2 Kings 16:11

But even as we have been approved by God to be entrusted with the Good News, so we speak: not as pleasing men, but God, who tests our hearts.

But Peter and the apostles answered, “We must obey God rather than men.

Therefore my people go into captivity for lack of knowledge. Their honorable men are famished, and their multitudes are parched with thirst.

You adulterers and adulteresses, don’t you know that friendship with the world is hostility toward God? Whoever therefore wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God.

not in the way of service only when eyes are on you, as men pleasers, but as servants of Christ, doing the will of God from the heart,

but he is a Jew who is one inwardly, and circumcision is that of the heart, in the spirit not in the letter; whose praise is not from men, but from God.

Give diligence to present yourself approved by God, a workman who doesn’t need to be ashamed, properly handling the Word of Truth.

You are to make a distinction between the holy and the common, and between the unclean and the clean.

It isn’t good to have zeal without knowledge, nor being hasty with one’s feet and missing the way.

“For my people are foolish. They don’t know me. They are foolish children, and they have no understanding. They are skillful in doing evil, but they don’t know how to do good.”

“No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other; or else he will be devoted to one and despise the other. You can’t serve both God and Mammon.

They sent their disciples to him, along with the Herodians, saying, “Teacher, we know that you are honest, and teach the way of God in truth, no matter whom you teach, for you aren’t partial to anyone.

Don’t love the world or the things that are in the world. If anyone loves the world, the Father’s love isn’t in him.

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

Now for a long time Israel was without the true God, without a teaching priest, and without law.

The lips of the righteous feed many, but the foolish die for lack of understanding.

The ox knows his owner, and the donkey his master’s crib; but Israel doesn’t know. My people don’t consider.”

For you have forgotten the God of your salvation, and have not remembered the rock of your strength. Therefore you plant pleasant plants, and set out foreign seedlings.

“For from their least even to their greatest, everyone is given to covetousness. From the prophet even to the priest, everyone deals falsely.

He measured it on the four sides. It had a wall around it, the length five hundred, and the width five hundred, to make a separation between that which was holy and that which was common.

For Israel has forgotten his Maker and built palaces; and Judah has multiplied fortified cities; but I will send a fire on his cities, and it will devour its fortresses.”

Her prophets are arrogant and treacherous people. Her priests have profaned the sanctuary. They have done violence to the law.

Servants, obey in all things those who are your masters according to the flesh, not just when they are looking, as men pleasers, but in singleness of heart, fearing God.

“You shall set the altar of burnt offering before the door of the tabernacle of the Tent of Meeting.

He set the altar of burnt offering at the door of the tabernacle of the Tent of Meeting, and offered on it the burnt offering and the meal offering, as Yahweh commanded Moses.

A nation which you don’t know will eat the fruit of your ground and all of your work. You will only be oppressed and crushed always,

Samuel said to Saul, “I will not return with you; for you have rejected Yahweh’s word, and Yahweh has rejected you from being king over Israel.”

Jehu said, “Sanctify a solemn assembly for Baal!” So they proclaimed it.

The ropes of the wicked bind me, but I won’t forget your law.

My zeal wears me out, because my enemies ignore your words.

I have gone astray like a lost sheep. Seek your servant, for I don’t forget your commandments.

The priests didn’t say, ‘Where is Yahweh?’ and those who handle the law didn’t know me. The rulers also transgressed against me, and the prophets prophesied by Baal and followed things that do not profit.

Then I said, “Surely these are poor. They are foolish; for they don’t know the Yahweh’s way, nor the law of their God.

Therefore Yahweh says, “If you return, then I will bring you again, that you may stand before me; and if you take out the precious from the vile, you will be as my mouth. They will return to you, but you will not return to them.

You have despised my holy things, and have profaned my Sabbaths.

“ ‘ “But the Levites who went far from me, when Israel went astray, who went astray from me after their idols, they will bear their iniquity.

They shall teach my people the difference between the holy and the common, and cause them to discern between the unclean and the clean.

Hear Yahweh’s word, you children of Israel; for Yahweh has a charge against the inhabitants of the land: “Indeed there is no truth, nor goodness, nor knowledge of God in the land.

According to their pasture, so were they filled; they were filled, and their heart was exalted. Therefore they have forgotten me.

For the statutes of Omri are kept, and all the works of Ahab’s house. You walk in their counsels, that I may make you a ruin, and her inhabitants a hissing; And you will bear the reproach of my people.”

But you have turned away from the path. You have caused many to stumble in the law. You have corrupted the covenant of Levi,” says Yahweh of Armies.

Leave them alone. They are blind guides of the blind. If the blind guide the blind, both will fall into a pit.”

If anyone serves me, let him follow me. Where I am, there my servant will also be. If anyone serves me, the Father will honor him.

“Speak to the children of Israel, and tell them, ‘The set feasts of Yahweh, which you shall proclaim to be holy convocations, even these are my set feasts.

Now the sons of Eli were wicked men. They didn’t know Yahweh.

Now Eli was very old; and he heard all that his sons did to all Israel, and how that they slept with the women who served at the door of the Tent of Meeting.

King Ahaz went to Damascus to meet Tiglath Pileser king of Assyria, and saw the altar that was at Damascus; and king Ahaz sent to Urijah the priest a drawing of the altar and plans to build it.

You, Solomon my son, know the God of your father, and serve him with a perfect heart and with a willing mind; for Yahweh searches all hearts, and understands all the imaginations of the thoughts. If you seek him, he will be found by you; but if you forsake him, he will cast you off forever.

