2 Kings 17:14-23

14But the Israelites would not agree to obey God's Law. They were proud and they refused to obey. Like their ancestors, they did not trust in the Lord their God.

15They did not obey God's rules. They did not accept the covenant that he had made with their ancestors. They did not listen when he warned them. Instead, they worshipped useless idols, which caused them to become useless themselves. The Lord had commanded them not to live in the same way that the nations around them did. But they did that anyway.

16They turned away from all the commands of the Lord their God. They used metal to make images of two calves as their idols. They also made an Asherah pole to worship. They worshipped all the stars in the sky and they served Baal.

17They burned their sons and their daughters in fire as offerings to Baal. They used magic to find out what would happen in the future. They chose to do things that the Lord said were evil. That made him very angry.

18The Lord was so angry with Israel that he sent them far away from himself. Only the tribe of Judah remained.

19But even the people of Judah did not obey the commands of the Lord their God. They did the same bad things that the Israelites had done.

20So the Lord turned against all the descendants of Israel. He punished them. He put them under the power of robbers. In that way, he chased them far away from himself.

21God made Israel become a separate kingdom from David's family, Judah. Then Israel chose Nebat's son Jeroboam to be their king. Jeroboam caused the Israelites to turn away from the Lord. He led them to do terrible sins.

22The Israelites continued to live in the bad way that Jeroboam showed them. They did not turn away from those sins.

23In the end, the Lord sent the Israelites away from himself. He had used his servants, the prophets, to warn them that this would happen. As a result, the Assyrian army took the Israelites away from their own land as prisoners to Assyria. They still live there, even today.