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1 Kings 12 (Part 2) Bible Study (The Kingdom Divided/Jeroboam's Golden Calves) | Pastor Daniel Batarseh · Bible Study with Pr. Daniel Batarseh | Verse by Verse Series | Maranatha Bible Church - Chicago

• 0:02
  First Kings Chapter 12 beginning here in verse 16.
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  If you were here last week, then you are fully aware that we took
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  our time through the introduction of this character
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  named Rehoboam, who is the six succeeding king to Solomon, his
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  father, to absorb these life preserving, relationally
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  flourishing God, glorifying promises that wisdom, biblical
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  wisdom provides. And unfortunately, it wasn't
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  through Rehoboam's positive example that we glean much of
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  these truths and these insights about wisdom, but through his
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  failures. And unfortunately, the sad
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  pattern of Rehoboam's thinking is only going to grievously
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  continue in these next set of verses.
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  And if that's not upsetting enough, then you and I are also
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  going to encounter the nation of Israel as a whole, making tragic
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  decisions to their own harm and injury for generations to come.
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  And if that's difficult to stomach, I'm sorry, there's even
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  more. Because we are also going to be
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  introduced to Jeroboam, not as a character, not as a person in
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  the Bible, but as the first king of the northern tribes of
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  Israel. And he too will make
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  dramatically foolish decisions that will also add to the harm
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  of the people for generations to come.
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  All in all, for the rest of this chapter, we're almost going to
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  get a sense that there's like a competition here.
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  Who can be the most foolish? There's this foolishness
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  everywhere, and we know what foolishness will produce in a
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  life that is unrepentant and unwilling to change and be
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  humbled before the truth of God. So to introduce a Bible study in
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  this way, I wouldn't be surprised if it's disheartening
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  and not the most exciting thing to uncover in the next hour.
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  But if there's any hope in digesting this together, it is
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  that this is good for us. This is good for us in that it
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  will contribute to your personal growth in the area of wisdom.
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  And so be encouraged in that because the Bible speaks about
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  what serious observation can produce in the life of a person
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  who desires wisdom, or who may not even know their need for
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  wisdom. The verse that comes to mind is
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  Proverbs 21, verse 11, and here's what it says in the first
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  part of Proverbs 21, verse 11. When the scoffer is punished,
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  this simple become wise. A scoffer is somebody who has
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  become stiff necked, who mocks at the idea of correction, who
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  rejects the idea of counsel, who is set in their own ways even
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  though those ways are destructive and wrong.
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  And a scoffer, according to the Bible, through divine
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  sanctioning or just because of the world today that we live in
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  that has somewhat of a grasp of right and wrong.
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  At least it should. A scoffer is susceptible to much
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  punishment consequences for his foolishness, and here's what the
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  Bible says following that When a scoffer experiences the outcome
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  of their own disregard for truth and biblical wisdom, the simple
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  the simple is not the same as a fool.
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  The simple can become a fool. But the simple in the Bible
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  speaks of the naive, the gullible, the uninformed, the
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  immature. This simple becomes wise.
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  The simple becomes wise. And seeing, oh, that's what
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  happens when a person lives foolishly.
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  Oh, that's what happens when a person lives as a scoffer.
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  That's what happens when a person implements human wisdom
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  above God's wisdom. And through that they learn
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  through what observation you and I are observing.
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  We're observing what foolishness can produce in a life, not just
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  in a life in society, not just in society to a nation.
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  And we are to become more wise as a result of it.
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  So let's begin here in verse 16. And when all Israel saw that the
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  king did not listen to them, the people answered the king.
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  What portion do we have in David?
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  We have no inheritance in the son of Jesse.
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  To your tents, O Israel. Look now to your own house,
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  David. So Israel went to their tents,
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  but rail bomb reigned over the people of Israel who lived in
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  the cities of Judah. What's happening here?
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  Well, you and I learned it last week.
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  That rail bomb was counseled to approach the people who had a
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  request and a negotiation. That if they were going to
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  submit under his leadership, then he would have to lighten up
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  on the taxes, lighten up on the hard labor that his father
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  exercised during his reign. Rehab rejected their desire, and
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  he decided to go the authoritarian approach, You're
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  not going to mess with me. You think that you can determine
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  how this nation is going to function.
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  You got another thing coming. And so he implements an iron
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  fist and it backfires. As we read here, all Israel now
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  chooses to disassociate, not just from rehab but from the
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  dynasty of David. Can I ask you a question?
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  How many years did it take for both David and Solomon to
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  establish their monarch? How many years did it take in
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  total for these two to build this Kingdom so to speak in
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  honoring of God's covenant with David?
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  It's very simple. How long did David rule and
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  reign for 40, So total how many years?
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  80 with Solomon? 80 years to get to this point,
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  and he had. The last moments of Solomon's
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  life were quite shaky, but we can just generally say it took
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  80 years and after 80 years it took Rehoboam 3 days to
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  dismantle it. It took this man less than a
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  week to topple all that was built through the toil of his
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  father's. Can you imagine that?
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  We wish it wasn't so, but such is the reality of what our
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  decisions can do, such as the reality.
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  And don't worry about that, guys.
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  If it's not going to operate, don't worry about it.
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  It's not that bad. So you have here a man who makes
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  these kind of decisions, very few, but significant enough to
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  do what? To bring it all down to nothing.
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  And what we're supposed to take from that is that you and I have
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  to understand the significance of our choices in life.
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  And that is not meant to paralyze you in the advancements
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  that you have to make in this life.
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  And through those advancements, you have to make major
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  decisions. It's not meant to cripple you at
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  all, but what it is meant to do is encourage you to stay near to
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  God. Stay close to God.
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  Always be needy before God. Plunge every plan, every desire,
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  every decision in prayer. Receive the counsel of His Word
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  continually in the counsel of God's people who submit to this
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  Word, and you'll be more than safe.
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  You will actually flourish. This is not a man who innocently
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  made a mistake. This is a man who blatantly
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  chose to turn away from God's will, God's Word, God's
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  provision of guidance through other people, and He's paying
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  for it. And not just him, but you.
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  Think about what his Father's invested up to this time and
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  what will take place following Rehoboam.
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  And as we look at this, we think to ourselves how?
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  How did this happen? How is this now Kingdom for the
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  first time divided? Listen, this is such a calamity
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  and a stain to Israel's history that the scriptures will even
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  use this moment as a benchmark to measure future catastrophes
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  that this nation will face. Let me give you an example of
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  that and Isaiah 7 verse 17. The Lord speaks to the prophet,
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  and this is what he says, and it provides great insight to just
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  how profound this moment is. In our study of the Old
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  Testament, says here in Isaiah 7, verse 17, the Lord will bring
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  upon you and upon your people and upon your Father's house.
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  Such days as have not come since the day that Ephraim departed
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  from Judah, the king of Assyria, the king of Assyria.
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  I'm going to release the king of Assyria upon you, Israel, and
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  you're not going to see these days.
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  They're going to not even be able to come close to what you
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  experienced in recent issue. The only thing I can compare it
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  to is First Kings chapter 12 when Ephraim, which is the
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  largest tribe of the northern tribes divorcing from Judah.
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  So this is serious. This is massive.
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  And we're supposed to feel the weightiness of this?
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  One man's choice would put a dent in Israel's history and
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  future now. Israel's severely divided,
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  right? They expressed this.
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  We have nothing to do with the House of David.
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  We're removing ourselves from him, and we see what Rehoboam
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  will do as a response. In verse 18.
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  Then King Rehoboam sent Adoram, who was taskmaster, over the
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  forced labor, and all Israel stoned him to death with stones.
