While I am still alive, extend to me the loyalty of the Lord, or else I will die!

Now when Abiathar son of Ahimelech had fled to David at Keilah, he had brought with him an ephod.

David asked him, “Where are you coming from?” He replied, “I have escaped from the camp of Israel.”

He set up an altar for Baal in the temple of Baal he had built in Samaria.

Joash passed away and Jeroboam succeeded him on the throne. Joash was buried in Samaria with the kings of Israel.

That day David first gave to Asaph and his colleagues this song of thanks to the Lord:

Rehoboam appointed Abijah son of Maacah as the leader over his brothers, for he intended to name him his successor.

Wherever you hear the sound of the trumpet, gather there with us. Our God will fight for us!”

So the wall was completed on the twenty-fifth day of Elul, in just fifty-two days.

“You saw the affliction of our ancestors in Egypt, and you heard their cry at the Red Sea.

“Call now! Is there anyone who will answer you? To which of the holy ones will you turn?

He catches the wise in their own craftiness, and the counsel of the cunning is brought to a quick end.

You will also know that your children will be numerous, and your descendants like the grass of the earth.

What is man that he should be pure, or one born of woman, that he should be righteous?

“But turn, all of you, and come now! I will not find a wise man among you.

My bones stick to my skin and my flesh; I have escaped alive with only the skin of my teeth.

If you say, ‘How we will pursue him, since the root of the trouble is found in him!’

His bones were full of his youthful vigor, but that vigor will lie down with him in the dust.

Their houses are safe and without fear; and no rod of punishment from God is upon them.

How then can a human being be righteous before God? How can one born of a woman be pure?