1 Kings 22:43

“I made a covenant with my eyes, how then should I look lustfully at a young woman?

Then he answered and spoke to me, saying, “This is Yahweh’s word to Zerubbabel, saying, ‘Not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit,’ says Yahweh of Armies.

It is better to take refuge in Yahweh, than to put confidence in man.

You shall surely destroy all the places in which the nations that you shall dispossess served their gods: on the high mountains, and on the hills, and under every green tree.

Turn my eyes away from looking at worthless things. Revive me in your ways.

Don’t lust after her beauty in your heart, neither let her captivate you with her eyelids.

and when you turn to the right hand, and when you turn to the left, your ears will hear a voice behind you, saying, “This is the way. Walk in it.”

“Blessed is the man who trusts in Yahweh, and whose confidence is in Yahweh.

But the high places were not taken away. Nevertheless the heart of Asa was perfect with Yahweh all his days.

you who inflame yourselves among the oaks, under every green tree; who kill the children in the valleys, under the clefts of the rocks?

but I tell you that everyone who gazes at a woman to lust after her has committed adultery with her already in his heart.

“You shall not covet your neighbor’s house. You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, nor his male servant, nor his female servant, nor his ox, nor his donkey, nor anything that is your neighbor’s.”

You shall observe to do therefore as Yahweh your God has commanded you. You shall not turn away to the right hand or to the left.

and they set up for themselves pillars and Asherah poles on every high hill, and under every green tree;

Yes, may you see your children’s children. Peace be upon Israel.

who are crooked in their ways, and wayward in their paths,

You shall love Yahweh your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your might.

that his heart not be lifted up above his brothers, and that he not turn away from the commandment to the right hand, or to the left, to the end that he may prolong his days in his kingdom, he and his children, in the middle of Israel.

and shall not turn away from any of the words which I command you today, to the right hand or to the left, to go after other gods to serve them.

However the people sacrificed in the high places, because there was not yet a house built for Yahweh’s name.

As for you, if you will walk before me, as David your father walked, in integrity of heart, and in uprightness, to do according to all that I have commanded you, and will keep my statutes and my ordinances;

and tore the kingdom away from David’s house, and gave it you; and yet you have not been as my servant David, who kept my commandments, and who followed me with all his heart, to do that only which was right in my eyes,

He walked in all the sins of his father, which he had done before him; and his heart was not perfect with Yahweh his God, as the heart of David his father.

They brought out the pillars that were in the house of Baal, and burned them.

However the high places were not taken away. The people still sacrificed and burned incense in the high places.

However the high places were not taken away. The people still sacrificed and burned incense in the high places.

They abandoned all the commandments of Yahweh their God, and made molten images for themselves, even two calves, and made an Asherah, and worshiped all the army of the sky, and served Baal.

Then Solomon offered burnt offerings to Yahweh on Yahweh’s altar, which he had built before the porch,

When Judah looked back, behold, the battle was before and behind them; and they cried to Yahweh, and the priests sounded with the trumpets.

Thus the children of Israel were brought under at that time, and the children of Judah prevailed, because they relied on Yahweh, the God of their fathers.

Abijah pursued Jeroboam, and took cities from him, Bethel with its villages, Jeshanah with its villages, and Ephron with its villages.

He placed forces in all the fortified cities of Judah, and set garrisons in the land of Judah, and in the cities of Ephraim, which Asa his father had taken.

My foot has held fast to his steps. I have kept his way, and not turned away.

Oh love Yahweh, all you his saints! Yahweh preserves the faithful, and fully recompenses him who behaves arrogantly.

Help us, God of our salvation, for the glory of your name. Deliver us, and forgive our sins, for your name’s sake.

They don’t know the way of peace; and there is no justice in their ways. They have made crooked paths for themselves; whoever goes in them doesn’t know peace.