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  And King Rehoboam hurried to mount his chariot to flee to
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  Jerusalem. This is like it's almost
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  unimaginable, you would think, if you took the counsel of your
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  companions and it backfired like this.
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  The 10 tribes say we we want nothing to do with you.
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  We're going our own way. You deal with your own tribe.
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  We're going to deal with our own.
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  That you would learn and realize that the counsel you received
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  was way off. You would be humbled by that.
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  And if you're going to flee to anything, you would flee to the
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  prayer closet and then return to the drawing board and say, Where
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  did I go wrong? How can I make this right?
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  I've learned from my own mistakes.
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  God, please help me. Instead, what does he do?
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  He sends a taskmaster, the same taskmaster that was employed by
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  Solomon. In other words, what this man is
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  doing is even though the people denied his authority, he double
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  S down. He double S down.
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  He still tries to play that tough guy card.
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  He double S down. Though the system was condemned,
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  he says no, I'm going to implement it whether you like it
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  or not. Is this foolishness or what?
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  How much more of a fool can you be?
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  And I step back when I read this last night and I study this and
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  I thought, How can you be so idiotic?
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  How can you not just see the plane writing on the wall?
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  How can you not see the fruit of your decisions?
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  How can you think you know what this needs me to pursue with
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  greater aggression. How?
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  And then a verse came to mind. It's in Proverbs 11, verse 2,
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  where it says when pride comes then comes disgrace.
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  But with the humble is wisdom. What is this man illustrating?
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  A lack of humility. A man who could not admit he was
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  wrong. A man who could not admit
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  defeat. A man who could not return to
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  his former understanding of what the truth was when it was
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  advised to him and say, this is the way I went the wrong way.
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  And when you do not have humility, you also forfeit
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  wisdom. Humility must be pursued and
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  secured if wisdom is going to be realized.
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  No humility, no wisdom. And if you don't have humility,
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  there's no neutrality. There's pride.
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  And when you have pride, you inherit disgrace.
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  And the longer you hold on to that pride, the greater the
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  disgrace will be in your life and in mine.
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  So why is why is rehab doing this?
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  It's because he lacks humbleness, and because of that
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  he forfeited wisdom. Even in the plain sight of the
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  obvious thing to do, he still was headlong, stiff, necked,
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  determined to pursue what he saw to be right.
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  How do I grow in wisdom? Just set the bedrock of humility
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  in your heart. Express continuing your need of
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  him and his guidance, and that also includes admitting and
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  confessing you're wrong so that light can come in and that you
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  can receive the insight you need to avoid that mistake.
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  Again, Rehoboam lack that and it came to his own harm.
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  As we see here, A man died because of his foolishness.
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  Relationship dies because of a lack of humility.
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  Ministries die because of a lack of humbleness.
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  So many things die when humility is not priority.
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  Look at this common verse 19. So Israel has been in rebellion
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  against the House of David to this day for the rest of the
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  landscape of the Old Testament. From this point on, we're going
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  to see a shift in the terrain of Scripture.
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  And this is the verse that pivots it, saying what do you
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  mean? Because from now on, generally
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  whenever you see the word Israel or Israel being mentioned, it's
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  not speaking about the entirety of the 12 tribes of the sons of
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  Jacob. Israel from this point on will
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  reference the 10 northern tribes, whereas Judah will
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  represent the southern Kingdom and Judah will not stand alone.
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  Judah, the southern Kingdom, will also be comprised with and
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  connected to which other tribe? Benjamin.
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  Correct. So you have the 10 who represent
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  Israel, the Kingdom of Israel. That's not the whole nation, the
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  10 tribes, the northern tribes. And then you have the Kingdom of
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  Judah, which is Judah primarily, but also Benjamin partnering
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  with him. And sometimes you'll read about
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  Ephraim and that's one tribe, but in some context.
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  Actually in many contexts that tribe represents the 10 northern
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  tribes you just read it in in Isaiah 717.
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  Since Ephraim departed from Judah, well it was more than
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  Ephraim. So Ephraim also in many context
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  of the Old Testament represents the 10 northern tribes as a
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  whole. Why?
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  Why Ephraim? Any idea?
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  Ephraim is the largest tribe. It's as simple as that.
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  Ephraim is the largest tribe. Judah out of the two is also
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  larger than Benjamin. So just a simple way of
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  identifying these two different kingdoms now and we're going to
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  see that for the rest of our study in the Hebrew scriptures.
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  Verse 19 indicates that. But we read on what do we see in
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  verse 20? And when all Israel heard that
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  Jeroboam had returned, they sent and called him to the assembly
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  and made him king. Over all Israel.
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  There was none that followed the House of David but the tribe of
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  Judah only. So Rehoboam is not the only fool
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  in this chapter, Israel. Those 10 tribes are also
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  foolish. Any idea why this demonstrates
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  their foolishness? They made Jeroboam their king.
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  Why is that important? Who is God's chosen king?
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  Was it just David? Or would it be his descendants
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  forever? His descendants forever?
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  So the mark of God's favor was upon David and his descendants.
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  They were the chosen lineage to operate as monarchs for the
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  Kingdom of God, the reflection of the glory of God.
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  And here's this people saying we want nothing to do with David's
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  line. We want Jeroboam.
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  Jeroboam, though he was called by God to work in this way.
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  We also learned that the people here made a drastic mistake in
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  separating themselves from God's original choice for the king of
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  Israel. And as we looked at this, we
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  think to ourselves, well, what is this going to cost them?
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  What We're going to find out in a moment, and we see here that
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  the folly of Israel's only met with greater folly, and that's
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  with this man, Rehoboam once again.
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  Look at verse 21. When Rehoboam came to Jerusalem,
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  he assembled all the House of Judah and the tribe of Benjamin,
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  180,000 chosen warriors to fight against the House of Israel, to
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  restore the Kingdom of Rehoboam, the son of Solomon.
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  So Rehoboam now, right? He sends a taskmaster.
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  He's killed. He learns that what the people
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  said early on in verse 16 wasn't just, you know, shallow talk.
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  This was real. They actually said we're cut
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  off, We're disconnected from you.
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  They made someone a king, real. One senses the seriousness of
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  this moment. So what does he do?
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  Humble himself before God. You know, he wants to declare
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  war. Round up the troops.
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  And now we sense there's a boiling point.
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  We sense the tension now, reaching a breaking point and we
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  we think to ourselves, this is this is getting ugly, this is
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  getting horrific so quickly, so fast.
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  And what's about to take place here is so amazing.
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  And verse 22. But the word of God came to
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  Shamaya, the man of God. We haven't seen a prophet in our
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  study in a long, long time and now all of a sudden appearing on
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  the scene is this man of God. He flashes on the scene, and he
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  will be removed from the scene just as quickly.
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  But what a pivotal moment for him to appear with a word from
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  the Lord. And this is what he says in
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  verse 23. Say to Rehoboam the son of
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  Solomon, king of Judah, and to all the House of Judah and
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  Benjamin, and to the rest of the people.
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  Thus says the Lord, you shall not go up or fight against your
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  relatives, the people of Israel. Every man returned to his home,
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  for this thing is from me. So they listened to the word of
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  the Lord and went home again according to the word of the
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  Lord. What moves you about that?
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  Peace. But how did peace come about?
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  OK, the prophetic word, yes, that was the way peace could be
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  achieved. But was the prophetic word over
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  ruling? OK, that's another thing that
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  we're going to look at as well. There's the sovereignty of God
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  in this. It's very simple.
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  They obeyed him. Finally, some obedience.
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  In this downward spiral of rebellion, you see something
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  that's almost like this cold glass of water to your soul as
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  you're trying to endure this. What do we read here?
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  So they listened to the word of the Lord and went home again.
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  According to the word of the Lord.
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  It's like a breath of fresh air. Wow.
