Therefore, Lord God of Israel,
keep what You promised
to Your servant, my father David:
“You will never fail to have a man
to sit before Me on the throne of Israel,
if only your sons guard their way to walk in My Law
as you have walked before Me.”

Listen to Your servant’s prayer and his petition,
Lord my God,
so that You may hear the cry and the prayer
that Your servant prays before You,

If a man sins against his neighbor
and is forced to take an oath
and he comes to take an oath
before Your altar in this temple,

If Your people Israel are defeated before an enemy,
because they have sinned against You,
and they return to You and praise Your name,
and they pray and plead for mercy
before You in this temple,

As for you, if you walk before Me as your father David walked, doing everything I have commanded you, and if you keep My statutes and ordinances,

However, if you turn away and abandon My statutes and My commands that I have set before you and if you go and serve other gods and worship them,

According to the ordinances of his father David, he appointed the divisions of the priests over their service, of the Levites over their responsibilities to offer praise and to minister before the priests following the daily requirement, and of the gatekeepers by their divisions with respect to each gate, for this had been the command of David, the man of God.

The king made the algum wood into walkways for the Lord’s temple and for the king’s palace and into lyres and harps for the singers. Never before had anything like them been seen in the land of Judah.

and the men of Judah raised the battle cry. When the men of Judah raised the battle cry, God routed Jeroboam and all Israel before Abijah and Judah.

So the Israelites fled before Judah, and God handed them over to them.

So the Lord routed the Cushites before Asa and before Judah, and the Cushites fled.

Then Asa and the people who were with him pursued them as far as Gerar. The Cushites fell until they had no survivors, for they were crushed before Yahweh and His army. So the people of Judah carried off a great supply of loot.

“Then a spirit came forward, stood before the Lord, and said, ‘I will entice him.’

“The Lord asked him, ‘How?’

for every dispute that comes to you from your brothers who dwell in their cities—whether it regards differences of bloodguilt, law, commandment, statutes, or judgments—you are to warn them, so they will not incur guilt before the Lord and wrath will not come on you and your brothers. Do this, and you will not incur guilt.

Then Jehoshaphat stood in the assembly of Judah and Jerusalem in the Lord’s temple before the new courtyard.

Are You not our God who drove out the inhabitants of this land before Your people Israel and who gave it forever to the descendants of Abraham Your friend?

“If disaster comes on us—sword or judgment, pestilence or famine—we will stand before this temple and before You, for Your name is in this temple. We will cry out to You because of our distress, and You will hear and deliver.”

Our God, will You not judge them? For we are powerless before this vast number that comes to fight against us. We do not know what to do, but we look to You.

All Judah was standing before the Lord with their infants, their wives, and their children.

Then Jehoshaphat bowed with his face to the ground, and all Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem fell down before the Lord to worship Him.

But if you go with them, do it! Be strong for battle! But God will make you stumble before the enemy, for God has the power to help or to make one stumble.”

After Amaziah came from the attack on the Edomites, he brought the gods of the Seirites and set them up as his gods. He worshiped before them and burned incense to them.

Judah was routed before Israel, and each fled to his own tent.

He burned incense in the Valley of Hinnom and burned his children in the fire, imitating the detestable practices of the nations the Lord had dispossessed before the Israelites.

Now you plan to reduce the people of Judah and Jerusalem, male and female, to slavery. Are you not also guilty before Yahweh your God?

Then Hezekiah encouraged all the Levites who performed skillfully before the Lord. They ate at the appointed festival for seven days, sacrificing fellowship offerings and giving thanks to Yahweh, the God of their ancestors.

Hezekiah did this throughout all Judah. He did what was good and upright and true before the Lord his God.

“Be strong and courageous! Don’t be afraid or discouraged before the king of Assyria or before the large army that is with him, for there are more with us than with him.

Didn’t Hezekiah himself remove His high places and His altars and say to Judah and Jerusalem, “You must worship before one altar, and you must burn incense on it”?

He did what was evil in the Lord’s sight, imitating the detestable practices of the nations that the Lord had dispossessed before the Israelites.

