Down the Slippery Slope

1 Kings 14-16

INTRODUCTION

Every time a newspaper comes to the door and I pick it up for the first time … the first section I turn to look at, is not the editorial page or the sports page .... it’s the obituary section. That may sound morbid to some of you, but I know I’m not alone. And, especially as you get older - don’t you find yourself drawn more and more to look and see if anyone you know has passed from this life? I also have to admit that, if I don’t know the person - I look to see how old he or she is - looking to see how close they were in age - to me.

But beyond whether I knew the person or not … beyond how old they were and what that means for the law of averages as it relates to my lifespan .... do you know the part of each obituary that has the biggest impact on me? It’s what kind of clue I can get as to the dead person’s relationship with Jesus Christ.

When I see the hobbies and interests listed, or the charities that were supported, the career successes , letters of honor awarded by universities or other societies … the things the world uses to measure a life by - well sure, I’m impressed with those temporal achievements.

… But what I NEED to know is: What was this person’s spiritual state. So if I read simply - that, “she’s in a better place” - or that

… I’m heartbroken. Because in eternity - the love you had for mountain climbing or the amount of degrees earned or trips around the world taken … none of it matters one little bit

What matters is - “Did you know Jesus Christ as Saviour?” So, when I read an obituary that says - this person is, “Is with her Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ” - or something along those lines - then I am ecstatic. That’s what really matters to me.

And not just to me. One of the distinctives about Christian faith - is that Christians look at history differently. Whether it’s the history of a solitary, individual life … OR the history of an entire country or society - we look at history from God’s perspective - or at least we SHOULD.

And God’s view of history - whether a success or failure - is all about how a person or a society - is related to him.

If they were in covenant relationship with God - following His ways in holy love - then that means success.

… IF they lived in rebellion against Him - ignoring God’s Will and making up the rules as they go … or following false religion .... that means failure.

We’re going to see that in our text today. Things are going to really speed up. We spent weeks and weeks going through the life of one king of Israel - Solomon. The first 11 chapters of this book are dedicated to Solomon’s life.

Then from chapters 12-14, we deal with Rehoboam and Jeroboam - We’re going back to pcik up Rehoboam’s story in chapter 14.

So that’s 3 kings in 14 chapters of this book. Now, you’re going to need to fasten your seatbelt and hold on, because in chapters 15-16, we’re going to deal with 2 kings in the south and 5 kings in the north: SEVEN kings in TWO chapters. This is going to go fast.

And in every case - the judgment made on the king’s life - isn’t “how much gold did he have?” “How much new land did he conquer?” “How many international treaties did he negotiate?” No - the determination on the success or failure of the king is this: “How did this king do at following God - in the footsteps of David?” Nothing else matters.

It’s the same as God’s verdict on your life and on our society.

So, let’s see what God has to teach us here.

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1 MEANWHILE DOWN SOUTH IN ‘GOD’S COUNTRY’, 14:21-15:24

First King that shows up on the stage this morning, is Rehoboam, the son of Solomon - the King of the Southern Kingdom of Judah. And aren’t you hoping for good news, when we pick up the story here? I mean, we know he started off poorly - we saw that in chapter 12 - he chose bad advice - it was under his watch that the nation of Israel was torn in two … And Jeroboam took 10 tribes and became their king.

But now Rehoboam has seen the northern king in action - he’s seen Jeroboam’s fear on full display. Jeroboam, so terrified that the people will keep going to the south, to Jerusalem, to worship God in the majest of the temple there - so he builds golden calves and worship centers in the north, driven by insecurity and fear - and presents these alternative worship experiences to keep his people away from God’s temple. He wants them to worship the TRUE God … but NOT in the way the true God commanded. Rehoboam knows all this.

Verse 21 gives us a hint that Solomon’s son knows his priviledged place: “… Rehoboam was 41 years old when he began to reign and he reigned 17 years in Jerusalem … THE CITY THAT THE LORD HAD CHOSEN OUT OF ALL THE TRIBES OF ISRAEL, TO PUT HIS NAME THERE.”

