but he did not invite Nathan the prophet, Benaiah, David's personal elite forces, or his brother Solomon.

When he had been ushered into the presence of the king, Nathan bowed low in front of the king with his face to the ground and asked, "Your majesty, did you say "Adonijah will be king after me and will sit on my throne'?

Well now, he went down today and sacrificed lots of oxen, fattened cattle, and sheep, and has invited all the king's sons, the army commanders, and Abiathar the priest. They're having a party together and saying, "Long live King Adonijah!'

I certainly did tell you in the name of the LORD God of Israel, "Your son Solomon will be king after me and will sit on my throne in my place.' I'm certainly going to make this happen today!"

and said "Blessed be the LORD God of Israel, who has provided someone to sit on my throne today. I've seen it with my own eyes!'"

"If he's done nothing wrong, not a hair of his head will be harmed," Solomon replied. "But if we find evil in him, he's a dead man."

"Furthermore, you're aware of what Zeruiah's son Joab did to me and to those two commanders of the armies of Israel, Ner's son Abner and Jether's son Amasa, whom he killed, and how he shed the blood of wartime during times of peace, staining the very belt he wears around his waist and the sandals he wears on his feet.

Now therefore, as the LORD lives, who has established me and set me on the throne of my father David, and who has established a dynasty, just like he promised, Adonijah will surely be executed today."

The king also told Abiathar the priest, "Go home to Anathoth. You deserve to die, but I won't kill you today, because you carried the ark of the Lord GOD before my father David and because you shared all the troubles that my father went through."

The king also reminded Shimei, "You know all the evil things that you admit you did to my father David. Therefore the LORD is going to repay you for all of your evil.

"You have demonstrated abundant gracious love to your servant David, my father, as he lived in your presence truthfully, righteously, and uprightly in his heart. In addition, you have kept on showing this abundant gracious love by giving him a son to sit on his throne today. Now, LORD my God, you have set me as king to replace my father David, but I'm still young. I don't have any leadership skills.

If you will live life my way, keeping my statutes and my commands, just like your father David did, I'll also increase the length of your life."

She got up in the middle of the night, took my son from me while your servant was asleep, and laid him to her breast after laying her dead son next to me.

The next morning, I got up to nurse my son, and he was dead. But when I examined him carefully in the light of day, he turned out not to be my son whom I had borne!"

"Not so," claimed the other woman. "The living child is my son, and the dead one is yours." But the first woman said, "Not so! The dead child is your son and the living one is my son." This is what they testified before the king.

The king said, "One of them claims, "This living son is mine, and your son is the dead one' and the other claims "No. Your son is the dead one and my son is the living one.'

As soon as Hiram received the message from Solomon, he became so ecstatic that he exclaimed, "Blessed be the LORD today, who has given David a wise son to rule this great people!" Then he sent this message to Solomon:

along with two doors of cypress wood, one door of which had two leaves that turned on hinges, as did the other door, which also had two leaves that turned on hinges.

the son of a widow from the tribe of Naphtali, whose father was from Tyre. A bronze worker, he was wise, knowledgeable, and was skilled in all sorts of bronze working. He went to King Solomon and did all of his work.

"LORD God of Israel, there is no one like you, God in heaven above or on the earth below, who watches over his covenant, showing gracious love to your servants who live their lives in your presence with all their hearts. It is you, LORD God, who have kept your promise to my father, your servant David, that you made to him. Indeed, you made a commitment to my father David and then personally fulfilled what you had promised today.

Pay attention to the prayer of your servant and to his request, LORD my God, and listen to the cry and prayer that your servant is praying in your presence today.

Now let your heart be completely devoted to the LORD our God, to live according to his statutes and to keep his commands, as we are doing today."

So Solomon observed the Festival of Tents at that time, as did all of Israel with him. A large assembly came up from as far away as Lebo-hamath and the Wadi of Egypt to appear in the presence of the LORD our God, not just for seven days, but for seven days after that, a total of fourteen days.

"Now as for you, if you commune with me like your father did, with an upright heart of integrity and doing everything that I've commanded you and keeping my statutes and ordinances,

"This Temple will become a pile of ruins. Everyone who passes by it will be so astounded that they will ask, "Why did the LORD do this to this land and to this Temple?'

However, Solomon did not force Israelis into conscripted labor, but they did serve as his soldiers, servants, princes, captains, chariot commanders, and cavalry.

Solomon answered all of her questions. Nothing was hidden from Solomon that he did not explain to her.

Solomon did this for all of his foreign wives, who burned incense and sacrificed to their own gods.

and warned him about this so he would not pursue other gods. But he did not obey what the LORD had commanded,

During David's military campaign against Edom, when his army commander Joab had gone out to bury the dead, he killed every male in Edom.

Later on, Hadad learned in Egypt that David had been buried with his ancestors and that Joab the army commander was dead. So Hadad asked Pharaoh, "Please send me out so I can go back to my own land."

He opposed Israel during Solomon's entire reign, in addition to all of the evil things that Hadad did. Rezon also hated Israel while he reigned over Aram.

I'm doing this because they have abandoned me and worshipped that Sidonian goddess Astarte, the Moabite god Chemosh, and the Ammonite god Milcom. They haven't lived my way by doing what I consider to be right and observing my statutes and my ordinances, like his father David did.

