Then Joab got up and came to Absalom’s house. He said to him, “Why did your servants set my portion of field on fire?”

In those days the Lord began to reduce the size of Israel’s territory. ¹  Hazael attacked their eastern border. ² 

Malkijah son of Harim and Hasshub son of Pahath-Moab worked on another section and the Tower of the Fire Pots.

After him Baruch son of Zabbai worked on another section, from the buttress to the door of the house of Eliashib the high priest.

Indeed, these are but the outer fringes of his ways! ¹  How faint is the whisper ²  we hear of him! But who can understand the thunder of his power?”

What they loved, ¹  as well as what they hated ²  and envied, ³  perished long ago, and they no longer have a part in anything that happens on earth. ⁴ 

They say, “Let’s attack Judah, terrorize it, and conquer it. ¹  Then we’ll set up the son of Tabeel as its king.” ² 

But you should go your way ¹  until the end. ²  You will rest and then at the end of the days you will arise to receive ³  what you have been allotted.” ⁴ 

They have committed treason ¹  against the Lord, because they bore illegitimate children. Soon ²  the new moon festival will devour them and their fields.

They said to him, “He will utterly destroy those evil men! Then he will lease the vineyard to other tenants who will give him his portion at the harvest.”

He ¹  kept back for himself part of the proceeds with his wife’s knowledge; he brought ²  only part of it and placed it at the apostles’ feet.

If the first portion ¹  of the dough offered is holy, then the whole batch is holy, and if the root is holy, so too are the branches. ² 

In Christ ¹  we too have been claimed as God’s own possession, ²  since we were predestined according to the one purpose of him who accomplishes all things according to the counsel of his will

For a tent was prepared, the outer one, ¹  which contained ²  the lampstand, the table, and the presentation of the loaves; this ³  is called the holy place.

The Holy Spirit is making clear that the way into the holy place had not yet appeared as long as the old tabernacle ¹  was standing.

This was a symbol for the time then present, when gifts and sacrifices were offered that could not perfect the conscience of the worshiper.

Joseph ¹  collected all the excess food ²  in the land of Egypt during the seven years and stored it in the cities. ³  In every city he put the food gathered from the fields around it.

When ¹  the Israelites saw it, they said to one another, ²  “What is it?” because they did not know what it was. ³  Moses said to them, “It is the bread ⁴  that the Lord has given you for food. ⁵ 

but the fire which is on the altar must be kept burning on it. ¹  It must not be extinguished. So the priest must kindle wood on it morning by morning, and he must arrange the burnt offering on it and offer the fat of the peace offering up in smoke on it.

for the breast of the wave offering and the thigh of the contribution offering I have taken from the Israelites out of their peace offering sacrifices and have given them to Aaron the priest and to his sons from the people of Israel as a perpetual allotted portion.’” ¹