They consult their wooden idols, and their diviner’s staff answers with an oracle. The wind of prostitution blows them astray; they commit spiritual adultery ¹  against their God.

Sow righteousness for yourselves, reap unfailing love. Break up the unplowed ground for yourselves, for it is time to seek the Lord, until he comes and showers deliverance ¹  on you.

Seek the Lord so you can live! Otherwise he will break out ¹  like fire against Joseph’s ²  family; ³  the fire ⁴  will consume and no one will be able to quench it and save Bethel. ⁵ 

The inhabitants of one will go to another and say, “Let’s go up at once to ask the favor of the Lord, to seek the Lord who rules over all. Indeed, I’ll go with you.”’

Then ¹  they watched him carefully and sent spies who pretended to be sincere. ²  They wanted to take advantage of what he might say ³  so that they could deliver him up to the authority and jurisdiction ⁴  of the governor.

Now at that very moment his disciples came back. ¹  They were shocked ²  because he was speaking ³  with a woman. However, no one said, “What do you want?” ⁴  or “Why are you speaking with her?”

He said, “What pledge should I give you?” She replied, “Your seal, your cord, and the staff that’s in your hand.” So he gave them to her and had sex with her. ¹  She became pregnant by him.

Indeed, ask about the distant past, starting from the day God created humankind ¹  on the earth, and ask ²  from one end of heaven to the other, whether there has ever been such a great thing as this, or even a rumor of it.

They inquired, “What is the guilt offering that we should send to him?” They replied, “The Philistine leaders number five. So send five gold sores and five gold mice, for it is the same plague that has afflicted both you and your leaders.

Now seek the Lord your God wholeheartedly and with your entire being! ¹  Get up and build the sanctuary of the Lord God! Then you can bring ²  the ark of the Lord’s covenant and the holy items dedicated to God’s service ³  into the temple that is built to honor the Lord.” ⁴ 

He met ¹  Asa and told him, “Listen to me, Asa and all Judah and Benjamin! The Lord is with you when you are loyal to him. ²  If you seek him, he will respond to you, ³  but if you reject him, he will reject you.

They seek me day after day; they want to know my requirements, ¹  like a nation that does what is right and does not reject the law of their God. They ask me for just decrees; they want to be near God.

“When you tell these people about all this, ¹  they will undoubtedly ask you, ‘Why has the Lord threatened us with such great disaster? What wrong have we done? What sin have we done to offend the Lord our God?’

Therefore speak to them and say to them, ‘This is what the sovereign Lord says: When any one from the house of Israel erects his idols in his heart and sets the obstacle leading to his iniquity before his face, and then consults a prophet, I the Lord am determined to answer him personally according to the enormity of his idolatry. ¹ 

Then she will pursue her lovers, but she will not catch ¹  them; she will seek them, but she will not find them. ²  Then she will say, “I will go back ³  to my husband, ⁴  because I was better off then than I am now.” ⁵ 

“And you, Solomon my son, obey ¹  the God of your father and serve him with a submissive attitude and a willing spirit, ²  for the Lord examines all minds and understands every motive of one’s thoughts. If you seek him, he will let you find him, ³  but if you abandon him, he will reject you permanently.