We're gonna take a reading this morning from the book of 1 Kings. If you wanna turn with me there, we're gonna read from 1 Kings and chapter 12. And some of you that have been noticing a theme, I've had it on my heart most of the year to be kind of walking through some of the history of scripture. And this morning we're gonna read about Rehoboam and the time in which the kingdom of Israel was divided. We know that God had a people in the Old Testament and they went by the name Israel. And in the beginning of their history, and when they begin to have kings, they were in what was called a united kingdom. And this is the way the nation was under King Saul and King David and then King Solomon. But after King Solomon died, there was a split that took place in the kingdom, and they divided between the two southern tribes and the 10 northern tribes. The 10 northern tribes were called Israel. and the two southern tribes were called Judah. And they went on in a divided kingdom for a number of years until finally they were defeated and taken into captivity. So that's just a little context. And this was Rehoboam and this was immediately after the kingdom under Solomon's reign. And Rehoboam went to Shechem for all Israel were come to Shechem to make him king. And it came to pass when Jeroboam, the son of Nebat, who was yet in Egypt, heard of it, for he was fled from the presence of King Solomon, and Jeroboam dwelt in Egypt, that they sent and called him, and Jeroboam and all the congregation of Israel came and spake unto Rehoboam, saying, Thy father made our yoke grievous, Now therefore make thou the grievous service of, excuse me. Now therefore make thou the grievous service of thy father and his heavy yoke, which he put upon us lighter, and we will serve thee. And he said unto them, depart yet for three days, then come again to me. And the people departed. And King Rehoboam consulted with the old men that stood before Solomon his father while he had yet lived. And he said, how do you advise that I may answer this people? And they spoke unto him saying, if thou wilt be a servant unto this people this day and wilt serve them and answer them and speak good words to them, then they will be your servants forever. But he forsook the counsel of the old man which they had given him and consulted with the young men that were grown up with him and which stood before him. And he said to them, what counsel do you give me that we may answer the people who have spoken to me saying, make the yoke which thy father did put on us lighter. And the young men that were grown up with him spake unto him, saying, Thus shalt thou speak unto this people that spake unto thee, saying, Thy father made our yoke heavy, but make thou it lighter unto us. Thus shalt thou say unto them, My little finger shall be thicker than my father's loins. And now, whereas my father did lay you with a heavy yoke, I will add to your yoke. My father hath chastised you with whips, but I will chastise you with scorpions.' So Jeroboam and all the people came to Rehoboam the third day, as the king had appointed, saying, Come to me again the third day. And the king answered the people roughly, and forsook the old men's counsel that they gave him, and spake to him after the counsel of the young men, saying, My father made your yoke heavy, and I will add to your yoke. My father also chastised you with whips, but I will chastise you with scorpions. Wherefore, the king hearkened not unto the people, for the cause was from the Lord, that he might perform this saying which the Lord spake by Ahijah the Shilonite unto Jeroboam the son of Nebat. So when all Israel saw that the king hearkened not unto them, the people answered the king, saying, What portion have we in David? Neither have we inheritance in the son of Jesse to your tent. So Israel now see to thine own house, David. So Israel departed unto their tents. But as for the children of Israel, which dwelt in the cities of Judah, Rehoboam reigned over them. Then King Rehoboam sent Adaram, who was over the tribute, and all Israel stoned him with stones that he died. Therefore King Rehoboam made speed to get him up to his chariot to flee to Jerusalem. So Israel rebelled against the house of David unto this day. And it came to pass when all Israel heard that Jeroboam was come again, that they sent and called him unto the congregation and made him king over all Israel. There was none that followed the house of David, but the tribe of Judah only. And when Rehoboam was come to Jerusalem, he assembled all the house of Judah with the tribe of Benjamin, a hundred and four score thousand chosen men, which were warriors, to fight against the house of Israel, to bring the kingdom again to Rehoboam, the son of Solomon. But the word of God came unto Shemaiah, the man of God, saying, Speak unto Rehoboam, the son of Solomon, king of Judah, and to all the house of Judah and Benjamin, and to the remnant of the people, saying, Thus saith the Lord, Ye shall not go up, nor fight against your brethren, the children of Israel. Return every man to his house, for this thing is from me. They hearkened therefore to the word of the Lord and returned to depart according to the word of the Lord. That's where I'm going to stop reading this morning. And I pray that God blesses His word. And I pray that He would help me to deliver the word this morning. It's an interesting text and one that I don't believe I've ever preached upon. The reason for the divided kingdom of God's people. And I think that as we read this, we probably should feel, if we think about how we should feel when we read a text, we should feel deeply saddened. God loves his people. God loves his children. And if you read the context of the scripture, you know that God loves