The real mother, her heart full of love for her son, said to the king, "Please, Your Majesty, don't kill the child! Give it to her!" But the other woman said, "Don't give it to either of us; go on and cut it in two."

Then Solomon said, "Don't kill the child! Give it to the first woman---she is its real mother."

As a father is kind to his children, so the LORD is kind to those who honor him.

"They will be my people," says the LORD Almighty. "On the day when I act, they will be my very own. I will be merciful to them as parents are merciful to the children who serve them.

As bad as you are, you know how to give good things to your children. How much more, then, will your Father in heaven give good things to those who ask him!

Your hunger will be so great that you will eat your own children.

Even the most refined woman of noble birth, so rich that she has never had to walk anywhere, will behave in the same way. When the enemy besieges her town, she will become so desperate for food that she will secretly eat her newborn child and the afterbirth as well. She will not share them with the husband she loves or with any of her children.

(SEE 28:56)

What's your trouble?" She answered, "The other day this woman here suggested that we eat my child, and then eat her child the next day.

So we cooked my son and ate him. The next day I told her that we would eat her son, but she had hidden him!"

As soon as King Ahaziah's mother Athaliah learned of her son's murder, she gave orders for all the members of the royal family to be killed.

Only Ahaziah's son Joash escaped. He was about to be killed with the others, but was rescued by his aunt Jehosheba, who was King Jehoram's daughter and Ahaziah's half sister. She took him and his nurse into a bedroom in the Temple and hid him from Athaliah, so that he was not killed.

Even a mother wolf will nurse her cubs, but my people are like ostriches, cruel to their young.

The disaster that came to my people brought horror; loving mothers boiled their own children for food.

they have no conscience; they do not keep their promises, and they show no kindness or pity for others.

The LORD says, "Israel, remember this; remember that you are my servant. I created you to be my servant, and I will never forget you.

"Israel, you are my dearest child, the one I love best. Whenever I mention your name, I think of you with love. My heart goes out to you; I will be merciful.

The LORD says, "When Israel was a child, I loved him and called him out of Egypt as my son.

Because they reject the Good News, the Jews are God's enemies for the sake of you Gentiles. But because of God's choice, they are his friends because of their ancestors.

For God does not change his mind about whom he chooses and blesses.