¹³ “Why don’t you do as much for all the people of God as you have promised to do for me?” she asked. “You have convicted yourself in making this decision, because you have refused to bring home your own banished son. ¹⁴ All of us must die eventually; our lives are like water that is poured out on the ground—it can’t be gathered up again. But God will bless you with a longer life if you will find a way to bring your son back from his exile.^{[a] 15-16} But I have come to plead with you for my son because my life and my son’s life have been threatened, and I said to myself, ‘Perhaps the king will listen to me and rescue us from those who would end our existence in Israel.