Israel. God called them out when he brought Abraham out from the place of his nativity and called him out to a place where he didn't know where he was going, but God had a promise that he was gonna make his seed to be like the sand of the seashore, like the stars of the heavens, that he was gonna give him land. God had the nation of Israel on his mind and a desire to give them according to the abundance of heaven. And certainly under different times in their history, they were a glorious kingdom. In fact, We spoke the last time I preached about Solomon and how the Queen of Sheba came and saw the kingdom that was under Solomon and about how that when she observed that, she said, the half had not been told me about the goodness of your God and how much he loves you, that he would put someone like you as a ruler over the people. He said, happy are the people and prosperous is your land. And she gave glory to God. The end of Solomon's life, he found himself in a downward spiral of sin. And because of that, the children that then came from him were not in a place they should have been spiritually. And you have this kind of setup where Rehoboam, probably not a good man, was put as king. God loves his people and God hates for his people to be damaged in any way. So when you think about, you know, the way that they were going through this hard time, it makes us sad, but I believe it grieved the heart of God. And so I wanted to maybe take this occasion and just talk about this division that took place and And talk about the way that Rehoboam presented this to the people and see what we can learn from it. And I think there's a lot here that we can learn from. But one thing that we need to first of all know is the kingdom was stronger when it was united. And I know there's been a lot of fracturing among God's people throughout the years, a lot of things that divide us, a lot of things that we see differently one from another. But if there was ever a generation that we should come together on the common principles of the faith, it would be this generation, which is so secularized and so such a need from a strong people and a strong church. If ever there was a day where God's people should stand in harmony together and in the power of the might of God, it would be today. And there's a need for the light of the world to shine out to a lost and dying world. When I think about the world that we live in, so many people are moving past the doctrines of Christianity, and we're living in what is referred to as a post-Christian culture. So much so that some people would even say that God is dead and that the church is dead. And maybe even some of God's people would say that the church is dead and has lost its influence. But I disagree with that. I believe there's a lot of opportunity for the church of God in the generation that we're living in. If only a few people will rise up and say, we will serve the Lord. When we look out among others and we might be able to say, you know, well, there's just so few of us among so many. Is there any way that we could even make a difference in the world? I would say that by the power of God, if we would individually say we will serve the Lord and do what he desires for us to do. And if we as families will say, as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord. And as churches, we will say to the best of our ability, we'll be faithful to the call of God and the Church of Jesus Christ and realize that the church is the institution that God has pleased to put in the world to be the bearer of the good news of Jesus Christ. And we might think, well, what good can I offer the church? But I would encourage you that your presence makes a difference and your affirmation of the truths of God's word and your upholding the banner of Christ makes a big difference in the world. even as the brother spoke about the witness that young people have to the community. And I would say I have seen that, but I really feel like that responsibility is not just on our young people, but upon all of us to be willing to be alive and be willing to be used by God to be able to make a difference in the world. And that's what God designed for his church to be. was a light to a darkened world, to be a salt to a rotting earth, that we can be a people. And not only that we can be, that we are a people that are called to make a difference in the world. But one thing that can keep us from being what we should be is whenever we lose sight of the mission at hand, when we lose sight of what's in front of us, what our purpose is, and we begin to focus on things that make us different or things that we maybe don't like in others, and then what we can do is lose sight and get our vision too low. You know, Rehoboam had a major responsibility as the king of Israel, first and foremost, to keep the country together. He had a responsibility that was handed down to him from Solomon to be a good steward as a king. And as we look at this occasion, he lost sight of what he was supposed to be doing and he turned to his own desires. And because of that, he rent the people apart and it became in many years down the road, the destruction of the people of God. Now, God never left them. God never forsook them. And they went into exile and God was with them even there. God brought them back together and reinstituted the people of God and all those things. He redeemed it. But it was a terrible time when in 722 BC, the nation of Israel fell to Assyria. And do you know that after Rehoboam, they split and Jeroboam became their king. And after that, the kingdom of Israel had 19 kings, 19 kings until their destruction. And every single one of them was an idol worshiper. You go from Saul, who now comparatively looks good, David and Solomon, Jeroboam