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  If only Rehoboam had done this way back when he started out as
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  a king. Only he prized the word of the
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  Lord in such a way. All the disasters that could
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  have been dodged, all the pain that could have been prevented,
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  all the life that could have been saved, all the unity
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  perhaps that could have been kept.
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  But you can't go back, can you? He couldn't have you and I can
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  either. And so here's the lesson from
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  these verses. It is never too late to obey
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  God. It is never too late to step
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  outside of the lane of disobedience and enter into the
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  lane of consecrated obedience to the Lord.
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  You know, I've talked to some people throughout the years and
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  they've approached me after a message, whether that be on
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  purity, whether that be on living for the Lord, whether
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  that be on your prayer life, worship, serving, whatever it
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  may be. And some people are so convinced
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  that they are so invested, so steeped into a mindset or a
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  lifestyle of sin that they don't see any point of escaping it and
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  living for the Lord. That's a lie.
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  That's a lie. God is always waiting.
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  God is always willing to redeem, to reverse, to recycle, even
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  your failures, what you have done to yourself and to others.
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  And only is He waiting because he is worthy to receive that
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  obedience. But He is waiting to also reward
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  you for that obedience. Do you understand what was
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  prevented because these people obeyed the word, the Lord.
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  How many lives again could have been sabotage, could have been
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  slaughtered if they had just ignored what the Prophet said?
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  But so many things were prevented, so many things were
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  avoided. Yes, even if you are on a fast
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  track, 100 miles an hour away from the will of God, Into
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  Darkness, into sin, things can stop the moment you and I
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  repent. The moment we call upon the name
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  of the Lord, even though we feel like we don't have the strength
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  within ourselves, even though we feel like the brake pad is
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  broken, God can intervene and stop you from committing greater
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  mass, greater tragedy, and to actually more than that, lead
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  you on a path with greater fruit, greater life, greater
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  hope. It's never too late to obey God.
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  That's what we learned from this.
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  You may feel that it is, but according to Rahel Bohm story,
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  it's not. And as you read this, you also
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  see something else. Her brother mentioned it.
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  The Prophet says here every man returned to his home for this
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  thing is from me. He's speaking on behalf of God.
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  So there's something about the sovereignty of God in this
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  exhortation that also contributed to their willingness
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  to step back from their ways and to obey God.
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  Now you read this and you think to yourself, what does this
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  mean? Well, we know from verse Chapter
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  11 rather that the prophet Ah Heja prophesied to Jeroboam that
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  there would be a division and that he would be made king, and
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  that there would be a tribe preserved for the line of David.
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  So everything went according to the prophesied script.
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  We're seeing the fulfillment of that prophecy right here, right
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  now. But for him to say this thing is
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  from me is that is that Shamaya here saying that God was the one
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  who pulled the strings of the moral actions of these different
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  parties to commit these atrocities, to commit this
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  rebellion, this foolishness in order to accomplish his will.
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  Some would say that is the case, but I believe there is a higher
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  view of God's sovereignty than him playing both sides of the
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  chess board. I believe that the higher view
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  of God's sovereignty is that though he has permitted and
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  granted men to be able to choose and make their choices, whether
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  that be to surrender to the to God or to live their own way, he
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  will still have His way. God will still have His purposes
• 24:13
  be performed, regardless of the attempts of men to thwart it, to
• 24:18
  challenge it, to contradict it. God's way will prevail always,
• 24:27
  and men will still be held accountable and responsible for
• 24:29
  their decisions. No one can rewrite history.
• 24:34
  God himself declares it, and God himself will have His way,
• 24:39
  regardless of men's agreement with it.
• 24:44
  This thing is from me. I allowed this to happen.
• 24:48
  He could have got intervened. Absolutely he could have
• 24:50
  intervened. But he allowed these parties to
• 24:54
  pursue their foolishness. And through that, the folly
• 24:57
  didn't cause things to fall apart.
• 25:00
  They fell according to plan. This thing is from me.
• 25:03
  I'm in charge here. I'm still in charge here.
• 25:07
  And though you think that you're running your own little show,
• 25:10
  this is going according to how I desire it to go.
• 25:13
  This is you experiencing the consequences of your own sin.
• 25:17
  You're going to be held responsible for it.
• 25:19
  But don't you worry, I'm still in charge.
• 25:24
  That's the view of God's sovereignty in this picture.
• 25:27
  So they listen to the word of the Lord because they were
• 25:29
  exposed to just how big God is. I'm sure that played a part in
• 25:33
  it. But there's a side note here
• 25:35
  from this text. I would use it to instruct the
• 25:37
  believers, the community of faith, of how you and I can
• 25:40
  avoid a civil war. Do civil wars happen in churches
• 25:46
  all the time? Christians have really good aim
• 25:50
  at shooting other Christians. I wish they were just as good as
• 25:55
  picking up wounded soldiers. But what you have here is a
• 26:00
  civil war ready to ensue. And there is a language that the
• 26:05
  Prophet uses that I believe unlocks another factor that can
• 26:09
  help us remain unified and less fearful.
• 26:14
  Worrisome that there can be a civil war in our midst.
• 26:16
  Let's read it again, shall we? Look at verse 24.
• 26:19
  Thus says the Lord, you shall not go up or fight against your
• 26:23
  Who? Your relatives?
• 26:28
  Other translations? Your brethren?
• 26:31
  Your brothers. So even in the way that the
• 26:34
  prophet addresses the situation, he reintroduces a lens that is
• 26:38
  necessary. Are you actually going to go up
• 26:41
  against your own brothers and kill each other?
• 26:46
  It reminds me of that verse that I briefly introduced you a
• 26:49
  couple Sundays ago. If you were here about love
• 26:52
  being the secret ingredient to Christian unity and the verse,
• 26:56
  if you remember that I brought forward, I think it's so
• 26:58
  fitting. For this moment is Romans 1210.
• 27:01
  But I have another verse that I didn't bring up to add to this.
• 27:04
  What did Paul say in Romans 1210?
• 27:06
  Love one another. With what kind of affection?
• 27:09
  Brotherly affection. He could have just said.
• 27:11
  Love one another. He says no, love each other with
• 27:14
  Philadelphia. Love, the natural affection that
• 27:19
  you would feel for somebody who has the same blood as you.
• 27:22
  It's something that's almost indescribable, right?
• 27:26
  And what I shared on on that evening, on that Saturday
• 27:28
  evening with those Romanian brothers and sisters, I share
• 27:30
  with you that although there are scrimmages at home, are there
• 27:34
  not? Although there are disagreements
• 27:35
  at home, although there is war sometimes at home, there is
• 27:39
  something that takes place in your heart when something
• 27:44
  happens to a loved one. Is it not true?
• 27:46
  I can speak as an older brother that I have throughout my
• 27:51
  history with my brothers and even my sister.
• 27:54
  Spoken to them, maybe corrected them, tried to rebuke them,
• 27:58
  instruct them, maybe in my flesh, especially when I wasn't
• 28:01
  saved, maybe a little bit more unnecessary approaches.
• 28:07
  And as a brother, you feel justified in that to some
• 28:09
  regard, right? But as a brother, you know this.
• 28:12
  If you're older, if somebody outside of your home is somebody
• 28:15
  on the school play field or somebody at work where you both
• 28:18
  work, speaks to your sibling in a way that only you should speak
• 28:23
  to your sibling, what happens to your blood?
• 28:27
  Oh, there's a protective rush that comes through.
• 28:30
  You have no right to speak to my brother.
• 28:31
  Only I can speak to him like that.
• 28:33
  Right. What is that?
• 28:34
  That's Philadelphia affection. Or when you hear some some bad
• 28:41
  news, some tragedy that happens to your sibling, to your parent,
• 28:45
  to your sister, something comes over you.