As for my people, children are their oppressors, and women rule over them. My people, those who lead you cause you to err, and destroy the way of your paths.

When its boughs are withered, they will be broken off. The women will come and set them on fire, for they are a people of no understanding. Therefore he who made them will not have compassion on them, and he who formed them will show them no favor.

They also reel with wine, and stagger with strong drink. The priest and the prophet reel with strong drink. They are swallowed up by wine. They stagger with strong drink. They err in vision. They stumble in judgment.

‘Hear this now, foolish people without understanding, who have eyes, and don’t see, who have ears, and don’t hear:

“For the children of Judah have done that which is evil in my sight,” says Yahweh. “They have set their abominations in the house which is called by my name, to defile it.

Therefore I will give their wives to others and their fields to those who will possess them. For everyone from the least even to the greatest is given to covetousness; from the prophet even to the priest everyone deals falsely.

But they set their abominations in the house which is called by my name, to defile it.

He brought me into the inner court of Yahweh’s house; and I saw at the door of Yahweh’s temple, between the porch and the altar, there were about twenty-five men, with their backs toward Yahweh’s temple, and their faces toward the east. They were worshiping the sun toward the east.

You have profaned me among my people for handfuls of barley and for pieces of bread, to kill the souls who should not die, and to save the souls alive who should not live, by your lying to my people who listen to lies.’

For when they had slain their children to their idols, then they came the same day into my sanctuary to profane it; and behold, they have done this in the middle of my house.

“ ‘ “In a controversy they shall stand to judge. They shall judge it according to my ordinances. They shall keep my laws and my statutes in all my appointed feasts. They shall make my Sabbaths holy.

Then Nebuchadnezzar came near to the mouth of the burning fiery furnace. He spoke and said, “Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, you servants of the Most High God, come out, and come here!” Then Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego came out of the middle of the fire.

I will visit on her the days of the Baals, to which she burned incense, when she decked herself with her earrings and her jewels, and went after her lovers, and forgot me,” says Yahweh.

My people consult with their wooden idol, and answer to a stick of wood. Indeed the spirit of prostitution has led them astray, and they have been unfaithful to their God.

For I desire mercy, and not sacrifice; and the knowledge of God more than burnt offerings.

“Put the trumpet to your lips! Something like an eagle is over Yahweh’s house, because they have broken my covenant, and rebelled against my law.

I wrote for him the many things of my law; but they were regarded as a strange thing.

“A son honors his father, and a servant his master. If I am a father, then where is my honor? And if I am a master, where is the respect due me? Says Yahweh of Armies to you, priests, who despise my name. You say, ‘How have we despised your name?’

Jesse became the father of King David. David became the father of Solomon by her who had been Uriah’s wife.

‘These people draw near to me with their mouth, and honor me with their lips; but their heart is far from me.

nor seeking glory from men (neither from you nor from others), when we might have claimed authority as apostles of Christ.

When Aaron saw this, he built an altar before it; and Aaron made a proclamation, and said, “Tomorrow shall be a feast to Yahweh.”

The priests shall not profane the holy things of the children of Israel, which they offer to Yahweh,

For they are a nation void of counsel. There is no understanding in them.

They shall teach Jacob your ordinances, and Israel your law. They shall put incense before you, and whole burnt offering on your altar.

The bronze altar, which was before Yahweh, he brought from the front of the house, from between his altar and Yahweh’s house, and put it on the north side of his altar.

King Ahaz commanded Urijah the priest, saying, “On the great altar burn the morning burnt offering, the evening meal offering, the king’s burnt offering, his meal offering, with the burnt offering of all the people of the land, their meal offering, and their drink offerings; and sprinkle on it all the blood of the burnt offering, and all the blood of the sacrifice; but the bronze altar will be for me to inquire by.”

Urijah the priest did so, according to all that king Ahaz commanded.

Among the sons of the priests there were found who had married foreign women: of the sons of Jeshua, the son of Jozadak, and his brothers, Maaseiah, and Eliezer, and Jarib, and Gedaliah.

Nehemiah, who was the governor, and Ezra the priest and scribe, and the Levites who taught the people, said to all the people, “Today is holy to Yahweh your God. Don’t mourn, nor weep.” For all the people wept when they heard the words of the law.

“Now consider this, you who forget God, lest I tear you into pieces, and there be no one to deliver.

Your testimonies are righteous forever. Give me understanding, that I may live.

and I will take for myself faithful witnesses to testify: Uriah the priest, and Zechariah the son of Jeberechiah.”

for both prophet and priest are profane. Yes, in my house I have found their wickedness,” says Yahweh.

Her priests have done violence to my law, and have profaned my holy things. They have made no distinction between the holy and the common, neither have they caused men to discern between the unclean and the clean, and have hidden their eyes from my Sabbaths. So I am profaned among them.

in that you have brought in foreigners, uncircumcised in heart and uncircumcised in flesh, to be in my sanctuary, to profane it, even my house, when you offer my bread, the fat and the blood, and they have broken my covenant, to add to all your abominations.

Therefore at that time, when all the peoples heard the sound of the horn, flute, zither, lyre, harp, pipe, and all kinds of music, all the peoples, the nations, and the languages, fell down and worshiped the golden image that Nebuchadnezzar the king had set up.

My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge. Because you have rejected knowledge, I will also reject you, that you may be no priest to me. Because you have forgotten your God’s law, I will also forget your children.

Ephraim is oppressed, he is crushed in judgment; Because he is intent in his pursuit of idols.

For am I now seeking the favor of men, or of God? Or am I striving to please men? For if I were still pleasing men, I wouldn’t be a servant of Christ.