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Remember from last week. I Mentioned in first Kings chapter 10 how we kind of hit the pinnacle of Solomon's reign Where I mean he was an awesome King is he had a great heart to serve God He started off, you know asking for God for wisdom was real humble. He'd he served the Lord in a great manner until we got about halfway through chapter 10 and then we kind of see where it looks like The gold kind of got to him the power kind of got to him and he kind of got lifted up and His heart started to stray from the Lord and I covered all that last week I'm not going to repreach that but just to you know provide the context of where we're starting off here in chapter 11 it's the the continuing of the decline of Solomon as as one of the Kings said that you know That is basically the third king of Israel Saul David Solomon his son now we're gonna start off here look at verse number one Bible reads, 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 You shall not go into 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 now I read last week also because we went into this chapter a little bit and explaining how God did not want the children of Israel his people that was supposed to be you know called by his name and Aspousing the words of God and his laws to be going after and to marrying You know these women of other nations That worshiped other gods that had false gods for their gods and he says look I don't want you intermarrying with them You need to stay with your own people and and people who serve the Lord now. It's not because God's a racist It's not because he cared about the physical seed of Abraham Intermingling with another physical seed Because we see throughout scripture that people of other lands can come and make themselves Jews They could come and join themselves to the nation of Israel and worship the Lord and they would be treated Just like any other Native born person in the land that was also part of God's law So it's not that God cares about their race, right? Because there's a lot of people that I mean even these days it's not quite as popular as it once was but there's been plenty of churches that will said that Believe that God doesn't want you to marry outside of your race And I don't believe that to be true for a second. I think what God cares about is the belief It's your it's your religion It's which are you putting your faith in the Lord or not? And these are the requirements that we find all throughout scripture and at the same thing As I just mentioned you go back and read the law of Moses and you'll see that people of other nations can come and join themselves to be a Israel and they are to be treated just like everybody else and they are supposed to observe all the same things that the children that the the the natural born children of Israel would so Going to these other nations and the annual Maranese women of the Moabites and the Ammonites the reason why it's not supposed to do that is because they're worshipping other gods and And that's exactly what happens here is that Solomon decides that he knows the law and think about this Solomon knew the law Solomon had wisdom God gave Solomon more wisdom than anybody else ever had He knew He knew what he was doing But I think the point to look at here and what I want to point out is looking for that the very end Of verse number two the last phrase Solomon clave unto these in love Solomon did it anyways regardless of what God said he did it for love This is the reason why so many people get involved in so many various sins because they call it love Think about kids right when they're when they're when they're dating and everything else. They feel like oh, man I love this person so much and that's why they end up fornicating and Instead of calling it fornication because you know, that's not a that's not a very pleasant word, right? That's pretty a negative connotation associated with the act. They want to call it. Well, we're making love right? We love each other We're gonna we're gonna appreciate you know, we're gonna enjoy this physical relationship with each other because we love each other The Bible says that's fornication. That's wicked When it's outside that is completely against what God has for us But they'll do things we were willing to get into sin and to ignore the commandments of the Lord and not listen to what God Has to say because oh it's for love and they elevate love above God Or they're let me put it this way their concept of love above God. We know God is love But they have a perverted and twisted understanding of love even Solomon Solomon go, but I love these women. I love them We're not supposed to be loving them not in that way According to God you love them and preach them the truth. You give them the gospel Right love them that way But you're not supposed to be marrying them and letting them turn your heart away from the Lord Because God told you so because God knows better than you Solomon God knows better than you or whoever you are that wants to think that well I could handle this. I'm Super Christian. I I have more wisdom than anybody else. I could allow myself to get close to these women They're not gonna turn my heart from the God. I know better. I'm wise It's the attitude that Solomon had I'm sure I'm sure he didn't get involved with these women thinking that I'm just gonna completely build all these false altars of