1 Kings 19

⁴⁰Then Elijah ordered them, “Seize the prophets of Baal! Do not let a single one escape.” So they seized them, and Elijah brought them down to the Kishon Valley and slaughtered them there.

²⁵(Surely there was never one like Ahab, who sold himself to do evil in the sight of the Lord, incited by his wife Jezebel.

⁵Soon his wife Jezebel came in and asked, “Why are you so sullen that you refuse to eat?”

⁶Ahab answered, “Because I spoke to Naboth the Jezreelite and told him, ‘Give me your vineyard for silver, or if you wish, I will give you another vineyard in its place.’ And he replied, ‘I will not give you my vineyard!’”

³¹And as if it were not enough for him to walk in the sins of Jeroboam son of Nebat, he even married Jezebel the daughter of Ethbaal king of the Sidonians, and he then proceeded to serve and worship Baal.

¹⁷Where you die, I will die, and there I will be buried. May the Lord punish me, and ever so severely, if anything but death separates you and me.”

¹⁰Then Ben-hadad sent another message to Ahab: “May the gods deal with me, and ever so severely, if enough dust remains of Samaria for each of my men to have a handful.”

³¹He announced, “May God punish me, and ever so severely, if the head of Elisha son of Shaphat remains on his shoulders through this day!”

¹Do not boast about tomorrow, for you do not know what a day may bring.

²⁸“Depart from me!” Pharaoh said to Moses. “Make sure you never see my face again, for on the day you see my face, you will die.”

²⁷But I know your sitting down, your going out and coming in, and your raging against Me.

²⁸Because your rage and arrogance against Me have reached My ears, I will put My hook in your nose and My bit in your mouth; I will send you back the way you came.’

³¹So that place was called Beersheba, because it was there that the two of them swore an oath.

⁷⁰But he denied it before them all: “I do not know what you are talking about.”

⁷¹When Peter had gone out to the gateway, another servant girl saw him and said to the people there, “This man was with Jesus of Nazareth.”

⁵⁶But this has all happened so that the writings of the prophets would be fulfilled.” Then all the disciples deserted Him and fled.

⁷or because of these surpassingly great revelations. So to keep me from becoming conceited, I was given a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me.

¹²“I, even I, am He who comforts you. Why should you be afraid of mortal man, of a son of man who withers like grass?

¹³But you have forgotten the Lord, your Maker, who stretched out the heavens and laid the foundations of the earth. You live in terror all day long because of the fury of the oppressor who is bent on destruction. But where is the fury of the oppressor?

¹²And Amaziah said to Amos, “Go away, you seer! Flee to the land of Judah; earn your bread there and do your prophesying there.

¹³But never prophesy at Bethel again, because it is the sanctuary of the king and the temple of the kingdom.”

³And now, O Lord, please take my life from me, for it is better for me to die than to live.”

¹⁵If this is how You are going to treat me, please kill me right now—if I have found favor in Your eyes—and let me not see my own wretchedness.”

⁸As the sun was rising, God appointed a scorching east wind, and the sun beat down on Jonah’s head so that he grew faint and wished to die, saying, “It is better for me to die than to live.”

¹⁴Cursed be the day I was born! May the day my mother bore me never be blessed.

¹⁵Cursed be the man who brought my father the news, saying, “A son is born to you,” bringing him great joy.

²¹For to me, to live is Christ, and to die is gain.

²²But if I go on living in the body, this will mean fruitful labor for me. So what shall I choose? I do not know.

¹⁴and went after the man of God. He found him sitting under an oak tree and asked, “Are you the man of God who came from Judah?” “I am,” he replied.

⁷The angel of the Lord encamps around those who fear Him, and he delivers them.

⁷Suddenly an angel of the Lord appeared and a light shone in the cell. He tapped Peter on the side and woke him up, saying, “Get up quickly.” And the chains fell off his wrists.

⁵Keep your lives free from the love of money and be content with what you have, for God has said: “Never will I leave you, never will I forsake you.”

¹¹On reaching a certain place, he spent the night there because the sun had set. And taking one of the stones from that place, he put it under his head and lay down to sleep.

¹²And Jacob had a dream about a ladder that rested on the earth with its top reaching up to heaven, and God’s angels were going up and down the ladder.

⁹I heard the sound of his words, and as I listened, I fell into a deep sleep, with my face to the ground.

¹⁰Suddenly, a hand touched me and set me trembling on my hands and knees.

¹⁴Are not the angels ministering spirits sent to serve those who will inherit salvation?

¹¹Then the devil left Him, and angels came and ministered to Him.

