Except - If
Notes
Transcript
Have you ever asked yourself about why you are not the recipient of all the blessings that we read about in the Bible? Does it seem it seem like life is like a bad dream?
The Apostle Paul wrote:
3 Bless the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! He has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing that comes from heaven.
Do you hear that verse and wonder why you don't seem to be the recipient of those blessings?
I want to point out what I think is the primary reason why many Christians seem to struggle and lot be on the receiving end of the blessings of God.
Do you remember when you were a kid and someone asked you to do something and you promised to do it but you really didn't want to do it? You promised to do it but you secretly crossed your fingers behind your back so the one asking you didn't see what you were doing. The crossed fingers gave you an out from not doing what you stated that you would do.
I sometimes wonder if we do that with God. We promise God that we will be obedient to Him and follow His commandments but we secretly cross our fingers behind our backs hoping that God doesn't see them.
Have you ever done that? I won't make you raise your hand, but have you ever done that? Maybe you didn't do it intentionally but you did it anyway. I've done that in the past.
I think we want to be obedient to God but we want to leave ourselves some wiggle room just in case we decide that what God is asking us is too hard in our minds.
Something I've discovered and perhaps you have to is that partial obedience is really disobedience. I think that is the problem that Solomon got himself into when he stepped into the position as King of Israel.
In verse 3 the writer tells us:
1 Kings 3:3 (CEB)
3 Now Solomon loved the Lord by walking in the laws of his father David with the exception that he also sacrificed and burned incense at the shrines.
That statement would have been great if the writer had stopped at "the instructions given him by his father David." But there is a comma at David and the writer continues by saying "except that he offered sacrifices and burned incense on the high places." Except, that one word which in this case is used as a conjunction. Do you remember what a conjunction is from your English grammar classes in school? A conjunction means:
used before a statement that forms an exception to one just made.
The exception to loving God and walking according to the instructions of his father David was that he offered sacrifices and burned incense on the high places. Before we explore what that means to us today, let's look at Solomon and his life.
The writer tells us that Solomon loved the Lord. He didn't just say that he loved God, but the writer tells us that he showed his love for the Lord by walking according to the instructions given him by his father David.
Sin not only impacts our life, but it impacts the church and others around the person who is living with known sin in their life. The Israelites when they first came out of Egypt and were camped at Mount Sinai where Moses received the Ten Commandments and the Law from God.
God wanted to come down from heaven and talk to His people. God said to Moses
9 Then the Lord said to Moses, “I’m about to come to you in a thick cloud in order that the people will hear me talking with you so that they will always trust you.” Moses told the Lord what the people said,
Can you imagine that? God wanted to come down and speak so that they people could actually hear him! You would think that they would be excited at the prospect of that, but listen to what happened:
18 When all the people witnessed the thunder and lightning, the sound of the horn, and the mountain smoking, the people shook with fear and stood at a distance.
19 They said to Moses, “You speak to us, and we’ll listen. But don’t let God speak to us, or we’ll die.”
20 Moses said to the people, “Don’t be afraid, because God has come only to test you and to make sure you are always in awe of God so that you don’t sin.”
21 The people stood at a distance while Moses approached the thick darkness in which God was present.
They did not want to hear God, they only wanted to hear from Moses. They were too afraid of God even to approach the mountain.
It wasn't long after this that they had Aaron created they golden calf and they worshipped it. What they had done was to create a knock-off God, they had created God in their image.
Solomon loved the Lord which is great, but he didn't stop there. It's easy to say the words "I love you," but it is an entirely different thing to demonstrate that love by the actions we take. The writer said that Solomon showed his love for Lord by walking according to the instructions given him by his father David.
I know I've repeated that several times, but it is important to get that picture in our minds this morning of Solomon showing his love for the Lord by what he did.
If you still have your Bibles open, turn back to chapter 2 of 1 Kings starting at verse 1, the writer says:
1 David’s time was coming to an end. So he commanded Solomon his son,
2 “I’m following the path that the whole earth takes. Be strong and be a man.
3 Guard what is owed to the Lord your God, walking in his ways and observing his laws, his commands, his judgments, and his testimonies, just as it is written in the Instruction from Moses. In this way you will succeed in whatever you do and wherever you go.