• 28:48
  There's this natural inherited set of feelings that is a gift
• 28:54
  from God. But in Paul's language here in
• 28:57
  Romans 12/10, he wants you to understand that those natural
• 29:00
  affections for your family are translated spiritually with your
• 29:03
  family in Christ. In other words, what you
• 29:06
  experience with your natural household, you should have a
• 29:09
  mirroring set of convictions and longings and passions for those
• 29:14
  who share the same spirit. So love with brotherly
• 29:19
  affection. You know what that tells me?
• 29:21
  Love toward my Christian brethren is more than just duty.
• 29:24
  All right, I got to love them. I got to love them.
• 29:30
  And all these different personalities and all these
• 29:32
  different backgrounds. And you're calling me to love?
• 29:35
  OK, I'll love them. Love what?
• 29:37
  OK, agape. Love.
• 29:38
  Serve them as sacrificial love. There's a higher call to love.
• 29:42
  Love with feeling. How is that OK?
• 29:46
  You think your challenge there, This is, this is a verse that I
• 29:49
  remember reading it at one point, and it shot out like an
• 29:52
  arrow and pierced my heart and it caused me to bleed for quite
• 29:57
  a long time. So he tells us in Romans 1210.
• 30:01
  Love one another with brotherly affection.
• 30:02
  That's a high call. Thank God for the Holy Spirit's
• 30:05
  help, but look what the Saint Paul says to the Philippian
• 30:09
  Church and Philippians. One verse 8.
• 30:14
  Brace yourselves, Philippians 18.
• 30:20
  Look at this, for God is my witness.
• 30:26
  He calls God to bear witness on this.
• 30:28
  God is my witness. How I yearn for you all with the
• 30:34
  affection of Philadelphia love. Look at the quality of affection
• 30:39
  here. The affection of Christ Jesus.
• 30:46
  Agape love, sacrificial love. Yes, it's the highest form of
• 30:49
  love, but I argue there's a higher thing that we should
• 30:53
  achieve, and that's, yes, agape love being the foundation, but
• 30:55
  love one another with brotherly affection and we have even a
• 30:58
  higher call. Paul exemplifies us.
• 31:01
  I love you with the affection of Christ Jesus.
• 31:09
  How strong is the love of Christ?
• 31:11
  And here's Paul is bearing witness and calling God,
• 31:14
  invoking the name of God to the validity of this testimony in
• 31:17
  the introduction of his letter to the Philippians.
• 31:19
  I love you with the affections that Jesus has, for you can't
• 31:25
  call this man a liar. He means it.
• 31:29
  Now you can read that and be like, oh, that's why he's the
• 31:32
  apostle Paul and I'm not. But you read later on in
• 31:36
  Philippians where he says what you've seen in me, what you've
• 31:38
  heard in me, what you've seen exemplified in me.
• 31:40
  Imitate it. Imitated, I'm called to the high
• 31:45
  call of love with the affections of Jesus Christ.
• 31:50
  Let's be honest now, don't answer, just answer in your
• 31:52
  heart before the Lord. Do I have the qualities of the
• 31:56
  affections of Christ for my brethren?
• 31:59
  It's very difficult to go to war when you have that pumping
• 32:02
  through your veins. So I don't present that to you
• 32:06
  to just see this clever connection in the Bible.
• 32:09
  I want you to see it so you can feel it.
• 32:12
  That is what I am to pursue. And if everybody's convinced
• 32:17
  that in a local church, I guarantee you you have heaven on
• 32:19
  earth, you have heaven, at least a fragment of heaven on earth.
• 32:24
  Every single time we gather, Every time a member is added
• 32:29
  loving and yearning for one another with the affection of
• 32:31
  Christ Jesus. What would churches look like if
• 32:36
  that was in the atmosphere? I can tell you one thing for
• 32:40
  certain. There would be no wars, or very
• 32:42
  few of them, at least unnecessary wars.
• 32:47
  Rehabalm has proven to be more foolish than we imagined, and
• 32:51
  thankfully his mention in this chapter ends on a relatively
• 32:55
  good note. Israel also foolish.
• 32:57
  And we still have Jeroboam. Let's read verse 25 then.
• 33:04
  Jeroboam built Shechem in the Hill Country of Ephraim and
• 33:09
  lived there, and he went out from there and built Penuel.
• 33:14
  So what's happening here? Well, Jeroboam is now the new
• 33:16
  crown king of the northern tribes, and he wants to secure
• 33:18
  two things. The first first thing that
• 33:20
  Jeroboam wants to do is secure headquarters, a commanding
• 33:23
  center. And he does so here in Shechem
• 33:26
  and also here in Penuel, his palace, his primary abiding
• 33:31
  place. And here's the second thing that
• 33:33
  Jeroboam wants to protect, and that is the loyalty of the
• 33:38
  people. And we see how he's going to do
• 33:41
  this in verse 26. And Jeroboam said in his heart,
• 33:46
  Now the Kingdom will turn back to the House of David.
• 33:50
  If this people go up to offer sacrifices in the temple of the
• 33:53
  Lord at Jerusalem, then the heart of this people will turn
• 33:56
  again to their Lord, to Rehoboam, king of Judah, and
• 34:00
  they will kill me and return to Rehoboam, king of Judah.
• 34:04
  So Jeroboam understood that the capital city of worship was
• 34:09
  where Jerusalem. And he also understood that how
• 34:14
  many times out of the year were the Jews supposed to travel to
• 34:17
  Jerusalem to honor the feasts? Not all the feasts.
• 34:20
  There were seven of them. But how many out of the seven
• 34:22
  were they to travel to Jerusalem?
• 34:25
  3 three times in the year they were to make way to the House of
• 34:29
  God to worship God. This is concerning to Jeroboam
• 34:34
  because in his mind he's thinking, well, if you have the
• 34:37
  people now travelling there and there in the territory of
• 34:39
  Roboam, then perhaps they're more susceptible and vulnerable
• 34:42
  to be influenced by Roboam. And so I need to do something to
• 34:47
  minimize that possibility. And I also believe that Jeroboam
• 34:52
  here is suffering from great fear, not just because of the
• 34:56
  obvious, but also because the the, the fickleness and the
• 35:01
  vacillating loyalty of the people that played in his favor.
• 35:05
  By saying we're divorcing from David, we're going with
• 35:07
  Jeroboam. I'm sure he knew that that could
• 35:10
  quickly, just as easily turn on him.
• 35:14
  And so he wants to again, try to strategize and think of a way to
• 35:19
  eliminate as much of that as possible.
• 35:21
  And so he comes up with this scheme.
• 35:25
  And the scheme here is quite conniving.
• 35:28
  It's so destructive to the spiritual state of the nation.
• 35:34
  But he could care less. There's so many things to say
• 35:37
  about what Jeroboam is meditating on.
• 35:39
  But let me make this one comment, and let me ask you this
• 35:41
  question. What is the root of this
• 35:45
  foolishness that's brewing in his heart?
• 35:48
  What is the root of the irrational anxiety?
• 35:53
  Notice what he's saying? They're going to kill me.
• 35:55
  They'll go back to Robo and they'll turn back on me.
• 35:58
  That is an extreme view, but what's the reason for it?
• 36:02
  There's something down deep inside, something that you and I
• 36:05
  have heard of. Something you and I are warned
• 36:06
  about constantly. Any idea this belief is the
• 36:14
  right answer? Do you remember what I hate?
• 36:17
  I told him in First Kings 11. Let me remind you, go to your
• 36:19
  Bibles and turn to verse 38 at First Kings 11.