As many as walk by this rule, peace and mercy be on them, and on God’s Israel.

you shall not bow yourself down to them, nor serve them, for I, Yahweh your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children, on the third and on the fourth generation of those who hate me,

You shall most certainly not make gods of silver or gods of gold for yourselves to be alongside me.

He received what they handed him, fashioned it with an engraving tool, and made it a molded calf. Then they said, “These are your gods, Israel, which brought you up out of the land of Egypt.”

“You shall make no cast idols for yourselves.

For I command you today to love Yahweh your God, to walk in his ways and to keep his commandments, his statutes, and his ordinances, that you may live and multiply, and that Yahweh your God may bless you in the land where you go in to possess it.

Only be strong and very courageous. Be careful to observe to do according to all the law which Moses my servant commanded you. Don’t turn from it to the right hand or to the left, that you may have good success wherever you go.

“Let your heart therefore be perfect with Yahweh our God, to walk in his statutes, and to keep his commandments, as it is today.”

So the king took counsel, and made two calves of gold; and he said to them, “It is too much for you to go up to Jerusalem. Look and behold your gods, Israel, which brought you up out of the land of Egypt!”

The servants of the king of Syria said to him, “Their god is a god of the hills; therefore they were stronger than we. But let’s fight against them in the plain, and surely we will be stronger than they.

Asa did that which was good and right in Yahweh his God’s eyes;

However the high places were not taken away, and the people had still not set their hearts on the God of their fathers.

But if you will go, take action, and be strong for the battle. God will overthrow you before the enemy; for God has power to help, and to overthrow.”

Now when all this was finished, all Israel who were present went out to the cities of Judah, and broke the pillars in pieces, cut down the Asherah poles, and broke down the high places and the altars out of all Judah and Benjamin, also in Ephraim and Manasseh, until they had destroyed them all. Then all the children of Israel returned, every man to his possession, into their own cities.

Hasn’t the same Hezekiah taken away his high places and his altars, and commanded Judah and Jerusalem, saying, ‘You shall worship before one altar, and you shall burn incense on it?’

In the shelter of your presence you will hide them from the plotting of man. You will keep them secretly in a dwelling away from the strife of tongues.

Blessed is he whose disobedience is forgiven, whose sin is covered.

Oh taste and see that Yahweh is good. Blessed is the man who takes refuge in him.

Our heart has not turned back, neither have our steps strayed from your path,

The fear of Yahweh is to hate evil. I hate pride, arrogance, the evil way, and the perverse mouth.

On a high and lofty mountain you have set your bed. You also went up there to offer sacrifice.

I have seen your abominations, even your adulteries, and your neighing, the lewdness of your prostitution, on the hills in the field. Woe to you, Jerusalem! You will not be made clean. How long will it yet be?”

if they do that which is evil in my sight, that they not obey my voice, then I will repent of the good with which I said I would benefit them.

“Again, when a righteous man turns from his righteousness, and commits iniquity, and I lay a stumbling block before him, he will die. Because you have not given him warning, he will die in his sin, and his righteous deeds which he has done will not be remembered; but I will require his blood at your hand.

You will know that I am Yahweh, when their slain men are among their idols around their altars, on every high hill, on all the tops of the mountains, under every green tree, and under every thick oak, the places where they offered pleasant aroma to all their idols.

They called to them, so they went from them. They sacrificed to the Baals, and burned incense to engraved images.

When he had removed him, he raised up David to be their king, to whom he also testified, ‘I have found David the son of Jesse, a man after my heart, who will do all my will.’

Let love be without hypocrisy. Abhor that which is evil. Cling to that which is good.

But if anyone loves God, the same is known by him.

When Pharaoh came near, the children of Israel lifted up their eyes, and behold, the Egyptians were marching after them; and they were very afraid. The children of Israel cried out to Yahweh.