4 So also the Lord will confirm the word he spoke to me: ‘If your children will take care to walk before me faithfully, with all their heart and all their being, then one of your own children will never fail to be on the throne of Israel.’
David was at the end of his life. He had Solomon anointed as the new king of Israel. He is now giving him his parting words. His words to Solomon included three things to keep in his mind.
1. Be strong - that word in Hebrew can mean to be courageous. It takes courage to be a leader. It takes courage to be a Christian, to stand up for God.
2. Be a man - David is telling Solomon to be mature. The longer we walk with God the more mature we should become in our faith.
3. Guard what is owed to the Lord your God - Other translations render that "keep the charge of the LORD your God." What David is telling Solomon is to obey God. He doesn't let Solomon try to figure that out himself but he continues and says to him:
1 Kings 2:3 (CEB)
walking in his ways and observing his laws, his commands, his judgments, and his testimonies, just as it is written in the Instruction from Moses.
How do we know today what God desires from us? Is it what the Preacher or the Sunday school teacher tells us? Is it what we read in the latest book that is printed? Is it how we feel about something? Is it what a friend or family member tells us? Those are all good sources, but they aren't the final answer. We need to go to God's Word, the Bible. We get ourselves into real trouble when we don't seek out God's will by looking in the Bible.
David is telling Solomon to look to God's words and be obedient to them. For Solomon that would have been the Law of Moses who we begin reading about in Exodus and continues through Deuteronomy.
David's words to Solomon are a good reminder to us today. You and I need to spend time in God's word. It doesn't have to be a burden. Find an easy to read translation or paraphrase and spend time each day reading it.
The more time you spend reading God's word, the more that God will speak through it to you. You can't get enough of God by one hour on a Sunday morning, you absolutely must spend time with Him each day. There is no substitute.
David attached two promises to Solomon in his charge. The first was:
1 Kings 2:3 (CEB)
In this way you will succeed in whatever you do and wherever you go.
There is blessing in being obedient to God. That word that is used in the NIV is prosper. Other translations translate it succeed. We need to be careful not to pull this verse out of context and think that we are going to be prosperous in everything we do.
David is telling Solomon that if he lives a life of obedience to God if he walks with God daily then God is going to give him success in what he does for God.
I believe that principle applies to you and me today. If we are walking according to the word of God, if we are living lives of obedience to God daily then I believe that God will give us success in what He calls us to do.
God doesn't set us up for failure, He just simply doesn't. If God calls us to do something He is going to give us everything that we need to be successful. Paul in his first letter to the Thessalonians wrote:
23 Now, may the God of peace himself cause you to be completely dedicated to him; and may your spirit, soul, and body be kept intact and blameless at our Lord Jesus Christ’s coming.
24 The one who is calling you is faithful and will do this.
Do you see the promise in those verses? It is God who does that sanctifying work. God calls us to live holy lives and it is He who will do it in us. Our part of that is to live obedient and faithful lives.
The second promise that David tells Solomon is:
4 So also the Lord will confirm the word he spoke to me: ‘If your children will take care to walk before me faithfully, with all their heart and all their being, then one of your own children will never fail to be on the throne of Israel.’
If Solomon lives a life of obedience then the promise that God made to David will be kept through Solomon and that was a continued successor on the throne of Israel. We know that didn't happen because of the failure of future kings.
We needed to look at David's charge to Solomon to lay the groundwork for understanding what is said in verse 3 of our scripture text. Look again at that verse in chapter 3:
3 Now Solomon loved the Lord by walking in the laws of his father David with the exception that he also sacrificed and burned incense at the shrines.
The writer says that Solomon showed his love for the Lord by living the way that David told him to live. Except, that one little word shows that Solomon didn't fully obey God.
You might be wondering what the big deal is. The Bible tells us that he offered sacrifices and burned incense on the high places. Sounds like a good and reasonable thing to do. Except God had something to say about the high places.
In the book of Numbers we read in chapter 33:
50 The Lord spoke to Moses on the plains of Moab by the Jordan across from Jericho:
51 Speak to the Israelites and say to them: When you cross the Jordan into the land of Canaan,
52 you will drive out all the inhabitants of the land before you. You will destroy all their carved figures. You will also destroy all their cast images. You will eliminate all their shrines.