• 36:22
  Here's what the Prophet here's what the Prophet told the same
• 36:29
  person. And if you will listen to all
• 36:32
  that I command you and will walk in my ways and do what is right
• 36:35
  in my eyes by keeping my statutes and My commandments, as
• 36:40
  David my servant did, I will be with you and will build you a
• 36:45
  sure house as I built for David and I will give Israel to you.
• 36:51
  That's a promise from God, And for him to think in this way
• 36:56
  shows that he didn't believe God.
• 37:00
  Listen. Your heart and mind will never
• 37:03
  be short in coming up with sinful alternatives to pacify
• 37:06
  our fears and our worries. The only way that you and I can
• 37:14
  defeat deceitful thoughts from sucking the life out of our walk
• 37:22
  with God is by taking every object of your worry to arrest
• 37:29
  it and then to release it into the ocean of God's Word and to
• 37:36
  let it drown in it. And I can tell you, as you are
• 37:39
  fully aware, that those creeping things will try to crawl back on
• 37:44
  the shore of your faith. But it is your duty and mind to
• 37:47
  identify it and to restart the process if need be, apprehend it
• 37:53
  and launch it back into God's Word, and to submerge it, and to
• 38:01
  let it drown under it until it dies.
• 38:06
  It has no more life or strength to even visit your heart again
• 38:13
  if you fail to be so familiar with the truth, and more than
• 38:15
  just familiar, but to believe this truth, your heart will
• 38:18
  never be short in stock of coming up with crazy ideas to
• 38:21
  try to help you navigate through life or to respond to certain
• 38:24
  situations. Unfortunately, this man had no
• 38:28
  grasp of the truth. He was told the truth, but he
• 38:29
  didn't cling to the truth. He didn't rehearse the promises
• 38:32
  of God, and what was he left with?
• 38:34
  The scariest thing you can be left with in this life, your
• 38:37
  heart, your heart governing your own life is a nightmare.
• 38:43
  Who has betrayed you more than you?
• 38:47
  Who has lied to you more than you?
• 38:48
  Who has convinced you of things only for you to look back and
• 38:52
  think an embarrassment? How did I get to that point?
• 38:55
  How did I think like that? And so God in his mercy and
• 38:59
  goodness, gives us something to chain our hearts and for
• 39:04
  something else to instead be the heartbeat behind all that we
• 39:07
  say, think, or do His word. This man abandoned all of that.
• 39:13
  And So what is he going to do? You know, it reminds me of what
• 39:16
  we read in First Samuel 27. Do you remember the story of
• 39:18
  David when he thought he would be better off going to the
• 39:20
  Philistines? In verse one, it says, And David
• 39:24
  said in his heart. Now Saul will kill me, and
• 39:28
  there's nothing better for me to do but to go to the land of the
• 39:31
  Philistines. You know what David's problem
• 39:33
  was? What began in his heart as a
• 39:35
  lie, as a temptation, stayed in his heart.
• 39:40
  He never brought it and spilled it out before the Lord.
• 39:43
  He never sought counsel from people to bring light to it.
• 39:46
  He kept it in the chambers of his own thinking, and it led him
• 39:50
  into disaster. It led him into backsliding, and
• 39:54
  here we see kind of a similar statement, Jeroboam said in his
• 39:57
  heart. And now he's seeing all these
• 39:59
  crazy ideas, and we're hoping you're not going to stay there,
• 40:02
  right, Jeroboam? You're going to do something
• 40:04
  about this, bring it to the light, expose it with truth.
• 40:07
  And the first few verses of verse 28 bring some kind of hope
• 40:10
  to us. So the king took counsel.
• 40:13
  Yes, you got it, man, And made two calves of gold.
• 40:17
  Hold on for a second. What kind of counsel did you
• 40:21
  get? He took counsel, something David
• 40:26
  didn't do. But which counselors did you go
• 40:28
  to? Do you remember one of the
• 40:30
  things that wisdom teaches you from last week?
• 40:32
  Wisdom teaches you to seek, not just counsel, specific counsel.
• 40:36
  Wisdom is not just being counseled and being open to
• 40:39
  instruction. It's about getting it from the
• 40:40
  right source. Many people make foolish
• 40:44
  decisions because of counsel. Isn't it amazing here that
• 40:47
  Jeroboam mirrors the mistake of Rehoboam?
• 40:50
  Rehoboam took counsel from his fellow companions, those who
• 40:53
  grew up with him and stood before him, and it led him to
• 40:55
  this mistake. And now here's Jeroboam
• 40:57
  repeating that he took counsel from who knows who, and now it's
• 41:01
  going to lead him to making a tragic mistake for generations
• 41:05
  again to come. Why is the Bible repeating this?
• 41:08
  To get it through our thick heads, that's why.
• 41:10
  Be careful who you surround yourself with.
• 41:13
  Be careful which voices speak into your life.
• 41:17
  Be careful what your source of motivation in his life and how
• 41:20
  to frame your view of the world. Especially in this day where so
• 41:23
  many people are willing to speak freely with podcasts and ideas
• 41:28
  and books and blogs, more voices and more accessibility to voices
• 41:31
  than any point in history. So we, you and I, need to be
• 41:34
  extra guarded. Extra guarded with the truth.
• 41:38
  This man took counsel good. No, not good, and made two
• 41:42
  calves of gold. What kind of counsel is this?
• 41:49
  When we read on and we see what he's going to do with these two
• 41:52
  calves of gold, And he said to the people, you have gone up to
• 41:55
  Jerusalem long enough. Behold your gods, O Israel, who
• 41:59
  brought you out of the land of Egypt.
• 42:03
  Does this sound familiar to you? Tell me where it's from.
• 42:08
  This is from Exodus 32. This is how diabolical this
• 42:14
  council is. Whoever gave it to him was very
• 42:17
  strategic, satanically strategic.
• 42:22
  So I don't know how it happened, but perhaps Jeroboam heard it
• 42:27
  this way. You remember the people of
• 42:30
  Israel when they first came out of Egypt and how all it took was
• 42:33
  a golden calf for them to cut away from their allegiance to
• 42:38
  Moses and Yahweh Jeroboam. If it worked then surely it can
• 42:42
  work now. And here's how wicked Jeroboam
• 42:45
  is. Does he build 1 Golden calf?
• 42:48
  He builds 2. He builds 2.
• 42:53
  So he's telling himself and he's telling others.
• 42:55
  I'm going to make sure that this works, and it almost seems
• 42:59
  unimaginable, but remember, Jeroboam here is not operating
• 43:03
  under honoring God, is he? You know, he wants to secure and
• 43:07
  maintain his throne, his governance, his rule.
• 43:10
  And when you put anything, listen so closely to this.
• 43:15
  When a man puts anything above God, anything, then he or she is
• 43:22
  willing to use God as a means to achieve that thing that they
• 43:26
  love more than God. You and I have seen it.
• 43:32
  We've seen it with our own eyes. We see it on online.
• 43:34
  We see people using the name of God, using the truth of God.
• 43:37
  No problem declaring things about their faith in God when
• 43:41
  everything about their life contradicts it.
• 43:43
  How is a person able to do such a thing?
• 43:47
  It's very easy. When you have idolatry in your
• 43:50
  life. You're willing to use God to
• 43:53
  serve your idol, manipulate God's word to serve your idol,
• 43:58
  to trick people about the truth, and with the truth of God to
• 44:00
  serve your idol. And this is the horrific thing
• 44:03
  about Jeroboam's actions here. But notice what he does in
• 44:07
  telling the people what he said. And he said to the people, you
• 44:10
  have gone up to Jerusalem long enough, Who here has a New King
• 44:12
  James or King James or a new American standard?
• 44:16
  Can you read how it reads in New King James?