and all 19 kings of Israel were idol worshipers. In Judah, you had Rehoboam, and then you had 20 kings, including Rehoboam, and somewhere between five and eight of those kings worshiped the Lord, and the rest of them were idol worshipers. The good kings, as it were, were Asa, Jehoshaphat, Uzziah, Hezekiah, and Josiah. The other 15 kings were essentially what you might call evil. I guess my point in that is that they were stronger when they were together. They were stronger when they were united. They were stronger when they realized that their God was the Lord. And when they lost sight of that, it only took one generation to lose sight of that. And everything began to unravel, even to the point when Rehoboam fled and he came back, he had 140,000 or 120,000 people. I just read it, but let's say 140,000 people. And, uh, He wanted to go to war against Israel. He was ready to go and destroy them. And God sent a prophet to him and spoke to him and said, this is the Lord speaking, you shall not go up. And whatever it was about that, Rehoboam stood down and said, I won't go up. He told him, he said, the Lord's against this. He's against this fighting. He's against this war among his own people. And it's a terrible thing whenever a country turns against itself. I'm not really what you'd call a Civil War buff. I know there are some that are, but around the time that my son was born, and his name obviously is Lincoln, I read a lot about the Civil War. And I remember one of the things we did whenever Lincoln was young, we went to the Springfield, Illinois, where they had the Abraham Lincoln Museum and we walked through that. I remember one of the things that was so striking to me, Abraham Lincoln never lost sight of the vision. If you read about his life, he had his faults and he had flaws. But one thing was true is he always knew what was important for the nation. He saw his role as president. And he said one time, he said, my sole interest is keeping the union together. He said, if I can do that by freeing all the slaves, I'll do it. If I can keep the union together and free no slaves, I'll do it. But by all means, the union must stay together. And eventually, by the power and might of God, the union stayed together and there was freedom from slavery at the same time. And that stands as such a stark difference because Abraham Lincoln had such a vision. And one of the things that he said was he quoted the scripture that was found that said a kingdom divided against itself cannot stand. He had the vision to say, of all things, we need to unite in the Lord. And what we can't do and we can't let happen is this glorious country be brought down a road, even that we see in the history of Israel, where eventually They were destroyed and captured. So I want to just share a few things that rent this nation apart. And I think they're noteworthy for us to learn from and maybe even apply as we think about our own life. Because, you know, I feel like more than anything, our relationships are so important. And sometimes we can let things or stuff or things that are less important get in the way of things that are most important. And I think that's what happened with Rehoboam. And so if you look, first of all, I want to maybe comment that the Lord desired mercy over justice. the Lord desired mercy over justice. Or maybe in this case, the Lord desired mercy very much more than injustice. See, when we look at the balance, God cares about justice as well. He wants things to be right. But many times he calls us to be merciful even more than being right. Rehoboam as king, and you could imagine how this felt, the northern tribes had been subjected to heavy taxation and forced labor. And they had every right to speak up. Most likely they were saying that we have been overburdened by Solomon as king. And if you'll read about his kingdom, it was very lavish. It had been filled with riches, but it had been filled with riches on the backs of many people. So the people rose up whenever the kingdom went from Solomon to Rehoboam and they pulled Jeroboam, who wasn't exactly a great character, but they pulled him in and said, we just want to ask you one thing, that you lighten the burden that is upon our people. And I read some as I was studying this that they probably were. Many of them were forced to forced labor and they were working for the government and they were working under heavy taxation. And they asked for mercy. And so when they came to him, if you'll look, it says, they went and they called him and Jeroboam and all the congregation of Israel came and spoke to Rehoboam and said, your father made our yoke grievous. Now, therefore, make thou the grievous service of thy father and his heavy yoke which is put upon us lighter and we will serve you. It's almost like they offered up an olive branch and said, we will pledge our allegiance to you as our king. We only ask that you make the service lighter. And Rehoboam, he's the next generation. And he thought, well, how can these people come to me asking me to be weak? How could these people, if I show mercy, if I show humility, you know, you know he's thinking in his mind that they'll see me as weak. And probably from reading this story, he was more concerned about the way people thought about him than what was right and what was good for the kingdom. And they did not realize that what God desires often is for people to reach out with mercy instead of exacting what is right. I think about the scripture where the Apostle Paul is talking to the church and he says, do not repay evil for evil. Do not cast what people deserve upon them, but remember the saying of the Word of God, vengeance is mine, I will repay, saith the Lord. And I think it's always important for us as God's people