Chosen People

Even before the conquest, God had given specific instructions what to do with the people the Israelites conquered in the specified cities. For the cities of Hittites, Girgashites, Amorites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites and the Jebusites. The instructions include utter destruction, make no covenant (eg peace treaty), show no mercy, no intermarriage and destroy everything connected to their idol worshipping. One of the reasons for this is so that the Israelites will not fall under the influence of the pagan practice and idol worship.

God also made it clear that He chose Israel, not because of them but because of the promise He made to their forefathers Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Here God's character as a faithful and promise keeping God is revealed. In return for obedience and faith, God will bless and multiply the Israelites.

The blessings include fertility, good production from their land and livestock, health and freedom from sickness and disease, blessed above all other people. On the other hand the detail warnings were given not to associate in any way with the pagan practices and the religions of the other land. Any images, idols, statues associated with other religion is an abomination to God.



Deuteronomy 7

A Chosen People

 1 “When the LORD your God brings you into the land which you go to possess, and has cast out many nations before you, the Hittites and the Girgashites and the Amorites and the Canaanites and the Perizzites and the Hivites and the Jebusites, seven nations greater and mightier than you, 2 and when the LORD your God delivers them over to you, you shall conquer them and utterly destroy them. You shall make no covenant with them nor show mercy to them. 3 Nor shall you make marriages with them. You shall not give your daughter to their son, nor take their daughter for your son. 4 For they will turn your sons away from following Me, to serve other gods; so the anger of the LORD will be aroused against you and destroy you suddenly. 5 But thus you shall deal with them: you shall destroy their altars, and break down their sacred pillars, and cut down their wooden images,[a] and burn their carved images with fire.
6 “For you are a holy people to the LORD your God; the LORD your God has chosen you to be a people for Himself, a special treasure above all the peoples on the face of the earth. 7 The LORD did not set His love on you nor choose you because you were more in number than any other people, for you were the least of all peoples; 8 but because the LORD loves you, and because He would keep the oath which He swore to your fathers, the LORD has brought you out with a mighty hand, and redeemed you from the house of bondage, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt.
9 “Therefore know that the LORD your God, He is God, the faithful God who keeps covenant and mercy for a thousand generations with those who love Him and keep His commandments; 10 and He repays those who hate Him to their face, to destroy them. He will not be slack with him who hates Him; He will repay him to his face. 11 Therefore you shall keep the commandment, the statutes, and the judgments which I command you today, to observe them.


Blessings of Obedience
  
12 “Then it shall come to pass, because you listen to these judgments, and keep and do them, that the LORD your God will keep with you the covenant and the mercy which He swore to your fathers. 13 And He will love you and bless you and multiply you; He will also bless the fruit of your womb and the fruit of your land, your grain and your new wine and your oil, the increase of your cattle and the offspring of your flock, in the land of which He swore to your fathers to give you. 14 You shall be blessed above all peoples; there shall not be a male or female barren among you or among your livestock. 15 And the LORD will take away from you all sickness, and will afflict you with none of the terrible diseases of Egypt which you have known, but will lay them on all those who hate you. 16 Also you shall destroy all the peoples whom the LORD your God delivers over to you; your eye shall have no pity on them; nor shall you serve their gods, for that will be a snare to you.