(Cf. Numbers 18:20-24.)
Moses here sums up the general result of his intercession. As at the first, he was on the mount the second time forty days and forty nights; and in response to his pleading, the Lord willed not to destroy Israel, and commanded him to resume his place as leader of the people, and conduct them to the Promised Land "This commandment and promise was a testimony that God now was reconciled unto them by the intercession of Moses" (Ainsworth).
God had showed great favor to Israel; what return did he require? Only what, without any prescription, they were bound to render—fear, love, and obedience (comp. Micah 6:8). To fear the Lord thy God (cf. Deuteronomy 6:2, Deuteronomy 6:13). To walk in all his ways; to receive his truth, accept his law, and follow the course of conduct which he prescribes (cf. Genesis 18:19; Psalms 25:4, Psalms 25:5; Psalms 67:2; Acts 18:25, Acts 18:26). To love him (cf. Exodus 20:6). "Fear with love! Love without fear relaxes; fear without love enslaves, and leads to despair" (J. Gerhard). There is a fear with which love cannot coexist—a fear which hath torment, and which love casts out as its antagonist (1 John 4:18); but the fear of God which he requires is that pious reverence which not only can coexist with love to him, but is not where love is not. And to serve the Lord thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul. Love prompts to service. Wherever love fills the heart, it seeks expression in acts of service to its object; and where no such expression comes forth, the evidence is wanting of the existence of the emotion in the bosom (cf. John 14:15, John 14:23; Galatians 5:13; 1 John 3:18). For thy good (cf. Deuteronomy 5:29; Deuteronomy 6:24). "In serving the Lord the glory redoundeth unto him, the benefit to ourselves; for them that honor him he will honor (1 Samuel 2:30), and 'godliness hath the promise of the life that now is, and of that which is to come' (1 Timothy 4:8)" (Ainsworth).
To love and serve the Lord, Israel was specially bound, because of God's love to them and choice of them to be his people. He, the Lord and Proprietor of the universe, was free to choose any of the nations he pleased, and needed not the service of any, but of his free grace he chose Israel, in whose fathers he had delight, to love them (cf. Exodus 19:5). The heaven and the heaven of heavens; the highest heavens, all that may be called heaven, with all that it contains. Delight ("set his eve upon," Deuteronomy 7:7); literally, cleaved to, was attached to. "Affection, love, choice, the three moments prompting from the innermost impulses to the historical act" (Lange).