Now let us make an agreement before our God. We will send away all these women and their children as you and those who respect the commands of our God advise. Let it be done to obey God’s Teachings.
Then Jehoiada made an agreement between the Lord and the king and the people that they would be the Lord’s special people. He also made an agreement between the king and the people.
“Go and ask the Lord about the words in the book that was found. Ask for me and for the people who are left alive in Israel and Judah. The Lord is very angry with us, because our ancestors did not obey the Lord’s word; they did not do everything this book says to do.”
When you heard my words against this place and its people, you became sorry for what you had done and you humbled yourself before me. You tore your clothes to show how upset you were, and you cried in my presence. This is why I have heard you, says the Lord.
Now, confess it to the Lord, the God of your ancestors. Do his will and separate yourselves from the people living around you and from your non-Jewish wives.”
So within three days all the men of Judah and Benjamin gathered in Jerusalem. It was the twentieth day of the ninth month. All the men were sitting in the open place in front of the Temple and were upset because of the meeting and because it was raining.
Everyone who trembled in fear at the word of the God of Israel gathered around me because of the unfaithfulness of the captives who had returned. I sat there in shock until the evening sacrifice.
This is what they found written in the Teachings: The Lord commanded through Moses that the people of Israel were to live in shelters during the feast of the seventh month.
My hand made all things. All things are here because I made them,” says the Lord. “These are the people I am pleased with: those who are not proud or stubborn and who fear my word.
You should follow the teachings and the agreement with the Lord. The mediums and fortune-tellers do not speak the word of the Lord, so their words are worth nothing.
He said to the man, “Go through Jerusalem and put a mark on the foreheads of the people who groan and cry about all the hateful things being done among them.”
Then they went to Joshua in the camp near Gilgal. The men said to Joshua and the Israelites, “We have traveled from a faraway country. Make a peace agreement with us.”