Here in chapter 11 of 1st Kings,
the first observation in reading these verses of how he sinned
against the Lord, and did evil in the sight of the Lord, and
the Lord was angry with him. The first thing I want to say
about that is that Solomon was a child of God, because that
may be a question in your mind after us reading that. Some have
said because of this type of thing and this that he was not
But they've said wrong and it's clear very clear from The scripture
and if you're wondering whether somebody like we just read about
can even know the Lord the answer is yes Second Samuel 12 24 you may remember
this in David comforted Bethsheba his wife and went inland to her
and lay with her and she bear a son and He called his name
Solomon and the Lord loved him The Lord loved him Now the Lord Does Keep his people
from the evil that's in our hearts. He does make his people faithful
for the most part and A believer will be steadfast for the most
part. A believer does commit himself
unto the Lord. Paul said, I know that he's able
to keep that which I've committed unto him. A believer is a new creation
in Christ and all things are become new, but believers see
him. Believers are full of unbelief.
They're full of pride. They are by nature adulterers
like David, idolaters like Solomon, traitors like Simon Peter and
every other flawed and abominable thing you can be. Believers are,
we are. Turn please with me to Romans
chapter five and verse eight. Romans five, eight. I wanna look
at some scripture with you tonight Get some perspective on this
text in 1 Kings 11, Romans 5a. What does our text teach? You
know, people could go off in all kinds of different directions
with this, but here's what it teaches. God commendeth his love
toward us, and that while we were yet sinners, Christ died
for us. All right, we're not done yet.
Much more than being now justified by his blood, we shall be saved
from wrath through him. For if when we were enemies,
we were reconciled to God by the death of his son, much more
being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life. In other words, God saved you
when you weren't worth saving and you haven't changed. It hasn't
gotten better in that sense of our sinfulness. Even when we
are faithful for the most part in worshiping Him, supporting
His ministry, being witnesses for Him, everything we do, our
best deeds are full of sin. But if we were sinners when Christ
died for us, we're sinners now, but much more now If he with
Christ has freely given us all things, then how could we think
he would abandon us now? What could we do that would make God change his
mind? What could we do that would cause God to say, well, he just
crossed the line. He was a sinner when I saved
him and not that bad of a sinner. Oh yeah, we were, we were. Unreconciled sinners then as
far as from our part our point of view Without restraint for
our evil except God's prevenient grace Now with a new heart. There's a great restraint For
our evil though we still committed. We still sin we still fall But
thank God here Because of our text Thank God for salvation that
we can't mess up. That's the first thing I wanna
observe from this. Thank God for salvation that
we can't forfeit with our evil. Full, free, eternal salvation
in Christ. I want us to look at a passage
of scripture now that I think will explain our text very clearly
from the important point of view. It's easy for people to get caught
up in, well, he had 700 wives, you know, what about now? Does
that excuse men for doing evil things now? No, it doesn't. But
I'll tell you this, here's what it does do. Here's what it does
reveal. And I want us to look together
at 2 Samuel chapter seven and verse eight. People have said,
as I mentioned earlier, that Solomon wasn't a child of God.
And of course, anybody might be discouraged by Solomon's behavior. People might even be, someone
that doesn't know the Lord, might be emboldened to evil because
of Solomon's story. It might cause all kinds of questions
to come up, but I believe this will help us now. Look at 2 Samuel
7 verse 8. Now therefore, so shalt thou
say unto my servant David, Thus saith the Lord of hosts, I took
thee from the sheep coat, from following the sheep to be ruler
over my people, over Israel. You remember the story of David,
his countrymen were going to war against the Philistines and
David heard about it and he ran off and went and took some food
down to his brothers who were a part of that army. And he got
heckled and maligned for that, but he was following his father's. Anyway, we know the human side
of the story, the chronology of how he came to be down there
and see Goliath, and his heart was stirred up for the honor
of God. But the way God describes it is this. I took you from the sheep coat
and made you king. Like moving a piece on a chessboard. Because God does what he will
in the armies of heaven, among the inhabitants of this earth,
and none can stay his hand or say unto him, what doest thou?