⁶The ravens would bring him bread and meat in the morning and evening, and he would drink from the brook.

⁹When they landed, they saw a charcoal fire there with fish on it, and some bread.

²“I have compassion for this crowd, because they have already been with Me three days and have nothing to eat.

³If I send them home hungry, they will faint along the way. For some of them have come a great distance.”

³²For the Gentiles strive after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them.

⁹“Get up and go to Zarephath of Sidon, and stay there. Behold, I have commanded a widow there to provide for you.”

¹⁰So Elijah got up and went to Zarephath. When he arrived at the city gate, there was a widow gathering sticks. Elijah called to her and said, “Please bring me a little water in a cup, so that I may drink.”

¹³As a father has compassion on his children, so the Lord has compassion on those who fear Him.

¹⁴For He knows our frame; He is mindful that we are dust.

²⁵May the bolts of your gate be iron and bronze, and may your strength match your days.”

¹⁸Then I fell down before the Lord for forty days and forty nights, as I had done the first time. I did not eat bread or drink water because of all the sin you had committed in doing what was evil in the sight of the Lord and provoking Him to anger.

²⁸So Moses was there with the Lord forty days and forty nights without eating bread or drinking water. He wrote on the tablets the words of the covenant—the Ten Commandments.

¹⁸Moses entered the cloud as he went up on the mountain, and he remained on the mountain forty days and forty nights.

¹Meanwhile, Moses was shepherding the flock of his father-in-law Jethro, the priest of Midian. He led the flock to the far side of the wilderness and came to Horeb, the mountain of God.

²After fasting forty days and forty nights, He was hungry.

²where for forty days He was tempted by the devil. He ate nothing during those days, and when they had ended, He was hungry.

⁹But the Lord God called out to the man, “Where are you?”

¹³When Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his cloak and went out and stood at the mouth of the cave. Suddenly a voice came to him and said, “What are you doing here, Elijah?”

¹⁸Now what will you gain on your way to Egypt to drink the waters of the Nile? What will you gain on your way to Assyria to drink the waters of the Euphrates?

⁸“Hagar, servant of Sarai,” he said, “where have you come from, and where are you going?” “I am running away from my mistress Sarai,” she replied.

²¹The Lord continued, “There is a place near Me where you are to stand upon a rock,

²²and when My glory passes by, I will put you in a cleft of the rock and cover you with My hand until I have passed by.

³⁸The world was not worthy of them. They wandered in deserts and mountains, and hid in caves and holes in the ground.

⁴for when Jezebel had slaughtered the prophets of the Lord, Obadiah had taken a hundred prophets and hidden them, fifty men per cave, providing them with food and water.)

¹⁴For you must not worship any other god, for the Lord, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God.

²²Then Elijah said to the people, “I am the only remaining prophet of the Lord, but Baal has four hundred and fifty prophets.

²God did not reject His people, whom He foreknew. Do you not know what the Scripture says about Elijah, how he appealed to God against Israel:

³“Lord, they have killed Your prophets and torn down Your altars. I am the only one left, and they are seeking my life as well”?

³⁰Then Elijah said to all the people, “Come near to me.” So all the people approached him, and he repaired the altar of the Lord that had been torn down.

⁵You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on their children to the third and fourth generations of those who hate Me,

⁴I looked and saw a whirlwind coming from the north, a great cloud with fire flashing back and forth and brilliant light all around it. In the center of the fire was a gleam like amber,

³Our God approaches and will not be silent! Consuming fire precedes Him, and a tempest rages around Him.

³⁰And the Lord will cause His majestic voice to be heard and His mighty arm to be revealed, striking in angry wrath with a flame of consuming fire, and with cloudburst, storm, and hailstones.

¹Then the Lord answered Job out of the whirlwind and said:

²⁶At that time His voice shook the earth, but now He has promised, “Once more I will shake not only the earth, but heaven as well.”

²Be ready in the morning, and come up on Mount Sinai to present yourself before Me on the mountaintop.

¹⁶It stood still, but I could not discern its appearance; a form loomed before my eyes, and I heard a whispering voice:

⁶So he said to me, “This is the word of the Lord to Zerubbabel: Not by might nor by power, but by My Spirit, says the Lord of Hosts.

³³Has a people ever heard the voice of God speaking out of the fire, as you have, and lived?

¹¹You came near and stood at the base of the mountain, a mountain blazing with fire to the heavens, with black clouds and deep darkness.

¹²And the Lord spoke to you out of the fire. You heard the sound of the words but saw no form; there was only a voice.

