You will have to work hard and sweat to make the soil produce anything, until you go back to the soil from which you were formed. You were made from soil, and you will become soil again."

"The LORD will bless you with many children, with abundant crops, and with many cattle and sheep.

The LORD will give you many children, many cattle, and abundant crops in the land that he promised your ancestors to give you.

You will plant vineyards and take care of them, but you will not gather their grapes or drink wine from them, because worms will eat the vines.

They will eat your livestock and your crops, and you will starve to death. They will not leave you any grain, wine, olive oil, cattle, or sheep; and you will die.

Whenever the Israelites would plant their crops, the Midianites would come with the Amalekites and the desert tribes and attack them.

They would come with their livestock and tents, as thick as locusts. They and their camels were too many to count. They came and devastated the land,

Here is what I have found out: the best thing we can do is eat and drink and enjoy what we have worked for during the short life that God has given us; this is our fate.

If God gives us wealth and property and lets us enjoy them, we should be grateful and enjoy what we have worked for. It is a gift from God.

The LORD has made a solemn promise, And by his power he will carry it out: "Your grain will no longer be food for your enemies, And foreigners will no longer drink your wine.

And so I tell you that those who worship and obey me will have plenty to eat and drink, but you will be hungry and thirsty. They will be happy, but you will be disgraced.

People will build houses and get to live in them---they will not be used by someone else. They will plant vineyards and enjoy the wine---it will not be drunk by others. Like trees, my people will live long lives. They will fully enjoy the things that they have worked for.

The work they do will be successful, and their children will not meet with disaster. I will bless them and their descendants for all time to come.

A sinner may commit a hundred crimes and still live. Oh yes, I know what they say: "If you obey God, everything will be all right,

The righteous will be happy, and things will go well for them. They will get to enjoy what they have worked for.

Does it make you a better king if you build houses of cedar, finer than those of others? Your father enjoyed a full life. He was always just and fair, and he prospered in everything he did.

So then, my dear friends, stand firm and steady. Keep busy always in your work for the Lord, since you know that nothing you do in the Lord's service is ever useless.

"so that all may go well with you, and you may live a long time in the land."