1 Kings chapter 11 and reading
from verse 1. We're going to read down to verse
13 and then just pick up a couple of verses right at the end. This is the word of God. But Solomon, but King Solomon
loved many strange women. Together with the daughter of
Pharaoh, women of the Moabites, Ammonites, Edomites, Zidonians,
and Hittites. Of the nations concerning which
the Lord said unto the children of Israel, ye shall not go in
to them, neither shall they come in unto you. For surely they
will turn away your heart after their gods. Solomon clave unto
these in love. And he had seven hundred wives,
princesses, and three hundred concubines. These are lesser
wives. And his wives turned away his
heart. 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. For Solomon went after Ashtoreth,
the goddess of the Zidonians, and after Milcom, the abomination
of the Ammonites. And Solomon did evil in the sight
of the Lord, and went not fully after the Lord, as did David
his father. Then did Solomon build an high
place for Chemosh, the abomination of Moab, in the hill that is
before Jerusalem, and for Molech, the abomination of the children
of Ammon, And likewise did he for all his strange wives, which
burnt incense and sacrificed unto their gods. And the Lord
was angry with Solomon, because his heart was turned from the
Lord God of Israel, which had appeared unto him twice, and
had commanded him concerning this thing, that he should not
go after other gods. But he kept not that which the
Lord commanded. Wherefore the Lord said unto
Solomon, Forasmuch as this is done of thee, and thou hast not
kept my covenant and my statutes which I have commanded thee,
I will surely rend the kingdom from thee, and will give it to
thy servant. Notwithstanding, in thy days
I will not do it for David thy father's sake, but I will rend
it out of the hand of thy son. Howbeit, I will not rend away
all the kingdom, but will give one tribe to thy son for David
my servant's sake and for Jerusalem's sake, which I have chosen. And
then just to turn over for completeness to the end of the chapter and
verse 41, it says this. And the rest of the acts of Solomon
and all that he did and his wisdom, are they not written in the book
of the acts of Solomon? That book doesn't exist anymore.
And the time that Solomon reigned in Jerusalem over all Israel
was forty years. And Solomon slept with his fathers,
and was buried in the city of David his father. And Rehoboam
his son reigned in his stead. Amen. May the Lord bless to us
this reading from his word. In recent weeks, we've heard
a lot about Solomon's wealth, his wisdom, and his accomplishments. We've seen how he typified the
Lord Jesus in the building of God's temple, how he encouraged
spiritual worship and dispensed spiritual knowledge to those
such as the Queen of Sheba, who came seeking wisdom from one
who had been highly blessed of God, one who had been granted
extraordinary encounters with the Lord. But now, in Solomon's old age,
we are confronted with a sad, surprising and shameful deviation
in Solomon's testimony. As if to remind us that no mere
man or woman or boy or girl can stand before God except the Lord
keep and preserve us. We learn how Solomon became obsessed
with lust and preoccupied with sensual things. I could say sexual
things, pleasure. This man, beloved of God, blessed
of God, above all men, nevertheless turned his back upon the Lord's
goodness and turned to idolatry for the sake of his wives and
his concubines. And somewhat staggeringly, I
suggest, we learn that Solomon had 700 wives, princesses, and
300 concubines. and we learn that his wives,
and I guess his concubines as well, turned away his heart from
the Lord. The glory of Solomon, which has
filled our attention for weeks, now ends in shame and darkness. His great wealth His self-importance,
his widespread reputation became stumbling blocks. They lifted
up his heart with pride and they made him careless for the things
of God. Now this is not to say, and this
is perhaps worth noting because it's important in our own lives
that we recognise this, that is not to say that he publicly
denied or that he aggressively repudiated God. but his heart was not right with
God. And you know, we can live our
lives as far as the outward appearance is concerned, as if that, yes,
we're still worshipping God, and yes, we're still going to
the temple, we're still going to church, we're still hearing
things said, but if our heart has turned cold towards the Lord,
that is the same, that is the parallel that is being presented
to us here regarding Solomon. His heart was not right with
God. By condoning idolatry and then
promoting it, he slighted and he snubbed the Lord. He first
tolerated the false gods in his land, the false gods of his wives
and lovers. And then he promoted them actively
together with their practices. Solomon had built a grand temple
in Jerusalem to worship God. And now he built altars to worship
idols in all the hills around about Jerusalem. He brought foreign
wives into the land, which he should not have done. Maybe he
thought to himself, oh, this is good political wisdom. This is good to build these relationships
with all these different countries for the strengthening of the
empire, for the good of the kingdom. But he should not have done it
because it was against what the Lord had said. He brought in
these foreign wives who brought their heathen gods with them.
