Now therefore fear the Lord
Since he has done such great and good things, fear the Lord and
his goodness, fear him for his goodness sake; nothing so
influences fear, or a reverential affection for God, as a sense
of his goodness; this engages men sensible of it to fear the
Lord, that is, to worship him both internally and externally in
the exercise of every grace, and in the performance of every
duty:
and serve him in sincerity and in truth:
in the uprightness of their souls, without hypocrisy and deceit,
and according to the truth of his word, and of his mind and will
revealed in it, without any mixture of superstition and will
worship, or of the commands and inventions of men:
and put away the gods which your fathers served on the
other side of
the flood, and in Egypt;
that is, express an abhorrence of them, and keep at a distance
from them, and show that you are far from giving in to such
idolatries your ancestors were guilty of, when they lived on the
other side Euphrates, in Chaldea, or when they were sojourners in
Egypt; for it cannot be thought that the Israelites were at this
time guilty of such gross idolatry, at least openly, since Joshua
had bore such a testimony of them, that they had cleaved to the
Lord unto that day, ( Joshua 23:8 ) ; and
their zeal against the two tribes and a half, on suspicion of
idolatry, or of going into it, is a proof of it also:
and serve ye the Lord:
and him only.