when we're encountering issues in life. And all of us are encountering issues in life. And we're all faced with difficulty and we're all faced with problems. Remember that God primarily has revealed himself as a God of mercy and a God that desires for us to be compassionate. And not that people would walk over us and not that people would use his people, but as the church of God, we need to remember that primarily he wants us to reach out with mercy and not seek our own welfare, but seek the welfare primarily of others. I don't know if you agree with that. I know that's difficult to swallow sometimes, but Jesus, when he was teaching his disciples, he said for us not just to love your friends, but for you to love your enemies. And you'd like to think that if you did things well, that you would never have an enemy. But I think Jesus was talking to a people and he basically assumed the fact that you're going to have some that are your friends and some that are your enemies. And he said, even the Gentiles are good to their friends. Even the people that don't know God are good about doing good to those that do good to them. But it is supernatural and it is something higher than this earth when you can reach out to those that are your enemies and you can show love to them. He even says that it'll be, and I don't know that we're supposed to do it because of this, but says whenever we show mercy and grace for those that are our enemies, that we're dumping hot coals upon their head. I often wonder if that was self-interested, but it can't be. That was the instruction that were given. But if you ever thought, well, I just want to dump hot coals on their head, then the way to do that is to show them love, to show them to speak well, to have kindness, to extend grace. And so here's these people that are asking for mercy. And Rehoboam actually does the right thing. And he said, give me three days. to consider the matter. Now, why do I say that? I think that was right. While I was reading that, I thought, you know, generally that's a sign of wisdom whenever we don't respond immediately to stimulus. I think this is an important life lesson, so I'm letting that hang over you. Oftentimes in the flesh, we are tempted when we have some kind of stimulus that's brought to us to immediately react. And we can learn a good lesson here from Rehoboam. He said, give me three days to consider the matter. I think that's wise. I heard it read one I read one time in a book where it was talking about, you know, responding immediately to things that come our way. And there was a quote that that was stated. It said the the gap between in the space between stimulus and reaction, there is freedom. Let that hang over you just a little bit. In the gap between stimulus and reaction, whatever gap there is there, there is freedom. And oftentimes when we choose to respond, When we go out and make a post on social media, when we send that email, when we, you know, lash out in words, we do that bound by emotions like anger and bitterness and hurt and all these things. And it would do well for us as God's people particularly to take a step back and pray about those things before we respond. I thought, man, as I'm going to share these things, I'm not going to get some hearty amens. But you know it's right that in the space between stimulus and reaction, there's freedom. There's freedom to think. There's freedom to pray. There's freedom to look at different options that you might be able to pursue. You can think through scenarios in your mind without hurting anybody. You can go and seek counsel. Anytime there's a space between stimulus and reaction, there is a freedom that we as God's people should well enjoy, particularly because there are things that we ought to pray about to know the right direction to go. And so often we're reactive and there are times in which God maybe moves upon our heart and we need to go ahead and react and go ahead and do something now because we've been procrastinating. And now is the time. No doubt there are times like that where The time is now to act. The time is now to respond. But most of the time, God will allow us some space to commune with him and to pray and to ask him about the right thing. And if you can delay things just a little bit and pray about them. and say, I want to know that I'm doing the right thing. I want to seek some counsel. I want to know that these are the things that we should be doing. That's wisdom. And oftentimes churches get splintered apart and broken apart. And so do families and so do nations, because people have something that comes and they just respond and dump on them. And people get offended and then they get hurt. And once those words come out, they can never be taken back. It's wisdom to be able to use that space, that freedom wisely. Now, I think I've already said this, and so I risk the danger of repeating, but don't put off till tomorrow what God says to do today. OK, don't put off till tomorrow what God says to do today, because we also do that. I remember one time I was debating about whether or not I should go to Oregon where I was called the pastor at the first church that I pastored. And I was actually down in Arkansas when God let me know that I was supposed to go to Oregon. I was preaching at this little church that was in Southern Arkansas and it was a neat place. They had moved an old time church house onto the grounds and it was a one room church house. It looked like one of those old school houses that you see from the past and they had cleaned it all up. I went to preach there and The place was really clean and neat and kind of like a throwback. They had designed it to look like the way it looked in its original state. And it was really kind of neat. When they