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Well, I'm gonna read a different
passage than I put into your bulletin. Sorry about that, but
it's gonna be 1 Kings 9. I really think this one is a
passage that encapsulates some of the main messages of 1 and
2 Kings together. 1 Kings 9, beginning at verse
1. And it came to pass when Solomon
had finished building the house of the Lord, and the king's house,
and all Solomon's desire which he wanted to do. But the Lord
appeared to Solomon the second time as he had appeared to him
at Gibeon. And the Lord said to him, I have
heard your prayer and your supplication that you have made before me.
I have consecrated this house which you have built to put my
name there forever, and my eyes and my heart will be there perpetually. Now if you walk before me as
your father David walked in integrity of heart and in uprightness To
do according to all that I have commanded you and if you keep
my statutes and my judgments Then I will establish the throne
of your kingdom over Israel forever as I promised David your father
saying you shall not fail to have a man on the throne of Israel,
but If you or your sons at all turn from following me and do
not keep my statutes and my commandments and my statutes, which I have
set before you, but go and serve other gods and worship them.
Then I will cut off Israel from the land, which I have given
them. And this house, which I have consecrated for my name, I will
cast out of my sight. Israel will be a proverb and
a byword among all peoples. And as for this house, which
is exalted, everyone who passes by it will be astonished and
will hiss and say, why has the Lord done thus to this land and
to this house? Then they will answer, because
they forsook the Lord, their God, who brought their fathers
out of the land of Egypt and have embraced other gods and
worship them and serve them. Therefore, the Lord has brought
all this calamity on them. Amen. Father, we thank you for
this, your word, and for the whole First and Second Kings,
which has so many instructions that we need in our day and age. And I pray that you would enable
me to faithfully bring your word to this, your people, for your
people to be edified, built up in this, your gracious word. We pray this in Jesus' name,
amen. Well, I'm just curious how many people have been able
to keep up with the readings and have read through 1st and
2nd Kings. Just a few. I don't blame you. It's been
a slogging big job to get through that. I have found the stories
in 1st and 2nd Kings to be absolutely captivating. I try to read through
the Bible once a year, sometimes more, but this book is one of
my favorites. It is so huge. taking on these
two books that I won't be able to give an adequate survey. So
my survey part is going to be pretty brief. But what I want
to do this morning is I want to dissect this book in a way
that will help you to read through First and Second Kings much more
intelligently in the future. The first thing that I want to
point out is that these books constitute far more than simply
history. Most commentaries that you read
on First and Second Kings will tell you that the author was
very selective in his choice of facts for the history because
the purpose of the author was not just to ground us in history,
that is one of the purposes, but the purpose of the author
was to give us theological lessons and practical and moral lessons
to guide his people. And that means that this book
was designed to transform us. and even to transform entire
nations. It was not designed to just give
us geopolitical facts. Now, there are a lot of fascinating
geopolitical facts in this book, but this is far more than simply
a history. Now, just one example of the
selectivity, based on archeology and secular history, most scholars
acknowledge that Omri was probably one of the most important kings
after Solomon in the entire history of Israel, and yet this book
dismisses him in eight verses. Harley spends any time whatsoever
on Omri. Why? Well, because it does not
entirely fit the purpose for this book. And we'll get to the
purpose a little bit later on, but he's selective is the point.
He skips over decades of fascinating history. in other kings' lives,
again, because it does not fit the purpose of this book. So
you're gonna be a little bit disappointed if you're looking
to 1 and 2 Kings to be a complete history. You really need to look
at all of the Bible together to get that complete history.
But this book has a very specific purpose for every fact that was
included. Let me give you another example.
In the 1 Kings 22 story, where Jehoshaphat and Ahab link up
together to fight against the Syrians who had amassed an enormous
army, you would expect the author to spend a lot more time, give
a lot more details about a battle that proves to be one of the
pivotal battles in Ahab's life. In fact, he dies and it's the
end of his kingdom. But the details that the author
gives to us actually go behind the scenes and reveal the conflict
between demons and angels. bad prophets and a good prophet,
and why God is sovereign over absolutely every detail of history,
including, you know, some soldier who has no idea what he's shooting
at. He just shoots an arrow at random, and God takes that random
arrow and pierces at the precise point where Ahab's armor was
weak, and it kills him. And Ahab was disguised so that
nobody would know to shoot at him. But that's one of my favorite
stories in showing that God's providence covers even the so-called
chance events of life. In God's economy, there is nothing
chance. Even the throwing of a dice,
Proverbs says, is controlled by the Lord. Now from our perspective,
it looks random. It looks very, very chance-like,
but God controls even that. And from this book, this history
was written clearly In a way that shows in that chapter, the
pragmatic decision of Jehoshaphat, and he was a very good king,
the pragmatic decision of Jehoshaphat to align with evil King Ahab
against an even worse enemy was a disastrous decision because
of angered God and proved to be covenantally unfaithful. The
history of that one battle is full of practical lessons on
things like God's sovereignty, the importance of nations adhering
to his covenant, the importance of following the details of God's
law even when it proves to be inconvenient, how spiritual principalities
and powers factor into warfare, God's laws of harvest. It's just
a rich repository of lessons. So we can't just read these books
as histories. We need to see them as God's
prophetic writings to a nation that had been disregarding his
covenant. And there are several features of this book we need
to understand as background in order to properly understand
the book as a whole. So I'm going to go through a
little bit of background detail for you. First fact that everybody
acknowledges, and that's so important to understand if we're to understand
these books, is that 1 and 2 Kings is a unity. In our books, they're
divided up into two books, but the original Hebrew, it was one
book. That's why I'm only preaching one sermon on 1 and 2 Kings.
