Category: 1 Kings

Reading

Audio, Visual

SAA Notes

Northern Israel goes through a time of great political instability, with assassination commonplace. Israel has six kings while Judah has only one – godly Asa. The cycle of the Book of Judges is repeated, with no Judge arising to save Israel. God does send His prophet Elijah instead! Israel has rejected God and His Christ. Their way peters out, as Psalm 2 warns.

SJA Notes

* Loving God, because Your steadfast love is good, deliver us! We are poor and needy, our hearts are stricken with us. Help us, O LORD our God!

“And as if it had been a light thing for him to walk in the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, …”

Baasha, Elah, Zimri, Omri, Tibni and Ahab.

A sorry lot of kings who did evil, each one going deeper and deeper into sin. Both in themselves and in leading the people.

Here we see the very real effects of continual unrepentant sin in the king, a life of unbelief, rejecting God and His word.

It is good to remind ourselves that at the root of this evil is idolatry.

David sinned, but he continued to promote true worship of God and obedience to His commands all his days.

From Solomon on we see a line of kings who sin and push false religion, not-God ideologies, IDOLATRY.

We as God’s people need to be especially vigilant in a time when idols might often not be as obvious as they were.

We as God’s people need to protect and promote the right worship of our God, true religion in word and in practice.

* Holy God,

You alone as the true God – Lord Your Name be praised!

Please help us to be discerning, to watch for false teaching, for any ideology or movement that takes our eyes from You.

Please let us clearly see the idolatry that exists in the world today.

Thank You Lord for saving us from our sin.

Amen.

Reading

Audio, Visual

SAA Notes

A bad king has a good son! For three thousand years the world has been reading this wonderful testimony to Asa in verse 14. What will the succeeding generations know of you? Wouldn’t it be wonderful if they knew this, too, of you?

SJA Notes

* Mighty God, we will give thanks to You, O Lord, amongst the peoples. For Your steadfast love is great above the heavens, Your faithfulness reaches to the clouds.

“He did what was evil in the sight of the LORD and walked in the way of his father, …”

These words are a repeating refrain of behaviour as we walk through the books of Kings and Chronicles.

We see here that Jeroboam’s son rejected God just like his father did.

As a king he led Israel _away_ rather than _towards_ God.

However!

There is another repeated refrain,

“And [King’s Name] did what was right in the eyes of the LORD, as David his father had done.”

We have these two refrains, one about rejecting God, the other following Him.

But there is more, we go deeper.

We know King David was a sinner, imperfect, a broken vessel.

How do we make sense of this passage saying things like,

“… And yet you have not been like my servant David, who kept my commandments and followed me with all his heart, …”

How do we make sense of this?

Only through Jesus!

He is the lens through which we SEE, through which SENSE comes.

Jesus is our righteousness, just as He was David’s righteousness. David will stand in Jesus on the last day, just as we will.

David’s sins are forgiven, the record of his debt cancelled (Colossians 2) – Just as with us.

Like Abraham, David had righteousness credited to him – Just as with us.

David was obedient, as was Abraham, just as we are called to be obedient. David sought the face of the Lord, just as we strive to. David had God’s gift of faith being grown within him just the Spirit grows it in us.

David pursued holiness. Abraham sought a better country. This then is for us too.

* God Above,

Thank You that we stand not in our own works but in the righteousness of Christ.

Nothing of ourselves, All of You.

What a wonderful salvation You have wrought for us, what an inheritance we look forward to.

Thank You Lord!

Amen.

Reading

Audio, Visual

SAA Notes

Isn’t verse 33 of chapter 13 tragic? Jereboam and Rehoboam grew up within a believing society when the tide of faith was at its high point. In terms of Psalm 2, they refused to kiss the Son and so they were destroyed in going their own way. Ponder on the words of God’s severe mercy to Jereboam’s son in 14:12,13.

SJA Notes

* Lord God, we give thanks to You, for You are good, Your steadfast love endures forever!

“And all Israel shall mourn for him and bury him, for he only of Jeroboam shall come to the grave, because in him there is found something pleasing to the LORD, the God of Israel, in the house of Jeroboam.”

There is a mystery in how God works. His calling and election, His decisions, His sovereign will and mighty power.

Here is a mystery shown in this passage.

There was something pleasing to the Lord found in the child of Jeroboam!

Hallelujah for this!

Because it is for us. We have something pleasing in us, buried gold in a field, a light in the darkness, true religion and worship.

But.

Of no goodness in ourselves, we have the goodness, the righteousness, of God the Son – Jesus the messiah king.

Of no goodness in ourselves, we are able to choose obedience, the things that please God.

We can resist idolatry, flee from the sin of Jeroboam son of Nebat. A sin that is still as evil and potent and evident today as it was in the days of the Israelite kings.

And so how wonderful it is that our Lord, the Almighty sovereign God, can find something pleasing in us.

Because God dwells in us! Because God the Spirit lives within us, little tabernacles, we all living stones being built up into that spiritual house.

Humility. Meekness. A contrite spirit. A trembling at God’s word. To do justice. To love mercy. To walk humbly with our Lord God.

* God Above,

Lord, thank You for saving us.

Thank You for saving us unto (but not because of) good works.

Please help us today to please You.

Mark us as a faithful people today, we would please You!

Amen.