did worship, they didn't have a piano player. So there was a guy that played the guitar. And some of you might not like that, but I enjoyed that worship and they just got into it. And we had a wonderful service. There was a man that approached me after this service and he was a big man. He made me look small. He stood over me and he had overalls on and his hands could swallow my hands. And he grabbed my hand in a handshake. And I felt like I had little petite hands when he came up to me and he said, A feller like you would really make a good pastor down here. If you came here and we called you to pastor, would you come? And I was scared to say no. And I said, well, if God tells me to come here, I'll come here. And as soon as I said that, the Lord told me I was supposed to go to Oregon. And all the way home, I was driving home, and I had that on my heart. And he said, you told him if the Lord told you to go, you'd go. I just told you where to go. Will you go? So then I prayed about that thing because I'm from here and I didn't want to go anywhere. And so I said, I'm going to pray about it. But the thing was, I wasn't praying about it. And I already knew the answer. But I wanted to give it some space because I wanted to make sure on some big decision like that, if he had told me to go, that I was willing to do it. So I gave it some space. And every time I thought about it, I knew I was supposed to go. I didn't give it three days, I gave it like three weeks. And I just, you know, said, I'm praying about it, I'm praying about it. No one else knew about it but me and the Lord. I'd never told anybody, but I kept telling him I'm praying about it. And then I realized that I was telling the one that I was supposed to be praying to not to bother me about it because I was praying about it. See how ironic that was? So I got on my knees one morning and I tried to pray about it and the response I got was, you're not praying, you're procrastinating. I couldn't say another word. So I wrote a letter, told them I was coming, put it in the mailbox, stared at the mailbox to see the postman pick up the letter. I knew once it got out, I was done for. Now, Only reason I tell you that story is because, as I'm saying, you should give some space and delay that's good and well and wise unless you already know what it is that God is telling you to do. And in the case that you know that, you need to act on that. But it's OK to take some time to pray about it and make sure most of the time God doesn't want us to have knee jerk reactions to every stimulus that comes our way. We need to be a praying people. A people that are praying that God would grant wisdom for this thing is a big deal. The nation of Israel that was before Rehoboam, that was a big deal. What God was doing through Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and Saul and David and Solomon that had been handed to him was a big deal and he needed to make the right decision. So he gave some space and he reached out for counsel, which is also wise to do. Age does not guarantee wisdom, but it is the most likely place to find it. Age does not guarantee wisdom, but it is the most likely place to find it. So he sought out the old men. He asked for their advice. He said, what should I do? He got all the old men that was with his father, Solomon. And he said, what's your advice about what I should do? They said, if you will serve the people. If you will honor their request, if I go back to the chapter, he said, if you will be a servant to the people this day and will serve them and answer them and speak good words to them, they will be your servants forever. Their advice was humble yourself. Speak soft words to them. Honor their request. They have pledged loyalty to you. You need them. Lead with a humble servant's heart." And he heard it and he hated it. But it was good advice. Now, I just want to say that not always will old people give you good advice. But you should seek it and you should weigh it out and you should see if it's right because oftentimes it has a perspective that you've never considered before. Because as you start to get older, you realize that younger people often are in their folly, the same folly that you were in, that you learned a lot of lessons from, that you could probably help them if only they asked. And I don't just mean the elderly in general, but your parents. I want to encourage young people to rely upon your parents' counsel. They might not always be right, but ask for it and weigh it out and see if they are. You see, Rehoboam asked for these people to give him advice, and they gave him good advice. Now, he didn't accept it, but it was good that he heard it. And I want to encourage you, there's a lot of good advice that your parents, that your grandparents, I haven't thought about, you know, not only the older people that are here, but those that have gone before us. It's a tendency in this generation to forsake the advice from the past. But there are good and trustworthy sources of information that you can seek the advice of. The best of which is the book that's without error, that's without any mixture of deceit or error, and that is the Holy Bible, that we can't, as a new generation, forsake the advice of our forefathers, but we should seek it and prayerfully consider it, knowing from where it came from. And beyond that, when we have access, unlike people before us to the word of God, we ought to seek its counsel, pour over its pages and pray that we might get advice from people like Moses, that we might get advice from people like Isaiah, that we might get some advice from people like Jesus, like the apostles, and it's all there for us in the word of God, it says, and this is Job, he said, with the ancient is wisdom and in length