 Okay. Yeah. Thanks Oliver for pointing out that there was no audio. So sorry. Yeah, okay. I'll begin again. We'll start. Yeah. So before the break, we saw that the house, that the Ark of the Covenant has been placed in the house of Obed Edom. And Obed Edom and his entire household, they conduct themselves in a very honourable way, fearing God, you know, giving glory to God and everything that they do in their conduct and their choices in their everyday lifestyle. And because of the way they are living in such a God fearing manner, the Lord begins to bless Obed Edom's household. The Lord, in fact, blesses his household to such an extent that David gets to hear about it. And that is how we should be living today, you and I, who are containing the Holy Spirit inside us. We literally have the living God living in us and we should be living the way Obed Edom and his household lived for those three months where everything that they are doing, they are asking themselves, will this please the Lord or not? Is this the righteous thing to do or is it not? What action would God want us to take regarding this particular decision? In every single thing they did, they placed the Lord first. This is the fear of the Lord. This is the kind of honourable fear that we should be having towards God. Do we have it? If we do, just as Obed Edom was blessed, the Lord will be able to bless us as well. So when David hears that Obed Edom's household is being blessed, now he stops being afraid. He says, oh look, they are benefiting from all the blessings. If we bring the Ark into Jerusalem, then Jerusalem will be blessed. So now he decides, he says, no, no, we're going to bring the Ark. But this time we'll do it correctly. So in 1 Chronicles chapter 15 verses 12 to 15 is where you have the details. And now in 1 Chronicles 15, 12 to 15, David is so careful. He goes to the Levites. He says to them in verse 12, he says, sanctify yourselves. He says, the Levites are going to be carrying the Ark. He says, sanctify yourselves, prepare yourselves. And in verse 13 he says, because you did not do it the first time, the Lord our God broke out against us. Because we did not consult him about the proper order. So he says, the mistake we made the first time, let us not repeat that now. So he tells the Levites, prepare yourselves in the correct manner and correctly find out what the Lord's instructions are. And so the Levites would have consulted the earlier passage which we looked at Exodus chapter 25. They would have found out exactly how the Ark should be moved. So they would have learned all of that, prepared themselves spiritually. And now the Ark is finally brought into Jerusalem in the correct manner. Maybe we can have one person read out 1 Chronicles chapter 15 verse 15. 1 Chronicles 15, 15. And the Levites carried the Ark of God on their shoulders with their paws as Moses had commanded according to the word of the Lord. It says here that now this time, the children of the Levites, they carry the Ark on their shoulders as Moses had commanded according to the word of the Lord. They are very careful now to follow the instructions of God. Do we have that attitude today? Because we have the Holy Spirit living in us. All that we do, it should be as has been commanded according to the word of the Lord. If we are living pleasing lives like that, then the Lord will be able to release His blessings into our lives. So those were just some of the things that we could look at from the two books of Samuel. Now due to lack of time, we will move into 1 Kings and 2 Kings. So we will start off by looking at the outline structure of Kings. So the 1 Kings, we can say that the first 11 chapters can be the first section. So chapters 1 to 11 of 1 Kings, the focus is mainly on Solomon. How did Solomon become king? What were all the events and conspiracies involved in his becoming king? And then after he becomes king, how he built the temple, details about that. All the other building projects which he took up, that's also explained. And then of course we also have details about how he falls into sin and he starts worshipping other idols and all of that. So all the details of Solomon's life are given in chapters 1 to 11. And then chapters 12 to 22 is basically where you have details about how the kingdom of Israel got divided into northern Israel and southern Judah. So you have the kingdom being split into northern and southern Israel. So that is discussed in chapters 12 to 22. In the second section, you have a lot of details about Ahab, the evil king. There's also much detail about Elijah, how Elijah goes constantly again and again to Ahab, warns him, corrects him. So some details about the divided kingdom and a lot of details about Ahab's rule and also Elijah's role. These things are described in chapters 12 to 22. Coming to the structure of 2 Kings, the first 17 chapters, we have some details about the divided kingdom. Who are the kings ruling in the north? The kings who were ruling in the south, just some details, not much. But you have a lot of detail about Elijah and the ministry that he did, the miracles that he did. All those things are given in your first 17 chapters. We also see how finally the northern Israel comes under God's judgment. So most of us will already be familiar with these details. But for the small handful who may not be familiar, once the kingdom gets divided into the northern Israel and southern Israel, northern Israel declares Samaria as their capital. And southern Israel is basically where you have Jerusalem. So Jerusalem becomes the capital of southern Israel and it's usually known as the nation of Judah. So while the term Israel is generally used for northern Israel, the term Judah is used for the southern kingdom. So what we learn is that most of the kings of the northern Israel don't bother to follow the Lord. They don't honor God. On the other hand, in southern Israel, at least some of the kings choose to stay loyal to the Lord. And so God declares judgment against northern Israel. He says to the people, if you do not repent, if you don't change your ways, I will bring a powerful army against you and you will be defeated. You will be taken away as slaves from this land and you will have to end up in some foreign country somewhere else. So that is the judgment which is declared against the northern kingdom. And so in this first 17 chapters, we see how the kings continue to sin against God in northern Israel. The people also, the priests also do not follow the instructions of the Lord. Until finally, we see the last king of the northern kingdom Hoshia, a man named Hoshia. He's the last king during whose reign you have the Assyrians coming and they defeat the northern Israelites and they take them away as slaves to Assyria. So that is the end of the northern kingdom. So now only the southern kingdom is left. So in chapters 18 to 25, you have details being given about the southern kingdom. So that would be the structure of your second kings. So let's look at some of the main events which we find in the two books of the kings. How did Solomon come to the throne? In the same way, David's ascension to the throne was not easy. In the same way, there are many complications involved in Solomon coming to the throne. In Solomon's case, the main opposition is from one of his older brothers. You know, David had many wives. So all these wives would have had many sons. But one of the more important sons was somebody named Adonija. So Adonija has this desire to be king. So in the very first chapter, we see that Adonija tries to hatch a small conspiracy. He takes the support of David's commander Joab. So along with the support of Joab, the commander of David. And along with the support of Abiathar the priest, Adonija establishes himself. Announces himself as king. So however, we learn in chapter one, first king's chapter one that some people choose to remain loyal to David. Because David had declared that the actual king should be Solomon. Because God himself said that Solomon should be the one to come to the throne. So while you have Joab and Abiathar conspiring along with Adonija to put him on the throne. We have some faithful people who are mentioned in first king's chapter one, verse six or verse eight, I think. Where it says, you know, Zadok the priest, Nathan the prophet and David's small army unit, his special guard. They remain faithful to David. So Nathan comes to Bathsheba and gives a warning saying, see Adonija has hatched a conspiracy. He's now going to establish himself as king. Once he establishes himself as king, he's going to kill Solomon obviously. Because you can't allow your competition to stay alive. So Nathan comes and warns Bathsheba and he says, you know, the king David is probably not even aware that all this is going on. Because by that time King David is very old. He cannot even get up from his bed is basically bedridden. So Nathan gives advice to Bathsheba and says, go to the king, tell him what has happened. Tell him what Adonija is planning to do. Otherwise you and your son will be killed by Adonija. So Bathsheba goes to the king. She tells him what is happening and the king says, no, the Lord wanted Solomon to be on the throne. So Solomon should be made king. And so you have this faithful people Zadok the priest, Nathan the prophet and some of the other faithful followers of David. They all take Solomon to a place called Gaihorn and over there Solomon is anointed as the new king. And this is the details that we have in 1 Kings chapter 1 verses 39 and 40. If someone can read out 1 Kings chapter 1 verses 39 and 40. Zadok the priest took the horn of oil from the dead and anointed Solomon. Then they blow the trumpet and all the people said, Long live King Solomon. And all the people went off after him playing on pipes and rejoicing with great joy. So that was split by dead noise. Okay, so it says over here that these faithful followers of David, they take Solomon to Gaihorn. They anoint him as king and then there is a celebration. The trumpets are blown. You know the people start playing music and it says that the celebration was so loud that the ground shook is what it says. And while this celebration is going on, there's another celebration going on by Adonija and his party. Adonija has declared himself as king. So he's having his celebration party in another place. And so he hears the noise which is coming from Gaihorn and he says, What is that noise? What's going on over there? And so then somebody comes to him and says, You know what Solomon has