When the man got ready to leave ¹  with his concubine and his servant, ²  his father-in-law, the girl’s father, said to him, “Look! The day is almost over! ³  Stay another night! Since the day is over, ⁴  stay another night here and have a good time. You can get up early tomorrow and start your trip home.” ⁵ 

They were having a good time, ¹  when suddenly ²  some men of the city, some good-for-nothings, ³  surrounded the house and kept beating ⁴  on the door. They said to the old man who owned the house, “Send out the man who came to visit you so we can have sex with him.” ⁵ 

During the time of the judges ¹  there was a famine in the land of Judah. ²  So a man from Bethlehem ³  in Judah went to live as a resident foreigner ⁴  in the region of Moab, along with his wife and two sons. ⁵ 

surely you would not want to wait until they were old enough to marry! ¹  Surely you would not remain unmarried all that time! ²  No, ³  my daughters, you must not return with me. ⁴  For my intense suffering ⁵  is too much for you to bear. ⁶  For the Lord is afflicting me!” ⁷ 

The Levites took down the ark of the Lord and the chest that was with it, which contained the gold objects. They placed them near the big stone. At that time the people of Beth Shemesh offered burnt offerings and made sacrifices to the Lord.

When you enter the town, you can find him before he goes up to the high place to eat. The people won’t eat until he arrives, for he must bless the sacrifice. Once that happens, those who have been invited will eat. Now go on up, for ¹  this is the time when you can find him!”

“At this time tomorrow I will send to you a man from the land of Benjamin. You must consecrate ¹  him as a leader over my people Israel. He will save my people from the hand of the Philistines. For I have looked with favor on my people. Their cry has reached me!”

Is this not the time of the wheat harvest? I will call on the Lord so that he makes it thunder and rain. Realize and see what a great sin you have committed before the Lord by asking for a king for yourselves.”

Saul said, “I will give her to him so that she may become a snare to him and the hand of the Philistines may be against him.” So Saul said to David, “Today is the second time for you to become my son-in-law.” ¹ 

Jonathan said to David, “The Lord God of Israel is my witness. ¹  I will feel out my father about this time the day after tomorrow. If he is favorably inclined toward David, will I not then send word to you and let you know? ² 

Neither man nor woman would David leave alive so as to bring them back to Gath. He was thinking, “This way they can’t tell on us, saying, ‘This is what David did.’” Such was his practice the entire time ¹  that he lived in the country of the Philistines.

So Achish summoned David and said to him, “As surely as the Lord lives, you are an honest man, and I am glad to have you ¹  serving ²  with me in the army. ³  I have found no fault with you from the day that you first came to me until the present time. But in the opinion ⁴  of the leaders, you are not reliable. ⁵ 

But David said to Achish, “What have I done? What have you found in your servant from the day that I first came into your presence until the present time, that I shouldn’t go and fight the enemies of my lord the king?”

So Joab sent to Tekoa and brought from there a wise woman. He told her, “Pretend to be in mourning ¹  and put on garments for mourning. Don’t anoint yourself with oil. Instead, act like a woman who has been mourning for the dead for some time. ² 

So get up now and go out and give some encouragement to ¹  your servants. For I swear by the Lord that if you don’t go out there, not a single man will stay here with you tonight! This disaster will be worse for you than any disaster that has overtaken you from your youth right to the present time!”

He turned them over to the Gibeonites, and they executed them on a hill before the Lord. The seven of them ¹  died ²  together; they were put to death during harvest time – during the first days of the beginning ³  of the barley harvest.

“The time will come when ¹  the skies are shut up tightly and no rain falls because your people ²  sinned against you. When they direct their prayers toward this place, renew their allegiance to you, ³  and turn away from their sin because you punish ⁴  them,

“The time will come when the land suffers from a famine, a plague, blight and disease, or a locust ¹  invasion, or when their enemy lays siege to the cities of the land, ²  or when some other type of plague or epidemic occurs.

“The time will come when your people ¹  will sin against you (for there is no one who is sinless!) and you will be angry with them and deliver them over to their enemies, who will take them as prisoners to their own land, ²  whether far away or close by.

At that time Solomon and all Israel with him celebrated a festival before the Lord our God for two entire weeks. This great assembly included people from all over the land, from Lebo Hamath in the north to the Brook of Egypt ¹  in the south. ²