After a while, the stream dried up because there had been no rain in the land.

The jar of flour was never empty and the jug of oil never ran out, just as the Lord had promised through Elijah.

Ahab sent messengers to all the Israelites and had the prophets assemble at Mount Carmel.

So they took a bull, as he had suggested, and prepared it. They invoked the name of Baal from morning until noon, saying, "Baal, answer us." But there was no sound and no answer. They jumped around on the altar they had made.

Elijah then told all the people, "Approach me." So all the people approached him. He repaired the altar of the Lord that had been torn down.

Then Elijah took twelve stones, corresponding to the number of tribes that descended from Jacob, to whom the Lord had said, "Israel will be your new name."

Then he said, "Fill four water jars and pour the water on the offering and the wood." When they had done so, he said, "Do it again." So they did it again. Then he said, "Do it a third time." So they did it a third time.

Ahab told Jezebel all that Elijah had done, including a detailed account of how he killed all the prophets with the sword.

while he went a day's journey into the desert. He went and sat down under a shrub and asked the Lord to take his life: "I've had enough! Now, O Lord, take my life. After all, I'm no better than my ancestors."

When the Israelites had mustered and had received their supplies, they marched out to face them in battle. When the Israelites deployed opposite them, they were like two small flocks of goats, but the Syrians filled the land.

The prophet then said to him, "This is what the Lord says, 'Because you released a man I had determined should die, you will pay with your life and your people will suffer instead of his people.'"

So Ahab went into his palace, bitter and angry that Naboth the Jezreelite had said, "I will not sell to you my ancestral inheritance." He lay down on his bed, pouted, and would not eat.

The men of the city, the leaders and the nobles who lived there, followed the written orders Jezebel had sent them.

When Jezebel heard that Naboth had been stoned to death, she said to Ahab, "Get up, take possession of the vineyard Naboth the Jezreelite refused to sell you for silver, for Naboth is no longer alive; he's dead."

(There had never been anyone like Ahab, who was firmly committed to doing evil in the sight of the Lord, urged on by his wife Jezebel.

He was so wicked he worshiped the disgusting idols, just like the Amorites whom the Lord had driven out from before the Israelites.)

Now the king of Syria had ordered his thirty-two chariot commanders, "Do not fight common soldiers or high-ranking officers; fight only the king of Israel."

They washed off the chariot at the pool of Samaria (this was where the prostitutes bathed); dogs licked his blood, just as the Lord had said would happen.

He removed from the land any male cultic prostitutes who had managed to survive the reign of his father Asa.

He worshiped and bowed down to Baal, angering the Lord God of Israel just as his father had done.