3
Now for a long while Israel [was] without the true God, and without a teaching priest, and without law;
4
but in their trouble they turned to Jehovah the God of Israel, and sought him, and he was found of them.
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And in those times there [was] no peace to him that went out nor to him that came in, but great disturbances were amongst all the inhabitants of the countries.
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And nation was broken against nation, and city against city; for God disturbed them with all manner of distress.
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But as for you, be firm and let not your hands be weak; for there is a reward for your deeds.
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And when Asa heard these words and the prophecy of Oded the prophet, he took courage, and put away the abominations out of all the land of Judah and Benjamin, and out of the cities that he had taken from mount Ephraim, and renewed the altar of Jehovah, that was before the porch of Jehovah.
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And he assembled all Judah and Benjamin, and the strangers with them out of Ephraim and Manasseh, and out of Simeon; for they fell away to him out of Israel in abundance, when they saw that Jehovah his God was with him.
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And they assembled themselves at Jerusalem in the third month of the fifteenth year of the reign of Asa.
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And they sacrificed to Jehovah in that day, of the spoil that they had brought, seven hundred oxen and seven thousand sheep.
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And they entered into a covenant to seek Jehovah the God of their fathers, with all their heart, and with all their soul,
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and that whoever would not seek Jehovah the God of Israel should be put to death, whether small or great, whether man or woman.