If you listen to everything that I command you to do, and if you live your life my way, and if you do what I consider to be right by observing my statutes and my commandments, just like my servant David did, then I will be with you, I will build an enduring dynasty for you, just like I did for David, and I'll give Israel to you.

Now the rest of Solomon's accomplishments, including everything else he did, as well as records of his wisdom, are recorded in the Book of the Acts of Solomon, are they not?

They advised him, "If today you are a servant, you will serve this people by answering them and speaking kindly to them. Then they will serve you forever."

"Which way did he go?" their father asked him, since his sons had observed the way that the man of God had taken to return to Judah from Bethel.

Then he ordered his sons, "Saddle the donkey for me." So they did.

Despite everything that happened, Jeroboam never did repent of his evil practices. Instead, he appointed even more people to act as priests for the high places. Anyone who wanted to be a priest was ordained to be a priest in the high places.

So that's what Jeroboam's wife did. She got up, went to Shiloh, and found Ahijah's home. Ahijah was blind, because his eyes could not focus due to his age.

"I tore the kingdom away from David's dynasty. "Then I gave it to you. But you have not lived like my servant David, who kept my commands with all his heart, and did only what I considered to be right.

"In addition to this, the LORD will raise up for himself a king over Israel who will eliminate Jeroboam's dynasty, starting today and from now on.

Judah practiced what the LORD considered to be evil. They did more to provoke him to jealousy than their ancestors had ever done by committing the sins that they committed.

Eventually, Abijah died, as did his ancestors, and he was buried in the City of David. His son Asa succeeded him as king.

So King Ben-hadad did just what King Asa had asked: he sent his commanding officers to attack the cities of Israel, conquering Ijon, Dan, Abel-beth-maacah, all of Chinneroth, and the territory of Naphtali.

practicing what the LORD considered to be evil, living the way his father did, committing sins, and leading Israel to sin.

He practiced what the LORD considered to be evil, living like Jeroboam did and leading Israel into sin.

In addition, a message from the LORD came through Hanani's son Jehu the prophet against Baasha and his household, not only because of all of the things that Baasha did that the LORD considered to be evil, including provoking the LORD to anger by what he did and by being like the household of Jeroboam, but also because Baasha had destroyed Jeroboam's household.

As soon as he had consolidated his reign, he executed the entire household of Baasha. He did not leave a single male alive, including any of Baasha's relatives or friends.

because of all the sins that Baasha and his son Elah had committed and because of what they did to lead Israel into sin, thus provoking the LORD God of Israel to anger with their idolatry.

because of the sins that he committed by doing what the LORD considered to be evil, living like Jeroboam did, and sinning so as to lead Israel into sin.

So Elijah left and did exactly what the LORD had told him to do he went to live near the Wadi Cherith, where it enters the Jordan River.

So she went out and did precisely what Elijah told her to do. As a result, Elijah, the widow, and her son were fed for days.

But Obadiah replied, "What did I do wrong, that you would put me in a position where Ahab would execute me?

Hasn't anyone told you, my master, what I did when Jezebel was killing the LORD's prophets? I hid 100 of the LORD's prophets by fifties in a cave and provided food and water for them.

But Elijah promised him, "As the LORD of the Heavenly Armies lives, in whose presence I stand, I will appear to Ahab today."

"Do it a second time," he ordered. So they did it a second time.

"Do it a third time," he said. So they did it a third time. The water ran down around the altar and completely filled the trench.

As the time for the evening offering arrived, Elijah the prophet approached and said, "LORD God of Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, let it be known today that you are God in Israel and that I, your servant, have done all of this in obedience to your word.

Ben-hadad made this promise to Ahab: "I will restore the cities that my ancestors took from your ancestors. You'll be able to build streets named after yourself in Damascus, as my father did in Samaria." "With this promise I will release you," Ahab replied. So Ahab made a treaty with Ben-hadad and let him go.

So the leading men of the city, along with the elders and nobles who lived there, did precisely what Jezebel had directed them to do. They followed the instructions that she had set forth in the memos:

Afterwards, they sent a message to Jezebel that said, "Naboth has been stoned. He's dead."

When Jezebel heard that Naboth had been stoned to death, she told Ahab, "Get up and confiscate Naboth's vineyard that he refused to sell you for cash. Naboth the Jezreelite isn't alive anymore. He's dead!"

So once he heard that Naboth was dead, Ahab got up, went down to the vineyard of Naboth the Jezreelite, and confiscated it.

Ask the king, "Did you commit murder? And now you're going to steal as well?' Also tell him, "This is what the LORD says: "Where the dogs were licking up Naboth's blood, dogs will also lick up your blood that's right yours!"'"

It can be truly said that no one else sold himself to practice what the LORD considered to be evil quite like the way Ahab did, because his wife Jezebel incited him.

Right then, Chenaanah's son Zedekiah approached Micaiah and struck him on the cheek. Then he asked him, "How did the Spirit of the LORD move from me to speak to you?"

He lived like his father Asa and never abandoned that life. He did what the LORD considered to be right. Nevertheless, the high places were not demolished, and the people continued to sacrifice and burn incense on the high places.

Later, Jehoshaphat died, as did his ancestors, and he was buried alongside his ancestors in the City of David. Jehoram his son became king in his place.

He practiced what the Lord considered to be evil by living life like his father and mother did. He lived like Nebat's son Jeroboam, who led Israel into sin.