They responded to us saying, ‘We are servants of the God of heaven and earth, and we are rebuilding the House that was built many years ago. A great king of Israel built and finished it.
Do you not know that to whatever you yield yourselves as slaves for obedience, you are slaves to what you obey—whether to sin resulting in death, or to obedience resulting in righteousness?
Nebuchadnezzar then approached the door of the furnace of blazing fire and exclaimed, “Shadrach, Meshach and Abed-nego, servants of the Most High God, come out and come here!” So Shadrach, Meshach and Abed-nego came out from the middle of the fire.
If it seems bad to you to worship Adonai, then choose for yourselves today whom you will serve—whether the gods that your fathers worshipped that were beyond the River or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you are living. But as for me and my household, we will worship Adonai!”
and in the eleventh year, in the month of Bul (which is the eighth month), the House was completed in all its parts and according to all its details. So he was seven years building it.
so that I may make you take an oath by Adonai, the God of heaven and the God of earth, that you will not take a wife for my son from among the daughters of the Canaanites among whom I am dwelling.