of days understanding. That's the word of God. Proverbs 11, 14, which was actually written by Rehoboam's dad. He said this, where no counsel is, the people fall. But in the multitude of counselors, there is safety. Proverbs 11, 14. The way of a fool is right in his own eyes, but he that hearkens to counsel is wise. Proverbs 12, 15. Now that was Rehoboam's dad. I've got something on my heart here with this and so if you'll just bear with me for a minute. We need to seek the counsel of God for our life. Not just for decisions we make, but we have, by human beings I'm saying, we have a tendency to go our own way. It says where the way of a fool is right in his own eyes. And we're always right in our own eyes. I mean, we are. We wouldn't have thought that opinion if we didn't think it was right. We start out in the beginning thinking we're right. And it says the way of a fool, even the way of a foolish person is right in his own eyes. But he that seeks counsel is wise. In our life, we need to trust the counsel of the word of God, of others, of the church. You don't even think about a man that says, I know the way to go. I know the right way to live and all these things. But God's word is put before him and he rejects the counsel of the word of God and he ends up doing it to his destruction. My friends, we need the help of God. We need the help of God's people as we try to navigate through life, because life is tough and you want to end up destroying your life. You just do it your way. And I know that's strong, but you come up with your own opinions. You say, I know better. I'll do it my way. You hear the wisdom of the ancient and say, no, I think I'm going to go a different way. You will destroy your life. Somewhere in the ages of like 12 or 13 until God knows whenever it ends, we think that we're smarter than anybody else in the world. And I want to encourage our young people, give that up. I don't think that you know everything. You don't have to know everything. You know, I was growing up. One of the things that got in my way all the time is I thought if I didn't know something, I was weak or if I didn't know something. And oftentimes I wasn't taught much in my family from my dad. And I love my dad, but he didn't give me a lot of wisdom when I was growing up. And there were a lot of things I didn't know that probably most commonly people knew. And it used to make me feel inferior and insecure. And so I hated to ask a question. So I would always try to figure it out and figure out the way. And when I thought I had it figured out, I would go that way. But I was just listening to my own counsel. And what I learned as I got older, that sometimes if you'll just ask the question and listen, that somebody will speak something into it that was exactly what you needed to know and to hear. And even sometimes God would use that person to speak a word to you that without it, you would have no idea which way to go. Including whenever we're considering where we're going to invest for our sole security. Because you think, well, I think I know the way to heaven. My idea is that as long as my good deeds outweigh my bad deeds and as long as I'm a good dad and a good citizen and a good man, I'm going to go to heaven. But the counsel of the church and the word of God says you need Jesus, says the way to heaven is that you surrender your heart to God, you humble yourself before God, you give your life to Jesus. He'll save you and you'll have the Holy Spirit inside of you that will enable you to be able to live a life that's fulfilled and you can know that in the end of your life, you're going to go to heaven. And people listen to people like me preach that message and they fold their arms or they stop their ears and they say, I don't want to go that way. I want to go my way. My friend, the way of a fool is right in his own eyes, but he that entertaineth and attendeth the council is wise. And there is great counsel in the word of God, in the church of the living God, in people that God has called to preach the word of God, that we might hear a word not from a man, but from God himself. The greatest counsel is when we get the counsel of the Lord and he uses means to do it sometimes. It's not just like it just comes in a vision in heaven. There's something that happens that God uses to just place that in your heart. And, you know, it's God speaking. And when you hear the counsel of God, you need to tend to it. If you don't, it's to your own peril. God, Jesus Christ, is the ancient of days, without fail, unchanging from the beginning until now. You can trust him. And if you ever don't know how and you're ever wondering what decision you should make, I want to implore you based on the word of God that you seek the counsel of God. And if you will search with it from all of your heart and you'll pour out your heart and say, God, I just want to know what you want from my life. I'm willing to do whatever you tell me to do. I'm seeking your counsel. I don't want to go my own way. I want to go to the way that you prescribed for me. God is faithful. God is merciful. God will get a hold of your heart and lead you in the right way. And it doesn't matter what man may think of you. It doesn't matter what you've thought is the way. If God has prescribed it and you're following him, he will bless it abundantly, a hundredfold more than anything you ever thought was possible. But you have to give heed to the counsel. And the counsel that comes from heaven through whatever source that God sends it is what you need. And Rehoboam got it. And he said, you know what? What do my buddies think? I think I can relate more to them. He called his buddies together. Okay, boys. We're of the generation that gets it. The old heads don't understand. They're