Rehoboam has the massive privilege of ruling in the very place that Go dhas chosen - with God’s temple at the very center of his kingdom.

If you were king of Judah - wouldn’t you be proud of having God’s temple in your territory? Wouldn’t you put that in all of your travel brochures and make that the highlight for your Chamber of Commerce to use in enticing outside business and people into your kingdom?

“We are the home of the temple of the Living God!”

Rehoboam apparently wasn’t so moved. He hasn’t learned a thing from Jeroboam up north. The text tells us what was happening under Rehoboam’s lead.

Verse 22, “And Judah did what was evil in the sight of the LORD and they provoked him to jealousy with their sins that they committed, more than all that their fathers had done.”

‘PROVOKED’ - that’s an evocative word. Does it sound a little ‘beneath’ God to allow himself to be ‘provoked’? Well, this is what they did that brought that reaction from God:

vv. 23-24, “For they also built for themselves high places and pillars and Asherim on every high hill and under every green tree, (24) and there were also male cult prostitutes in the land. They did according to all the abominations of the nations that the LORD drove out before the people of Israel.”

Apparently, having the temple of the living God in your capital city isn’t enough. You need worship centers spread all through the land -

Last week we talked about the Asherim - those were wooden poles set up to honor the goddess Asherah/Ashteroth - the female consort to the Canaanite male God El ...

All of a sudden, you aren’t worshiping the God of Israel anymore. And when v. 23 mentions ‘pillars’ - those are stone pillars, standing straight up in the air - that represent the Canaanite gods - the male gods - so you have the Asherah pole representing the goddess and the stone pillar - representing the male god. Very likely the pillar is a phallic symbol.

So when you go to worship at one of these ‘high places’ marked by the male and female deities - you’re worshiping at a fertility cult - and doing what you think you need to do to encourage the gods and goddesses to do their thing so that the crops are fertile and so are the women of the land.

That’s why there are male prostitutes on site - to help you show the gods what they need to do for you.

Do you see how things are falling apart? The very religion that was desecrating the land of Canaan - harming people - creatinvg and supplying a market for human trafficking - the religion that made the Canaanites so vile that God threw them out of the land and gave it to His people - so they could show the world true, life-giving worship

.... now God’s people are mimicking those very religious practices - and the king is leading the way! Can you see how that might provoke some anger to a ‘holy God?’

Well, there are consequences for our behaviour. And you see some real world consequences for Rehoboam.

Verses 25-26

The golden shields that Solomon had made - that cost millions upon millions of dollars in our money - they’re all gone. Centuries have gone by since God rescued His people from Egypt’s slavery .... in fact so powerfully did he rescue Israel, that on the way out of Egypt - the people of Egypt piled up the Israelites with mound after mound of treasure - so they didn’t leave town empty handed.

Now the king of Egypt has come to the center of the Promised Land and helped himself to Israel’s wealth. He even loots God’s temple!

Don’t miss the pathetic picture of vv. 27-28

Solomon’s Jerusalem was bathed with gold .... so much gold that silver was considered to be the equivalent of Dixie cups today - silver was throw away stuff.

Now, one generation later .... and the king of Israel has lost the gold, can’t even afford the silver … so he’s making replacement shields out of bronze. And keeping the bronze dollar-store shields under careful lock and key, as if anyone would care about them.

What humiliation … what failure. How the glory has faded in Judah!

ABIJAM

Chapter 15 begins with a new king stepping up and taking his seat on the throne of Judah. Here’s a new day - a chance for a fresh start. Rehoboam’s son, Abijam takes his father’s place. And we want to know, ‘will he be like his great-grandfather David … or grandfather Solomon, in his best days?

Abijam has seen first hand, from the palace how his father’s failures have decimated the glory of once proud Israel. Can God’s people get back on track?

Hopes are quickly dashed

READ vv. 1-3.

Abijam is no better than his dad. In fact, notice how little God thinks of his life and reign - his whole life rates no more than 8 verses … and 3 of those verses are used to point out how UN-like David he is. This is failure.

But .... don’t miss the grace of God here.