And The author clearly connected
the book of Kings to the book of Samuel, and he did so not
only thematically. There is a connection thematically
that all commentators talk about, and that is it's a part of the
Deuteronomistic literature. That means, just like Samuel,
Kings is applying the book of Deuteronomy to the blessings
and the cursings that God was bringing upon nations. But it's also connected very
tightly to Samuel, just via its structure. And if we had time
to dig into it, we would see that it's connected tightly to
later books by a later subsequent prophet. For right now, I'm just
gonna stick to the fact that we will misinterpret the book
if we do not see all of 1 and 2 Kings as one book, united in
purpose and theology. We'll miss the central message
if we divide them up. And we'll look at that a little
bit more in a bit. The second thing that needs to
be understood is when the book was written. Unlike Chronicles,
which was written by Ezra, a prophet who wrote after the exile and
after Israel gets back into the land of Israel, Kings began to
be written in the years just prior to the exile, and the last
two chapters were written after Judah was carried away, captured
to Babylon. And there are many proofs of
that. I'll just give you one hint of the kind of internal
evidences you need to look at. 1 Kings 8, verse 8, is the first
example. After discussing the temple,
and the Ark of the Covenant, and the cherubim, angels that
were on top of that Ark of the Covenant, and the rings, and
the poles that go through those rings, the last phrase of 1 Kings
8, verse 8 says, and they are there to this day." Now that
statement would make no sense whatsoever if the temple had
been destroyed. and the furniture taken away.
That's the way many people think of this, that it's written centuries
before. No, that statement makes it very
clear that the bulk of this book was actually written before the
exile. Now the last two chapters are
written immediately after the exile. But if Jeremiah wrote
this book, and I'm jumping ahead in my outline, but if he wrote
the book, as I believe he did, and as ancient authorities have
clearly stated, that all of these facts make sense. Jeremiah would
have been writing the vast bulk of the book prior to the exile,
but he would record the last two chapters because he was an
eyewitness. Chapter 25 is obviously being
written by an eyewitness of the burning of the temple and of
the city, and he was an eyewitness. But just like the other histories,
The very last part of the book, the last four verses, was written
by the next historical prophet, who was Ezra. This is one of
the ways that the historical books have been linked together.
Let me just give you a review of this kind of an issue that
we have seen already. The last verses of Deuteronomy
were written by Joshua, and Joshua wrote not only his book, but
the last part of that, to connect those books together. So Joshua
24, verse 26 says, then Joshua wrote these words in the book
of the law of God. It's written right into the canon,
okay? They didn't have to wait for
centuries to figure out, is Joshua canonical or not? That's a heretical
view of canonicity. No, the prophet who wrote the
book immediately wrote that book right into the canon, and that
is true of all of the subsequent prophets as well. The last verses
of Joshua were written by Samuel, connecting 1st and 2nd Samuel
tightly to Joshua. The last verses of Samuel were
written by Jeremiah, and actually we saw that Samuel, the chiasm
in it, is not finished until the first two chapters of Kings.
And again, it's to tightly connect these books together. The last
verses of Kings were written by Ezra. And my book on Canon
shows how all of these tightly integrated features show that
the books of the Bible are self-authenticating. God alone can declare them to
be canonical. Now, keep in mind that you better
not believe what I have just told you if you want to be academically
respectable. liberals and even some modern
conservatives think, oh, that's not academically respectable
anymore to believe that Jeremiah wrote the book First and Second
Kings. Everybody thinks it's way, way
later than that. Well, I don't care to be academically
respectable in this compromised age at all. Ancient, all of the
ancient authorities and certainly the internal evidence shows,
for example, their stylistic features that are identical in
Kings as they are in Jeremiah. I won't get into all of the internal
evidences, but there are a number of conservative scholars who
have shown that the modern debate on authorship is absolutely ridiculous. It's silly. Jeremiah did indeed
write this book. Now that fact alone is going
to clue us into why Kings is constantly preaching the theological
and the moral themes of this book to his audience. He was
warning his nation that if it did not repent, it would end
up in exile. And once they were in exile,
he was trying to warn them that if they did not repent, they
were not going to get back into the land Canaan. Our covenantal
God does not turn a blind eye to the compromises of any nation
including our own. Now the fourth thing that helps
us to understand why this book was written is the Hebrew structure
of the book. You know I'm big on getting into
the structure of the books because it's a part of hermeneutics.
It's a part of the design. Many different ways in which
the Hebrews would structure books. This one happens to be a Chiasm. And I usually try to find the
structure of a book before I read what the scholars say the structure
is, because there is a danger of eisegesis. You say, oh, that's
a cool structure, and then you read it back into the text. So
what I typically do is try to find the structure, and then
I will look to the scholars to see if others have come up with
the same structure. It's just kind of a validation
technique. And I will grant you, because
we've hosted Presbytery, I have not had the time to do a lot
of the computer analysis of Hebrew words and phrases, but this one
just fell together very easily. All I did was look at the beginning
and the ending and working back to the middle, and it was instantly
obvious that this was a chiasm. A chiasm is an A, B, C, D, C,
B, A kind of a structure, you know, where the heart of the
book is the central theme. So I started writing down what
the themes of each section were, and voila, I came up with the
chiasm that's in your outlines. And then I went to test to see
if any others saw the same thing, and they did. George Sabron,
Jerome Walsh, Robert Cohn, Peter Lightheart, and others. Slightly
different details that you will see, but again, the same basic
structure and all pointing to 2 Kings 2 as being the very center
of that chiasm. So take a look at the first chart
of the chiasm of the book. I'm just going to quickly walk
you through it. You'll see that the book begins with the last
days of aged David. the first king of the Davidic
covenant, and it ends with the last days of Jehoiakim, the last
king of the Davidic dynasty. And throughout this book, every
king is being compared to David. The Davidic covenant is a central
theme to this book. It's part of the thesis of this
book. And the fact that the last verses
of 2 Kings or about God preserving Jehoiakim in Babylon, or a hint,
hey, God's not finished with the Davidic covenant yet. There
is something yet to occur in the Davidic covenant. He is preserving
the line of David just as he promised to be an eternal line.