these altars on these false gods and Go out and end up worshipping and you know these other idols and things, you know that I'm sure that wasn't going on in his mind when he first started marrying these women and Adding them as concubines and you know in making these wives of all these very I think he just looked on him and said oh Wow, I could see you know, he liked diversity He looked on his women and thought they're all had their own beauty and whatever and he loved them But it was wickedness there's a sin found in Solomon and it end up turning his heart away People put a big emphasis emphasis on doing things for love I mean you hear about it in the music you see it in the movies Love is exalted above everything else, but it's always this perverted version of love I mean love is the reason why people commit adultery too, right? Oh, I don't love my spouse anymore I don't love they don't love me. I found my soul mate. Oh, we love each other and That makes it okay for me to break my marriage vows before God and man and to split up my family and the cause of the vision and the strife in the home because I love This person and everything's just gonna be okay when we get together and we could just enjoy our love for each other That's the narrative that's pushed in music. That's the narrative that's pushed in Hollywood, and it's a big fat lie That's a narrative that Solomon bought into I'm gonna cleave to these women in love and Disregard the word of the Lord in many ways I mean the Bible said we saw that last week that the Kings not supposed to multiply wives unto himself in one. I Don't know, but I think 700 wives and 300 concubines is multiplication. I think that's that's Beyond multiplying that's like logarithmic. I mean we're talking exponential here with a thousand different women That's more than just just two four six eight, right? I said, that's that's that's a lot That is a lot but but his reasoning was love We need to be aware of that. We need to be aware of our emotions or these feelings that we think Oh, this is above all other things and elevate the status of love and and forget that there are things called Fornication and adultery that are not love It is not loving at all Let's keep reading here verse number three Here we see and he had 700 wives Princesses and 300 concubines and his wives turned away his heart Think about this he clave unto these in love How much love do you think Solomon had for any one of those individuals when you have 700 wives? It's not How shallow is that love When you have 700 wives, how much can you love any one of them individually? I mean when you love someone you spend time with them when you love someone you care for them You're thinking about them. You're doing things for them, right? I mean, this is what naturally comes when you love people When you have a love for the lost you're gonna be going out and preaching gospel and knocking on the doors and trying to get You know when you have a love for your spouse, you're gonna be spending time with them. You're gonna have your intimacy You're gonna be talking to one another you'll be spending time together when you love your children You'll be doing the same thing. I mean you're gonna be spending time with them doing things for them teaching them, right? When you have 700 wives how much love can there possibly be It's a false love. It's it's just it's an excuse to Get to satisfy. I believe to gratify his flesh and call that love Because what he really want what he really had was probably lust for these women And that's what he wanted to fulfill when by having so many of them to be able to satisfy himself and Not care about them Because how could you care about them? They're not getting attention I mean, oh you could say oh, but they got so much money and they were taken care of who cares That money is not going to make any of those women happy I Mean any any any people who are happily married women who get are happily married today think about it. I mean Maybe you don't want to answer this question, but if you had the choice of you know being married to a man that you're never gonna see and Just okay. Yeah, well I could I could live in a mansion But like I'm married to a husband and you can't go out and get another husband. I mean you're married to the one man and He's never around ever or he's spending time with other wives Is it really worth it to have a lot of money and just to sit around and eat? I Was looking like wait a minute. Are you you tell me? I don't know is it worth it It's not we know it would be foolish to say Yeah, having all this money is worth it the relationships that we build having a good marriage having You know having that that bond and that love for one another is so much more precious Than being able to eat good meals or have servants or whatever it truly is and anyone who has a relationship knows that that's the truth, but Solomon's claim that he clave unto these in love even He didn't he didn't have a very good love at all Let's let's keep reading here verse number four 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 in 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 Now do we see where his love got him? You think it was really worth it to have that that that pleasure that that fleshly pleasure for for a season Now to turn his heart He started in his own disobedience to God's Word By marrying all these various wives and going after women that he