, His long-suffering and forbearance, His love, His kindness, and amazing wisdom and sovereignty that He can accomplish His plans no matter the obstacles.
Not only do we and all the celestial beings get a better glimpse of who God is but we as humans get a better glimpse of who we are. We are so sinful that even given every chance to succeed, we won't. As my reformed friends like to say, "What is the good of a 'whosoever will' when whosoever won't." The Bible continually show us that we need a savior and nothing reveals this more than Moses' farewell address in Deuteronomy.
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