because it's Jesus who's going to carry, he's going to be eternally,
you know, the seed of David who will rule over the kingdom. And
so it's not by accident that the New Testament points back
to Jehoiakin, this exact passage to make that point. Now back
to the outline, the second part of the book of Kings, that's
the first B section, deals with executions of contenders in order
to consolidate David's dynasty, and that section is paralleled
by the second to last section of the book, the second B section,
with executions of contenders that ends the ruling of the Davidic
dynasty. Third part of the book deals
with the temple and city being built up by a wise but very young
Solomon corresponding to the second sea near the end of Kings
where the temple and city are destroyed by an equally young
but very unwise king. In fact, this temple imagery
is a central message to the book. But the parallel sides, when
you start examining those two sides, you realize the temple
was built upon the Davidic covenant and the temple was ruined because
people were violating the Davidic covenant. The first D section
of the last days of United Kingdom involves Solomon calling foreigners
to see the glory and the wisdom of the kingdom. You got this
Queen of Sheba, right? She's traveling 1,200 miles on camel. That's a long way just to see
the glory of this kingdom. But this is immediately followed
by an astonishing and unexpected apostasy, and then conflict,
and then successors. And this parallels the last days
of the kingdom of Judah where Hezekiah, who some people liken
to a second David or a second Solomon, he's an inspired prophet,
Hezekiah is, but he pridefully unwisely calls foreigners to
see the glory of the kingdom followed by apostasy, conflict,
and successors as well. Now he's going to be making in
this book a big theological point of the foreigners being called
to see the glory of the kingdom. The first calling was good. The
second calling was not good. Why? The first E section outlines
lessons from the wars of Judah and Israel. And for convenience
sake, I've really shortened this outline. I didn't give you all
of those details. And they're paralleled in amazing
ways by lessons from the wars of Judah and Israel in the second
E, but that discussion, same discussion, but it is interrupted
by telling us about the prophets Elijah and Elisha, which are
the F-section of this chiasm. The first F-section deals with
the ministry of Elijah the prophet, paralleled with the second F-section
that deals with the ministry of Elisha the prophet, the prophet
who has a double portion of the spirit of Elijah, which leads
to the heart of the book, which is the passing of the prophetic
mantle from Elijah to Elisha in 2 Kings 2. So the way chiasms
go, we've preached on chiasms enough, you understand this,
the elbow or the heart of that chiasm is the central theme of
the chiasm. So you can see why you have to
take both books together, otherwise you're gonna miss this. if the
central feature there is not about some king, which you might
expect some glorious king is going to be the center or some
horribly bad king. No, it's not about the king at
all. Since it's about the prophetic lawsuits, covenant lawsuits that
Elijah and Elisha bring against the nation, you can see that
it makes sense of Jeremiah using this as the basis for his covenant
lawsuit. So basically what happens is
1 and 2 Kings is his compilation of the evidence that's going
to be entered into the courtroom documents for his covenant lawsuit
of the book of Jeremiah. So that's what's going on in
this book. By the way, this is what makes
1 and 2 Kings so, so different from 1 and 2 Chronicles. Chronicles equals the history
of Samuel and Kings. And there's a whole bunch of
material cut out of Chronicles. Most of the bad stuff is cut
out of Chronicles. It's emphasizing the positive
stuff. You almost have no negative stuff
about Solomon or other kings like that. Why? Because Chronicles
is designed to encourage the post-exilic community about God's
promises to those who are faithful, whereas Kings is documenting
how God is going to bring his covenant lawsuits against those
who are unfaithful. And so the prophetic message
is central to this book. And it's no wonder then that
the Hebrews, they recognized this, they spoke of both Samuel
and Kings as being the former prophets. It's a prophetic document. And interestingly, 2 Kings 2
is also a very precise chiasm. I won't get into all of the details
of the parallels, but if you look in your bulletins, I mean
your insert there, I put Peter Lightheart's description of even
the geographical nature of the chiasm. He points out, yes, thematically
it's a perfect chiasm, but even the way in which they travel
geographically was a chiasm. He points out that Elijah, for
example, had to go way out of his way in a very odd route out
of Israel, and that trip was a prophetic trip. Not just so
that it would later be able to fit into a chiasm that God providentially
arranged, but also to show a reversal of the original conquest in order
to show God's preparation for a new spiritual reconquest of
the land. It's not accidental, it's very
deliberate. Let me just explain what is meant by that. If you
just look at the geographical locations in his outline of chapter
2, of Gilgal, to Bethel, to Jericho, to the crossing of the Jordan,
those just happen to, well there's no happen to's in the Bible right,
but they just happen to mirror the geographical locations of
entrance into the land of Canaan in the book of Numbers and in
the book of Joshua, which makes sense of why in this book Elijah
is portrayed as a second Moses And Elisha is portrayed as a
second Joshua. So just as the spirit of Moses
rested upon Joshua, and he took up the mantle of Moses to conquer
the land of Canaan, the spirit of Elijah rests upon Elisha,
and Elisha takes up Elijah's mantle to engage in a new conquest.
But Lightheart believes that these are also prophetic statements
of exile and return to the land that would have been very, very
encouraging to Jeremiah's audience. As Lightheart says, quote, the
departure and return of the two prophets points ahead toward
the departure and return of Israel in the exile. In both cases,
two go out and one returns. Now I'll just warn you, if you're
reading Lightheart, he many times reads way too much into a text. But the parallels are so many
and so obvious, I think he is absolutely correct on this. The
parallels between Moses, Joshua, Elijah, and Elisha. They are not by accident. So
what's going on here is God is using the themes of exodus and
conquest to show that the northern tribes of Israel are being treated
as an Egypt that is destined to judgment. And the southern
tribes are being treated as a Canaan that is destined for judgment. It really is beautiful imagery.
But as I've already mentioned, there are themes of hope in 2
Kings 2, a hope of a return to the land and a reversal of the
curse if Israel will but repent. Now, how does Jeremiah include
those hints of hope? If you just take a look at 2
Kings 2, verse 18, 2 Kings 2, verse 18, this occurs after Elijah
dies and is taken away with no body to be found. despite the
fact that 50 prophets searched diligently for that body for
three days. I think even the three is not
by accident. They could not find the body,
just as no one could find Moses' body because God had buried that
body. Now what happens after Moses
dies and Joshua goes into the land, after he's crossed the
Jordan? Jericho gets conquered, right? First city. that what
happens after Elisha crosses the Jordan, verse 18 tells us,
and when they came back to him, for he had stayed in Jericho,
he said to them, did I not say to you, do not go up? Now keep
in mind that God through Joshua, Joshua had cursed Jericho in
Joshua 6, verse 34, and he had said as a part of his curse that
the First King who tried to rebuild Jericho would sacrifice his son
upon its walls. Well, 1 Kings 16 verse 34 showed
the fulfillment of that prophecy. The king there rebuilt the walls
and he sacrificed his firstborn when he laid its foundation.