shouldn't have been looking at in the first place for a wife because they did not serve God they did not worship God did not believe in the Lord and Then he ends up Going after a goddess that was the first one here It says for Solomon went after Ashtoreth in verse number five the goddess of the Zidonians He went from marrying all these various women's now to going after some goddess Then he ends up building high places and altars unto many false gods to satisfy all of his ungodly unsaved wives You think about it once once you open up the doors for the first one Now you got 700 wives, but you know he wasn't thinking about all that when he married him Oh, he's thinking all man is gonna be great now. You got him saying oh well You built an altar for so-and-so what about my God right see when you when you stay consistent And you say no the Lord is the true God. We're not building any altars now. I'm not gonna hear it I'm not gonna have it from anyone as soon as that first one turns his heart away and say oh, okay Well, I love you so much. Okay here. I'll build this for you. Go ahead and worship your false God Now you're gonna have seven seven hundred well, what about my God what about my God what you can't do that for her not for me and before you know it it's every abominable You know false god idol in That he's married into now is receiving An altar is receiving even you know getting credibility The nation of Israel supposed to be a nation that serves the Lord. They're supposed to be the lighthouse dedicated unto God and By the time you reach the third King look at what's happening So quickly they fall so quickly we fall as human beings and and This type of power and everything else happened. We need to learn from his mistake one of the things for sure that we could learn what lessons is be very careful who you marry and one of the lessons we learn from this is that you were only supposed to be marrying people who are Saved people turn if you want to first Corinthians chapter number seven I'm gonna read for you from Nehemiah chapter 13 Nehemiah chapter 13. It talks about Solomon and his wives Nehemiah 13 23 you're turning to first Corinthians 7 Nehemiah 13 23 says in those days also saw I Jews that had married wives of Ashtad of Ammon and of Moab and Their children spake half in the speech of Ashtad and could not speak in the Jews language But according to the language of each people he's saying this is in the problem, you know When they were rebuilding the temple in the days of Nehemiah He's saying they married these strange women that they weren't supposed to be marrying right and he said they can't even speak our own language They can't even speak the Jews language because you're marrying these other people. They have these false gods You can't you're not even raising them right now because typically it's the the man that's gonna be working and women are gonna be raising the Children and you're marrying is these women that that don't speak the Jews language and raise your children not to speak your own language verse number 25 and I contended with them and cursed them and smote that certain of them and Plucked off their hair and made them swear by God saying you shall not give your daughters unto their sons Nor take their daughters unto your sons or for yourselves Did not Solomon king of Israel sin by these things Yet among many nations was there no king like him who was beloved of his God and God made him king over all Israel nevertheless even him Did outlandish women cause to sin and this is a point I want to drive home. Is that even Solomon? Even Solomon who had more wisdom than anyone else even Solomon who had his great relationship with God God loved him. God blessed him. He's serving the Lord. He built the temple. He's offering all these sacrifices unto God He's you know, the kingdom is is in a great state. Everybody's happy. Everybody's serving the Lord even Solomon Had his heart turned by these Outlandish women meaning they're outside of that land. They were from another foreigners and they didn't believe in the Lord If anybody had strength Solomon had strength if anyone had wisdom Solomon had wisdom Let him that thing at the stand and take heed lest he fall because If you want to compare yourself to Solomon wisdom and in your godly strength and in your relationship with God You know, especially at the time he had it, you know We're gonna become up lacking Keep that in mind when you're looking at especially those of you Obviously if you're married you're married who you're married to you're gonna stay married, you know, God doesn't want you getting divorced but For there's a lot of there's a lot of young women in this in in church tonight. We've got girls We got a lot of girls. You'll be looking for someone to get married to This is extremely important for your life when you're looking at someone to get married to Find someone who has the same belief as you find someone who's who's going to be a godly man to serve the Lord with and It's not gonna gonna turn your heart away from the Lord and then in verse 27 I'm gonna finish up Nehemiah 13 shall we then hearken unto you to do all this great evil to transgress our God and marrying strange wives First Corinthians chapter 7 look at verse number 39. We're gonna see this same concept in the New Testament I'm not going to all the various places. I've preached on this subject before on only marrying people in the Lord, but