and the Lord will fulfill his promise to me, ¹  ‘If your descendants watch their step ²  and live faithfully in my presence ³  with all their heart and being, ⁴  then,’ he promised, ⁵  ‘you will not fail to have a successor on the throne of Israel.’ ⁶ 

David said to his son Solomon: “Be strong and brave! Do it! Don’t be afraid and don’t panic! ¹  For the Lord God, my God, is with you. He will not leave you or abandon you before all the work for the service of the Lord’s temple is finished.

“If a man opens a pit or if a man digs a pit and does not cover it, and an ox or a donkey falls into it,

Judah also failed to keep the commandments of the Lord their God; they followed Israel’s example. ¹ 

However, the high places were not eliminated; the people were still not devoted to the God of their ancestors. ¹ 

Exercise appropriate caution so that there is no negligence in this matter. Why should danger increase to the point that kings sustain damage?”

But the one who does not find me ¹  brings harm ²  to himself; ³  all who hate me ⁴  love death.”

The new wine dries up, the vines shrivel up, all those who like to celebrate ¹  groan.

For I, the Lord, promise: “David will never lack a successor to occupy ¹  the throne over the nation of Israel. ² 

So whoever knows what is good to do ¹  and does not do it is guilty of sin. ² 

Your sons and daughters will be given to another people while you look on in vain all day, and you will be powerless to do anything about it. ¹ 

Joshua continued, ¹  “This is how you will know the living God is among you and that he will truly drive out before you the Canaanites, Hittites, Hivites, Perizzites, Girgashites, Amorites, and Jebusites.

May his blood whirl over ¹  the head of Joab and the entire house of his father! ²  May the males of Joab’s house ³  never cease to have ⁴  someone with a running sore or a skin disease or one who works at the spindle ⁵  or one who falls by the sword or one who lacks food!”

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Brotherly love must continue.

When Ish-bosheth ¹  the son of Saul heard that Abner had died in Hebron, he was very disheartened, ²  and all Israel was afraid.

For this is what the Lord God of Israel says, ‘The jar of flour will not be empty and the jug of oil will not run out until the day the Lord makes it rain on the surface of the ground.’”

The jar of flour was never empty and the jug of oil never ran out, just as the Lord had promised ¹  through Elijah.

When the king of Moab realized he was losing the battle, ¹  he and 700 swordsmen tried to break through and attack ²  the king of Edom, but they failed.

Everyone who did not come within three days would thereby forfeit all his property, in keeping with the counsel of the officials and the elders. Furthermore, he himself would be excluded from the assembly of the exiles.