And there's actually gonna be another firstborn sacrificed
in 2 Kings 3. So there's a theme going on there.
But in our chapter, apparently even the water and the ground
are cursed. So take a look at verse 19. Then the men of the
city said to Elisha, please notice, the situation of this city is
pleasant as my Lord sees, but the water is bad and the ground
barren. The water had poisoned the ground
and made everything barren. Everything was under Joshua's
curse. And there's a reversal that's
going to happen. Elisha is going to heal the water, heal the land.
He's going to do it with a bowl of salt. And the salt represents
a new covenant. It's a covenant of salt. It was
a prophetic foreshadowing. Now some think it's just a prophetic
foreshadowing of Israel being able to come back into the land
of Israel and there's going to be now restoration. But many
also think that this is a prophetic foreshadowing of Jesus, the greater
Elisha, who takes Jericho's and turns them into new covenant
gardens. And I'll explain in a bit how Elisha is very clearly
a type of Christ, is said to be. If you've ever been to Jericho,
It's beautiful. It's not barren at all. Even
to this day, it is a beautiful land. But the chapter as a whole
is strewn with hints that the prophetic evaluation of nations
is at the heart of what the book is all about. And at the heart
of the heart of this book is verses 9 through 12, which details
Elijah being caught up, his mantle falls down. There's a transfer
of the mantle to Elisha, which symbolizes what? It symbolizes
the constant prophetic presence of God's voice evaluating history. Now if that's true, then it makes
sense that the book as a whole is going to be used as the foundational
evidence for Jeremiah's prophetic covenant lawsuit in the book
of Jeremiah. He uses real history to warn nations not to rebel
against God and numerous examples of a disaster that follows when
they do not. So we're into why 1 and 2 Kings
was written. And I've already told you, but
let me summarize it again. God made an eternal covenant
with David and Now that Israel's in exile, they're gonna be wondering,
what was with this eternal covenant? And God, there's always gonna
be some king to reign, and now there's no kings reigning. Is
God unfaithful? Has he failed his promises? And
this book is an apologetic to show that God has been totally
consistent with his promises. The history of kings was designed
to clearly demonstrate God's covenantal curses on kings, when
they violated God's law, God's covenantal blessings on kings,
when they kept His covenant. They submitted to it. When you
see the consistency of God's blessings and curses over the
course of hundreds of years, you cannot explain these things
away as accidents of history. God was totally sovereign. And
throughout the histories, God is continually reminding Israel,
hey, this is why Samaria fell and the Jews were scattered over
all of the empire of Syria. And he's continually reminding
them, if you don't repent, you in a similar way, southern kingdom,
Jerusalem, are going to be destroyed and you're going to be scattered
amongst the Babylonians. Constantly and repetitiously,
the writer tells us, here is yet another example of why this
nation deserves to be destroyed. They were not destroyed by an
accident of politics. They were not destroyed because
of economics or any other geopolitical fact. Well, yes, God blesses
and curses with geopolitical facts, doesn't he? But ultimately,
it's God who blesses or curses nations, and he has been 100%
faithful to his Davidic covenant. I think that is the message.
of Kings. Key word is David, which occurs
92 times. Every king is compared to David,
and the book is showing that God enforces the covenant with
David. And I was torn on what constitutes
the key passage for interpreting the whole book, so I put two
up there. But I really do think that the
one I read earlier, 1 Kings 9, captures the essence of the book. And I'm just going to only reread
verses 4 through 7 of God's speech. God says, now, if you walk before
me as your father David walked, in integrity of heart and uprightness,
to do according to all that I commanded you, and if you keep my statutes
and my judgments, then I will establish the throne of your
kingdom over Israel forever, as I promised David your father,
saying, you shall not fail to have a man on the throne of Israel.
But if you or your sons at all turn from following me, and do
not keep my commandments and my statutes, which I have set
before you, but go and serve other gods and worship them,
then I will cut off Israel from the land which I have given them
and this house which I have consecrated for my name, I will cast out
of my sight. Israel will be a proverb and
by word among all people. So no surprise, God had already
right from the beginning promised this is the way it's going to
be. In a nutshell, nations are in covenant with God, and they
must obey His laws, they must trust His gospel, and they must
submit to His rule. If they do not, they are sowing
trouble to themselves. And it's just a matter of time
before apostate nations are destroyed if they don't repent, if no revivalist
is brought to slow down that day of reckoning. And by the
way, it doesn't matter whether the king is as good as David.
If he violates God's covenant, he suffers the consequences.
And this book shows that all the kings failed in some way
from David to Jehoiakim. This not only reminds us that
we must look forward to a coming Messiah who would be the final
and the only faithful king, truly faithful king, but it reminds
us of the need to apply the gospel even to politics. Without God's
grace, no nation could be pleasing in God's sight. Now let me give
you a whirlwind tour of some of the key features of the book.