We're gonna see here what the Bible says first Corinthians 7 verse 39 the wife is bound by the law as Long as her husband liveth Bound by the law. I mean you when you get married You are married to that person until death do us part. That's what the Bible says, but if her husband be dead She is at liberty to be married to whom she will Whom she will means that anyone that she wants to she is at liberty She's free from that from the marriage vow when her husband dies Now hey, you can get married again To whoever you want, but then the last phrase only in the Lord That's the requirement. This is only in the Lord Get married to whoever you want Just make sure That they're saved make sure that they are in Christ also Only in the Lord that is something that is what's taught and and we see here You know a lot of people like to say oh and those times where people had arranged marriages and this and that Yeah, that was going on But that's not even what the Bible taught ever either the Bible teaches that you have Liberty and even here It's talking about a woman, right? It's not just the men that had the freedom to choose who they want to get married to The women the godly women of the Bible what the Bible teaches that they have Liberty to decide who they want to get married to As well, even when the wife was found for Isaac right They asked her they said do you want to go with this man if you know and it was up to her. Yes I want to go. Yes. I'll go and do this. That was her choice to go and do that and and All throughout the Bible you're gonna find that You know were there arranged marriages all kinds of other things going on during time sure there was and there still are even today But it doesn't mean it's right and it's not what the Bible teaches The Bible teaches that you have Liberty to be married who you want But God's restriction is marry somebody of the same faith marry someone who believes like you do Because a marriage is so is supposed to be so personal and you're so connected and interwoven with each other and you know When a husband and wife come together, they too are one flesh I mean you are supposed to be like one body one person working together to In your lives for everything that you do and when you're supposed to be that and so closely knit together Something as personally held as as your religion is your faith in God You don't want to have that differing from the person you're you're yoking up with the Bible says, you know not to be unequally yoked together with unbelievers and that is there is there isn't much more of a Permanent yoke than marriage, right? I mean you're yoking up together and And that's who you're dedicating yourself to be with until one of you dies so Keep that in mind even King Solomon Had his heart turned away By marrying these women that that didn't believe on the Lord that had their false gods and he wasn't you know, he didn't convert them They converted him Verse number nine And if not, I'm not necessarily they converted him to no longer believe in God But they got him to do all kinds of sin that he wouldn't have normally done. Okay. I'm not saying he believed in Molech. I think he still believed in Lord but but he built the altars to him and just grossly Backslid and did all these horrible things and built all these altars unto unto these false gods that he wouldn't have done and his heart Was turned from from serving the Lord in in pureness Let's get back to the chapter here verse number nine And the Lord was angry with Solomon because his heart was turned from the Lord God of Israel which had appeared unto him twice God actually appeared to Solomon and like spake to Solomon two times in his life Not very many people can say that you've had God directly like like speaking to you God as Solomon asked me what you know what you want, basically And in Answered Solomon's prayer. That's a pretty amazing thing and God's looking at this going. I Spake with you twice and now you're you're going after these false gods and you're and you're turning on me like this That made God pretty angry. So here's what he did. Let's keep reading Verse 10 and he 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 for as much as this is done of thee and Thou has 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 How be it 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 so God's telling them because you did this I'm gonna tear this kingdom apart from you and And you're gonna be left with just one and the only reason why you're gonna be left with anything is because of David Not because of you Solomon because of David because David's heart was right with the Lord all of his life and I preach an entire sermon on this but I'm just going to mention briefly what you know The influence that one person can have is immense one person You think my life is meaningless. What can I do? What you can do is a lot and the impact that you could have on other people is a lot and the impact you gave on future generations is a lot and It's based on your faith with God and your walk with God David's influence continued beyond his death The way that he chose to live his life and to not give up in the end and not to just give in the backsliding and whatever else carried forward To his next generation and to subsequent generations even after that because of his dedication and his faith Unfortunately Solomon's influence also continued beyond his death But not for the better part