1 KINGS 8:28-48

²⁸Yet have thou respect unto the prayer of thy servant, and to his supplication, O LORD my God, to hearken unto the cry and to the prayer which thy servant prayeth before thee this day:

²⁹that thine eyes may be open toward this house night and day, even toward the place whereof thou hast said, My name shall be there: to hearken unto the prayer which thy servant shall pray toward this place.

³⁰And hearken thou to the supplication of thy servant, and of thy people Israel, when they shall pray toward this place: yea, hear thou in heaven thy dwelling place; and when thou hearest, forgive.

³¹If a man sin against his neighbour, and an oath be laid upon him to cause him to swear, and he come and swear before thine altar in this house:

³²then hear thou in heaven, and do, and judge thy servants, condemning the wicked, to bring his way upon his own head; and justifying the righteous, to give him according to his righteousness.

³³When thy people Israel be smitten down before the enemy, because they have sinned against thee; if they turn again to thee, and confess thy name, and pray and make supplication unto thee in this house:

³⁴then hear thou in heaven, and forgive the sin of thy people Israel, and bring them again unto the land which thou gavest unto their fathers;

³⁵When heaven is shut up, and there is no rain, because they have sinned against thee; if they pray toward this place, and confess thy name, and turn from their sin, when thou dost afflict them:

³⁶then hear thou in heaven, and forgive the sin of thy servants, and of thy people Israel, when thou teachest them the good way wherein they should walk; and send rain upon thy land, which thou hast given to thy people for an inheritance.

³⁷If there be in the land famine, if there be pestilence, if there be blasting or mildew, locust or caterpiller; if their enemy besiege them in the land of their cities; whatsoever plague, whatsoever sickness there be;

³⁸what prayer and supplication soever be made by any man, or by all thy people Israel, which shall know every man the plague of his own heart, and spread forth his hands toward this house:

³⁹then hear thou in heaven thy dwelling place, and forgive, and do, and render unto every man according to all his ways, whose heart thou knowest; (for thou, even thou only, knowest the hearts of all the children of men;)

⁴⁰that they may fear thee all the days that they live in the land which thou gavest unto our fathers.

⁴¹Moreover concerning the stranger, that is not of thy people Israel, when he shall come out of a far country for thy name’s sake;

⁴²(for they shall hear of thy great name, and of thy mighty hand, and of thy stretched out arm;) when he shall come and pray toward this house;

⁴³hear thou in heaven thy dwelling place, and do according to all that the stranger calleth to thee for; that all the peoples of the earth may know thy name, to fear thee, as doth thy people Israel, and that they may know that this house which I have built is called by thy name.

⁴⁴If thy people go out to battle against their enemy, by whatsoever way thou shalt send them, and they pray unto the LORD toward the city which thou hast chosen, and toward the house which I have built for thy name:

⁴⁵then hear thou in heaven their prayer and their supplication, and maintain their cause.

⁴⁶If they sin against thee, (for there is no man that sinneth not,) and thou be angry with them, and deliver them to the enemy, so that they carry them away captive unto the land of the enemy, far off or near;

⁴⁷yet if they shall bethink themselves in the land whither they are carried captive, and turn again, and make supplication unto thee in the land of them that carried them captive, saying, We have sinned, and have done perversely, we have dealt wickedly;

⁴⁸if they return unto thee with all their heart and with all their soul in the land of their enemies, which carried them captive, and pray unto thee toward their land, which thou gavest unto their fathers, the city which thou hast chosen, and the house which I have built for thy name: