And the king was told, “Nathan the prophet is here.” So he went before the king and bowed with his face to the ground.

So Benaiah entered the tent of the Lord and said to Joab, “The king says, ‘Come out!’” But he answered, “No, I will die here.” Benaiah reported to the king, “This is how Joab answered me.”

Your servant is here among the people you have chosen, a great people, too numerous to count or number.

Here is the account of the forced labor King Solomon conscripted to build the Lord’s temple, his own palace, the terraces, the wall of Jerusalem, and Hazor, Megiddo and Gezer.

“What have you lacked here that you want to go back to your own country?” Pharaoh asked. “Nothing,” Hadad replied, “but do let me go!”

Here is the account of how he rebelled against the king: Solomon had built the terraces and had filled in the gap in the wall of the city of David his father.

After seeking advice, the king made two golden calves. He said to the people, “It is too much for you to go up to Jerusalem. Here are your gods, Israel, who brought you up out of Egypt.”

By the word of the Lord he cried out against the altar: “Altar, altar! This is what the Lord says: ‘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.’”

But the man of God answered the king, “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.

“Leave here, turn eastward and hide in the Kerith Ravine, east of the Jordan.

“Yes,” he replied. “Go tell your master, ‘Elijah is here.’”

But now you tell me to go to my master and say, ‘Elijah is here.’

And now you tell me to go to my master and say, ‘Elijah is here.’ He will kill me!”

Then Elijah said to all the people, “Come here to me.” They came to him, and he repaired the altar of the Lord, which had been torn down.

There he went into a cave and spent the night.

The Lord Appears to Elijah

And the word of the Lord came to him: “What are you doing here, Elijah?”

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

While your servant was busy here and there, the man disappeared.” “That is your sentence,” the king of Israel said. “You have pronounced it yourself.”

But Jehoshaphat asked, “Is there no longer a prophet of the Lord here whom we can inquire of?”