Deuteronomy 30:19 I call heaven and earth to record this day against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing: therefore choose life, that both thou and thy seed may live:
- 20 That thou mayest love the LORD thy God, and that thou mayest obey his voice, and that thou mayest cleave unto him: for he is thy life, and the length of thy days: that thou mayest dwell in the land which the LORD sware unto thy fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give them.
Man was placed upon this earth and given the choice of serving Jehovah or rejecting him. Man was given the free choice, which resulted in choosing life or death. Man did not have a choice of being created so this was amended by giving him the choice of existing (life) or of not existing (death, which is explained in the next question). Man was given the whole earth and every living creature to be his dominion.
- Genesis 26 And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.
Man had a duty to look after all his dominion and to serve Jehovah only and not serve other gods. Whether pagan deities or lusts of the world, we are not to even consider them.
- Ecclesiastes 12:13 Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: Fear God, and keep his commandments: for this is the whole duty of man.
- 14 For God shall bring every work into judgment, with every secret thing, whether it be good, or whether it be evil.
- Deuteronomy 8:19 And it shall be, if thou do at all forget the LORD thy God, and walk after other gods, and serve them, and worship them, I testify against you this day that ye shall surely perish.
- 1 John 2:16 For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world.