⁷Surely no fear of me should terrify you; nor will my hand be heavy upon you.

⁶Then the Lord passed in front of Moses and called out: “The Lord, the Lord God, is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in loving devotion and faithfulness,

⁹There Elijah entered a cave and spent the night. And the word of the Lord came to him, saying, “What are you doing here, Elijah?”

⁵Then I said: “Woe is me, for I am ruined, because I am a man of unclean lips dwelling among a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of Hosts.”

²Above Him stood seraphim, each having six wings: With two wings they covered their faces, with two they covered their feet, and with two they were flying.

¹⁵When they had finished eating, Jesus asked Simon Peter, “Simon son of John, do you love Me more than these?” “Yes, Lord,” he answered, “You know I love You.” Jesus replied, “Feed My lambs.”

¹⁶Jesus asked a second time, “Simon son of John, do you love Me?” “Yes, Lord,” he answered, “You know I love You.” Jesus told him, “Shepherd My sheep.”

⁸“Hagar, servant of Sarai,” he said, “where have you come from, and where are you going?” “I am running away from my mistress Sarai,” she replied.

⁴²So Ahab went up to eat and drink. But Elijah climbed to the summit of Carmel, bent down on the ground, and put his face between his knees.

³⁰Ships of Kittim will come against him, and he will lose heart. Then he will turn back and rage against the holy covenant and do damage. So he will return and show favor to those who forsake the holy covenant.

⁷But they, like Adam, have transgressed the covenant; there they were unfaithful to Me.

⁹There Elijah entered a cave and spent the night. And the word of the Lord came to him, saying, “What are you doing here, Elijah?”

¹⁰“I have been very zealous for the Lord, the God of Hosts,” he replied, “but the Israelites have forsaken Your covenant, torn down Your altars, and killed Your prophets with the sword. I am the only one left, and they are seeking my life as well.”

²⁰When I have brought them into the land that I swore to give their fathers, a land flowing with milk and honey, they will eat their fill and prosper. Then they will turn to other gods and worship them, and they will reject Me and break My covenant.

⁴Alas, O sinful nation, a people laden with iniquity, a brood of evildoers, children who act corruptly! They have forsaken the Lord; they have despised the Holy One of Israel and turned their backs on Him.

¹For Zion’s sake I will not keep silent, and for Jerusalem’s sake I will not keep still, until her righteousness shines like a bright light, her salvation like a blazing torch.

¹⁰See, I have appointed you today over nations and kingdoms to uproot and tear down, to destroy and overthrow, to build and plant.”

¹This is what the Lord says to Cyrus His anointed, whose right hand I have grasped to subdue nations before him, to disarm kings, to open the doors before him, so that the gates will not be shut:

⁷Then Elisha came to Damascus while Ben-hadad king of Aram was sick, and the king was told, “The man of God has come here.”

⁸So the king said to Hazael, “Take a gift in your hand, go to meet the man of God, and inquire of the Lord through him, ‘Will I recover from this illness?’”

¹⁵During the night, Abram divided his forces and routed Chedorlaomer’s army, pursuing them as far as Hobah, north of Damascus.

⁴So I will send fire upon the house of Hazael to consume the citadels of Ben-hadad.

¹⁴Thus Jehu son of Jehoshaphat, the son of Nimshi, conspired against Joram. (Now Joram and all Israel had been defending Ramoth-gilead against Hazael king of Aram,

¹Now Elisha the prophet summoned one of the sons of the prophets and said to him, “Tuck your cloak under your belt, take this flask of oil, and go to Ramoth-gilead.

²When you arrive, look for Jehu son of Jehoshaphat, the son of Nimshi. Go in, get him away from his companions, and take him to an inner room.

⁹After they had crossed over, Elijah said to Elisha, “Tell me, what can I do for you before I am taken away from you?” “Please, let me inherit a double portion of your spirit,” Elisha replied.

¹⁹So Elijah departed and found Elisha son of Shaphat. He was plowing with twelve teams of oxen, and he was with the twelfth team. Elijah passed by him and threw his cloak around him.

²⁰So Elisha left the oxen, ran after Elijah, and said, “Please let me kiss my father and mother goodbye, and then I will follow you.” “Go on back,” Elijah replied, “for what have I done to you?”

¹⁵When the sons of the prophets who were watching him from Jericho saw what had happened, they said, “The spirit of Elijah rests on Elisha.” And they went to meet him and bowed down to the ground before him.

²²And when the three hundred rams’ horns sounded, the Lord set all the men in the camp against one another with their swords. The army fled to Beth-shittah toward Zererah as far as the border of Abel-meholah near Tabbath.

