141 At that time Abijah the son of Jeroboam was sick. 2 And Jeroboam said to his wife, Arise, I pray thee, and disguise thyself, that thou be not known to be the wife of Jeroboam; and go to Shiloh: behold, there is Ahijah the prophet, who told me that [I should be] king over this people. 3 And take with thee ten loaves, and cakes, and a cruse of honey, and go to him: he will tell thee what shall become of the lad. 4 And Jeroboam's wife did so, and arose and went to Shiloh, and came to the house of Ahijah. And Ahijah could not see; for his eyes were set by reason of his age. 5 And Jehovah said to Ahijah, Behold, the wife of Jeroboam cometh to ask a thing of thee about her son; for he is sick: thus and thus shalt thou say unto her; for it shall be, when she cometh in, that she shall feign to be another. 6 And it was so, when Ahijah heard the sound of her feet, as she came in at the door, that he said, Come in, thou wife of Jeroboam; why feignest thou to be another? But I am sent to thee with a hard [message].
7 Go, tell Jeroboam, Thus saith Jehovah the God of Israel: Forasmuch as I exalted thee from among the people, and made thee prince over my people Israel, 8 and rent the kingdom away from the house of David, and gave it thee; and thou hast not been as my servant David, who kept my commandments, and who followed me with all his heart, to do only that which is right in my sight; 9 but thou hast done evil above all that were before thee, and hast gone and made thee other gods, and molten images, to provoke me to anger, and hast cast me behind thy back: 10 therefore behold, I will bring evil upon the house of Jeroboam, and will cut off from Jeroboam every male, him that is shut up and left in Israel, and will take away the house of Jeroboam, as a man taketh away dung, till it be all gone. 11 Him that dieth of Jeroboam in the city shall the dogs eat, and him that dieth in the field shall the fowl of the heavens eat; for Jehovah hath spoken. 12 And thou, arise, go to thine own house; when thy feet enter into the city, the child shall die. 13 And all Israel shall mourn for him, and they shall bury him; for he only of Jeroboam shall come to the grave, because in him there is found something good toward Jehovah the God of Israel, in the house of Jeroboam. 14 And Jehovah shall raise up for himself a king over Israel, who shall cut off the house of Jeroboam that day; and what? ... even now. 15 And Jehovah will smite Israel, as a reed is shaken in the water, and he will root up Israel out of this good land which he gave to their fathers, and will scatter them beyond the river, because they have made their Asherahs, provoking Jehovah to anger. 16 And he will give Israel up because of the sins of Jeroboam, wherewith he has sinned, and made Israel to sin. 17 And Jeroboam's wife arose and departed, and came to Tirzah; when she came to the threshold of the door, the child died. 18 And they buried him; and all Israel mourned for him, according to the word of Jehovah, which he spoke through his servant Ahijah the prophet. 19 And the rest of the acts of Jeroboam, how he warred, and how he reigned, behold, they are written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Israel. 20 And the days that Jeroboam reigned were twenty-two years; and he slept with his fathers. And Nadab his son reigned in his stead.
21 And Rehoboam the son of Solomon reigned in Judah. Rehoboam was forty-one years old when he began to reign, and he reigned seventeen years in Jerusalem, the city that Jehovah had chosen out of all the tribes of Israel to put his name there; and his mother's name was Naamah, an Ammonitess. 22 And Judah did evil in the sight of Jehovah, and they provoked him to jealousy with their sins which they committed more than all that their fathers had done. 23 And they also built for themselves high places, and columns, and Asherahs on every high hill and under every green tree; 24 and there were also sodomites in the land. They did according to all the abominations of the nations that Jehovah had dispossessed before the children of Israel. 25 And it came to pass in the fifth year of king Rehoboam, [that] Shishak king of Egypt came up against Jerusalem. 26 And he took away the treasures of the house of Jehovah, and the treasures of the king's house; he even took away all; and he took away all the shields of gold that Solomon had made. 27 And king Rehoboam made in their stead brazen shields, and committed them to the hands of the chief of the couriers who kept the entrance of the king's house. 28 And it was so, that as often as the king entered into the house of Jehovah, the couriers bore them, and brought them again into the chamber of the couriers. 29 And the rest of the acts of Rehoboam, and all that he did, are they not written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Judah? 30 And there was war between Rehoboam and Jeroboam all [their] days. 31 And Rehoboam slept with his fathers, and was buried with his fathers in the city of David. And his mother's name was Naamah, an Ammonitess. And Abijam his son reigned in his stead.
