In the past, even when Saul was still our king, you led the people of Israel in battle, and the LORD promised you that you would lead his people and be their ruler."

David was thirty years old when he became king, and he ruled for forty years.

The time came when King David and his men set out to attack Jerusalem. The Jebusites, who lived there, thought that David would not be able to conquer the city, and so they said to him, "You will never get in here; even the blind and the crippled could keep you out."

That day David said to his men, "Does anybody here hate the Jebusites as much as I do? Enough to kill them? Then go up through the water tunnel and attack those poor blind cripples." (That is why it is said, "The blind and the crippled cannot enter the LORD's house.")

He grew stronger all the time, because the LORD God Almighty was with him.

And so David realized that the LORD had established him as king of Israel and was making his kingdom prosperous for the sake of his people.

The following children were born to him in Jerusalem: Shammua, Shobab, Nathan, Solomon,

Elishama, Eliada, and Eliphelet.

The Philistines arrived at Rephaim Valley and occupied it.

So David went to Baal Perazim and there he defeated the Philistines. He said, "The LORD has broken through my enemies like a flood." And so that place is called Baal Perazim.

Then the Philistines went back to Rephaim Valley and occupied it again.

When you hear the sound of marching in the treetops, then attack because I will be marching ahead of you to defeat the Philistine army."

Then he defeated the Moabites. He made the prisoners lie down on the ground and put two out of every three of them to death. So the Moabites became his subjects and paid taxes to him.

David captured seventeen hundred of his cavalry and twenty thousand of his foot soldiers. He kept enough horses for a hundred chariots and crippled all the rest.

Then he set up military camps in their territory, and they became his subjects and paid taxes to him. The LORD made David victorious everywhere.

He also took a great quantity of bronze from Betah and Berothai, cities ruled by Hadadezer.

So he sent his son Joram to greet King David and congratulate him for his victory over Hadadezer, against whom Toi had fought many times. Joram took David presents made of gold, silver, and bronze.

Edom, Moab, Ammon, Philistia, and Amalek---as well as part of the loot he had taken from Hadadezer.

He set up military camps throughout Edom, and the people there became his subjects. The LORD made David victorious everywhere.

Joab, whose mother was Zeruiah, was the commander of the army; Jehoshaphat son of Ahilud was in charge of the records;

Benaiah son of Jehoiada was in charge of David's bodyguards; and David's sons were priests.

King David said, "I must show loyal friendship to Hanun, as his father Nahash did to me." So David sent messengers to express his sympathy. When they arrived in Ammon,

Hanun seized David's messengers, shaved off one side of their beards, cut off their clothes at the hips, and sent them away.

The Ammonites realized that they had made David their enemy, so they hired twenty thousand Syrian soldiers from Bethrehob and Zobah, twelve thousand men from Tob, and the king of Maacah with a thousand men.

The Ammonites marched out and took up their position at the entrance to Rabbah, their capital city, while the others, both the Syrians and the men from Tob and Maacah, took up their position in the open countryside.

He placed the rest of his troops under the command of his brother Abishai, who put them in position facing the Ammonites.

Be strong and courageous! Let's fight hard for our people and for the cities of our God. And may the LORD's will be done!"

When the Ammonites saw the Syrians running away, they fled from Abishai and retreated into the city. Then Joab turned back from fighting the Ammonites and went back to Jerusalem.

King Hadadezer sent for the Syrians who were on the east side of the Euphrates River, and they came to Helam under the command of Shobach, commander of the army of King Hadadezer of Zobah.

and the Israelites drove the Syrian army back. David and his men killed seven hundred Syrian chariot drivers and forty thousand cavalry, and they wounded Shobach, the enemy commander, who died on the battlefield.

The LORD will bring all the nations together to make war on Jerusalem. The city will be taken, the houses looted, and the women raped. Half of the people will go into exile, but the rest of them will not be taken away from the city.

The beast was taken prisoner, together with the false prophet who had performed miracles in his presence. (It was by those miracles that he had deceived those who had the mark of the beast and those who had worshiped the image of the beast.) The beast and the false prophet were both thrown alive into the lake of fire that burns with sulfur.