3. Now for a long season Israel hath been without the true God, and without a teaching priest, and without law.
4. But when they in their trouble returned to the LORD God of Israel, and sought him, he was found by them.
5. And in those times there was no peace to him that went out, nor to him that came in, but great vexations were upon all the inhabitants of the countries.
6. And nation was destroyed by nation, and city by city: for God troubled them with all adversity.
7. Be ye strong therefore, and let not your hands be weak; for your work shall be rewarded.
8. And when Asa heard these words, and the prophecy of Oded the prophet, he took courage, and put away the abominable idols out of all the land of Judah and Benjamin, and out of the cities which he had taken from mount Ephraim, and renewed the altar of the LORD, that was before the porch of the LORD.
9. And he gathered all Judah and Benjamin, and the strangers with them out of Ephraim and Manasseh, and out of Simeon: for they resorted to him out of Israel in multitudes, when they saw that the LORD his God was with him.
10. So they assembled at Jerusalem in the third month, in the fifteenth year of the reign of Asa.
11. And they offered to the LORD at the same time, of the spoil which they had brought, seven hundred oxen and seven thousand sheep.
12. And they entered into a covenant to seek the LORD God of their fathers with all their heart and with all their soul;
13. That whoever would not seek the LORD God of Israel should be put to death, whether small or great, whether man or woman.
14. And they swore to the LORD with a loud voice, and with shouting, and with trumpets, and with cornets.