• 44:18
  Because all these other word for word translations spell out
• 44:22
  Jeroboam's words slightly differently.
• 44:24
  And I think it really captures what's happening here.
• 44:28
  Yes, stop. It is too much for you to go up
• 44:42
  to Jerusalem. What is Jeroboam doing here?
• 44:46
  He is enticing the people and preparing them to compromise in
• 44:51
  this way by appealing to what you and I understand.
• 44:57
  And that is convenience. There's an allurement here.
• 45:04
  There's an attraction here to worship these gods.
• 45:08
  And the gateway for these people to remove any hesitation or to
• 45:12
  let down their arms of defence is convenience.
• 45:19
  It's too much for you to go up to Jerusalem.
• 45:22
  You don't want to travel all the way down there.
• 45:24
  You don't have to book time off. You don't want to have to bring
• 45:26
  your family. You don't have to bring the
• 45:27
  it's. I'm about to give you an easier
• 45:30
  way to worship. Compromise loves to feed off of
• 45:39
  convenience. It's not the only reason for
• 45:43
  compromise. But convenience is a seduction,
• 45:48
  and much compromise is justified by what convenience can offer.
• 45:52
  I mean, it's true for this moment.
• 45:54
  It's true for people in the Church today doing what the Lord
• 45:58
  asked me to do in this area or not in that area.
• 46:01
  It's not convenient. It's not convenient to my
• 46:07
  schedule. It's not convenient to my social
• 46:11
  life. I know what God is asking of me.
• 46:15
  Like basic things of the Christian walk.
• 46:18
  But it's not convenient to my career path.
• 46:21
  It's not convenient. It's not convenient.
• 46:25
  A consecrated life crucifies the nagging of convenience.
• 46:32
  Convenience with many other things are nailed to the cross.
• 46:36
  When Christ becomes your treasure, the Christian who is
• 46:41
  filled with the Spirit is no longer operated by convenience.
• 46:45
  He is now under the operation of the Lordship of Jesus Christ.
• 46:51
  Convenience as a justification to disobey dies when a man or
• 46:56
  woman carries his cross. And with all our advancements
• 47:02
  today, convenience is a greater allurement to a diluted
• 47:05
  Christianity more than at any time in church history.
• 47:11
  So this is this is how Jeroboam is tempting the people.
• 47:13
  It's easier. It's more convenient.
• 47:19
  Oh yeah, we have to think rightly about how we go about
• 47:21
  life. We can't be foolishly radical
• 47:24
  even in our pursuit of spirituality.
• 47:25
  But I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about what God
• 47:27
  plainly asked of us and for us to look at it.
• 47:30
  And then to look at our own lives, look at our comfort, look
• 47:32
  at our goals, look at our man made convictions and say this
• 47:38
  isn't really convenient to support these other things that
• 47:41
  I prize more dangerous way to be a Christian.
• 47:48
  So what do we see here? Verse 29.
• 47:51
  And he set one in Bethel and the other he put in Dan.
• 47:57
  Then this thing became a sin for the people went as far as Dan to
• 48:01
  be before 1. So here's the Holy Spirit's
• 48:06
  commentary and something that's obvious to us, right?
• 48:07
  God doesn't approve of what Jeroboam did.
• 48:10
  And why this is mentioned here is because though there is this
• 48:13
  division that took place, Jeroboam had no right, no
• 48:16
  liberty by disconnecting from the line of David to also
• 48:20
  disconnect from the covenantal requirements that he was bound
• 48:23
  by as an Israelite connected to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.
• 48:29
  And so God plainly says this thing became a sin.
• 48:32
  This is not right. And notice this additionally,
• 48:36
  for the people went as far as Dan to be before one of these
• 48:41
  golden calves. And what's mentioned here is
• 48:47
  that these people, though initially invited into this
• 48:53
  through convenience, we're actually willing to make great
• 48:56
  sacrifices to worship one of these false gods.
• 48:59
  Do you see that language here? Some of these guys went as far
• 49:02
  as Dan. Evidently, Dan wasn't as close
• 49:05
  to some of these neighboring tribes, but they were still
• 49:08
  willing to go that way. What an accurate example, an
• 49:11
  illustration of how idolatry works.
• 49:17
  Willing to give more sacrifice, more love, more.
• 49:21
  Set your affections on something, more on anything than
• 49:26
  what God deserves. That's what it is.
• 49:27
  They're willing to go that far to worship a false God, but they
• 49:32
  weren't willing to go to Jerusalem to worship the true
• 49:34
  God. That's what we're what we're
• 49:35
  being told here are the people today who have their investments
• 49:43
  and who have their longings and other things more than the Lord
• 49:46
  Jesus. You know the answer to that.
• 49:47
  I don't have to stay on that point too long, do I?
• 49:50
  And it's as old as the story going as far as then.
• 49:55
  But when God and his goodness and his mercy and love set some
• 49:58
  relational requirements with us, I don't know.
• 50:01
  It's not very convenient. But that I'll go as far as I
• 50:05
  need to go. This is this is a real
• 50:09
  confronting Bible study. Is it not good?
• 50:14
  It's good for us. If you thought that this man's
• 50:20
  calamity ends here, It doesn't. Verse 31.
• 50:26
  He also made temples on high places and appointed priests
• 50:29
  from among all the people who are not of the Levites.
• 50:33
  So not only this is this man. Establish places of worship to
• 50:37
  replace the House of God. He now comes up with his own
• 50:41
  line of priests. God had consecrated one line,
• 50:48
  Aaron's line to be set apart for the ministerial work in the
• 50:51
  temple. Jeroboam thought to himself, You
• 50:54
  know what, this is going to be a problem.
• 50:56
  So I'm going to make up my own roster of ministers, and he
• 51:00
  creates this mixed inclusive group to be ministers under his
• 51:06
  self-made religion. Why do you think Jeroboam came
• 51:11
  up against the Levites in this way?
• 51:14
  I have a hunch. Personally, I'm just curious to
• 51:17
  know if you have insight on it. Let me ask you a question in
• 51:22
  connection to the golden calf in Exodus 32.
• 51:25
  Moses comes down from the mountain and he sees this, this
• 51:29
  gross idolatry, this orgy, this, this festival of the flesh.
• 51:34
  And he stands at the gate, and he makes one final call before
• 51:37
  God's judgment comes. Whoever is on the Lord's side,
• 51:40
  come to me. Who comes to him?
• 51:42
  Levi and only Levi. Levi, awakened from what was
• 51:48
  taking place, was sobered up by the confrontation of a man of
• 51:52
  God and pledged their allegiance to the Lord.
• 51:54
  And more than just verbally affirming it, Moses puts a sword
• 51:57
  in each of their hands. And he says, Now run back and
• 51:59
  forth and kill whoever you see on site for this idolatry of
• 52:02
  worshipping this golden calf. And they did it without
• 52:04
  blinking. I wonder if Jeroboam understood
• 52:09
  the history of the Levites. And now that he has these golden
• 52:11
  calves on site, he's concerned that these Levites will be up to
• 52:15
  no good to his new found program.
• 52:17
  So let's get rid of them, not even include them to begin with.
• 52:20
  And guess what? He was right.
• 52:24
  Look at the parallel accounts in our Bible study in Second
• 52:26
  Chronicles. And look here at verse 11,
• 52:29
  Chapter 11. Excuse me, verse 16.
• 52:32
  We can begin in verse 14 rather Second Chronicles Chapter 11,
• 52:39
  verse 14. This is in the same context of
• 52:45
  what's taking place in the Kingdom of Israel, and the
• 52:49
  Chronicler writes by the Spirit Second Chronicles, 1114.
• 52:53
  For the Levites left their common lands and their holdings
• 52:58
  and came to Judah and Jerusalem because Jeroboam and his sons
• 53:03
  cast them out from serving as priests of the Lord.