And his example before the people of Israel led them into marriages
with unbelievers and the pursuit of foreign gods as well. They adopted their heathen practices
and their religious vanities. And we might wonder how one so
wise as Solomon could act so foolishly in a matter so crucial. How one so blessed of God could
return such ingratitude. How one who ascended so high
in the esteem of men and women could fall so low in his spiritual
testimony towards God. The answer is this, and I think
the lesson the Lord would have us all learn from Solomon's example
is that sin in our lives is a constant threat and a persistent enemy. Don't think that age dampens
evil tendencies or that experience reduces the likelihood of sinning. It is true that youth brings
certain kinds of temptation and enticements, but so does old
age and security. The fact that Solomon's lust
led to idolatry simply proves the point. When we lose sight
of the Lord, The devil will creep in by any means possible and
every means available. So here are three lessons that
we might learn from this sad episode. First is this, none
of us are immune to sin. even the worst kind of sin. And I think the Holy Spirit has
highlighted these particular sins in Solomon's life as examples
of the kind of sins every professing Christian might face. Immorality
in our natural life and idolatry in our spiritual life. These
are two powerful forces that we cannot stand against in our
own strength. Those who imagine that they are
becoming more and more holy as they mature in their Christian
experience, and therefore perhaps less likely to sin, don't really
understand their own hearts or the nature of sin. The old man
never leaves us. And while his appetites might
change as the years go by, they can easily be stirred up when
the opportunity arises. And we all, young and old, must
keep close to the Lord by staying alert to the dangers around us
and keeping the Lord ever before us in our thoughts, in our prayers,
in our Bible reading and hearing the gospel. Sometimes we might wonder why
our life seems so difficult and why our times are full of troubles
and challenges. Well, look what happens when
everything is great, as was the case in the example of Solomon. I think it is the Lord's wisdom
to keep us alert and to keep us dependent on him and aware
of our own weaknesses. When Solomon was wealthy, he
became lazy in his soul. When he was popular, he grew
pride. He grew proud and self-sufficient. When he was self-indulgent, he
grew shameless. Have you ever thought about your
troubles like this? That it is the Lord's goodness
to keep us from becoming rich, and popular and proud and self-confident. Even our hardships are evidence
of God's care when they keep us dependent on him and needing
his help. The second point I want to make
by way of application is to think about what we didn't read in
this chapter. Discipline and divine displeasure. We didn't read the whole chapter
because it's long, but much of this passage is about the trouble
that came on Solomon because of God's displeasure, because
of his sin. where there had been peace and
prosperity in the land, where there had been stability in the
kingdom for decades. Now there arose challenges, and
we're given three specific examples, three different sources. Two
from outside his borders, Hadad the Edomite and Rezan the son
of Eliadad. one from among his own servants,
a man called Jeruboam, the son of Nebat. Solomon's enemies prevailed
against him, and one judgment after another fell upon the land,
which is no more than the Lord had warned in the early days
of Solomon's reign. And this begs the question, how
do we know What troubles are the Lord's discipline when we
sin and what are sent for our protection and safeguarding? Well, let me answer that in two
ways. First, discipline is not punishment. Discipline is designed to restore. to recover and to redirect us
when we sin. And it is the case that as believers,
when we sin, we will incur the discipline of the Lord. It's
not a punishment for our sin. It is to redirect us and restore
us to a sense of the Lord's presence with us. The Lord does not punish
a believer, but he does correct us. So how can we tell the difference? Well, the Holy Spirit tells us. If the Lord is correcting us,
the Holy Spirit will speak to our hearts, he will speak to
our conscience, and he will make our sin obvious to us. We will
know that we are sinning and that the Lord's displeasure is
upon us because of our sin. And he will call us to repent
as we pray, as we read our Bible, as we hear the gospel preached. The Lord will provoke us and
the Holy Spirit will turn us again. if we are the Lord's people. A believer cannot long remain
in a state of coldness and opposition to the Lord until the Holy Spirit
begins that process of conviction and conversion, converting us
again to return to the Lord Jesus Christ. And here's the third
thing that I want to just mention. God's faithfulness when we are
unfaithful. His mercy when we fall. It has been a question in the
past. Some have wondered if Solomon's
idolatry at the end of his life, if his immorality means that
he was eternally lost and that he is in hell today. I don't think so. I feel sure
that Solomon messed up in a big way. And I feel sure that Solomon
missed out on blessings in a big way. He brought on himself sadness
and he brought on himself shame. He brought that upon his family. He brought that upon his nation. He followed, in a sense, his
father David, who had done much the same in the case of Bathsheba
and Uriah. Nevertheless, God is faithful. And he saved Solomon from his
sin, as he saves us from our sin. We are not explicitly told
of Solomon's repentance. but perhaps we can discern it,
perhaps we can discover it in his proverbs and in his other
writings such as Ecclesiastes and Song of Solomon. Either way,
God's faithfulness does not depend on man's goodness or man's faithfulness. God's mercy and grace overcome
the sins of God's elect because Christ has taken our sin and
borne our grief and he has paid for it with his own blood. The end came for Solomon. and he died. After a reign of
40 years, we are told, he was buried in the city of David,
and with him died the temporary glory and unity of the combined
kingdom of Israel. Solomon had been promised so
much if he would be obedient, and he proved the futility of
resting in his own strength. Solomon left one son, a man called
Rehoboam. He was not a strong man. He was
not a good man. This one son, in whose lifetime
the kingdom of Israel would be brought once again to its knees. Let me mention one final thing.
In many ways Solomon's sins were as grievous and hurtful to his
testimony as can be imagined. All these wives, all this lust,
all this sensuality and idolatry into the bargain. In many ways, Solomon's sins
were as grievous and hurtful to his testimony as can be imagined. But there is forgiveness with
God, and all who come to him upon the merits of Christ's sacrifice,
all who come on the merits of Christ's shed blood, will find
the Lord gracious and forgiving. No matter what evil you have
committed, or indeed shall commit, God forbid that we fall into
such immorality, God forbid that we fall into such idolatry, but
even these crimes can find forgiveness with the Lord. So that no matter
how shameful and hurtful our sins may be, the testimony of
David, the testimony of Solomon, is that God forgives sinners
in Jesus Christ. No one who seeks mercy from God
through the death of Jesus Christ will ever be disappointed. If
we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins
and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. May the Lord give us all grace
to do so. Amen.