First two chapters of Kings, First Kings are a really odd
way to begin a book. That is, they are odd if you're
trying to prove that David is an absolutely fantastic leader,
the ideal king. He is anything but that. He is
portrayed as weak and utterly out of touch with reality on
some levels. He is not the eternal Messiah
that was promised. Instead, the opening verses show
him shivering in bed, unable to keep warm, and his advisors
give the odd suggestion Oh, why don't you marry a young, beautiful
virgin who can keep you warm in bed? And he goes along with
that ridiculous, ungodly suggestion, living just like what the pagan
nations were doing. It again shows this is not quite
the ideal king that we might think that he was. He's not the
Messiah. David was even out of touch with
reality when it came to politics, not even realizing that his son
Adonijah had already conspired to overthrow the kingdom. He'd
already been declared as king. He wanted to take the kingdom
away from his dad. He was out of touch as a parent. The text
says that he never disciplined his son. Now, these are embarrassing
details that this author is including here, and other authors don't
include that, but he very deliberately includes these in the book to
show that David is weak. He's not like the final Messiah
will be. It really takes a prophet, Nathan,
to remedy the solution. And by the way, the prophets
are a pretty strong link in this book. And Bathsheba also reminds
David, and David quickly does so. Now on his deathbed in chapter
two, David gives instructions to Solomon to deal with issues
he had been too weak to be able to deal with himself. Again,
showing that David lacks what it will take to be the final
Messiah. We're looking for another. He tells Solomon to follow God's
laws, stay in covenant with God, since that is the only way that
a king can prosper. And Solomon deals, I believe,
very fairly with the three men who had all engaged in capital
crimes under David's reign. In chapter three, we are left
wondering, if we're just first-time readers and not Christians who
already know better, But we might be left wondering, well, maybe
this is the promised Messiah because look at how magnificent
His reign is. He seems like He is a man after
God's own heart. He's humble. He's dependent upon
God. Verse 3 says, Solomon loved Yehoah,
walking in the statutes of his father David, except that he
sacrificed and burned incense in the high places. Uh-oh, okay,
there's one defect there. But it does appear that he even
corrected that by consolidating all worship into the temple,
which is a glorious temple of gold, where Almighty God has
His throne. He is devoted to God. He loves
God. And 2 Samuel 12 verse 24 says
that God loved Solomon in those early years. He loved him. 1
Chronicles says that God named him Solomon, which means peace,
because he's going to be the representative of Christ's empire
of peace. It was a symbol of Christ. In
those early years, Solomon recognized his desperate need of the Lord
if he was to reign properly. And in response to his humility,
God says in verse five, ask, what shall I give you? And Solomon's
prayer of response, I think, is a magnificent prayer. Rather
than asking for riches and power, he simply asks for wisdom to
discern between good and evil and to be able to reign in a
way that will please God. And God was very pleased with
that prayer. And he not only gives him more
wisdom than any of the ancients had, but more wealth and more
power, and again reflecting the Lord Jesus Christ and the future.
So this is 2 Kings 3, beginning to read at verse 10. The speech
pleased the Lord that Solomon had asked this thing. Then God
said to him, because you have asked this thing and have not
asked long life for yourself, nor have asked riches for yourself,
nor have asked the life of your enemies, and have asked for yourself
understanding to discern justice, behold, I have done according
to your words. See, I have given you a wise and understanding
heart so that there has been not been anyone like you before
you, nor shall any like you arise after you. And I have also given
you what you have not asked, both riches and honor, so that
there shall not be anyone like you among the kings all your
days. So if you walk in my ways to keep my statutes and my commandments
as your father David walked, then I will lengthen your days."
Now, this is a theme that keeps coming up throughout the book.
So Solomon is off to a good start. When you look at the things that
Solomon did in the first eight chapters, with two exceptions,
he is portrayed as a king that is almost as ideal as David was. And as I mentioned before, the
scripture especially portrays him as the symbol, the type of
Jesus Christ and his messianic kingdom. The temple itself, we
won't get into that, but it's got imagery of the Garden of
Eden showing that only by God's grace and by his rule can paradise
be restored. It's all of grace, beautiful
imagery. Solomon's prayer at the dedication of the temple
in first Kings eight, one of the most heart moving prayers
you can find in the Bible. I would encourage you to pray
at least parts of that prayer to the Lord. I love that prayer.
I've prayed it many, many times. I know some of you guys have
prayed it, uh, right here in church, at least parts of it.
Dr. Joe Moorcraft is correct when he says that this prayer
shows the early Solomon to be a man who knows his God, knows
the scripture, has a heart for God, loves his law, walks in
his laws, keeps his covenant. With two exceptions, he seemed
like such an appropriate symbol for the Messiah. So the question
comes, how on earth could he backslide so far? How on earth
could he violate every prohibition to kings that God gave in Deuteronomy
chapter 17? How on earth could a man who
loved God so much backslide as far as chapter 11 says that he
backslid in his old age? It seems inconceivable. But Jeremiah's
point is that even the best kings will fail if their hearts are
not constantly kept by God's grace. Solomon stands as a warning
to all of you. that you need to guard your hearts
or you could become a slave to Satan. Out of the heart arise
the issues of life, and Solomon gave in to the lust of the flesh,
the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life. And if you read
chapter 11, wow, you see all three lusts written all over
that chapter. I'm gonna read the first few
verses of chapter 11. But King Solomon loved many foreign
women, as well as the daughter of Pharaoh. Women of the Moabites,
Ammonites, Edomites, Sidonians, and Hittites, from the nations
of whom the Lord had said to the children of Israel, you shall
not intermarry with them, nor they with you. Surely they will
turn your hearts after their gods. Solomon clung to these
in love. And he had 700 wives, princesses,
and 300 concubines, and his wives turned away his heart. For it
was so, when Solomon was old, that his wives turned his heart
after other gods, and his heart was not loyal to the Lord his
God, as was the heart of his father David. For Solomon went
after Ashtoreth, the goddess of the Sidonians, and after Milcom,
the abomination of the Ammonites. Solomon did evil in the sight
of the Lord and did not fully follow the Lord as did his father
David. Then Solomon built a high place for Chemosh the abomination
of Moab on the hill that is east of Jerusalem and for Molech the
abomination of the people of Ammon. And he did likewise for
all his foreign wives who burned incense and sacrificed to their
gods. Now it's very easy for us to
shake our heads at Solomon and wonder how a man of prayer How
a man who could write the inspired and beautiful book of Proverbs,
a man of such intense devotion to God, and a man who had already
warned other people, hey, don't stray from God's laws, how he
could stray so far. At the age of 17 or 18, Solomon
told his first wife, by inspiration, that she was his one and only. At least that's how I understand
verse in the Song of Solomon, and there's a number of other
commentators say yes, that's a declaration of monogamy. He
was not a polygamist at that point. Because it was said by inspiration,
I just assume that he had no problem with lust at that point. He had a beautiful relationship
with his first wife, who by the way was not the daughter of Pharaoh. And I can prove that definitively.
