Christ Is God's Power and Wisdom

1 Corinthians 1¹⁸The message about the cross doesn't make any sense to lost people. But for those of us who are being saved, it is God's power at work. ¹⁹As God says in the Scriptures,
"I will destroy the wisdom of all who claim to be wise.
I will confuse those who think they know so much."
²⁰What happened to those wise people? What happened to those experts in the Scriptures? What happened to the ones who think they have all the answers? Didn't God show that the wisdom of this world is foolish? ²¹God was wise and decided not to let the people of this world use their wisdom to learn about him.
Instead, God chose to save only those who believe the foolish message we preach. ²²Jews ask for miracles, and Greeks want something that sounds wise. ²³But we preach that Christ was nailed to a cross. Most Jews have problems with this, and most Gentiles think it is foolish. ²⁴Our message is God's power and wisdom for the Jews and the Greeks that he has chosen. ²⁵Even when God is foolish, he is wiser than everyone else, and even when God is weak, he is stronger than everyone else.
²⁶My dear friends, remember what you were when God chose you. The people of this world didn't think that many of you were wise. Only a few of you were in places of power, and not many of you came from important families. ²⁷But God chose the foolish things of this world to put the wise to shame. He chose the weak things of this world to put the powerful to shame.
²⁸What the world thinks is worthless, useless, and nothing at all is what God has used to destroy what the world considers important. ²⁹God did all this to keep anyone from bragging to him. ³⁰You are God's children. He sent Christ Jesus to save us and to make us wise, acceptable, and holy. ³¹So if you want to brag, do what the Scriptures say and brag about the Lord.

Jeroboam's Son Dies

1 Kings 14About the same time, Abijah son of Jeroboam got sick. ^2-3Jeroboam told his wife:

Disguise yourself so no one will know you're my wife, then go to Shiloh, where the prophet Ahijah lives. Take him ten loaves of bread, some small cakes, and honey, and ask him what will happen to our son. He can tell you, because he's the one who told me I would become king.

⁴She got ready and left for Ahijah's house in Shiloh.
Ahijah was now old and blind, ⁵but the LORD told him, "Jeroboam's wife is coming to ask about her son. I will tell you what to say to her."
Jeroboam's wife came to Ahijah's house, pretending to be someone else. ⁶But when Ahijah heard her walking up to the door, he said:

Come in! I know you're Jeroboam's wife--why are you pretending to be someone else? I have some bad news for you. ⁷Give your husband this message from the LORD God of Israel: "Jeroboam, you know that I, the LORD, chose you over anyone else to be the leader of my people Israel. ⁸I even took David's kingdom away from his family and gave it to you. But you are not like my servant David. He always obeyed me and did what was right.

⁹"You have made me very angry by rejecting me and making idols out of gold. Jeroboam, you have done more evil things than any king before you.

¹⁰"Because of this, I will destroy your family by killing every man and boy in it, whether slave or free. I will wipe out your family, just as fire burns up trash. ¹¹Dogs will eat the bodies of your relatives who die in town, and vultures will eat the bodies of those who die in the country. I, the LORD, have spoken and will not change my mind!"

¹²That's the LORD's message to your husband. As for you, go back home, and right after you get there, your son will die. ¹³Everyone in Israel will mourn at his funeral. But he will be the last one from Jeroboam's family to receive a proper burial, because he's the only one the LORD God of Israel is pleased with.

¹⁴The LORD will soon choose a new king of Israel, who will destroy Jeroboam's family. And I mean very soon. ¹⁵The people of Israel have made the LORD angry by setting up sacred poles for worshiping the goddess Asherah. So the LORD will punish them until they shake like grass in a stream. He will take them out of the land he gave to their ancestors, then scatter them as far away as the Euphrates River. ¹⁶Jeroboam sinned and caused the Israelites to sin. Now the LORD will desert Israel.

¹⁷Jeroboam's wife left and went back home to the town of Tirzah. As soon as she set foot in her house, her son died. ¹⁸Everyone in Israel came and mourned at his funeral, just as the LORD's servant Ahijah had said.

Jeroboam Dies

¹⁹Everything else Jeroboam did while he was king, including the battles he won, is written in The History of the Kings of Israel. ²⁰He was king of Israel for twenty-two years, then he died, and his son Nadab became king.

King Rehoboam of Judah
(2 Chronicles 11.5--12.16)

²¹Rehoboam son of Solomon was forty-one years old when he became king of Judah, and he ruled seventeen years from Jerusalem, the city where the LORD had chosen to be worshiped. His mother Naamah was from Ammon.
²²The people of Judah disobeyed the LORD and made him even angrier than their ancestors had. ²³They also built their own local shrines and stone images of foreign gods, and they set up sacred poles for worshiping the goddess Asherah on every hill and in the shade of large trees. ²⁴Even worse, they allowed prostitutes at the shrines, and followed the disgusting customs of the foreign nations that the LORD had forced out of Canaan.
²⁵After Rehoboam had been king for four years, King Shishak of Egypt attacked Jerusalem. ²⁶He took everything of value from the temple and the palace, including Solomon's gold shields.
²⁷Rehoboam had bronze shields made to replace the gold ones, and he ordered the guards at the city gates to keep them safe. ²⁸Whenever Rehoboam went to the LORD's temple, the guards carried the shields. But they always took them back to the guardroom as soon as he was finished.
²⁹Everything else Rehoboam did while he was king is written in The History of the Kings of Judah. ³⁰He and Jeroboam were constantly at war. ³¹Rehoboam's mother Naamah was from Ammon, but when Rehoboam died, he was buried beside his ancestors in Jerusalem. His son Abijam then became king.

Locusts and an Enemy Army

Joel 2 Sound the trumpet on Zion, the LORD's sacred hill. Warn everyone to tremble!
The judgment day of the LORD is coming soon.
²It will be dark and gloomy with storm clouds overhead.
Troops will cover the mountains like thunderclouds.
No army this powerful has ever been gathered before
or will ever be again.
³Fiery flames surround them; no one escapes.
Before they invaded, the land was like Eden;
now only a desert remains.

⁴They look like horses and charge like cavalry.
⁵They roar over mountains like noisy chariots,
or a mighty army ready for battle.
They are a forest fire that feasts on straw.
⁶The very sight of them is frightening.
⁷They climb over walls like warriors;
they march in columns and never turn aside.
⁸They charge straight ahead, without pushing each other;
even arrows and spears cannot make them retreat.
⁹They swarm over city walls and enter our homes;
they crawl in through windows, just like thieves.

¹⁰They make the earth tremble and the heavens shake;
the sun and moon turn dark, and stars stop shining.
¹¹The LORD God leads this army of countless troops,
and they obey his commands.
The day of his judgment is so terrible
that no one can stand it.