How can all of religion be based on don't, you know, don't say
no to God and things like that. You don't say no to God. You
just don't. God says, yes, it's yes, all
around. I took you from following the
sheep to be ruler over my people, over Israel, and I was with you,
whithersoever you went, Boy, isn't that glorious? That's true
of him with all of his people. And have cut off all thine enemies
out of thy sight and have made thee a great name like unto the
name of the great men that are in the earth. Moreover, I will
appoint a place for my people Israel and will plant them that
they may dwell in a place of their own and move no more. Neither
shall the children of wickedness afflict them any more as before
time. And as since the time that I commanded judges to be over
my people, Israel, and have caused thee to rest from all thine enemies,
also the Lord telleth thee that he will make thee in house."
Remember David said, Lord, I want to make you a house. And God
said, the heaven of heavens can't contain me. I'm going to make
you a house, David. And that's salvation. That's
the gospel. We're going to do something for
God. Until God shows us that salvation is Him doing something
for us. When thy days, verse 12, be fulfilled,
and thou shalt sleep with thy fathers, I will set up thy seed
after thee, which shall proceed out of thy bowels, and I will
establish his kingdom, that's Solomon, of course, his son.
He shall build a house for my name, and he did. and I will
establish the throne of his kingdom forever. I will be his father
and he shall be my son. If he commit iniquity, if he
does evil in my sight, as our text describes it, I will chasten
him with the rod of men and with the stripes of the children of
men." In other words, earthly chastening. Bad things will happen
as a consequence of his sin. They always do. in an earthly
sense, I will chasten him with his enemies, I will chasten him
with issues in his family, like God did with David, whatever
it is, God has everything at his disposal among the children
of men to chasten you with the rod of men, but my mercy shall
not depart away from him. Does that clear it up a little
bit? There are consequences in a sense for our sin. But as I
said this morning, it's not punishment for sin. The consequences that God's people
suffer for sin in this world are not the judgments of the
holy God. They are the chastisements of
the loving father. I will chastise him, I will chasten
him. You see that? Not punish. And his chastenings are not pleasant. Paul tells us that in the book
of Hebrews. They're not pleasant. But my mercy shall not depart
away from him. As I took it from Saul, for example. God left Saul, just left him
where he stood. whom I put away before thee.
So if there's any questions about Solomon standing before God,
there shouldn't be. I mean, that's just, that doesn't
get any clearer, does it? And there's a reason that it's
called mercy. That's what we see in this. We're
not gonna dwell on the evil of a man. May God give us grace
to dwell on the mercy of God. It's called mercy because we
don't deserve it. It's called mercy because if
God put us in hell, he'd be doing the right thing. Do you maybe see a little bit
better tonight in our text, what happened on Calvary? The mercy of God reaches all
the way down, deeper than the stain has gone. It reaches all
the way down to the bottom of the barrel for riches like us. God commendeth his love toward
us and that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. Behold what manner of love the
father hath bestowed upon us that we should be called the
sons of God. Solomon's security wasn't in
that he was a good Christian and lived the Christian life
and walked for Jesus. His security was in those words
we read a while ago when Solomon was born and God said he loved
him and God loved Solomon. It doesn't get any more secure
than that. It mentions in verse eight that
Solomon built places of worship to these other gods for his wives. I wanted to point this out. He
did it for his wives. He did all of this for his wives.
And I'm not in any way excusing Solomon. It doesn't say here
in this passage that Solomon's wives did evil in the sight of
the Lord. It says Solomon did. Let's make that clear up front.