151 And in the eighteenth year of king Jeroboam the son of Nebat began Abijam to reign over Judah. 2 He reigned three years in Jerusalem; and his mother's name was Maachah, a daughter of Abishalom. 3 And he walked in all the sins of his father, which he had done before him; and his heart was not perfect with Jehovah his God, as the heart of David his father. 4 But for David's sake Jehovah his God gave him a lamp in Jerusalem, setting up his son after him, and establishing Jerusalem; 5 because David did that which was right in the sight of Jehovah, and turned not aside from anything that he commanded him all the days of his life, except in the matter of Urijah the Hittite. 6 And there had been war between Rehoboam and Jeroboam all the days of his life. 7 And the rest of the acts of Abijam, and all that he did, are they not written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Judah? And there was war between Abijam and Jeroboam. 8 And Abijam slept with his fathers; and they buried him in the city of David. And Asa his son reigned in his stead.
9 And in the twentieth year of Jeroboam king of Israel, Asa began to reign over Judah; 10 and he reigned forty-one years in Jerusalem; and his mother's name was Maachah, daughter of Abishalom. 11 And Asa did what was right in the sight of Jehovah, as David his father. 12 And he put away the sodomites out of the land, and removed all the idols that his father had made. 13 And also Maachah his mother he removed from being queen, because she had made an idol for the Asherah; and Asa cut down her idol, and burned it in the valley of Kidron. 14 But the high places were not removed; only, Asa's heart was perfect with Jehovah all his days. 15 And he brought into the house of Jehovah the things which his father had dedicated, and the things which he himself had dedicated, silver and gold and vessels.
16 And there was war between Asa and Baasha king of Israel all their days. 17 And Baasha king of Israel came up against Judah, and built Ramah, in order to let none go out or come in to Asa king of Judah. 18 And Asa took all the silver and the gold that were left in the treasures of the house of Jehovah, and in the treasures of the king's house, and gave them into the hand of his servants; and king Asa sent them to Ben-Hadad, the son of Tabrimmon, the son of Hezion, king of Syria, who dwelt at Damascus, saying, 19 There is a league between me and thee, [as] between my father and thy father; behold, I send thee a present of silver and gold: go, break thy league with Baasha king of Israel, that he may depart from me. 20 And Ben-Hadad hearkened to king Asa, and sent the captains of his forces against the cities of Israel, and smote Ijon, and Dan, and Abel-Beth-Maachah, and all Kinneroth, with all the land of Naphtali. 21 And it came to pass when Baasha heard of it, that he left off building Ramah, and dwelt in Tirzah. 22 And king Asa called together all Judah: none was exempted; and they carried away the stones and the timber from Ramah, with which Baasha had been building; and king Asa built with them Geba of Benjamin, and Mizpah. 23 And the rest of all the acts of Asa, and all his might, and all that he did, and the cities that he built, are they not written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Judah? Only, in the time of his old age he was diseased in his feet. 24 And Asa slept with his fathers, and was buried with his fathers in the city of David his father. And Jehoshaphat his son reigned in his stead.
25 And Nadab the son of Jeroboam began to reign over Israel in the second year of Asa king of Judah; and he reigned over Israel two years. 26 And he did evil in the sight of Jehovah, and walked in the way of his father, and in his sin with which he made Israel sin. 27 And Baasha the son of Ahijah, of the house of Issachar, conspired against him; and Baasha smote him at Gibbethon, which [belonged] to the Philistines, when Nadab and all Israel were besieging Gibbethon. 28 And Baasha slew him in the third year of Asa king of Judah, and reigned in his stead. 29 And it came to pass when he was king, he smote all the house of Jeroboam; he left to Jeroboam none that breathed; until he had destroyed him, according to the word of Jehovah which he spoke by his servant Ahijah the Shilonite, 30 because of the sins of Jeroboam which he sinned, and wherewith he made Israel to sin; by his provocation with which he provoked Jehovah the God of Israel to anger. 31 And the rest of the acts of Nadab, and all that he did, are they not written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Israel? 32 And there was war between Asa and Baasha king of Israel all their days.