• 53:07
  And he appointed his own priest for the high places and for the
• 53:10
  goat idols. So we don't just have calves, we
• 53:12
  have goat idols and for the calves that he had made.
• 53:16
  Do you see this? Not everybody was pleased with
• 53:20
  Jeroboam's decision, though they appointed him as king.
• 53:22
  Once he start flirting with idolatry and being very obvious
• 53:27
  with it and flaunting it, there was a group that said we're not
• 53:29
  going to take place of place in this.
• 53:31
  The Levites. No part in this.
• 53:34
  And here's a man who persuaded a majority of the people through
• 53:38
  convenience. And yet you have a people here
• 53:40
  now who did not budget with this request because they were
• 53:44
  consecrated. Talk about a cost for being
• 53:47
  consecrated. Talk about not being convenient
• 53:50
  to them. Look what happens verse 14.
• 53:51
  The Levites left their common lands and their holdings.
• 53:57
  They moved. They left their familiarity.
• 54:02
  They left their their livelihood.
• 54:03
  They left their jobs. They left their ministry
• 54:05
  positions. They weren't going to surrender
• 54:09
  their allegiance to the Lord, no matter how much it costs.
• 54:12
  This is the opposite of worshipping through convenience.
• 54:17
  This is what consecration looks like, no matter what it costs
• 54:20
  me. I want to be where God is
• 54:22
  worshipped. I want to be where God is truly
• 54:24
  served. I want to be where God
• 54:26
  prescribed true worship. And if it means you and I
• 54:29
  packing up and leaving. Honey, let's get going, because
• 54:32
  we're going to honor God even if it costs us our convenience.
• 54:38
  Can I tell you something? This attitude, demonstrated by
• 54:41
  the Levites, is absolutely vital and necessary for God to use
• 54:49
  you. When convenience dominates a
• 54:55
  heart, it's very difficult for the Lord to find somebody to
• 54:59
  recruit. But when you have people like
• 55:02
  this who are willing to pay any price to honor God, the
• 55:06
  possibilities of being used for the glory of God are endless.
• 55:10
  Can I prove that to you? You remember this from our study
• 55:13
  in Deuteronomy. But let me remind you, in
• 55:15
  Deuteronomy 33, verse 8, here is a prophetic declaration that is
• 55:19
  made over every single tribe. And in that verse you have the
• 55:23
  tribe of Levi, and the tribe of Levi had the honor of being who
• 55:27
  they were as Levites priests and ministers and mediators.
• 55:30
  Because of what? Let me remind you from
• 55:32
  Deuteronomy 33, verse eight and nine, here's what the scripture
• 55:36
  says. And of Levi, he said, Give to
• 55:40
  Levi your Thummim and your Urim, to your godly one, whom you
• 55:45
  tested at Messiah, with whom you quarreled at the waters of
• 55:48
  Meribah. Who said of his father?
• 55:51
  This is what Levi said of his father?
• 55:53
  Who said of his father and mother?
• 55:54
  I regard them not. Huh.
• 55:59
  I regard them not. He disowned his brothers and
• 56:03
  ignored his children, for they observed your word and kept your
• 56:07
  covenant. What is that consecration?
• 56:12
  What is that? I uphold the word of God above
• 56:16
  the opinions and above even the threats of those who are closest
• 56:19
  to me. If obeying God in love, yes in
• 56:23
  humility, yes in gentle, not in legalism, not in self
• 56:25
  righteousness, in genuine good heartedness.
• 56:29
  If me obeying God in that regard will cost me, even my brothers,
• 56:34
  my sisters, even for my children not to love me, then so be it.
• 56:40
  What's their reward? For they observed your word and
• 56:42
  kept your covenant in verse 10. They shall teach Jacob your
• 56:47
  rules and Israel your law. They shall put incense before
• 56:52
  you and hold burnt offerings on your altar.
• 56:56
  Because you honor my word above everything and everyone, I'm
• 57:00
  going to use you. I'm going to use you in the most
• 57:04
  intimate way possible, in closest proximity to my
• 57:08
  presence. You will now forever be my
• 57:10
  priests and the attitude that the Levites displayed early on
• 57:15
  in their history is still alive and well in the days of
• 57:18
  Jeroboam. If we have to go away, if we
• 57:23
  have to move, if we have to go down to Judah, then so be it.
• 57:26
  We will honor God. What a refreshing display of
• 57:30
  obedience in a very dark chapter.
• 57:34
  But notice this in verse 16 of Second Chronicles.
• 57:38
  I hope you're still there. Something else happens.
• 57:43
  There's an important lesson here for leaders who are tempted to
• 57:45
  compromise, to achieve or maintain something that their
• 57:48
  flesh desires or equates with true success and fulfillment.
• 57:52
  I want you to see what happens after Jeroboam established these
• 57:55
  calves and these high places and his carnally appointed
• 57:59
  ministers. Not only did the Levites leave,
• 58:01
  what else happens In Second Chronicles 1116, You read it of
• 58:04
  another group of people who leave and those who had set
• 58:08
  their hearts to seek the Lord God of Israel came after them
• 58:13
  from all the tribes of Israel to Jerusalem to sacrifice to the
• 58:16
  Lord the God of their fathers. So it wasn't just the Levites.
• 58:19
  You had a remnant of people in the northern tribes of Israel
• 58:22
  who had their hearts set on seeking God, who said we're
• 58:24
  going with the Levites leaders, especially in spiritual context
• 58:33
  and spheres, who attempted to compromise concerning God's
• 58:38
  standard, God's protocol for worship, God's blueprint for the
• 58:42
  local church in every regard. I never, personally, I never
• 58:46
  understood the temptation to bend what God had made so clear.
• 58:55
  I never understood that temptation.
• 58:58
  Do you know why? Because no matter what you think
• 59:01
  you're going to win with compromise, you will always lose
• 59:05
  something of true value and substance.
• 59:07
  Always. So what do you have here?
• 59:10
  You have Jeroboam, who was able to win the northern tribes
• 59:14
  allegiance to him by introducing idolatry in the land.
• 59:20
  And who did he lose as a result? He lose the true priesthood.
• 59:24
  He lost the true priesthood and the people who really wanted
• 59:27
  God. You know, the same thing happens
• 59:29
  in ministries that compromise today.
• 59:31
  OK, who do you win? Who do you win?
• 59:34
  When you when you tiptoe around the truth.
• 59:35
  Who do you win when you placate and give into what the culture
• 59:38
  wants to hear? Who do you win?
• 59:39
  Who do you bring in people who want the truth?
• 59:42
  No. And what else happens?
• 59:45
  You push away the people who want the truth.
• 59:48
  You always lose. Never forget the example of
• 59:51
  Jeroboam. OK, what did he gain?
• 59:54
  But what did he lose? And it's no different today.
• 59:57
  I don't. I I'm honest.
• 59:58
  I don't get it. Because when you give people the
• 1:00:01
  truth. What's going to happen?
• 1:00:04
  Well, one, you honor God. One, you please God.
• 1:00:06
  But two, you win The people who want the truth, You you win the
• 1:00:10
  people who want all of what God has to say.
• 1:00:12
  Isn't that? Isn't that what you want?
• 1:00:15
  Isn't that what you desire to make up this ministry in the
• 1:00:18
  name of Jesus Christ? I I'm telling you, man, this is
• 1:00:20
  confession time. Maybe I don't get it.