I'm not making excuses for Solomon. God certainly didn't in his word,
and I'm not going to either, of course. But this, is this the extent, is this what
it means to go after other gods? Then we better be extra careful. Because it can be subtle, can't
it? That's the point I wanna make here. Not excusing Solomon
at all, I'm saying on the contrary, that we see people following
after other gods all the time, every day. You may not recognize
it as that. Solomon may well, and I don't
know for sure, I don't see Solomon in this and other texts. I don't
see him going into these temples and bowing down to the other
gods and burning incense and saying, hallelujah, praise whoever
they are, Molech or whatever. But he built those places for
his wives. Maybe he did go in there and
worship the other gods. I don't know. Maybe he did. I'm
not saying that I know that. I don't. But this teaches us
something, that even the facilitating the worship of other gods is
idolatry in God's sight. I know that. Not just from this
scripture, because I'm speculating about how far Solomon went with
this. I don't know for sure about that. But I know this. I know that whosoever transgresseth
and abideth not in the doctrine of Christ hath not God. He that
abideth in the doctrine of Christ, he hath both the Father and the
Son. If there come any unto you and bring not this doctrine,
receive him not into your house. Neither bid him God's speed,
for he that biddeth him God's speed is partaker. of his evil
deeds. What are his evil deeds? He's
an idolater. First and foremost, he's worshiping
another God. So are you. If you facilitate
it, if you cooperate with it, if you promote it, if you support
it. I know people right now that
I think they know the Lord that are supporting the churches of
a false God. And you know what I'm talking
about. You know what I'm talking about. They're giving him money.
I don't recommend that. I want to be real clear about
that. Life's too short for us to hem-haw around and be tactful.
I want to be tactful. When it comes to the truth now,
do not cooperate. Do not facilitate. Do not even
allow it to go on anywhere near you or have anything to do with
your family. You see that in this? You're
partaker in it. I'm pretty sure that what Solomon
did was cave into his wives. It says it, it's kind of obvious. He caved in in his older age
and that tends to happen. I've seen preachers do things
and say things in their older age. Don't let me do it. Shoot
me in the head. I've seen them do and say things
in their older age that they never would have said 20 years
ago or done. Never would have done it. Not
in a million years would they have done that 20 years ago.
And there it is. All right, well. Our text speaks of David's heart
in contrast to Solomon's. You can't miss that in that,
can you? Twice, I believe he said, not like my servant, David. And then another two times, he
says it a little bit different way, that you didn't follow fully,
you haven't followed him fully as David did. So four times,
I'm pretty sure in that half of a chapter, it mentions, it
contrasts Solomon with David in this aspect, David's heart. David's heart, so I want us to
look at that tonight. In verses four and six, let's
read verses four and six again. For it came to pass when Solomon
was old, that his wives turned away his heart after other gods,
and his heart was not perfect with the Lord his God, as was
the heart of David his father. And then verse six, and Solomon
did evil in the sight of the Lord and went not fully after
the Lord as did David his father. Now there's two examples of it
right there in the two different ways that it's used, twice both
times, I believe. So it speaks of David's heart.
What do we know about David? I want to be like David in this,
don't you? When God says David did right
and you didn't, I wanna be like David. Well, what do we know
about David though? He wasn't perfect. The word perfect,
he wasn't sinless. He didn't follow after the Lord
all the time. It's not that he didn't do evil
in the Lord's sight. It's not about that. It can't
be, can it? I don't remember Solomon murdering
anybody in cold blood, do you? So he could have his wife. But
David did that. You might compare David with
Solomon unfavorably if you dwelt on the, Our sin. That's not it. That's not the difference. The difference that God makes
is not that somebody sins less than somebody else. That ain't
it. David was far from perfect in
that sense, but in the context of this statement, it's speaking
of other gods. It's speaking of what Solomon
did here specifically. For all of David's sins and failures,
we never read of him going after other gods, like Solomon did. From his very youth, the first
time David comes on the scene in the scriptures, what is he
doing? He's saying, God is with me. God, the God that saved me
from the lion and the barrel, saved me from you too. How dare
you defy the armies of the living God? He was jealous for God's
glory right from the start. And that never changed in all
of his sinfulness. And I must think that David's
father, Jesse, you reckon he must have been a good father. Because David as a young man,
even, Jesse I believe must have been
a God-fearing man and taught David to love and glorify God
only But here's what I want to think about I want a heart like
David had Now what is that and how do I get one of those? That's
what I want to look at a perfect heart that goes fully after the
Lord Here's the first thing is given by God It's given by God
and David knew that and Listen to First Chronicles 29, 18. David
prayed that God would give a heart like that to his son Solomon.