telling me I should grant mercy to these people. What do you think? And they said, you should tell them that your finger is thicker than your dad's thigh, that he beat you with whips, but I'm going to beat you with scorpions. You better subject to me or else. And he heard that message and he said, yeah, that sounds good. That's kind of what I was thinking anyway. Show them I'm tough. Show them that I can lead and rule. It's got warning flags all over it and he couldn't see it. Why? Because it confirmed what he was already thinking. We are terrible about that. And that actually is one of the problems with, you know, AI tailored social media is you will only get the news that confirms what you're already thinking. Do you know what that does? It takes people that lean towards one side and it makes them extreme. It takes people that lean toward the other side and makes them extreme until you've got two people that are so extreme they can't talk to each other and there's no way back to unity. Does that sound familiar? That's Satan's work. If he can just feed one group to go this way, and I'm not talking about just politics, I'm talking about anything. One worldview that goes this way, one that goes this way, about the only way they know to solve their differences is to get 140,000 people and go to war. And God finally stepped in through a prophet and said, don't go. It will not go well for you if you take these men and go. This is all part of the plan. It's going to be all right. Don't fight. And they stood down. how oftentimes we never put anybody around us that challenges us. In fact, we never want our life to have anything in it that might challenge us. And I would say that if you don't have anything in your life that's challenging you to be different, better, look higher, it's a meaningless, purposeless life. You need some people in your life that'll say, you know, this is the way that's right. And I've found that sometimes my buddies aren't always the best ones to give me that. Sometimes it's the one that's a little older, a little wiser that's gone on before me. And sometimes it's not even people that are here. Sometimes it's Moses and Paul and the men of the word of God. Sometimes it's men like Spurgeon, different ones that have gone on in different generations that I read. And I'm like, you know, they understood some things then. And God's using it to give me counsel now. And what we should all be listening for is this. What does God want? As many words as I've said, that's really what we try to hear. What does God want? And sometimes it's hard to know what God wants. And so we pray. And we say, God, I want what you want. I might not know what that is, might not know how to go there, might not know how to get it. I'm just confessing that to you. If you'll teach me, Lord, I'll be a servant to the people. If you'll just teach me how. I think it would have gone a lot different if he'd approached it that way. Instead, the people all gathered around him. He took the advice of his buddies. He said, my dad's thigh wasn't as thick as my finger. He beat you with whips. I'm going to beat you with scorpions. And they said, what portion do we have in David? What portion do we have in the son of Jesse? And they all left and they appointed their own king. And from that point forward, the nation was divided. The people eventually fell. The people were exiled first to Assyria, then to Babylon. and they were in a place of exile and they were sad. Oftentimes you'll read writings from the time of the exile and you'll find that people didn't even really know how to worship God in a foreign land. They just felt like a fish out of water. They felt like they were forsaken by God. And all, if you trace it back, had its roots to this event that I read you today. And yeah, It ended up being God's plan, and God used it for His glory in the end, and He always does. But it doesn't mean it was good. It wasn't good. It was hurtful. It was bad. It's okay for us to say so. It was bad. God was not pleased that the house was divided. In Mark 3, verse 25, I quoted this already. It says, but if a house be divided against itself, that house cannot stand. Jesus said that. Abraham Lincoln quoted that during the Civil War. Our prayer should be, and this is how I'll land this plane. I'm sorry I went so long. God, help me to be a help for your people. Help me to do your will on this earth. Your will that is in heaven, we want to see that will done on earth. And man, we often mess it up. May I listen for your voice? May I tend to wise counsel? May it take some time to pray and consider what it is that you're doing in my heart that I might do the right things for the right things done for the right reasons according to the will of God. Bring blessing. We're not fatalistic. We don't think that no matter what we do, it's going to end up the same way. When you do a right thing the right way for the right reason, it invokes blessing. And when we do our own thing, we can't even bear the consequences of it. I pray God would give us a spirit of wisdom and he would lead our hearts and our minds toward his will. And this is not a rebuke. This is just saying we need to humbly seek the will of God. And we're all in this together. God bless you. Why don't we have a song and as we all stand together and sing, I pray that we would worship the Lord. If God's speaking to you in some way, maybe he's been leading you some way for some time now, you've known the way to go. You've known what God was telling you, but you've been unwilling to surrender to what God is saying. I encourage you even this morning to say, God, I surrender to your will. I'll do what you say. I'll give you my life. That's the only way to live is if God has control of our life. Amen.