ASA

After Abijam dies, his son - Asa, takes his seat on the throne, in his place. Chapter 15:9-24 tell us about Asa’s reign. READ vv. 9-15.

Well, that’s a complete surprise. What do you expect to read about Asa? I’ll tell you what you expect to read. You expect exactly what we all expect - we’ve seen it all before. Asa’s great-grandfather Solomon ended his life in the spiritual desert - he had so many blessings and he threw them all away for a harem of foreign women.

Asa’s grandfather, Rehoboam continued the downward slide. His dad Abijam continued the cycle … we’ve seen this all before - not just here in Biblical history - we’ve seen it in our world. The cycle of parental failures repeat themselves in generation after generation

ILLUSTRATION I end up talking to a lot of people who are trapped in cycles – cycles of addictions, bad decisions, bad relationships and so forth. They don’t believe they can get out of these cycles. They are convinced they’re trapped. They don’t think they can ever be free. They see themselves as victims of the cycle.

Child abusers, most of the time, were abused as children. Addicts, most of the time, have addicts in their families. On and on it goes. The sins of the fathers are indeed visited upon the children.

God even promised this when he pronounced His judgment on Solomon, back in chapter 11 - Weill tear the kingdom almost fully away from you.

So, of course - Asa will repeat this cycle.

“Your dad was a failure and you are his son - why would you expect to be any different? You are destined to be a failure just like your father.”

How many of you have had a father or mother like that?

Satan is always there - in every mistake you make, every time you fail to live up to your desire to be more than what you saw growing up … in the inevitable failures that come - there’s the enemy of your soul, shouting in your ear: “You belong to me. God doesn’t want you - He has no use for you … Your father was a failure and so are you!” Have you heard that voice?

Oh, but not so fast. This world may put people in boxes because of the accident of your birth into this family or that. The God of covenant love does NOT operate that way.

God is in the habit of doing the unexpected and bringing a new day of life and hope out of the black of hopeless futures. The God of the Bible is not restricted by the failures of generations past.

V. 11, “And Asa did what was right in the eyes of the LORD, as David his father had done.”

Asa’s immediate father may have been Abijam - but God chooses to associate this king with his ancestor David - from generations ago! And this son of a deadly, ungodly king … turns out to be a man of God.

Asa breaks the cycle. In fact - he doesn’t just follow the LORD - he follows HARD after the LORD.

Don’t miss what he did in vv. 12-13 - “He put away the male cullt prostitutes … he removed all the idols that his own dad had made ....” That’s going to effect the economy - because there’s a lot of money flowing through the temple because of the ‘business’ being transacted there.

But more than that … v. 13, “He also removed Maacah his mother from being queen mother because she had made an abominable image for Ashera. And Asa cut down her image and burned it at the brook Kidron.”

So King Asa, comes home from church one day and, as he’s eating lunch out on the patio - he notices that out in the back garden, a wooden pole is tucked under a shady tree. He sends the secret service out to do some investigating. It’s not a branchless tree … it’s an Ashera pole. Right on the palace grounds. The detectives begin their work and find out that the culprit is none other than his own mother.

Up marches King Asa - to his mom’s wing of the palace, goes into her room, packs all of her belongings up into trunk after trunk (she’s the queen mother - she’s lived in the palace for most of her life - I’m sure there are lots of valuables to pack up). The trunks are loaded .... and then they’re carted down out the front door of the palace, out through the front gate of the complex and unceremoniously plopped on the ground outside the palace walls with a note taped on top: “Mom - consider yourself Evicted. Love, your son.”

Then Asa has the Asherah pole pulled right out of the ground and he carries it off the palace grounds, out through the city gates, down the hillside outside of town, to the garbage dump at the brook Kidron - and there he proceeds to set it on fire, roast some marshmallows in the flame and watches it burn until there’s nothing left but a pile of ashes.

King Asa means business - This is God’s country - and as for me and my house, WE WILL SERVE THE LORD.

He’s not fooling around - and that faithfulness to God was costly. Can you imagine the family dinners from that day onward? When you kick mom out of her position because she pushed false worship and didn’t take seriously the holiness of God?