So Manasseh caused Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem to stray so that they did worse evil than the nations the Lord had destroyed before the Israelites.

When he was in distress, he sought the favor of Yahweh his God and earnestly humbled himself before the God of his ancestors.

His prayer and how God granted his request, and all his sin and unfaithfulness and the sites where he built high places and set up Asherah poles and carved images before he humbled himself, they are written in the Records of Hozai.

But he did not humble himself before the Lord like his father Manasseh humbled himself; instead, Amon increased his guilt.

because your heart was tender and you humbled yourself before God when you heard His words against this place and against its inhabitants, and because you humbled yourself before Me, and you tore your clothes and wept before Me, I Myself have heard’—this is the Lord’s declaration.

He did what was evil in the sight of the Lord his God and did not humble himself before Jeremiah the prophet at the Lord’s command.

and who has shown favor to me before the king, his counselors, and all his powerful officers. So I took courage because I was strengthened by Yahweh my God, and I gathered Israelite leaders to return with me.

I proclaimed a fast by the Ahava River, so that we might humble ourselves before our God and ask Him for a safe journey for us, our children, and all our possessions.

Guard them carefully until you weigh them out in the chambers of the Lord’s house before the leading priests, Levites, and heads of the Israelite families in Jerusalem.”

Lord God of Israel, You are righteous, for we survive as a remnant today. Here we are before You with our guilt, though no one can stand in Your presence because of this.

While Ezra prayed and confessed, weeping and falling facedown before the house of God, an extremely large assembly of Israelite men, women, and children gathered around him. The people also wept bitterly.

Let us therefore make a covenant before our God to send away all the foreign wives and their children, according to the counsel of my lord and of those who tremble at the command of our God. Let it be done according to the law.

When I heard these words, I sat down and wept. I mourned for a number of days, fasting and praying before the God of heaven.

During the month of Nisan in the twentieth year of King Artaxerxes, when wine was set before him, I took the wine and gave it to the king. I had never been sad in his presence,

before his colleagues and the powerful men of Samaria, and said, “What are these pathetic Jews doing? Can they restore it by themselves? Will they offer sacrifices? Will they ever finish it? Can they bring these burnt stones back to life from the mounds of rubble?”

On the first day of the seventh month, Ezra the priest brought the law before the assembly of men, women, and all who could listen with understanding.

While he was facing the square in front of the Water Gate, he read out of it from daybreak until noon before the men, the women, and those who could understand. All the people listened attentively to the book of the law.

On the second day, the family leaders of all the people, along with the priests and Levites, assembled before Ezra the scribe to study the words of the law.

You divided the sea before them,
and they crossed through it on dry ground.
You hurled their pursuers into the depths
like a stone into churning waters.

So their descendants went in and possessed the land:
You subdued the Canaanites who inhabited the land before them
and handed their kings and the surrounding peoples over to them,
to do as they pleased with them.

When they were in their kingdom,
with Your abundant goodness that You gave them,
and in the spacious and fertile land You set before them,
they would not serve You or turn from their wicked ways.

the bread displayed before the Lord, the daily grain offering, the regular burnt offering, the Sabbath and New Moon offerings, the appointed festivals, the holy things, the sin offerings to atone for Israel, and for all the work of the house of our God.

Now before this, Eliashib the priest had been put in charge of the storerooms of the house of our God. He was a relative of Tobiah

When shadows began to fall on the gates of Jerusalem just before the Sabbath, I gave orders that the gates be closed and not opened until after the Sabbath. I posted some of my men at the gates, so that no goods could enter during the Sabbath day.

I rebuked them, cursed them, beat some of their men, and pulled out their hair. I forced them to take an oath before God and said: “You must not give your daughters in marriage to their sons or take their daughters as wives for your sons or yourselves!

to bring Queen Vashti before him with her royal crown. He wanted to show off her beauty to the people and the officials, because she was very beautiful.

For the queen’s action will become public knowledge to all the women and cause them to despise their husbands and say, ‘King Ahasuerus ordered Queen Vashti brought before him, but she did not come.’