And whether he did or not is up in the air. First Chronicles
29, 18, listen. Oh Lord, God of Abraham, Isaac,
and of Israel, our fathers, Keep this forever in the imagination
of the thoughts of the heart of thy people, and prepare their
heart unto thee, and give unto my son Solomon a perfect heart. What a prayer. Do we pray that
for our children, for our grandchildren? Lord, give them a perfect heart. What does that mean? To keep
thy commandments, thy testimonies, and thy statutes, and to do all
these things, and to build a palace for which I have made provision.
Give him a perfect heart. Don't let his heart turn away
from you. So what is this perfect heart? We know where it comes
from now. What is a perfect heart? Turn with me to 2 Chronicles
16, please. Let's look at a few examples
of this and this is this is a simple study in the Word of God just
put punch in the words perfect heart And here's a few examples
of what the scripture says about that Second Chronicles 16 7 And at that time, Hanani the
seer came to Asa, king of Judah and said unto him, and let me
say this here, that word seer, that sounds weird, doesn't it? A seer, what was that? It's some
kind of, you know, witch or something? No, I believe Samuel was called
a seer at one time in the scriptures, maybe more than that. And it
just means somebody that knows the future because of God, God
will reveal things. People and so that's all that
is It's it's almost interchangeable with profit in the Old Testament Came to Asa king of Judah and
said unto him because thou hast relied on the king of Syria and
Not relied on the Lord thy God therefore is the host of the
king of Syria escaped out of thine hand and Were not the Ethiopians
and the Lubams a huge host with very many chariots and horsemen?
Yet because thou didst rely on the Lord, he delivered them into
thine hand. Now what this seer is saying,
Hanani, he's saying to Asa, the king of Judah, the reason you've
lost this battle is because you relied on a man. And Hananiah
says this, Asa, you remember when you didn't rely on a man?
Were not the Ethiopians and the Lubams a huge host with very
many chariots and horsemen? Yet because you relied on the
Lord in that, you won. But today, the fight is lost
against the Syrians. because you relied on the king
of Syria and not the Lord. That's clear, isn't it? All right,
now look, verse nine. For the eyes of the Lord run
to and fro throughout the whole earth to show himself strong
in the behalf of them whose heart is perfect toward him. Herein
thou hast done foolishly. Therefore, from henceforth thou
shalt have wars. God's looking for people. What
is the definition in that passage of scripture of a perfect heart?
It's somebody that relies completely on God for everything. I want you to think about this
because this again, this is an issue that every one of us has
in our heart. We rely every day on somebody. Every day in every situation
and circumstance We rely on somebody And it seems to me that the easiest
thing to do Is to rely on this world or to rely on somebody
in this world? And there's there's nothing wrong
in human matters to trust somebody and for them to help you the
Lord uses Each other to help one another I'm not saying that
But I'm just saying this The perfect heart in the sight of
God here, according to his word, is one that finds in the Lord
Jesus Christ all we need and looks to him alone. As I said,
God may use somebody in your life to bless you, but look to
the Lord. If you look to the king of Syria,
you're gonna fail, you're gonna lose. And if you look to the
Lord, no matter how huge a host opposes you, you will be successful. The eye, can you picture that?
That's a course of anthropomorphism. It's giving God human attributes
in order for us to picture this. God's eyes are looking to and
fro. Where's somebody that's relying on me? I'm gonna go help
them. And him helping you ain't him
giving you a leg up. It's him winning the battle for
you. in your everyday life, whatever it is, it's Him winning for you.
That's what it is. Rely on Him. Hold up your hand
to Him. You remember, I believe it was
Abraham that said, I don't need anything from you. I hold up
my hand to the God of my fathers. What is the perfect heart? Thank
the Lord for a good concordance. Because like I said, I just put
in the words perfect heart. You'd be surprised how many times
that's in scripture. What is a perfect heart? Those
two words appear together in that order quite a bit in the
word of God and how revealing are the contexts of those words
in the scripture. God gives it, it looks to him
alone. That even in looking to somebody
you trust, you're looking to Him and praying that God will
use them to help you. What's a perfect heart? Look
at 2 Chronicles 19. Just a few chapters over. I should have told you to stay
there. Maybe you still are, but look
at 19 of 2 Chronicles, verse eight. Second Chronicles 19, eight,
moreover in Jerusalem did Jehoshaphat set of the Levites and of the
priests and of the chief of the fathers of Israel for the judgment
of the Lord and for controversies when they returned to Jerusalem.
