From the other side of the Jordan, from Reuben, Gad, and the half tribe of Manasseh, there were 120,000 men armed with all kinds of weapons.

When David had settled into his palace, ¹  he ²  said to Nathan the prophet, “Look, I am living in a palace ³  made from cedar, while the ark of the Lord’s covenant is under a tent.” ⁴ 

You must serve me as your father David did. Do everything I commanded and obey my rules and regulations. ¹ 

In Jerusalem Jehoshaphat appointed some Levites, priests, and Israelite family leaders to judge on behalf of the Lord ¹  and to settle disputes among the residents of Jerusalem. ² 

Our God, you drove out ¹  the inhabitants of this land before your people Israel and gave it as a permanent possession ²  to the descendants of your friend ³  Abraham.

He did what the Lord approved, just as his father Uzziah had done. ¹  (He did not, however, have the audacity to enter the temple.) ²  Yet the people were still sinning.

For our fathers were unfaithful; they did what is evil in the sight of ¹  the Lord our God and abandoned him! They turned ²  away from the Lord’s dwelling place and rejected him. ³ 

But then Hezekiah and the residents of Jerusalem humbled themselves and abandoned their pride, and the Lord was not angry with them for the rest of Hezekiah’s reign. ¹ 

He did evil in the sight of ¹  the Lord, just like his father Manasseh had done. He offered sacrifices to all the idols his father Manasseh had made, and worshiped ²  them.

The king sent the following response: “To Rehum the commander, Shimshai the scribe, and the rest of their colleagues who live in Samaria and other parts of Trans-Euphrates: Greetings! ¹ 

Now there happened to be a Jewish man in Susa the citadel whose name was Mordecai. ¹  He was the son of Jair, the son of Shimei, the son of Kish, a Benjaminite,

Look, you make my days short-lived, ¹  and my life span is nothing from your perspective. ²  Surely all people, even those who seem secure, are nothing but vapor. ³ 

Remember your people ¹  whom you acquired in ancient times, whom you rescued ²  so they could be your very own nation, ³  as well as Mount Zion, where you dwell!

Your eyes saw me when I was inside the womb. ¹  All the days ordained for me were recorded in your scroll before one of them came into existence. ² 

I purchased male and female slaves, and I owned slaves who were born in my house; ¹  I also possessed more livestock – both herds and flocks – than any of my predecessors in Jerusalem. ² 

Were the nations whom my predecessors ¹  destroyed – the nations of Gozan, Haran, Rezeph, and the people of Eden in Telassar – rescued by their gods? ² 

who fulfills the oracles of his prophetic servants ¹  and brings to pass the announcements ²  of his messengers, who says about Jerusalem, ³  ‘She will be inhabited,’ and about the towns of Judah, ‘They will be rebuilt, her ruins I will raise up,’

“I, I am the one who consoles you. ¹  Why are you afraid of mortal men, of mere human beings who are as short-lived as grass? ² 

You also have done all these things, says the Lord, and I have spoken to you over and over again. ¹  But you have not listened! You have refused to respond when I called you to repent! ² 

The Lord says, “I have rejected them because ¹  the people of Judah have done what I consider evil. ²  They have set up their disgusting idols in the temple ³  which I have claimed for my own ⁴  and have defiled it.