1. If you do not obey the Lord (15)

God earnestly wanted to bless his people and promised blessings beyond their imagination, when they carefully followed all his commands. But what if they did not? God gave Israel a second detailed list to read in the promised land-a list of all the curses that would fall on the people if they broke their promise to God to keep his commands. We are often tempted to tell ourselves that sinful behaviors do not have serious consequences. But in fact they bring deadly curses on life.

2. These curses will overtake you (16-35)

The curses here include every kind of unfruitfulness, failure, poverty, disease, and defeat. Every aspect of life that is blessed through keeping God's commands can also become cursed through breaking them. It is not pleasant to think about. But these curses are nothing more than an expression of the principle "The wages of sin is death" (Ro 6:23). Thankfully, we also know that, in spite of our sins, "the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord."