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The Listener’s Bible®: NIV Edition

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<div class="version vid111 iso6393eng" data-vid="111" data-iso6393="eng">
 <div class="book bk1KI">
 <div class="chapter ch12" data-usfm="1KI.12">
 <div class="label">12</div><div class="s1">Israel Rebels Against Rehoboam</div><div class="p"> 1Rehoboam went to Shechem, for all Israel had gone there to make him king. 2When Jeroboam son of Nebat heard this (he was still in Egypt, where he had fled from King Solomon), he returned from#12:2 Or he remained in Egypt. 3So they sent for Jeroboam, and he and the whole assembly of Israel went to Rehoboam and said to him: 4&#8220;Your father put a heavy yoke on us, but now lighten the harsh labor and the heavy yoke he put on us, and we will serve you.&#8221;</div><div class="p"> 5Rehoboam answered, &#8220;Go away for three days and then come back to me.&#8221; So the people went away.</div><div class="p"> 6Then King Rehoboam consulted the elders who had served his father Solomon during his lifetime. &#8220;How would you advise me to answer these people?&#8221; he asked.</div><div class="p"> 7They replied, &#8220;If today you will be a servant to these people and serve them and give them a favorable answer, they will always be your servants.&#8221;</div><div class="p"> 8But Rehoboam rejected the advice the elders gave him and consulted the young men who had grown up with him and were serving him. 9He asked them, &#8220;What is your advice? How should we answer these people who say to me, &#8216;Lighten the yoke your father put on us&#8217;?&#8221;</div><div class="p"> 10The young men who had grown up with him replied, &#8220;These people have said to you, &#8216;Your father put a heavy yoke on us, but make our yoke lighter.&#8217; Now tell them, &#8216;My little finger is thicker than my father&#8217;s waist. 11My father laid on you a heavy yoke; I will make it even heavier. My father scourged you with whips; I will scourge you with scorpions.&#8217;&#8198;&#8221;</div><div class="p"> 12Three days later Jeroboam and all the people returned to Rehoboam, as the king had said, &#8220;Come back to me in three days.&#8221; 13The king answered the people harshly. Rejecting the advice given him by the elders, 14he followed the advice of the young men and said, &#8220;My father made your yoke heavy; I will make it even heavier. My father scourged you with whips; I will scourge you with scorpions.&#8221; 15So the king did not listen to the people, for this turn of events was from the Lord, to fulfill the word the Lord had spoken to Jeroboam son of Nebat through Ahijah the Shilonite.</div><div class="p"> 16When all Israel saw that the king refused to listen to them, they answered the king:</div><div class="q1">&#8220;What share do we have in David,</div><div class="q2">what part in Jesse&#8217;s son?</div><div class="q1">To your tents, Israel!</div><div class="q2">Look after your own house, David!&#8221;</div><div class="m">So the Israelites went home. 17But as for the Israelites who were living in the towns of Judah, Rehoboam still ruled over them.</div><div class="p"> 18King Rehoboam sent out Adoniram,#12:18 Some Septuagint manuscripts and Syriac (see also 4:6 and 5:14); Hebrew Adoram who was in charge of forced labor, but all Israel stoned him to death. King Rehoboam, however, managed to get into his chariot and escape to Jerusalem. 19So Israel has been in rebellion against the house of David to this day.</div><div class="p"> 20When all the Israelites heard that Jeroboam had returned, they sent and called him to the assembly and made him king over all Israel. Only the tribe of Judah remained loyal to the house of David.</div><div class="p"> 21When Rehoboam arrived in Jerusalem, he mustered all Judah and the tribe of Benjamin&#8212;a hundred and eighty thousand able young men&#8212;to go to war against Israel and to regain the kingdom for Rehoboam son of Solomon.</div><div class="p"> 22But this word of God came to Shemaiah the man of God: 23&#8220;Say to Rehoboam son of Solomon king of Judah, to all Judah and Benjamin, and to the rest of the people, 24&#8216;This is what the Lord says: Do not go up to fight against your brothers, the Israelites. Go home, every one of you, for this is my doing.&#8217;&#8198;&#8221; So they obeyed the word of the Lord and went home again, as the Lord had ordered.</div><div class="s1">Golden Calves at Bethel and Dan</div><div class="p"> 25Then Jeroboam fortified Shechem in the hill country of Ephraim and lived there. From there he went out and built up Peniel.#12:25 Hebrew Penuel, a variant of Peniel</div><div class="p"> 26Jeroboam thought to himself, &#8220;The kingdom will now likely revert to the house of David. 27If these people go up to offer sacrifices at the temple of the Lord in Jerusalem, they will again give their allegiance to their lord, Rehoboam king of Judah. They will kill me and return to King Rehoboam.&#8221;</div><div class="p"> 28After seeking advice, the king made two golden calves. He said to the people, &#8220;It is too much for you to go up to Jerusalem. Here are your gods, Israel, who brought you up out of Egypt.&#8221; 29One he set up in Bethel, and the other in Dan. 30And this thing became a sin; the people came to worship the one at Bethel and went as far as Dan to worship the other.#12:30 Probable reading of the original Hebrew text; Masoretic Text people went to the one as far as Dan</div><div class="p"> 31Jeroboam built shrines on high places and appointed priests from all sorts of people, even though they were not Levites. 32He instituted a festival on the fifteenth day of the eighth month, like the festival held in Judah, and offered sacrifices on the altar. This he did in Bethel, sacrificing to the calves he had made. And at Bethel he also installed priests at the high places he had made. 33On the fifteenth day of the eighth month, a month of his own choosing, he offered sacrifices on the altar he had built at Bethel. So he instituted the festival for the Israelites and went up to the altar to make offerings.</div>
