Behoboam's Rejection of the Old Men's Counsel

    Here we have another Absalom. Here good counsel is rejected, and the most absurdly foolish advice is providentially followed, in order that the word of the Lord should be fulfilled. Could any thing be more obvious to any man of ordinary understanding, than that Rehoboam should, on the application of his people, without a moment's delay, have given them satisfaction? A very child could hardly need advice on this emergency. But Rehoboam rejects the obvious dictates of common sense urged on him by his aged friends, and listens to the silly counsel of his young advisers. The thing was of the Lord. God had declared that, on account of Solomon's sins, he would take a part of the kingdom from his son. And here his Providence executes his threatening. "Wherefore the king hearkened not unto the people; for the cause was from the Lord, that he might perform his saying, which the Lord spoke by Ahijah the Shalomite unto Jeroboam the son of Nebat." Can any thing be more clearly asserted than it is here, that the reason why Rehoboam rejected the claims of the people, and the counsel of the old men, is, that the Lord might effect what he had declared? Here God fulfils his purposes by the free actions of men. How God does this, while the actions remain the actions of men, human intellect cannot comprehend. It is easy to refine, and to talk nonsense learnedly and metaphysically. But a satisfactory account of the manner of the harmony of these two things, man will never succeed in giving. How foolish is that wisdom which grapples with such a subject!