been anointed as king. And David now knows about the conspiracy. So David has given orders for Solomon to be anointed as king. Now you're in big trouble. And what does Adonija do? He's terrified. He goes running to the tabernacle and in the courtyard you have the altar. He goes and he clutches hold of the horns of the altar. Now the altar had, I don't know, maybe we can call it poles. You know what, on the four corners of the altar, the four corners of the altar, you would have four poles. Here they're called the horns, the horns of the altar because they're shaped like a horn. So if anyone holds on to that, it's like symbolically saying, I'm crying out to the Lord for mercy. May my life be spared. So Adonija goes running into the courtyard and he clutches hold of the horns. And then because he's crying out for mercy, Solomon chooses to show mercy. And this is what Solomon says in, yeah, we're still in chapter one. And then if you were to look at verse 40, 49, 50, there onwards. And then when you come to verse 52 is where Solomon says, if he shows himself to be worthy, not a hair of his head will fall to the ground. But if evil is found in him, he will die. So Solomon behaves honorably. He does not kill Adonija because Adonija has gone over there and is clutching onto the horns, crying out for mercy. Solomon says, all right, if he continues to behave himself, if he does not, you know, try to create any problem for my throne, let him live. I will allow him to live. But if he tries to do any conspiracy once again, he will be killed. And we see Adonija showing his true colors. He's not grateful for the mercy which Solomon has shown. And so he comes up with another tactic and we see that in chapter two. So a lot of details were involved in David becoming king, Solomon becoming king. It's not just a simple procedure where the person just went and sat on the throne. A lot of events were involved. So in chapter two, we see Adonija going to Bathsheba. And he says, you know, I'm one of the older sons. I am the one who should have been on the throne. But then it's okay. I mean, you know, David wanted Solomon to be on the throne. So fine, I lost the throne. But you know, one small favor at least can I have. You know, the concubine whom David married in his old age, Abhisag the Shunamite. Can I have her as my wife is what is the request that Adonija goes and makes to Bathsheba. And Bathsheba very innocently goes to her son and says, you know, poor Adonija. He's asking for one request. He's saying, you know, can we have give the concubine? You know, who used to be the concubine of David. Can we give him to, can we give her to Adonija? And King Solomon says to his mother in verse 22, he says, if we give the concubine to him, it's like a declaration saying, fine, you take over the kingship. You know, it's such a very foolish thing to say. So that's exactly what he says. He says, why do you request Abhisag the Shunamite for Adonija? You might as well request the kingdom for him. After all, he's my older brother. And so, you know, King Solomon is very upset with this tactic which Adonija has come up with. And so now what does Adonija do this time? Last time he went running into the courtyard and he caught hold of the altar. Now what does he do? He actually goes into the holy place. You know, the tabernacle has got two sections. You have the holy place and the most holy place. So we see him this time. He goes into the holy place and the altar which is over there. He goes and flutters on to that. And again, he's hoping that there will be mercy shown to him. But now, there's no mercy shown to him. In fact, you know, Benaiah the priest is given instruction. Go inside. Go inside the holy place. Kill the man exactly, you know, right where he is. Kill him because he has again and again tried to conspire against God's appointed king. And so we see that, you know, Adonija is killed. So we see the treachery of this Adonija. And Solomon is very honorable in his first few years. So we see that. I mean, we are very familiar with that story. You know, if that would be in your first Kings chapter three, when Solomon is appointed as king is so grateful to the Lord for giving such a great responsibility to somebody who is so small and ordinary like him. You know, he understands the magnitude of the privilege which is being given to him. And so he uses all these words. In fact, it says in verse four, you know, first Kings chapter three, verse four, it says that he was so grateful that he offers a thousand burnt offerings, you know, on the altar at Gibeon. He is that humbled by what the Lord has done for him. And he says, you know, in verse seven, he says, I'm only a little child and I do not know how to carry out my duties. And so he says in verse nine, he asks the Lord and he says, Lord, you give me a discerning heart so that I will be able to govern your people in the right way. You know, this is the wording that he uses over there in verse nine. First Kings chapter three, verse nine, he says, for who is able to govern this great people of yours? He doesn't say they are my people. He says, Lord, I know that these Israelites are your people and I have to govern them. Lord, I want to do it in a proper way, in an honorable way. You give me discernment of heart