But in the seventh year ¹  you must let it lie fallow and leave it alone so that the poor of your people may eat, and what they leave any animal in the field ²  may eat; you must do likewise with your vineyard and your olive grove.

Samuel said to all the people of Israel, “If you are really turning to the Lord with all your hearts, remove from among you the foreign gods and the images of Ashtoreth. ¹  Give your hearts to the Lord and serve only him. Then he will deliver you ²  from the hand of the Philistines.”

That’s not the way things are. There is a man from the hill country of Ephraim named Sheba son of Bicri. He has rebelled ¹  against King David. Give me just this one man, and I will leave the city.” The woman said to Joab, “This very minute ²  his head will be thrown over the wall to you!”

Then the king said to Queen Esther, “In Susa the citadel the Jews have killed and destroyed five hundred men and the ten sons of Haman! What then have they done in the rest of the king’s provinces? What is your request? It shall be given to you. What other petition do you have? It shall be done.”

Do any of the worthless idols ¹  of the nations cause rain to fall? Do the skies themselves send showers? Is it not you, O Lord our God, who does this? ²  So we put our hopes in you ³  because you alone do all this.”

They are to eat those things by which atonement was made ¹  to consecrate and to set them apart, but no one else ²  may eat them, for they are holy.

Because he has despised ¹  the word of the Lord and has broken ²  his commandment, that person ³  must be completely cut off. ⁴  His iniquity will be on him.’” ⁵ 

However, you did not approach the land of the Ammonites, the Wadi Jabbok, ¹  the cities of the hill country, or any place else forbidden by the Lord our God.

You must revere the Lord your God, serve him, and take oaths using only his name.

However, only to your ancestors did he ¹  show his loving favor, ²  and he chose you, their descendants, ³  from all peoples – as is apparent today.

a land the Lord your God looks after. ¹  He is constantly attentive to it ²  from the beginning to the end of the year. ³ 

No one will be able to resist you ¹  all the days of your life. As I was with Moses, so I will be with you. I will not abandon you or leave you alone.

The Reubenites and Gadites named the altar, “Surely it is a Reminder to us ¹  that the Lord is God.”

Now ¹  obey ²  the Lord and worship ³  him with integrity and loyalty. Put aside the gods your ancestors ⁴  worshiped ⁵  beyond the Euphrates ⁶  and in Egypt and worship ⁷  the Lord.

The Lord drove out from before us all the nations, including the Amorites who lived in the land. So we too will worship ¹  the Lord, for he is our God!”

He watches over ¹  his holy ones, ²  but the wicked are made speechless in the darkness, for it is not by one’s own strength that one prevails.

“God does not really live on the earth! ¹  Look, if the sky and the highest heaven cannot contain you, how much less this temple I have built!

Now the king of Syria had ordered his thirty-two chariot commanders, “Do not fight common soldiers or high-ranking officers; ¹  fight only the king of Israel.”

She went up and laid him down on the prophet’s ¹  bed. She shut the door behind her and left.

Instead you must worship the Lord, who brought you up from the land of Egypt by his great power and military ability; ¹  bow down to him and offer sacrifices to him.