The messengers returned to the king, who asked them, “Why have you come back?”

So King Ahaziah sent a captain of 50 with his 50 men to Elijah. When the captain went up to him, he was sitting on top of the hill. He announced, “Man of God, the king declares, ‘Come down!’”

Elijah responded to the captain of the 50, “If I am a man of God, may fire come down from heaven and consume you and your 50 men.” Then fire came down from heaven and consumed him and his 50 men.

So the king sent another captain of 50 with his 50 men to Elijah. He took in the situation and announced, “Man of God, this is what the king says: ‘Come down immediately!’”

Elijah responded, “If I am a man of God, may fire come down from heaven and consume you and your 50 men.” So a divine fire came down from heaven and consumed him and his 50 men.

Already fire has come down from heaven and consumed the first two captains of 50 with their fifties, but this time let my life be precious in your sight.”

The time had come for the Lord to take Elijah up to heaven in a whirlwind. Elijah and Elisha were traveling from Gilgal,

All Moab had heard that the kings had come up to fight against them. So all who could bear arms, from the youngest to the oldest, were summoned and took their stand at the border.

so let’s make a small room upstairs and put a bed, a table, a chair, and a lamp there for him. Whenever he comes, he can stay there.”

She summoned her husband and said, “Please send me one of the servants and one of the donkeys, so I can hurry to the man of God and then come back.”

He brought the letter to the king of Israel, and it read:

When this letter comes to you, note that I have sent you my servant Naaman for you to cure him of his skin disease.

When Elisha the man of God heard that the king of Israel tore his clothes, he sent a message to the king, “Why have you torn your clothes? Have him come to me, and he will know there is a prophet in Israel.”

But Naaman got angry and left, saying, “I was telling myself: He will surely come out, stand and call on the name of Yahweh his God, and will wave his hand over the spot and cure the skin disease.

Gehazi said, “It’s all right. My master has sent me to say, ‘I have just now discovered that two young men from the sons of the prophets have come to me from the hill country of Ephraim. Please give them 75 pounds of silver and two changes of clothes.’”

Then one said, “Please come with your servants.”

“I’ll come,” he answered.

So he prepared a great feast for them. When they had eaten and drunk, he sent them away, and they went to their master. The Aramean raiders did not come into Israel’s land again.

Elisha was sitting in his house, and the elders were sitting with him. The king sent a man ahead of him, but before the messenger got to him, Elisha said to the elders, “Do you see how this murderer has sent someone to cut off my head? Look, when the messenger comes, shut the door to keep him out. Isn’t the sound of his master’s feet behind him?”

If we say, ‘Let’s go into the city,’ we will die there because the famine is in the city, but if we sit here, we will also die. So now, come on. Let’s go to the Arameans’ camp. If they let us live, we will live; if they kill us, we will die.”

So the king got up in the night and said to his servants, “Let me tell you what the Arameans have done to us. They know we are starving, so they have left the camp to hide in the open country, thinking, ‘When they come out of the city, we will take them alive and go into the city.’”

Elisha said to the woman whose son he had restored to life, “Get ready, you and your household, and go and live as a foreigner wherever you can. For the Lord has announced a seven-year famine, and it has already come to the land.”

Elisha came to Damascus while Ben-hadad king of Aram was sick, and the king was told, “The man of God has come here.”

When Jehu came out to his master’s servants, they asked, “Is everything all right? Why did this crazy person come to you?”

Then he said to them, “You know the sort and their ranting.”

Now the watchman was standing on the tower in Jezreel. He saw Jehu’s troops approaching and shouted, “I see troops!”

Joram responded, “Choose a rider and send him to meet them and have him ask, ‘Do you come in peace?’”

So a horseman went to meet Jehu and said, “This is what the king asks: ‘Do you come in peace?’”

Jehu replied, “What do you have to do with peace? Fall in behind me.”

The watchman reported, “The messenger reached them but hasn’t started back.”

So he sent out a second horseman, who went to them and said, “This is what the king asks: ‘Do you come in peace?’”

Jehu answered, “What do you have to do with peace? Fall in behind me.”

When Joram saw Jehu he asked, “Do you come in peace, Jehu?”

He answered, “What peace can there be as long as there is so much prostitution and witchcraft from your mother Jezebel?”

As Jehu entered the gate, she said, “Do you come in peace, Zimri, killer of your master?”

Jehu met the relatives of Ahaziah king of Judah and asked, “Who are you?”

They answered, “We’re Ahaziah’s relatives. We’ve come down to greet the king’s sons and the queen mother’s sons.”

Then he said, “Come with me and see my zeal for the Lord!” So he let him ride with him in his chariot.

Then Jehu sent messengers throughout all Israel, and all the servants of Baal came; there was not a man left who did not come. They entered the temple of Baal, and it was filled from one end to the other.

Then in the seventh year, Jehoiada sent messengers and brought in the commanders of hundreds, the Carites, and the guards. He had them come to him in the Lord’s temple, where he made a covenant with them and put them under oath. He showed them the king’s son

and commanded them, “This is what you are to do: a third of you who come on duty on the Sabbath are to provide protection for the king’s palace.

Then Elisha died and was buried.

Now Moabite raiders used to come into the land in the spring of the year.

Amaziah then sent messengers to Jehoash son of Jehoahaz, son of Jehu, king of Israel, saying, “Come, let us meet face to face.”

until I come and take you away to a land like your own land—a land of grain and new wine, a land of bread and vineyards, a land of olive trees and honey—so that you may live and not die. But don’t listen to Hezekiah when he misleads you, saying: The Lord will deliver us.

They said to him, “This is what Hezekiah says: ‘Today is a day of distress, rebuke, and disgrace, for children have come to the point of birth, but there is no strength to deliver them.

Therefore, this is what the Lord says about the king of Assyria:
He will not enter this city
or shoot an arrow there
or come before it with a shield
or build up an assault ramp against it.

Then the prophet Isaiah came to King Hezekiah and asked him, “Where did these men come from and what did they say to you?”

Hezekiah replied, “They came from a distant country, from Babylon.”

‘The time will certainly come when everything in your palace and all that your fathers have stored up until this day will be carried off to Babylon; nothing will be left,’ says the Lord.

‘Some of your descendants who come from you will be taken away, and they will become eunuchs in the palace of the king of Babylon.’”

The priests of the high places, however, did not come up to the altar of the Lord in Jerusalem; instead, they ate unleavened bread with their fellow priests.