²⁷And there were many lepers in Israel in the time of Elisha the prophet. Yet not one of them was cleansed—only Naaman the Syrian.”

²²And Hazael king of Aram oppressed Israel throughout the reign of Jehoahaz.

³So the anger of the Lord burned against Israel, and He delivered them continually into the hands of Hazael king of Aram and his son Ben-hadad.

¹²“Why is my lord weeping?” asked Hazael. “Because I know the evil you will do to the Israelites,” Elisha replied. “You will set fire to their fortresses, kill their young men with the sword, dash their little ones to pieces, and rip open their pregnant women.”

⁵Therefore I have hewn them by the prophets; I have slain them by the words of My mouth, and My judgments go forth like lightning.

³²In those days the Lord began to reduce the size of Israel. Hazael defeated the Israelites throughout their territory

¹⁷Terror and pit and snare await you, O dweller of the earth.

¹⁸Whoever flees the sound of panic will fall into the pit, and whoever climbs from the pit will be caught in the snare. For the windows of heaven are open, and the foundations of the earth are shaken.

⁴And what was the divine reply to him? “I have reserved for Myself seven thousand men who have not bowed the knee to Baal.”

⁵In the same way, at the present time there is a remnant chosen by grace.

⁹Unless the Lord of Hosts had left us a few survivors, we would have become like Sodom, we would have resembled Gomorrah.

²⁰On that day the remnant of Israel and the survivors of the house of Jacob will no longer depend on him who struck them, but they will truly rely on the Lord, the Holy One of Israel.

²¹A remnant will return—a remnant of Jacob—to the Mighty God.

²Now they sin more and more and make for themselves cast images, idols skillfully made from their silver, all of them the work of craftsmen. People say of them, “They offer human sacrifice and kiss the calves!”

¹²Kiss the Son, lest He be angry and you perish in your rebellion, when His wrath ignites in an instant. Blessed are all who take refuge in Him.

¹⁰that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth,

⁸And Elijah took his cloak, rolled it up, and struck the waters, which parted to the right and to the left, so that the two of them crossed over on dry ground.

¹³Elisha also picked up the cloak that had fallen from Elijah, and he went back and stood on the bank of the Jordan.

¹⁴Then he took the cloak of Elijah that had fallen from him and struck the waters. “Where now is the Lord, the God of Elijah?” he asked. And when he had struck the waters, they parted to the right and to the left, and Elisha crossed over.

⁷⁰He chose David His servant and took him from the sheepfolds;

⁷¹from tending the ewes He brought him to be shepherd of His people Jacob, of Israel His inheritance.

¹⁴“What does he look like?” asked Saul. “An old man is coming up,” she replied. “And he is wearing a robe.” So Saul knew that it was Samuel, and he bowed facedown in reverence.

¹³When Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his cloak and went out and stood at the mouth of the cave. Suddenly a voice came to him and said, “What are you doing here, Elijah?”

¹¹Then the angel of the Lord came and sat down under the oak in Ophrah that belonged to Joash the Abiezrite, where his son Gideon was threshing wheat in a winepress to hide it from the Midianites.

²¹Another of His disciples requested, “Lord, first let me go and bury my father.”

²²But Jesus told him, “Follow Me, and let the dead bury their own dead.”

⁶¹Still another said, “I will follow You, Lord; but first let me bid farewell to my family.”

⁶²Then Jesus declared, “No one who puts his hand to the plow and then looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.”

³⁷They all wept openly as they embraced Paul and kissed him.

²⁰And at once they left their nets and followed Him.

²⁷“Look,” Peter replied, “we have left everything to follow You. What then will there be for us?”

⁹As Jesus went on from there, He saw a man named Matthew sitting at the tax booth. “Follow Me,” He told him, and Matthew got up and followed Him.

²²Araunah said to David, “May my lord the king take whatever seems good to him and offer it up. Here are the oxen for a burnt offering and the threshing sledges and ox yokes for the wood.

¹¹Only Luke is with me. Get Mark and bring him with you, because he is useful to me in the ministry.

¹³I would have liked to keep him with me, so that on your behalf he could minister to me in my chains for the gospel.

¹³So Moses set out with Joshua his attendant and went up on the mountain of God.

²⁸and Levi got up, left everything, and followed Him.

²⁹Then Levi hosted a great banquet for Jesus at his house. A large crowd of tax collectors was there, along with others who were eating with them.

⁴³“Go and look toward the sea,” he said to his servant. So the servant went and looked, and he said, “There is nothing there.” Seven times Elijah said, “Go back.”