Then all the men of Judah and Jerusalem returned joyfully to Jerusalem with Jehoshaphat leading them; the Lord had given them reason to rejoice over their enemies.

The messengers journeyed from city to city through the land of Ephraim and Manasseh as far as Zebulun, but people mocked and ridiculed them.

The king of Israel answered Jehoshaphat, “There is still one man through whom we can seek the Lord’s will. But I despise him because he does not prophesy prosperity for me, but always disaster. His name is Micaiah son of Imlah. Jehoshaphat said, “The king should not say such things!”

Look how they are repaying us! They come to drive us out of our allotted land which you assigned to us!

But the Lord was unwilling to destroy David’s dynasty because of the promise he had made to give David a perpetual dynasty.

Solomon had made a bronze platform and had placed it in the middle of the enclosure. It was seven and one-half feet long, seven and one-half feet wide, and four and one-half feet high. He stood on it and then got down on his knees in front of the entire assembly of Israel. He spread out his hands toward the sky,

God brought about Ahaziah’s downfall through his visit to Joram. When Ahaziah arrived, he went out with Joram to meet Jehu son of Nimshi, whom the Lord had commissioned to wipe out Ahab’s family.

God’s Spirit energized Zechariah son of Jehoiada the priest. He stood up before the people and said to them, “This is what God says: ‘Why are you violating the commands of the Lord? You will not be prosperous! Because you have rejected the Lord, he has rejected you!’”

But a prophet visited him and said: “O king, the Israelite troops must not go with you, for the Lord is not with Israel or any of the Ephraimites.

Who among all the gods of these nations whom my predecessors annihilated was able to rescue his people from my power?

King Huram of Tyre sent this letter to Solomon: “Because the Lord loves his people, he has made you their king.”

Lawless good-for-nothing men gathered around him and conspired against Rehoboam son of Solomon, when Rehoboam was an inexperienced young man and could not resist them.

Ahaziah was twenty-two years old when he became king and he reigned for one year in Jerusalem. His mother was Athaliah, the granddaughter of Omri.

He was buried in the City of David with the kings, because he had accomplished good in Israel and for God and his temple.

They commanded an army of 307,500 skilled and able warriors who were ready to defend the king against his enemies.

Now I intend to make a covenant with the Lord God of Israel, so that he may relent from his raging anger.

Josiah observed a Passover festival for the Lord in Jerusalem. They slaughtered the Passover lambs on the fourteenth day of the first month.

The Lord God of their ancestors continually warned them through his messengers, for he felt compassion for his people and his dwelling place.

He ordered the altars of the Baals to be torn down, and broke the incense altars that were above them. He smashed the Asherah poles, idols and images, crushed them up and sprinkled the dust over the tombs of those who had sacrificed to them.

The priests then entered the Lord’s temple to purify it; they brought out to the courtyard of the Lord’s temple every ceremonially unclean thing they discovered inside. The Levites took them out to the Kidron Valley.