or Lord so that I will be able to lead these people in the correct manner. Now that should be the attitude of Christian leaders today. You know, we have mega pastors, mega preachers and they say, my people they'll say, you know, but actually the congregation is not their people. The congregation is the Lord's people. Their responsibility is just to govern these people, lead them, you know, mentor them, teach them the ways of God, show them how to disciple others. That's all. They are meant to be more like a supervisor and a teacher, not really a king. So a Christian leader must always be aware that the people whom they are ministering to, they are God's people, not their people, not their personal property to be controlled and ruled. So that should be the correct attitude. So the Lord is very pleased with Solomon's humble attitude. And so the Lord says in verse 12, yes, I will give you a wise and discerning heart. And then in the next verse, the Lord also says, even though you did not ask me for wealth and honour, I will give you those things as well. And this is how Solomon starts off his kingship. But then later after his death and Rehoboam is getting ready to climb on the throne. What do the people come and say to Rehoboam? They say your father Solomon put so many taxes on us that we could not even bear the weight of it. Will you show more mercy? Will you reduce the taxes that we will be able to support our households? So what happened to this man who said, Lord, I have to govern your people. Give me a discerning heart so that I know I'm able to lead them in the correct manner. What happened to him? Somewhere along the way, he began to put such heavy taxes on them that the people could not even bear it. What happened? It was a slow, gradual backsliding. He takes seven years to build the temple of the Lord. And then how many years does he take to build his own palace? Anybody remembers? He spends 13 years, almost double what he spent on building the temple of the Lord. He takes seven years to build the temple of the Lord. He takes 13 years to build himself a grand palace and he builds one palace for the Pharaoh's daughter because he has gone and married the Pharaoh's daughter. What did the Lord say? The Lord said, when you marry, you should marry from the people of Israel, not outsiders, not idol worshipers. What has this man done? He's already gone and married a pagan princess. Why does he do that? Because that's basically what all the kings are doing around him. The nations, the kings, they establish a political partnership, a political alliance with the other nation by marrying into their families. So, in this way, Solomon marries a series of different princesses from different nations. Basically, he's forging partnerships with them. Nowadays, when we have international treaties, we just have signing of papers, no marriages, thankfully. But in those days, if you wanted to establish an international relation with another nation, there would be a marriage alliance involved. So, this man is doing it for political reasons. Where is the need for him to do this? The Lord has said that throne is yours, your kingdom is safe, nobody will even attack. He's given that promise that his will be a reign of peace. There will be no war during his lifetime. This is in 1st Chronicles, chapter 22, verse 9. The Lord promises him that he will have peace on every side. He doesn't have to worry about being attacked by any of the enemies. So, where is the need for him to go and establish his international alliances? Somewhere along the way, he stopped trusting the Lord. He thought, if I can build up my position, if I can make myself secure, if I can have partnership with all these people, then nobody will fight against me. From a man who trusted the Lord, now he's fallen into this mode of making one political alliance after another to get the favor of humans. So, instead of building these international relations, if he had instead built his relationship with the Lord and made that strong and secure, that would have benefited both him and the nation. And the same lesson can even apply to us. Are we so desperate to win the favor of people? Are we so eager to get the contact of the influential people in ministry circles and make friends with them? Because if you have good connections, then you can rise up and do more things for the Lord. Is that the attitude? Rather than building our relationship with people, with the idea of promoting ourselves, if we can just confine ourselves to strengthening the vertical relationship with the Lord, he will take care of the ministry. You don't need powerful contacts. You don't need powerful contributors who can pour a lot of money into your ministry. You don't need the horizontal partnerships. What you actually need is that vertical partnership. If that is strong and secure, the funds will come and the funds have to come. When you need a new opening into a new place, you will get the opening irrespective of whether people are backing you up or not. Because that partnership is strong and secure. So we see Solomon has fallen away. He's gotten into all these political alliances. And gradually, obviously, to please them, he would have also started participating in their pujas. And that is how he ends up in