• 1:00:23
  I don't understand. It just doesn't make sense to
• 1:00:26
  me. The loss will be much greater
• 1:00:30
  than whatever you win, and sometimes people don't see it
• 1:00:34
  because they're so intoxicated by different idea of success, as
• 1:00:39
  Jeroboam was. So we come back to our text as
• 1:00:42
  we close. If you thought the compromise
• 1:00:45
  ended there, it didn't. The dagger only goes deeper into
• 1:00:51
  our hearts in verse 32, And Jeroboam appointed a feast on
• 1:00:57
  the 15th day of the 8th month, like the feast that was in
• 1:01:02
  Judah. And he offered sacrifices on the
• 1:01:04
  altar. So he did in Bethel, sacrificing
• 1:01:08
  to the calves that he made, and he placed in Bethel the priests
• 1:01:11
  of the high places that he made. He went up to the altar that he
• 1:01:16
  had made in Bethel on the 15th day, in the eighth month, in the
• 1:01:21
  month that he had devised from his own heart.
• 1:01:23
  And he instituted A feast for the people of Israel and went up
• 1:01:26
  to the altar to make offerings. There's a phrase that repeats.
• 1:01:29
  What is it he made, he made, he made he made?
• 1:01:39
  This is self-made religion. This is what it is.
• 1:01:44
  But before we get into the ingredients of self-made
• 1:01:46
  religion and our closing thought, what's the other
• 1:01:49
  violation that Jeroboam performs?
• 1:01:51
  He sets up a place of worship where it's not supposed to be
• 1:01:55
  two places of worship. On top of that, he sets up high
• 1:01:58
  places for localized expressions of worship.
• 1:02:02
  He raises up his own priesthood and then he does something else.
• 1:02:05
  Did you notice it? He comes up with his own feast.
• 1:02:10
  You don't do that. God had raised up a calendar
• 1:02:15
  already where several feasts, 7 in particular feasts, would be
• 1:02:19
  honored. Those feasts point to the person
• 1:02:22
  and work of Jesus Christ. Here's a man now who wants to
• 1:02:26
  compete with the feast, because what?
• 1:02:28
  What kind of reason are you going to get people to come to
• 1:02:30
  these places of worship? And so he sets up a feast on the
• 1:02:33
  15th day. Of what month?
• 1:02:35
  Of the 8th month? What's the closest feast to
• 1:02:42
  that? According to the Hebrew
• 1:02:43
  scriptures? How many feasts were observed on
• 1:02:47
  the 7th month? Out of the seven, there was 3.
• 1:02:52
  The last one is what, on the 15th day of the 7th month?
• 1:02:57
  In the Hebrew calendar, it's the Feast of Tabernacles, the Feast
• 1:03:02
  of Booths. It was a celebratory feast.
• 1:03:05
  It was the way to sign off on the year.
• 1:03:09
  And that was one of the feasts where the people of Israel would
• 1:03:12
  have to make way toward Jerusalem to celebrate an honor.
• 1:03:15
  And so, in order to compete against that, he sets up a feast
• 1:03:18
  on the 15th day, not on the 7th month, but on the 8th month.
• 1:03:24
  He made, He had made, He had made.
• 1:03:27
  And look at this dangerous phrase here in the month that he
• 1:03:31
  had devised from his own heart. This didn't come from God.
• 1:03:36
  This didn't come from his word doesn't come from a prophetic
• 1:03:38
  revelation. It came from the cesspool of a
• 1:03:43
  heart that is not surrendered to the Lord.
• 1:03:47
  Let me tell you based on this the ingredients of self-made
• 1:03:50
  religion #1. Oftentimes it puts a great
• 1:04:00
  emphasis on convenience. How does this benefit me the
• 1:04:06
  most? Even at the cost of clear
• 1:04:09
  obedience? Convenience is the goal for
• 1:04:13
  self-made religion, but not just that, a disregard for God's
• 1:04:18
  credentials, for ministers and for his standards of worship.
• 1:04:26
  You know worship is about God, right?
• 1:04:29
  What does God want to hear? What does God want us to do?
• 1:04:35
  What does God require? That's worship.
• 1:04:38
  The will surrender to the wishes of God. self-made religion has
• 1:04:43
  no regard of God being the priority aim of our pleasure.
• 1:04:51
  Lastly, though there may be other things we can include,
• 1:04:54
  self-made religion includes the ingredient of a liberty to bend
• 1:04:57
  what God has made so clear in his word.
• 1:05:01
  I want to be worshipped on the 15th day of the 7th month.
• 1:05:06
  We're going to worship on the 15th day of the 8th month.
• 1:05:13
  It's so clear what God has revealed many cases and all
• 1:05:17
  we're called to do is to receive it, understand it and give
• 1:05:21
  ourselves to it. self-made religion does not do that and
• 1:05:25
  we're going to see that God does not tolerate self-made religion
• 1:05:31
  for too long. Let's pray, Lord, we do thank
• 1:05:36
  you from the bottom of our hearts with a difficult chapter
• 1:05:41
  to dissect. Yet we remember how we opened
• 1:05:44
  our time together, that when the scoffer is punished, the simple
• 1:05:49
  become wise. So we believe that you have
• 1:05:52
  instilled in US a greater nourishment in the place of
• 1:05:59
  discretion, in the place of consecration, in the place of
• 1:06:03
  true worship. Thank you, Lord, that week after
• 1:06:09
  week we've come here to know what you want.
• 1:06:12
  And Father, we confess that is our desire more than anything
• 1:06:16
  else. Lord, please fill us with your
• 1:06:28
  spirit. We want to love you more.
• 1:06:32
  We want to love one another more.
• 1:06:34
  We can't do it in our own strength.
• 1:06:37
  And what as we sang tonight, as people see a power working
• 1:06:43
  through us to obey your commandments, may they know that
• 1:06:44
  that power does not come from us.
• 1:06:48
  So inspire this love, this love that Paul could say with
• 1:06:52
  confidence was real in him the affection of Christ Jesus for
• 1:06:56
  one another, inspiring us a ferocious zeal for true worship.
• 1:07:04
  That, Lord, when convenience gnaws at us, and when the heart
• 1:07:08
  devises its own plans contrary to your will, that we would be
• 1:07:13
  quick to take every thought captive with the authority of
• 1:07:17
  Christ, but to declare even in that spiritual warfare in the
• 1:07:21
  heart and the mind trust that you are glorified in it, and
• 1:07:25
  that you are pleased by it. Lord, tonight we afresh declare
• 1:07:35
  that you are everything to us. And Lord, our desire to serve
• 1:07:40
  you and to live for you does not come from a fear of being
• 1:07:43
  rejected by you or fear of being punished by you.
• 1:07:49
  But, Lord, our obedience is built on grace.
• 1:07:52
  You have first loved us. You, the Creator of all things,
• 1:07:57
  extended your heart toward us and invite us to live in it.
• 1:08:02
  Lord, we pray that whatever we need to do, even if we are faced
• 1:08:07
  with the pressures to compromise, what would stimulate
• 1:08:11
  us to stand our ground, and like these Levites, even to make the
• 1:08:14
  moves we need to make, but would encourage us, Is I love my
• 1:08:19
  master more than these? And so, Lord, in this place, in
• 1:08:26
  our homes, in our marriages, in the, in the babies that are
• 1:08:30
  coming through the families of this house, may we reflect the
• 1:08:35
  attitude of those Levites who allow the word of God to be
• 1:08:41
  supreme and who live by that standard for generations.
• 1:08:49
  We pray that that would be true of us.
• 1:08:51
  We pray that would be true of this ministry.
• 1:08:54
  We pray that we would never be fooled by the lies of
• 1:08:56
  compromise. But we remember that we always
• 1:09:00
  win when we stand with you. And for you, Lord, we worship
• 1:09:05
  you tonight, in great honor of your name, in Jesus name we
• 1:09:08
  pray. Amen.
• 1:09:10
  Amen. Let's stand together.