33 In the third year of Asa king of Judah began Baasha the son of Ahijah to reign over all Israel in Tirzah, for twenty-four years. 34 And he did evil in the sight of Jehovah, and walked in the way of Jeroboam, and in his sin where with he made Israel to sin.
31 And the Lord said, Simon, Simon, behold, Satan has demanded to have you, to sift [you] as wheat; 32 but I have besought for thee that thy faith fail not; and thou, when once thou hast been restored, confirm thy brethren. 33 And he said to him, Lord, with thee I am ready to go both to prison and to death. 34 And he said, I tell thee, Peter, [the] cock shall not crow to-day before that thou shalt thrice deny that thou knowest me.
35 And he said to them, When I sent you without purse and scrip and sandals, did ye lack anything? And they said, Nothing. 36 He said therefore to them, But now he that has a purse let him take [it], in like manner also a scrip, and he that has none let him sell his garment and buy a sword; 37 for I say unto you, that this that is written must yet be accomplished in me, And he was reckoned with [the] lawless: for also the things concerning me have an end. 38 And they said, Lord, behold here are two swords. And he said to them, It is enough.
39 And going forth he went according to his custom to the mount of Olives, and the disciples also followed him. 40 And when he was at the place he said to them, Pray that ye enter not into temptation. 41 And he was withdrawn from them about a stone's throw, and having knelt down he prayed, 42 saying, Father, if thou wilt remove this cup from me:—but then, not my will, but thine be done. 43 And an angel appeared to him from heaven strengthening him. 44 And being in conflict he prayed more intently. And his sweat became as great drops of blood, falling down upon the earth. 45 And rising up from his prayer, coming to the disciples, he found them sleeping from grief. 46 And he said to them, Why sleep ye? rise up and pray that ye enter not into temptation.
(Read Luke 22:21-38)
How unbecoming is the worldly ambition of being the greatest, to the character of a follower of Jesus, who took upon him the form of a servant, and humbled himself to the death of the cross! In the way to eternal happiness, we must expect to be assaulted and sifted by Satan. If he cannot destroy, he will try to disgrace or distress us. Nothing more certainly forebodes a fall, in a professed follower of Christ, than self-confidence, with disregard to warnings, and contempt of danger. Unless we watch and pray always, we may be drawn in the course of the day into those sins which we were in the morning most resolved against. If believers were left to themselves, they would fall; but they are kept by the power of God, and the prayer of Christ. Our Lord gave notice of a very great change of circumstances now approaching. The disciples must not expect that their friends would be kind to them as they had been. Therefore, he that has a purse, let him take it, for he may need it. They must now expect that their enemies would be more fierce than they had been, and they would need weapons. At the time the apostles understood Christ to mean real weapons, but he spake only of the weapons of the spiritual warfare. The sword of the Spirit is the sword with which the disciples of Christ must furnish themselves.
(Read Luke 22:39-46)
Every description which the evangelists give of the state of mind in which our Lord entered upon this conflict, proves the tremendous nature of the assault, and the perfect foreknowledge of its terrors possessed by the meek and lowly Jesus. Here are three things not in the other evangelists. 1. When Christ was in his agony, there appeared to him an angel from heaven, strengthening him. It was a part of his humiliation that he was thus strengthened by a ministering spirit. 2. Being in agony, he prayed more earnestly. Prayer, though never out of season, is in a special manner seasonable when we are in an agony. 3. In this agony his sweat was as it were great drops of blood falling down. This showed the travail of his soul. We should pray also to be enabled to resist unto the shedding of our blood, striving against sin, if ever called to it. When next you dwell in imagination upon the delights of some favourite sin, think of its effects as you behold them here! See its fearful effects in the garden of Gethsemane, and desire, by the help of God, deeply to hate and to forsake that enemy, to ransom sinners from whom the Redeemer prayed, agonized, and bled.