complete idol worship. Now, another thing that we learn is that he builds all kinds of expensive gardens in Jerusalem, which would have cost a lot of money. And then it says that he purchased many, many expensive Arabian horses. Now, what has God told him? There is not going to be any warfare during his reign. So why is he buying those expensive Arabian horses? Not because there's going to be any war, just status symbol. Like people nowadays, they collect cars, right? So he wanted to collect horses just for status. He's not even going to have to fight any battles. God is going to take care of him, but this man is making a collection of horses. And who's paying for all of these fancy things? The people. They are being taxed very, very heavily so that he can collect the funds to do all these things to promote himself. And this is the man who said in the beginning, Lord, they are your people. I want to govern them in a way which is correct. You help me. How far he has fallen. How very far he has fallen. Now, he's no longer leading those people, not shepherding them. In fact, those poor people, they say your father was so harsh. Will you at least show us some kindness is what they ask. So Solomon is a complete disgrace to the name of the Lord. He's not the kind of king that the Lord had wanted him to be originally. So we see the insecurity of Solomon. And then we see that same insecurity also in Jeroboam. So after Solomon's death, Rehoboam, his son is supposed to come to the throne. But the Lord is very displeased with the behavior of Solomon. And so the Lord says only Judah and Benjamin will remain under the Davidic lineage. The other 10 tribes will be given to somebody else. And so in first things chapter 11 is where you have the story about the rise of Jeroboam. Jeroboam was basically an official working for Solomon. When Solomon sees how talented Jeroboam is, he decides to appoint him as the in-charge of one of his labor forces. Solomon had a lot of labor forces because he had all these fancy building projects. So he had a lot of labor forces. And so one of the officers in charge of one of the labor forces was Jeroboam. And God decides to choose that official to be the king of the 10 tribes. It's a great honor that the Lord is planning on bestowing upon this man. And so one day when Jeroboam is going someplace, you know, is going out of Jerusalem to another place. On the way in chapter 11, we see this first in chapter 11. Ahija the prophet of Shiloh comes to him and Ahija the prophet tells him, God is going to take away 10 tribes from the Davidic lineage and he will be giving it to you. And God makes very, very lavish promises to Jeroboam. This is what the Lord says to him in 1 Kings chapter 11 verses 37, 38, 39. So if we can have someone read out for us, 1 Kings chapter 11, 37, 38, 39. And I will take, take a decision and you shall be king of all Israel. And if you will listen to all that I command you and will work in my ways and do what is right in my eyes by keeping my status and my commandments as David my servant that did I will be with you and will build you a student house as I build for David and I will give his right to you. And I will afflate the offspring of David because of this but not forever. All right, so here the Lord is promising Jeroboam and saying, you know I'm going to give you 10 tribes, you're going to become the ruler of those under your Rehoboam, only two tribes will be there. And this is what God says to him in verse 37 he says, you will rule over all that your heart desires. How much of a territory you want, I will help you to conquer it. You will, I will bless you. And the Lord says to him in verse 38, I will build you a dynasty as enduring as the one I built for David. In no way will you be inferior. Whatever privileges the Davidic lineage has, the same privileges will be given even to you. This is the beautiful promise that the Lord makes to Jeroboam. But then when Jeroboam comes to the throne, what does he think in his foolish, foolish heart? He tells himself, oh okay, 10 tribes have now come to me, but all these people every year they'll be going for a number of festivals to Jerusalem. Every time they go to Jerusalem, what does somebody brainwashes them? What did they decide to go back and make the Davidic king, their ruler, what did they go away from me? Insecurity, in spite of the lavish promises that God makes to him. And so he decides, oh no, no, no, let me build to make two golden calves and let them consider these two golden calves as the symbols of Yahweh. So instead of going over there and worshipping Yahweh in Jerusalem, they will just worship these two calves because these two calves are symbolizing Yahweh. Now this again is a cultural kind of a thing. Something easier for us in India to understand. We have all these gods and goddesses belonging to the other religions. And if you notice all these gods and goddesses, they'll have a transport. You have one demon goddess which sits on a tiger and then you have another god which sits on another animal. So like that, so the tiger is a symbol of that particular demon goddess. So in the same way, this Jeroboam, he makes two golden calves. He's not telling them to worship the calves. Basically he's saying, they are like a symbol of