Reminds me of a more recent example of costly discipleship - that comes from the life of Donald Smarto. Donald Smarto used to serv as the director of the Institute for Prison Ministries at the Billy Graham Center in Wheaton, Illinois. Earlier in life, when Smarto put his trust in Jesus Christ and surrendered himself to him, his family wasn’t very happy. You see, his family was heavily involved in organized crime. In the 1980s his two older brothers were accused of committing the largest bank robbery in U.S. history. Smarto did not know the details of what they had done, but he was subpoenaed to testify at their public trial. While he was on the stand - he was asked if his brothers had ever offered him a large sum of money to pay for medical bills. Smarto answered truthfully: they had offered him $50,000. As a result of this testimony, the rest of his family vowed that they would never speak to him again. To show that he was dead to them, they sent him a package returning every gift that he had ever given to them.

In his spiritual autobiography, Smarto writes, “I still love each of my family members deeply, and fervently hope that they will be saved.… Many times in the years that followed, I’ve asked myself if given the same set of circumstances, I would testify again. The answer would be yes.” Then Smarto explains why:

When I entered a personal relationship with Jesus, I had no idea what the ramifications were. I wouldn’t have wanted to know that it could lead to separation from my own family.… I think now I understand better the meaning of taking up your cross. I had always wanted the cross to be something more manageable, something that I was willing to take on. In my own life, the cross has proven to be precisely what I did not want, often what would hurt the most”.

That was Asa - faithfulness to God - even when it hurts. And look at the verdict on this king: verses 14-15.

“The high places weren’t taken away ...” - so he wasn’t perfect. BUT - the heart of Asa was wholly true to the LORD all his days. (15) And he brought into the house of the LORD the sacred gifts of his father and his own sacred gifts, silver and gold, and vessels.

On his grandfather’s watch, the gold was looted from the temple - the Kingdom was humiliated. His dad carried on the downward slide. But see Asa - breaking the cycle … bringing silver and gold back into the Temple.

Oh friend - don’t let the voice of the evil one or your own insecurities persuade you that you are destined to repeat the cycle you were born into. God could make you an Asa.

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2 THINGS GO FROM BAD TO WORSE IN THE NORTH, 15:25-16:34

In verse 25 of chapter 15, the scene changes from the Southern Kingdom to the North. These are the kings who come after Jeroboam

Six kings in the Northern Kingdom - compared to three in the South. What does that tell you about the stability of that Kingdom. There’s no dynasty, no increasing influence of foreign policiy - hardly any of these rulers get to see a son on their throne to take their place. And I don’t know if you picked up on it - but all SIX of the northern kings ruled their kingdom during the single reign of Asa, in the South - SEVEN if you include Jeroboam at the beginning.

The Bible is emphasizing the instability here. There is no ‘rootedness’ in this Kingdom. And you could point to all sorts of human explanations for the rising and falling of these leaders, one after another - you could point to geographical problems, schemes and power struggles inside the kingdom … but at its root - the real, root reason for this shaky, unstable kingdom - is because of the unrepentant sin of the kings themselves. This is where rebellion against God, where covenant-breaking leads.

If you look at the lives of each of these northern kings, from a human perspective - you may come up with all kinds of judgments about their leadership: Baasha was a great risk taker and brutal power-grabber. Then there’s Omri -he only gets a few verses in Bible history - that’s not much of a statement on his importance. Did you know that surrounding nations - including Assyria, which was the rising superpower of the day - for generations afterward called Israel, ‘The Land of Omri’. He was well known in the world .... but that doesn’t matter to God.

The question that determines God’s verdict on every single one of these kings is: “How faithful has he been to God and His Word?” And see the consequences - king after king, brutal takeovers, suicides, 7 day r

The principle here is this: SIN LEADS TO SOCIAL DISINTEGRATION.

Do you see how relevant that message is for us today, in our Western civilization? If you grew up - even when I did (which may seem like ancient times to some of you, but it really was just yesterday) - you would never have thought the moral and social disintegration that our society has gone through in the last few years - and it seems that w