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<div class="version vid111 iso6393eng" data-vid="111" data-iso6393="eng">
 <div class="book bk1KI">
 <div class="chapter ch13" data-usfm="1KI.13">
 <div class="label">13</div><div class="s1">The Man of God From Judah</div><div class="p"> 1By the word of the Lord a man of God came from Judah to Bethel, as Jeroboam was standing by the altar to make an offering. 2By the word of the Lord he cried out against the altar: &#8220;Altar, altar! This is what the Lord says: &#8216;A son named Josiah will be born to the house of David. On you he will sacrifice the priests of the high places who make offerings here, and human bones will be burned on you.&#8217;&#8198;&#8221; 3That same day the man of God gave a sign: &#8220;This is the sign the Lord has declared: The altar will be split apart and the ashes on it will be poured out.&#8221;</div><div class="p"> 4When King Jeroboam heard what the man of God cried out against the altar at Bethel, he stretched out his hand from the altar and said, &#8220;Seize him!&#8221; But the hand he stretched out toward the man shriveled up, so that he could not pull it back. 5Also, the altar was split apart and its ashes poured out according to the sign given by the man of God by the word of the Lord.</div><div class="p"> 6Then the king said to the man of God, &#8220;Intercede with the Lord your God and pray for me that my hand may be restored.&#8221; So the man of God interceded with the Lord, and the king&#8217;s hand was restored and became as it was before.</div><div class="p"> 7The king said to the man of God, &#8220;Come home with me for a meal, and I will give you a gift.&#8221;</div><div class="p"> 8But the man of God answered the king, &#8220;Even if you were to give me half your possessions, I would not go with you, nor would I eat bread or drink water here. 9For I was commanded by the word of the Lord: &#8216;You must not eat bread or drink water or return by the way you came.&#8217;&#8198;&#8221; 10So he took another road and did not return by the way he had come to Bethel.</div><div class="p"> 11Now there was a certain old prophet living in Bethel, whose sons came and told him all that the man of God had done there that day. They also told their father what he had said to the king. 12Their father asked them, &#8220;Which way did he go?&#8221; And his sons showed him which road the man of God from Judah had taken. 13So he said to his sons, &#8220;Saddle the donkey for me.&#8221; And when they had saddled the donkey for him, he mounted it 14and rode after the man of God. He found him sitting under an oak tree and asked, &#8220;Are you the man of God who came from Judah?&#8221;</div><div class="p">&#8220;I am,&#8221; he replied.</div><div class="p"> 15So the prophet said to him, &#8220;Come home with me and eat.&#8221;</div><div class="p"> 16The man of God said, &#8220;I cannot turn back and go with you, nor can I eat bread or drink water with you in this place. 17I have been told by the word of the Lord: &#8216;You must not eat bread or drink water there or return by the way you came.&#8217;&#8198;&#8221;</div><div class="p"> 18The old prophet answered, &#8220;I too am a prophet, as you are. And an angel said to me by the word of the Lord: &#8216;Bring him back with you to your house so that he may eat bread and drink water.&#8217;&#8198;&#8221; (But he was lying to him.) 19So the man of God returned with him and ate and drank in his house.</div><div class="p"> 20While they were sitting at the table, the word of the Lord came to the old prophet who had brought him back. 21He cried out to the man of God who had come from Judah, &#8220;This is what the Lord says: &#8216;You have defied the word of the Lord and have not kept the command the Lord your God gave you. 22You came back and ate bread and drank water in the place where he told you not to eat or drink. Therefore your body will not be buried in the tomb of your ancestors.&#8217;&#8198;&#8221;</div><div class="p"> 23When the man of God had finished eating and drinking, the prophet who had brought him back saddled his donkey for him. 24As he went on his way, a lion met him on the road and killed him, and his body was left lying on the road, with both the donkey and the lion standing beside it. 25Some people who passed by saw the body lying there, with the lion standing beside the body, and they went and reported it in the city where the old prophet lived.</div><div class="p"> 26When the prophet who had brought him back from his journey heard of it, he said, &#8220;It is the man of God who defied the word of the Lord. The Lord has given him over to the lion, which has mauled him and killed him, as the word of the Lord had warned him.&#8221;</div><div class="p"> 27The prophet said to his sons, &#8220;Saddle the donkey for me,&#8221; and they did so. 28Then he went out and found the body lying on the road, with the donkey and the lion standing beside it. The lion had neither eaten the body nor mauled the donkey. 29So the prophet picked up the body of the man of God, laid it on the donkey, and brought it back to his own city to mourn for him and bury him. 30Then he laid the body in his own tomb, and they mourned over him and said, &#8220;Alas, my brother!&#8221;</div><div class="p"> 31After burying him, he said to his sons, &#8220;When I die, bury me in the grave where the man of God is buried; lay my bones beside his bones. 32For the message he declared by the word of the Lord against the altar in Bethel and against all the shrines on the high places in the towns of Samaria will certainly come true.&#8221;</div><div class="p"> 33Even after this, Jeroboam did not change his evil ways, but once more appointed priests for the high places from all sorts of people. Anyone who wanted to become a priest he consecrated for the high places. 34This was the sin of the house of Jeroboam that led to its downfall and to its destruction from the face of the earth.</div>
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