Yahweh. So when you're worshipping them, it's like as if you're worshipping Yahweh. And because none of the actual Levite priests will support something like this, he actually goes ahead and he appoints priests from other tribes because the Levites will definitely not participate in something rotten like this. So we see in which chapter would that be? Chapter 12. First in chapter 12, we see in verse 31, he appoints priests for this new temple which he has constructed. So he puts one calf in Bethel. The other calf he puts it in Dan. So those two places become places of heathen worship and he appoints priests who will be able to do the ceremonies over there. And in fact, he makes a similar kind of festival so that the people will not go to Jerusalem for the actual festival. They will celebrate the alternate festival over here. He gets into all this idolatry simply because he doesn't believe that God will give him the dynasty which God promised. He doesn't trust in the living God. So we see Solomon displaying great insecurity, getting into political alliances, getting into greed. And we see Jeroboam doing the same mistake. He's so scared that the people will go away from him that he starts idol worship. I mean, imagine idol worship was not there. He introduced it. What a terrible thing to do. What an evil thing to do when God so lovingly told him the same kind of dynasty that Davidic lineage has, I will give you the same kind of dynasty. And the man doesn't even trust God. And then, coming to Rehoboam, again, same story. The friends and companions of Rehoboam tell him, no, no, no, don't show kindness to the people. If you start reducing the taxes, they may take you lightly. On the other hand, tell them, I'll be even more harsh than my father. Again, insecurity, out of insecurity, Rehoboam, takes the advice of his friends. And he says, I will be harsh over you. I will rule over you. And the people say, we're not interested in you being our king. We'll go find a different king. And which is basically how they end up under Jeroboam. Another thing that we see, Solomon actually tries to murder Jeroboam. I mean, all his life, Saul was trying to kill David. And now we see this Solomon doing the same thing to Jeroboam. He tries to kill him and Jeroboam runs away, hides in Egypt and only after the death of Solomon, he comes back so that he can become king of the 12 tribes. So, where is the faith? Where is the trust in God? We don't see it happening in these chapters. So we need to ask ourselves, am I walking differently from these people? Am I so insecure? Am I so afraid of whether, my ministry will grow or not? Whether the Lord will lift me up and glorify me or not? Are these our concerns? If we are like that, then we will end up taking wrong steps just like Rehoboam, Solomon, Jeroboam. Let us not be one of those arms. Let us be different. Let us be people who will take a stand and say what the Lord has spoken he will do. I choose to trust him. I will not compromise. I will not fall into sin. I will stand on the word of the Lord and choose to obey him. In his time, in his way, he will give me whatever position he wants me to have. So that should be our attitude. We must not have the kind of insecurity which we see in the lives of these rotten kings. So, we don't really have much time. Maybe we can very briefly look at Elisha and Elijah because they too are a very important part of the Book of Kings. So, Elijah, of course, is mentioned in First Kings and Elisha is mainly mentioned in Second Kings. And it's basically because of Elijah that at least some level of holiness continues in northern Israel during the days of Ahab. Ahab, if you remember that man, he completely goes into idolatry and sin and he in fact encourages all the people of his land to get into idolatry. So during that time, Elijah plays a very important role. He's the one who goes from town to town teaching about the things of God. So because of Elijah's efforts, we see that the true worship of Yahweh continues only because of the work which is being done by this great prophet. And, of course, one of the important events that we see regarding Elijah is the contest which happens between the prophets of Baal and the living God on Mount Kamal. So during that incident he clearly proves and establishes but all these idols which these kings are encouraging the people to worship, those are nothing compared to the living God and the living God establishes his superiority. So we see those details about Elijah. Elijah, one of the important miracles that I remembered about Elijah is the healing of Naaman. So we see that in the case of both Elijah and Elisha, you have one miracle of multiplication. In Elijah's case, it is basically with the widow of Zarefath. You know, if someone could please give me some water because throat is getting really dry. Thanks a lot. Now, most of us are familiar with the story of the widow of Zarefath. So we will not really get into the details of it but then we see that in 1 Kings chapter 17. So in 1 Kings chapter 17 the the flower with which this lady was supposed to make the last bit of bread that continues to multiply. The supply of the bread does not run out. So that is the miracle of multiplication that we see in the case of Elijah. Elisha also has