They shall no more sacrifice their sacrifices to the goat idols, after which they play the prostitute. This shall be a statute forever to them throughout their generations.’

to love Yahweh your God, to obey his voice, and to cling to him; for he is your life, and the length of your days, that you may dwell in the land which Yahweh swore to your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give them.

Solomon said, “You have shown to your servant David my father great loving kindness, because he walked before you in truth, in righteousness, and in uprightness of heart with you. You have kept for him this great loving kindness, that you have given him a son to sit on his throne, as it is today.

He sacrificed and burned incense in the high places, on the hills, and under every green tree.

Then he made an altar of bronze, twenty cubits long, twenty cubits wide, and ten cubits high.

His heart was lifted up in the ways of Yahweh. Furthermore, he took away the high places and the Asherah poles out of Judah.

Nevertheless there are good things found in you, in that you have put away the Asheroth out of the land, and have set your heart to seek God.”

They abandoned the house of Yahweh, the God of their fathers, and served the Asherah poles and the idols, so wrath came on Judah and Jerusalem for this their guiltiness.

For in the eighth year of his reign, while he was yet young, he began to seek after the God of David his father; and in the twelfth year he began to purge Judah and Jerusalem from the high places, the Asherah poles, the engraved images, and the molten images.

Arise, Yahweh! Don’t let man prevail. Let the nations be judged in your sight.

For I don’t know what I am doing. For I don’t practice what I desire to do; but what I hate, that I do.

They have turned away quickly out of the way which I commanded them. They have made themselves a molded calf, and have worshiped it, and have sacrificed to it, and said, ‘These are your gods, Israel, which brought you up out of the land of Egypt.’ ”

Solomon loved Yahweh, walking in the statutes of David his father; except that he sacrificed and burned incense in the high places.

For they also built for themselves high places, sacred pillars, and Asherah poles on every high hill and under every green tree.

because David did that which was right in Yahweh’s eyes, and didn’t turn away from anything that he commanded him all the days of his life, except only in the matter of Uriah the Hittite.

Asa did that which was right in Yahweh’s eyes, as David his father did.

However the high places were not taken away. The people still sacrificed and burned incense in the high places.

He removed the high places, and broke the pillars, and cut down the Asherah. He also broke in pieces the bronze serpent that Moses had made, because in those days the children of Israel burned incense to it; and he called it Nehushtan.

But if you tell me, ‘We trust in Yahweh our God;’ isn’t that he whose high places and whose altars Hezekiah has taken away, and has said to Judah and to Jerusalem, ‘You shall worship before this altar in Jerusalem?’

Asa cried to Yahweh his God, and said, “Yahweh, there is no one besides you to help, between the mighty and him who has no strength. Help us, Yahweh our God; for we rely on you, and in your name are we come against this multitude. Yahweh, you are our God. Don’t let man prevail against you.”

When Asa heard these words, and the prophecy of Oded the prophet, he took courage, and put away the abominations out of all the land of Judah and Benjamin, and out of the cities which he had taken from the hill country of Ephraim; and he renewed Yahweh’s altar that was before Yahweh’s porch.

But the high places were not taken away out of Israel; nevertheless the heart of Asa was perfect all his days.

A letter came to him from Elijah the prophet, saying, “Yahweh, the God of David your father, says, ‘Because you have not walked in the ways of Jehoshaphat your father, nor in the ways of Asa king of Judah,

Nevertheless the people sacrificed still in the high places, but only to Yahweh their God.

Blessed is the man who makes Yahweh his trust, and doesn’t respect the proud, nor such as turn away to lies.

I will set no vile thing before my eyes. I hate the deeds of faithless men. They will not cling to me.

But as for those who turn away to their crooked ways, Yahweh will lead them away with the workers of iniquity. Peace be on Israel.

Don’t turn to the right hand nor to the left. Remove your foot from evil.

your own iniquities, and the iniquities of your fathers together”, says Yahweh, “who have burned incense on the mountains, and blasphemed me on the hills. Therefore I will first measure their work into their bosom.”