Um, scripture is abundantly clear on that point. That was a compromise
marrying Pharaoh. And I think first King says he
should never have married Pharaoh. Now, just to give you one crystal
clear proof, she was not his first wife. We learned from first
Kings 14, verse 21, that Rehoboam was one year old when Solomon
came to the throne. Pharaoh's daughter was married
to him significantly after he came to the throne. So again,
that's just a proof that Pharaoh's daughter was not the first wife.
But the point is, Solomon was such a humble, sincere, godly
man in his early years, it seems hard for people to understand
his transformation into the prideful, lecherous man that he became
in chapter 11 with 700 wives and 300 concubines. But you know
what? I have read numerous testimonies
of godly, passionate pastors who have played the same game
with pornography, which in some ways is no different than what
Solomon did. And because those pastors started
rationalizing their sin, they made an absolutely disastrous
mess of their lives. They got hooked. It started with
one compromise, and then the allure made them have another
compromise. Another, until they became addicted
and manifested problems similar to Solomon's idolatry. Now when
you read Steve Gallagher's book, Tearing Down the High Places
of Sexual Idolatry, or his book, At the Altar of Sexual Idolatry,
you can see one-to-one parallels between people addicted to pornography
today and what Solomon was going through. One-to-one parallels,
and as a result, these pastors have lost their ministries, their
reputation, their wives, their children, their houses, so many
things. They gave it all up because they
were pursuing after their idolatrous lusts. Do not think that you
were immune from falling as Solomon fell. Of course God used that
pain and he uses pain in our lives to bring the elect back
to himself, doesn't he? The book of Ecclesiastes was
written by a broken Solomon shortly before he died at the age of
60, and he was aged at 60. He was worn out in his life,
but he wrote that to warn us, don't imitate me. God did not
allow Solomon to experience any joy in sex, work, research, food,
entertainment, and any of the other wonderful things of life
as long as he was in a backslidden condition. It was all emptiness
and vanity. God turns the beautiful things
of this life into ashes. so that we will not serve idols. And yes, our idols are every
bit as real as Solomon's idols were. 1 Kings 11 verse 2 says
that Solomon clung to these women in love. He refused to give them
up. And given their idolatry, it
would have been perfectly just for him to give them up, execute
them, divorce them. Read Ezra. It would have been
perfectly lawful for him to have done that, but he clung to them.
When you cling to pornography, you are clinging to the same
demons that Solomon worshipped. In fact, you are opening your
life wide open as an invitation for demons to inhabit your life,
just as Solomon did. So Solomon learned that lesson
as an old man, probably feeling much older than his actual age
warranted, and he was restored to God, and he wrote the book
of Ecclesiastes to teach us to avoid his errors early. He basically
says, don't wait as long as I did. By the way, I think Song of Solomon
and Proverbs were written way early in his life during the
good period. Now interestingly, the author
of this book doesn't mention Solomon's restoration. Unlike
Chronicles, he is outlining how disasters will follow anyone
who compromises his covenant. It doesn't matter how good and
how glorious you are, those disasters will follow you. We already saw
that principle at work in the book of Judges, in the book of
Samuel. And this author leaves us with an image of Solomon in
his old age, where Solomon resembles Pharaoh more than he resembles
Christ, and the consequences are ugly. Chapter 12 begins the
next section of the book showing that Rehoboam has picked up his
father's evil actions. Parents, when you do not deal
with the issues in your life quickly, your children may well
imitate them and perhaps go beyond you. Rehoboam was much worse
than Solomon was. Not content with his insane wealth,
he tries to increase already burdensome taxes on the people,
and the people rebel under Jeroboam and form their own nation. And
interestingly, when Rehoboam tries to force the nation back
into the union, God sends a prophet in verse 24 saying, thus says
Yehovah, you shall not go up nor fight against your brethren,
the children of Israel. Let every man return to his house
for this thing is from me. So in this verse, God endorses
the doctrine of states seceding from a tyrannical country in
order to protect their citizens, interposition. issue was taxes. It wasn't even a hugely big issue. God authorized that secession. But the book goes on to show
that the secession is not a Savior either. Politics is never a Savior. Though Jeroboam had the right
to secede he too violated God's covenant and created problems
for the northern tribes right from the beginning. And the proof
of that is he built two temples. Now he did it to Yehovah but
he built two unauthorized temples. He and he refused to submit to
the Levitical priesthood, and he put two golden calves. I mean, this is exactly what
happened in Exodus, right? Where Moses, God said he almost
destroyed that nation if Moses hadn't interceded. So anybody
who's reading this and seeing those two golden calves, you
say, oh, this is not heading in a good direction. Jeroboam's
definitely in trouble. The rest of the book, and we're
not going to have time to adequately cover it all, but it's going
to get evaluations of each king and whether he followed in the
steps of faithful David or whether he rebelled against God like
Jeroboam or Ahab or one of the other evil kings. They were judged
on especially three things, whether they compromised in worship,
whether they failed to get rid of idolatry in the nation, and
whether they were willing to follow the covenantal laws and
provisions in their own life. Some kings made a pretense at
loyalty to God, but wow, this writer sees right through that
pretense and he says, no, they're a bad king. Doesn't matter if
they claim to be worshiping God. If they're violating in this
way, they are bad kings. Others were explicitly hostile
to the true faith and actually persecuted the true faith and
drove it underground. Kings is an outstanding book
to study during times of apostasy and persecution to see how God's
people handled such pressures. Now of the 19 Northern Kings,
not one was good, not a single one. Now you might wonder, what
about Jehu? Didn't he obey God in killing all of the prophets
of Baal? Yeah, he did, but he did it for ulterior motives because
those prophets would have been fiercely loyal to the Omri and
so he wanted to get rid of any competition, but God makes it
pretty clear that he was definitely a bad king. And every one of
those kings had a tragic death. Seven were assassinated, one
committed suicide, one was stricken by God, and one was taken to
Assyria. It does not give a pretty picture of of secular kingship. Northern kingdom lasted 209 years
and then was scattered around the world in exile. Now by itself
that shows God's an incredibly patient God and there's a reason
why he allows these kingdoms to last. They become tests then
of his people. We won't get into that right
now. Southern kingdom lasted 136 years longer than the northern
kingdom for a total of 345 years. The only interruption to the
line of David, the lawful line, was Queen Athaliah." Okay, so
you can see God's view on her. She's not a legitimate ruler. Of the southern kings, beginning
with Rehoboam, 12 did evil, two had a mixture of evil and good,
and six kings were quite good. But because of all of the evil
kings, many of Judah's kings also died a tragic death, with
five being assassinated, two being stricken by God, three
being exiled to foreign lands. And it illustrates that God is
not mocked. Now, the evil of the kings, pervasive evil that
was there, explains why the prophets play such an important role in
this book. Prophets were God's inspired
mouthpieces. to tell these kings and to tell
Israel what God thought about them. And it usually wasn't happy
news. Sometimes they gave supportive message, but usually it wasn't
happy. Now, I did hand out a legal-sized sheet of all of the kings and
prophets so that you could place where each story occurs. It can
get very confusing because it jumps back and forth from North
Kingdom to South Kingdom, and you can get lost if you don't
have a chart like that. And if you want a much, much
more detailed chart, this one's from Floyd Nolan Jones, but if
you go to floydnolanjonesministries.com, I think he's one of the most
accurate chronologists out there. You'll see a massive chart that's
almost impossible to print off, but you can read it online. It's
really cool. Anyway, the prophets that you see on that chart were
constantly challenging the people to get back to the laws of God.