something similar that would be in your 2 Kings chapter 4. So in 2 Kings chapter 4 we have one of the prophets who dies and is so now financially that family is in a bad state and so because they are unable to repay their debts the debtors come and take away the debtors want to come and take away the 2 sons as slaves. So this lady comes to Elisha and she says I am part of the my husband was one of the prophets and now he is dead. Please help us financially so that my sons will not be taken away as slaves. So this is in 2 Kings chapter 4 where we see Elisha telling collect empty jars from all the other houses start pouring whatever oil you have left into these jars and we see that the oil multiplies. So we have a multiplication miracle done by Elijah. We also see a miracle of multiplication being done by Elisha. In the same way Elijah brings a child back to life Elisha also brings a child back to life in the case of Elijah that's basically the family which was providing him bread that widow's son dies and when the widow's son dies we have Elijah all that will be in chapter 17 Elijah he stretches himself out on the dead boy three times and then the boy comes back to life in the case of Elisha it has to do with the lady from Shunem that lady from Shunem they construct a room on top of their house where he can come and stay and so in return he blesses them and says you will have a child and then that little boy when he dies you have Elisha doing something similar he spreads himself out he stretches himself out on the child two times in yeah the first time when he stretches himself on the child that would be in your chapter 2 Kings chapter 4 itself somewhere around the end of the chapter verse 36 37 somewhere over there so the first time he stretches himself out on the dead boy the boy's body begins to grow warm and then the second time when he stretches himself out on that boy the child comes back to life so the ministry and the miracles of Elisha and Elijah are very similar we see a lot of similarities between these two prophets the yeah there is a lot to be said about Ahab and all the conspiracies nowadays we see this TV series of dynasties these large families all kinds of conspiracies happen in these families and somebody wants to take power and all that they could actually make a TV series out of Ahab's dynasty really I mean the number of conspiracies and sub-conspiracies which take place Ahab his wife the things which he does and then the things which are done through the descendants a lot of conspiracies take place during this Ahab's thing you can actually make a TV series out of it and people will watch because the story is quite interesting all kinds of things happen and Elijah is the one who plays the main role again and again he goes to the king he wants him he gives words of judgment to him and so there is absolutely no time to get into all of that but you know we were able to look at at least some of the main details about David and Solomon so no one has posted any questions in the chat if anyone has any questions over here you can you can raise a hand otherwise we'll close with the word of prayer any questions there are no questions but people were you know paying attention and listening so I'm quite happy yeah so let's close with the word of prayer Lord we just thank you so much for all the life lessons that we could learn Lord from your word today Lord we want to learn from the positive examples and we want to avoid the wrong conduct of Lord of the negative examples that were presented today please Lord help us to become people who will honor you who will trust you who will trust you enough to hold on to you instead of running after position of power oh Lord make us into that kind of a people help us a lot to be like David who did not go running and sit on the throne the minute he got a chance instead he waited for you he waited to hear from you he wanted to be guided by you for him righteousness was more important than getting the throne so Lord help us to have that kind of an attitude where our hearts desire is to please you rather than get position Lord you do that Lord that work inside us if we have anything of any rottenness inside us the kind of rottenness that Solomon did that Jeroboam had that Rehoboam displayed Lord if that kind of a rottenness is inside us so Lord pluck it out from the roots oh Lord Lord do a work of discipline and correction in us because now oh Lord our hearts are still at their study stage tomorrow oh Lord they are going to be in leadership positions and ministry positions so oh Lord do a work of great deep sanctification inside them right now Lord if there is any rottenness inside pluck it out now oh Lord any greed and lust for power pluck it out now oh Lord help us oh Lord to sanctify ourselves and refine ourselves now so that tomorrow when responsibility is placed on our shoulders we will be like David oh Lord and not like Jeroboam oh Lord help us oh Lord to live lives that honor you help us oh Lord to be like Obed Edom and his household so that when you live inside us oh Lord we will honor you and glorify you in all that we do oh Lord so we pray that you would help us to develop that kind of an attitude to permit ourselves Lord into your hands thank you Lord in Jesus name Amen