And he charged them saying, thus shall you do in the fear of the
Lord faithfully and with a perfect heart. A perfect heart is one
that does what it does faithfully in the fear of the Lord. How much do we do in our lives
in reaction to this world or to disturbing circumstances that
happen to difficult situations that come upon us? And in the
fear of this world or in the fear of certain people and not
in the fear of the Lord, how much do we do? We make decisions
and act too often, so often, not in the way that honors God,
but in the way that seems right to us. How am I going to work
this out? Troubles, tribulations, trials
tend to take our eyes off of God. The worst thing that can
happen and cause us to wonder and try to work it out, what
am I gonna do? I'll tell you what you're gonna do. You're
gonna fall, you're gonna fail, you're gonna die and you're gonna
go to hell unless God does something for you. So where are we gonna
look? And I say it that way, I say
it because all of us, as clearly
as we know that, we still look away. We still trust ourselves. We still fret and worry and fear,
and we're afraid of this world, or we're afraid of something
that man can do to us. David, in the spirit of the Lord,
was able to say, the Lord is my helper. What can man do to
me? Can we say that maybe a little
bit more? If God's gracious to us, we will.
But we forget, don't we? We forget. It's so reactionary
of us to just depend upon our own resources. I want a perfect heart. May God give us a perfect heart.
And look at 1 Chronicles 29, verse six. A perfect heart, let me make
this as simple. I can't understand, if you're
looking for a theologian, you've come to the wrong place. Sometimes
God makes it clear, doesn't he? And I want to be so clear. Paul
said, seeing that we have such hope, we use great plainness
of speech. And I strive to do that. Not because I know anything,
but because talking about God is impossible without his grace. But having a perfect heart before
God is not a sinless heart or even a relatively sinless heart.
Having a perfect heart before God is God has given you a heart
to look to Him for everything, to rely on Him for everything,
and to walk in fear of Him, to walk constantly looking to Him
and faithfully walking in fear and doing what you do in the
fear of the Lord. Salvation affects everything
you do. The heart that He gives, everything
you say, everything you do, everything you decide, and we're exhorted
in the scripture. Look to Him. It's that heart that He gives.
It's Christ in you, the hope of glory. It's Him saying, I'll
give you a new heart. First Chronicles 29.6, did I
even tell you to turn there yet? First Chronicles 29.6, listen
to this. Then the chief of the fathers
and princes of the tribes of Israel and the captains of thousands
and of hundreds with the rulers of the king's work offered willingly
and gave for the service of the house of God of gold 5,000 talents and 10,000 drams, and of silver,
10,000 tallets, and of brass, 18,000 tallets, and 100,000 tallets
of iron. And they with whom precious stones
were found gave them to the treasure of the house of the Lord by the
hand of Jael, the Gershonite. And then the people rejoiced
for that they offered willingly, because with perfect heart they
offered willingly. unto the Lord, and David the
king also rejoiced with great joy." It was almost like they
were surprised. They rejoiced, look what we're
doing, what are we doing? What are we doing giving so much? It almost sounds like they were
shocked about it. They rejoiced, they didn't puff
up. They rejoiced that God had done
this. And remember where this heart
comes from now, a willing heart. A perfect heart before God is
a willing heart, willing to do whatever needs to be done for
his glory. What were they giving those things
for? For his glory, for his house, for his honor. Remember Psalm 110.3, thy people
shall be willing in the day of thy power. That's what happened
to these people. And they were like, man, this
is amazing. Look what God's doing. Lord, give us this heart. This
is my prayer in all of this. Give us this heart, willing and
faithful and fearing you and relying solely on you for all
things. That's what his word revealed.
That's how David's heart was different in this situation than
Solomon's. Solomon was turned away. He turned
away. Likely, when he was younger,
he would have said, no, I'm not building that. It mentions in
his older years. There's not much to us, is there?
There's just not much to us. Faithful and true Lord obedient
doing what we do in the fear of the Lord give it to us By
your grace give it to us for Christ's sake make it so Amen,
let's pray