That's the constant refrain. They called out idolatry and
injustice, brought God's covenant, lawsuits against nations that
refused to heed His voice. But don't think they were the
only prophets. You see some names there, but I'll just give you
a hint that God had sent hundreds of prophets. 1 Kings 18 verse
4 says that one of Ahab's officers, he was a good man by the name
of Obadiah, hid 100 prophets. We don't know the name of a single
one of those prophets, but he hid 100 prophets of God, 50 in
each cave, and fed them with bread and water. He was protecting
them from the queen, the wife of Ahab. So it's another kind
of interposition. In fact, this book is full of
examples. You want to find out how you can protect one another
against tyranny? Oh, this is a book that's got
all kinds of information on that. We aren't told the names of those
prophets, but it illustrates that God was faithfully bringing
his word to where? The northern kingdom that never
pretended to be, except under Rehoboam, a Christian nation.
Okay, despite its total commitment to paganism and its declaration,
hey, we're not a Yahweh's nation. God didn't say, okay, if you
want to worship other gods, that's okay. No, they too were subject
to God's law, just like the USA and Canada and every other nation
is. Don't ever think that God's laws are only for those who stay
in covenant with him. The most prominent prophets in
the Northern Kingdom were Elijah and Elisha. Ahab was the most
prominent king who needed God's rebuke. He had allowed his demonic
wife Jezebel to control him, to control the politics, and
the tyranny that resulted was horrible. Elijah declared a drought
on the northern kingdom, and true to his word, God did not
allow one drop to fall on that northern kingdom. Ahab was ticked
off. He hunts and hunts for Elijah.
He wants to kill him, and he can't. God preserves him. God
protects him, God feeds him. And finally Elijah shows up to
tell Ahab there's going to be a competition among Carmel to
see whose God is the true God, Baal or Yahweh. And Ahab, who
could have killed him right then and there, he thinks, well yeah,
maybe this will settle things once and for all. It must have
been kind of naive, but he calls all Israel to witness this. And
he's very polite, he says, okay, Baal worshipers, you can go first.
So they make their altar, they put the bull on top of it, and
they're praying and crying out to Baal to bring fire. He tells
these people, look, the God who brings fire down from heaven
miraculously and consumes the sacrifice, that's the true God.
And the people think, you know, that's pretty cool. We've never
seen anything like that. Let's go for it. So he has them go first. They're crying from morning till
noon with no results. So Elijah just starts mocking
them. You know, maybe it's your gods
are on a long trip. You know, maybe you need to cry out louder.
Maybe they're asleep. Maybe they're relieving themselves. You know,
he's just mocking them. And they do cry out louder and
louder. And they're cutting themselves
with knives and saying, please send fire. Finally, he says,
OK, it's over. It's my turn. And he puts his
bull on his altar and he asks them for water because he's the
only guy there. So he asked them for water. He
digs a big trench around this this altar. And he pours barrel
after barrel of water on top of this altar, drenching the
wood, filling up the trench that's around it, and a simple prayer
to God, and fire streaks from heaven, devouring not just the
sacrifice, but the wood and the stones and the water. There's
nothing left, and astounded, the people cry out, Yehoah, he
is God, he's the true God. And so Elijah seizes the moment,
and he says, okay, grab these false prophets, and he goes and
slays them all. Wow, does that tick off? Queen
Jezebel, and she vows to kill him. As I mentioned, 2 Kings
2 is the heart of the book, and it shows the mantle being transferred
from Elijah to Elisha. Elisha had asked for a double
portion of the spirit that was upon Elijah. Did he get it? Yes,
he did. Seven miracles for Elijah, 14
miracles for Elisha. Exactly double the portion. Now, let's take a quick look
at the Christ of Kings. Christ of Kings can be seen in
a number of symbols where David symbolized the period of Christ's
kingdom that we are in, the Messy Period. Solomon symbolizes the
future period of Christ's kingdom when the whole world's gonna
be converted and when it's going to be peace and prosperity and
wholeness. Another beautiful symbol of Jesus
is Elisha. Scholars believe that Elijah
was a symbol of John the Baptist. And Elisha, just like Joshua,
was a symbol of Jesus. And the New Testament seems to
back that up. In Matthew 11, verse 14, Jesus said very explicitly
that John the Baptist was the Elijah who was to come. And he
repeats that thought in Matthew 17, 10 through 12, which makes
Jesus the prophet who comes after John the Baptist. So he corresponds
to Elisha. So I think it's pretty strong
evidence he is a type of Jesus. Christ is also symbolized by
the temple, sacrifices, prophets, priests, kings. We've looked
at all of those symbols, so I won't delve into them today. I'm not
going to cover the themes of the book either. I've listed
them there for you. But let me list a few of my favorite
lessons from the book of Kings. I've put quite a few scripture
references for each lesson so you can study those on your own.
