God himself is with us - Ye have golden calves; we have the living and omnipotent Jehovah.

With - trumpets to cry alarm against you - This was appalling: When the priests sound their trumpets, it will be a proof that the vengeance of the Lord shall speedily descend upon you.

And, behold, God himself is with us for our Captain,.... To go before our armies, and fight our battles for us:

and his priests with sounding trumpets to cry alarm against you; which was one use of the trumpets, that the people might be remembered by the Lord, and saved from their enemies, Numbers 10:9, so that this circumstance was against Jeroboam and his army, and for Abijah and his:

O children of Israel, fight ye not against the Lord God of your fathers; for fighting against his people, that retained the pure worship of him, was fighting against him:

for you shall not prosper; he seems to be assured of victory.

Abijah draws from all this the conclusion: "Behold, with us at our head are (not the two calves of gold, but) God (האלהים with the article, the true God) and His priests, and the alarm-trumpets to sound against you." He mentions the trumpets as being the divinely appointed pledges that God would remember them in war, and would deliver them from their enemies, Numbers 10:9. Then he closes with a warning to the Israelites not to strive with Jahve, the God of their fathers.

And, behold, God himself is {l} with us for our captain, and his priests with sounding trumpets to cry alarm against you. O children of Israel, fight ye not against the LORD God of your fathers; for ye shall not prosper.

(l) Because their cause was good and approved by the Lord, they did not doubt the success and victory.

13:12 Trumpets - Upon the sounding whereof God hath solemnly promised to assist his people, Numb 10:9. The Lord - You have not only us for your enemies, but God, even the God whom your fathers served. It is folly to fight against the God of almighty power: but it is treachery and base ingratitude, to fight against your father's God.

13:1-22 Abijah overcomes Jeroboam. - Jeroboam and his people, by apostacy and idolatry, merited the severe punishment Abijah was permitted to execute upon them. It appears from the character of Abijah, 1Ki 15:3, that he was not himself truly religious, yet he encouraged himself from the religion of his people. It is common for those that deny the power of godliness, to boast of the form of it. Many that have little religion themselves, value it in others. But it was true that there were numbers of pious worshippers in Judah, and that theirs was the more righteous cause. In their distress, when danger was on every side, which way should they look for deliverance unless upward? It is an unspeakable comfort, that our way thither is always open. They cried unto the Lord. Earnest prayer is crying. To the cry of prayer they added the shout of faith, and became more than conquerors. Jeroboam escaped the sword of Abijah, but God struck him; there is no escaping his sword.