Before this day is over, the noble women of Persia and Media who hear about the queen’s act will say the same thing to all the king’s officials, resulting in more contempt and fury.

During the year before each young woman’s turn to go to King Ahasuerus, the harem regulation required her to receive beauty treatments with oil of myrrh for six months and then with perfumes and cosmetics for another six months.

In the first month, the month of Nisan, in King Ahasuerus’s twelfth year, Pur (that is, the lot) was cast before Haman for each day in each month, and it fell on the twelfth month, the month Adar.

“All the royal officials and the people of the royal provinces know that one law applies to every man or woman who approaches the king in the inner courtyard and who has not been summoned—the death penalty. Only if the king extends the gold scepter will that person live. I have not been summoned to appear before the king for the last 30 days.”

Put the garment and the horse under the charge of one of the king’s most noble officials. Have them clothe the man the king wants to honor, parade him on the horse through the city square, and proclaim before him, ‘This is what is done for the man the king wants to honor.’”

So Haman took the garment and the horse. He clothed Mordecai and paraded him through the city square, crying out before him, “This is what is done for the man the king wants to honor.”

Haman told his wife Zeresh and all his friends everything that had happened. His advisers and his wife Zeresh said to him, “Since Mordecai is Jewish, and you have begun to fall before him, you won’t overcome him, because your downfall is certain.”

Esther answered, “The adversary and enemy is this evil Haman.”

Haman stood terrified before the king and queen.

The king extended the gold scepter toward Esther, so she got up and stood before the king.

She said, “If it pleases the king, and I have found approval before him, if the matter seems right to the king and I am pleasing in his sight, let a royal edict be written. Let it revoke the documents the scheming Haman son of Hammedatha the Agagite, wrote to destroy the Jews who are in all the king’s provinces.

But when the matter was brought before the king, he commanded by letter that the evil plan Haman had devised against the Jews return on his own head and that he should be hanged with his sons on the gallows.

One day the sons of God came to present themselves before the Lord, and Satan also came with them.

One day the sons of God came again to present themselves before the Lord, and Satan also came with them to present himself before the Lord.

I sigh when food is put before me,
and my groans pour out like water.

A figure stood there,
but I could not recognize its appearance;
a form loomed before my eyes.
I heard a quiet voice:

Yes, I know what you’ve said is true,
but how can a person be justified before God?

before I go to a land of darkness and gloom,
never to return.

Yet I prefer to speak to the Almighty
and argue my case before God.

Even if He kills me, I will hope in Him.
I will still defend my ways before Him.

Yes, this will result in my deliverance,
for no godless person can appear before Him.

But you even undermine the fear of God
and hinder meditation before Him.

Were you the first person ever born,
or were you brought forth before the hills?

It will be accomplished before his time,
and his branch will not flourish.

My friends scoff at me
as I weep before God.

For only a few years will pass
before I go the way of no return.

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Their children are established while they are still alive,
and their descendants, before their eyes.

Are they like straw before the wind,
like chaff a storm sweeps away?

The dirt on his grave is sweet to him.
Everyone follows behind him,
and those who go before him are without number.

They were snatched away before their time,
and their foundations were washed away by a river.

I would plead my case before Him
and fill my mouth with arguments.

How can a person be justified before God?
How can one born of woman be pure?

Sheol is naked before God,
and Abaddon has no covering.

Now my life is poured out before my eyes,
and days of suffering have seized me.

I am just like you before God;
I was also pinched off from a piece of clay.

Do you think it is just when you say,
“I am righteous before God”?

how much less when you complain
that you do not see Him,
that your case is before Him
and you are waiting for Him.

Strength resides in his neck,
and dismay dances before him.

Lord, lead me in Your righteousness
because of my adversaries;
make Your way straight before me.

When my enemies retreat,
they stumble and perish before You.

You have made my enemies retreat before me;
I annihilate those who hate me.

I pulverize them like dust before the wind;
I trample them like mud in the streets.

I will give praise in the great congregation
because of You;
I will fulfill my vows
before those who fear You.

All the ends of the earth will remember
and turn to the Lord.
All the families of the nations
will bow down before You,