The high places were those places that the inhabitants of the Promised Land had set up as places to worship their gods. The high places were throughout the land. There were shrines and altars that the inhabitants had set up for the worship of their idols and gods.
Israel didn't do what God told them to do. God told them to totally destroy those high places. They only converted to places to worship God.
You might think that was a good thing, but for Israel where was the presence of God located at? It was located in the tabernacle with the Ark of the Covenant. Instead of worshipping God where His presence was located, the setup alternate sites. God never told them to do that. In fact, He condemned that. In Leviticus chapter 26 God said to the Israelites:
27 If, despite all this, you still do not obey me and continue to oppose me,
28 then I will continue to oppose you—with anger! I will punish you for your sins seven more times:
29 You will eat the flesh of your own sons and daughters.
30 I will eliminate your shrines, chop down your incense altars, and pile your dead bodies on the dead bodies of your idols. I will despise you.
God is serious about sin and disobedience. When God brought the Israelites to the Promised Land He gave them the conditions for the occupancy and the resulting blessings of being obedient to God. God also warned them what would happen if they didn't obey Him and that is what we read here in Leviticus.
In the book of Hosea, we read
8 The sin of Israel, the shrines of Aven will be torn down. Thorn and thistle will sprout up on their altars. They will say to the mountains, “Cover us,” to the hills, “Fall on us.”
One thing about sin is that it doesn't usually start out as full-blown disobedience to God. It begins small and then progresses from there. The high places may have started out with the right intentions, but those intentions soon change to open idolatry on the part of the Israelites.
David, Solomon's father in Psalm one wrote:
1 Blessed is the one who does not walk in step with the wicked or stand in the way that sinners take or sit in the company of mockers,
Did you notice the progression in the Psalm? It starts with walking in step with the wicked meaning you begin to compromise with the world. You start tolerating and accepting the things of the world.
The second phase is to stand in the way that sinners take. You start compromising and pretty soon you are on the same path as the world.
The final phase is sitting in the company of mockers. You've completely compromised your walk with God.
There is a subtle pattern of progression in those verbs "walk," "stand," "sit," suggesting that sin creeps up on its unsuspecting victims with tiny steps of encroachment that may at first seem harmless. (1)
Solomon started out with a love for God, a commendable faithfulness in prayer and worship, and a humble and teachable spirit. But he let Satan in the door by what must have seemed to him at the time trivial compromises. They would bear their poisonous fruit later.
Solomon goes to one of those high places at Gibeon where the tabernacle was located to offer sacrifices to God. It's interesting to note that the Ark of the Covenant was not at Gibeon in the tabernacle, it was in Jerusalem. Remember his father had it brought to Jerusalem.
It would seem logical that Solomon would have offered sacrifices in Jerusalem where the Ark of the Covenant was located. The Ark was where God's presence was. Regardless God met with Solomon in Gibeon through a dream where Solomon asked God for wisdom. You can read about that there in chapter 3.
God told Solomon that He would give him what he asked for. God tells Solomon in verse 14 these important words:
1 Kings 3:14 (CEB)
14 And if you walk in my ways and obey my laws and commands, just as your father David did, then I will give you a very long life.”
Notice what God said to Solomon because it is a principle that applies to us today. God told Solomon "if you walk in my ways and obey my laws and commands." The prophet Samuel told King Saul "To obey is better than sacrifice."
The question I asked at the beginning "If God has promised all these blessings, then why is life like a bad dream?" might be answered because there are disobedience and sin in my life right now.
Obedience comes from a heart that is yielded to God. It springs from a life that has said Yes to God and no to self. Obedience comes from taking up our crosses daily and following Jesus.
My desire is that there is no "except" in my life. I don't want to live a life that is consecrated to God except for that one little area. I want to fully obey God and follow so that "if" I do I will receive all the blessings that He has promised us.
I hope that is your desire today.
(1) Dilday, Russell, and Lloyd J. Ogilvie. 1, 2 Kings. Vol. 9. Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson Inc, 1987. Print. The Preacher’s Commentary Series.