But there are two ways in which Yehovah is said to be the only
true God who controls all things. So there's miracles that show
God controls nature. There are these twists and turns,
remarkable twists and turns of human history to show He controls
all history. I've already related the story
of Mount Carmel, but Elijah's statement that no rain would
fall except at his command, God's command through Elijah, shows
he controls rain. Feeding of Elijah by crows, when
nobody else had food and the crows didn't eat it, they just
brought it to Elijah, shows God's control over crows, right? The
widow of Zarephath having a never-ending supply of oil and flour, the
raising of the child from the dead in 1 Kings 17, 23, the randomly
shot arrow that God pokes right into Ahab. Those verses indicate
God controls every facet of nature and history. You cannot escape
that lesson when you read Kings. A second major lesson is God's
unconditional election. That's the second point of the
five points of Calvinism, right? Tulip, total depravity, unconditional
election, limited atonement, irresistible grace, perseverance
of the saints. So many stories that show God's selective grace,
His unconditional grace. But Jesus singles out two, and
those two stories infuriated the Jews of His day. It was the
widow of Zarephath and Naaman the leper. I'm not going to give
you the wonderful story of Naaman the leper. You probably all know
it by heart. But here's the point that Jesus makes from that story
Jesus said but I tell you truly Many widows were in Israel in
the days of Elijah when the heaven was shut up three years and six
months and there was a great famine throughout all the land
but to none of them was Elijah sent except to Zarephath in the
region of Sidon to a woman who was a widow and many lepers were
in Israel and in the time of Elisha the prophet, and none
of them was cleansed except Naaman the Syrian." What marvelous examples
of unconditional election. He bypasses the people who think
they're pretty good, and he sends his grace to two Gentiles. Another major lesson is that
God demands exclusive worship. I give verses that show whether
you're Jew or Gentile, all nations are called to worship God. Next
point, I've given several verses that show God dictates the nature,
content, and place of worship. We call this what? The regulative
principle of worship. That God needs to be worshipped
the way he wants, the way he dictates, not the way that we
think he ought to be worshipped. Jeroboam is an example of this.
He didn't worship pagan gods. He claimed to be worshipping
Yehoah, But he did it according to the dictates of his own heart,
not the dictates of the scripture. So this book speaks against the
false worship that plagues evangelical churches who worship the true
God, but they do it according to the dictates of their own
hearts, not according to the dictates of scripture. Deuteronomy
12 had commanded, you shall not worship Yehovah your God in that
way. Whatever I command you, be careful to observe it. You
shall not add to it nor take away from it. And then you can
study some of the examples I give in Kings. I think they're fantastic
examples illustrating regulative principle of worship. Another
major lesson of this book is that God's laws are binding on
all men, not just on true believers. God enforced it on David, if
he violates God's laws, he suffers. When Manasseh, the most wicked
of the kings, violates God's laws, he suffers more. But they
were both subject to the law. And one interesting story that
illustrates this is in 1 Kings 20 when God allows Ahab to win
against the Syrians. Now the reason, and the only
reason He allowed Ahab to win against the Syrians is because
the Syrians had blasphemed him by saying, Yehoah, he's the God
of the hills. We have the God of the plains.
We can win them if we fight on the plains. And so here's what
God says to Ahab to teach them not to blaspheme. Thus says Yehoah,
because the Syrians have said Yehoah is God of the hills, but
he is not the God of the valleys. Therefore, I will deliver all
this great multitude in your hand and you shall know that
I am Yehoah. God didn't give it to him because
of his goodness, far from it. And Ahab actually should have
learned from this. He should have said, oh, wow, he is the
God of all the world and submitted, but he couldn't because he was
under the thumb of Jezebel. He continued to worship Baal.
So it also explains one of the reasons why God allows bad nations
to exist so long. They are very convenient tools
to persecute and also to purify the church. God has his reasons.
But another lesson seen throughout the book is that God is faithful
to always keep His promises. His promise to David keeps coming
up over and over again. He also mentions keeping His
promises to other kings. Very encouraging theme. I love
the theme of God's promises. He is a promise-keeping God.
Most of the kings in this book end up having syncretism, and
it's clear God hates you mixing the presuppositions of the world
with the presuppositions of the scripture. And again, this book
speaks against evangelicals who think like the world, act like
the world. They're trying to mix the two together. Yet another
lesson is that the repeated failures of kings in this book illustrates
the saying, it is better to trust in Yehovah than to put your confidence
in princes, Psalm 118, 9. Or, do not put your trust in
princes, nor in a son of man, in whom there is no help, Psalm
146, 3. This book is a fantastic illustration
of that principle. Paul summarizes yet another lesson
of this book by saying that the unfaithfulness of the Jews does
not mean that God was being unfaithful to His promises. He always had
the elect to whom he was utterly faithful. And in teaching election,
Paul comes to the inescapable conclusion that all Israel is
not Israel. In other words, there's an invisible
church within the church as a whole. So Paul says, but it is not as
though the word of God has taken no effect, for they are not all
Israel who are of Israel, nor are they the children, all the
children, because they are the seed of Abraham. but in Isaac
your seed shall be called." That is, those who are the children
of the flesh, these are not the children of God, but the children
of the promise are counted as seed. And then finally, this
book illustrates that only grace can keep us from the downward
slide that depravity is tugging at, okay? Don't ever presume
upon God's grace or you may well become like Solomon. Every day
recognize that there but for the grace of God goes every single
one of us. And every day ask God to keep
you from stumbling. I love the verse near the end
of Jude where he says that he is able to keep us from stumbling. May it be so, Lord Jesus. Amen. Father, we thank you for your
word. And we thank you for how you have constructed the Bible
to present to us so many different lessons. Help us to learn those
lessons, to be transformed by those lessons, and to grow in
our love and devotion to you as a result. Bless this, your
people, in Jesus' name.
Kings
Series Bible Survey
The practical and theological exposition of 1 and 2 Kings.
| Sermon ID | 5301921041584 |
| Duration | 1:04:55 |
| Date | |
| Category | Sunday Service |
| Bible Text | 1 Kings 1:1; 2 Kings 1:1 |
| Language | English |
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