Abraham approached the LORD and asked, "Are you really going to destroy the innocent with the guilty?

For rulers are not to be feared by those who do good, but by those who do evil. Would you like to be unafraid of those in authority? Then do what is good, and they will praise you,

because they are God's servants working for your own good. But if you do evil, then be afraid of them, because their power to punish is real. They are God's servants and carry out God's punishment on those who do evil.

for kings and all others who are in authority, that we may live a quiet and peaceful life with all reverence toward God and with proper conduct.

The towns of Israel stood abandoned, Deborah; they stood empty until you came, came like a mother for Israel.

You really are your mother's daughter. She detested her husband and her children. You are like your sisters, who hated their husbands and their children. You and your sister cities had a Hittite mother and an Amorite father.

Were you satisfied to follow in their footsteps and copy their disgusting actions? No, in only a little while you were acting worse than they were in everything you did.

She and her daughters were proud because they had plenty to eat and lived in peace and quiet, but they did not take care of the poor and the underprivileged.

Hushai added, "Quick, now! Send a message to David not to spend the night at the river crossings in the wilderness, but to cross the Jordan at once, so that he and his men won't all be caught and killed."

and swallowed them and their families, together with all of Korah's followers and their possessions.

The ground opened and swallowed them, and they died with Korah and his followers when fire destroyed 250 men; they became a warning to the people.

then they would have swallowed us alive in their furious anger against us;

The king of Babylonia cut Jerusalem up and ate it. He emptied the city like a jar; like a monster he swallowed it. He took what he wanted and threw the rest away.

I will punish Bel, the god of Babylonia, and make him give up his stolen goods; the nations will not worship him any more. "Babylon's walls have fallen.

The Lord destroyed without mercy every village in Judah And tore down the forts that defended the land. He brought disgrace on the kingdom and its rulers.

Like an enemy, the Lord has destroyed Israel; He has left her forts and palaces in ruins. He has brought on the people of Judah unending sorrow.

All your enemies mock you and glare at you with hate. They curl their lips and sneer, "We have destroyed it! This is the day we have waited for!"

So when this takes place, and the mortal has been changed into the immortal, then the scripture will come true: "Death is destroyed; victory is complete!"

While we live in this earthly tent, we groan with a feeling of oppression; it is not that we want to get rid of our earthly body, but that we want to have the heavenly one put on over us, so that what is mortal will be transformed by life.

So David summoned the people of Gibeon and said to them, "What can I do for you? I want to make up for the wrong that was done to you, so that you will bless the LORD's people."

Now, if you will obey me and keep my covenant, you will be my own people. The whole earth is mine, but you will be my chosen people,

a people dedicated to me alone, and you will serve me as priests."

but Jacob's descendants he chose for himself.

Your Majesty, listen to what I have to say. If it is the LORD who has turned you against me, an offering to him will make him change his mind; but if some people have done it, may the LORD's curse fall on them. For they have driven me out from the LORD's land to a country where I can only worship foreign gods.