for the worse and and I preached on Generational blessings and cursings where I went into a lot more examples and details of this How people can have much more of an influence on generations to come but I mean David you say well Well didn't David commit adultery and murder? Yes, he did. He did he sinned big time But you know what? He also did he repented and his heart Was still right with God and when he was confronted with his sin He didn't do what King Saul did. He didn't try to make excuses for it. He didn't try to say oh, you don't understand Oh, you know, I really didn't sin. I actually did what God wanted me to do. He said you're right I sinned God, you know, like like have mercy on me God have mercy on these people. It's not their fault You know David did do sins. He numbered the children of Israel too. Okay, he failed at some times But his heart was right because he repented in Cyclops and ashes because he got right with God and he was always Turning back and saying God. I'm sorry. I screwed up You know help me through his heart was right and genuine with God his whole life That is why and that is what God wants from us Does he want us to be perfect? You bet he does. He wants us to obey his commandments. Of course he does They're not suggestions or commandments But he also knows that we have a sinful flesh He knows the sinful nature as an excuse it But what he ultimately wants at the end of the day is for our hearts to be right with him so that way when when when the the sin happens we can just Get on our knees repent and and be right with God and God holds that as a high value and something that he will bless you for and Will bless your children for and bless their children for and in David's case I mean he let David have a son on the throne You know all the way through their cap until their captivity right and ultimately leading in the the birth of Jesus Christ the king of kings and Lord of Lords, but The way we live our life we need to make sure that we're we're not fainting we're staying until the end Let's keep reading here verse number 14 because now we're gonna see some other things start to happen and all these various events happen God raises up basically these these people to Annoy Solomon and to and to start troubling him and in causing problems within the kingdom now these are all a result of things that that They stemmed from an earlier time during the reign of David But I believe they're a direct consequence of Solomon's sin I don't think that any of these things would have happened the way they did had Solomon not sin had Solomon kept his heart Right with the Lord, but let's read these and we're gonna look at a few of these examples that are given here verse 14 And the Lord stirred up an adversary unto Solomon. Hey dad the Edomite He was of the king's seat in Edom For it came to pass when David was in Edom and Joab the captain of the host was gone up to bury the slain After he had smitten every male in Edom For six months did Joab remain there with all Israel until he had cut off every male in Edom So when these wars were going on in the time of David's reign They thought they had they'd cut off all the men in the land of Edom in this in this you know in one of these battles here But it says in verse 17 that hey dad fled He and certain Edomites of his father's servants with him to go into Egypt. Hey dad being yet a little child So this hey dad He was one of the you know, the king of that nation He was one of his sons. He was one of the descendants. So he was in line to be king and He was of the king's seed so when they came in and destroyed the whole nation, you know They destroyed all the people some people escaped they got out of there right there. They're going through for six months They're making sure that they're wiping everybody out in the land. Well, they fled into Egypt. They got away They hightailed it out of there verse 18 says and they rose out of Midian and came to Peran and they took men with them Out of Peran and they came to Egypt unto Pharaoh king of Egypt Which gave him in a house and appointed him vittles and gave him land. So here's the you know, the king of Edom Or the king of Edom's child right his seed goes into Egypt King of Egypt goes. Okay, I'll recognize you as royalty and I'm gonna I'm gonna help you out here Egypt and Edom didn't have problems with each other. So Pharaoh welcomes them in and he gives them land He get you know, he takes care of them verse 19 says and hey dad found great favor in the sight of Pharaoh so that he gave him to wife the sister of his own wife the sister of tapenese the queen and the sister of tapenese bare him ganubath his son whom tapenese weaned in Pharaoh's house and Ganubath was in Pharaoh's household among the sons of Pharaoh. So he's basically growing up in Pharaoh's household He gets his wife things are going great. I mean, he's well taken care of and It says in verse 21 and when hey dad heard in Egypt that David slept with his father's and that Joab the captain of the host Was dead hey dad said to Pharaoh let me depart that I may go to mine own country see this whole time He was he was fearful as long as David and Joab were around I mean, those are the guys that destroyed all of his people and they find out that the one of the king's seed is still alive They're gonna go after him too, but they find out okay, they're dead It's like now I want to go back to my own people. I want to go back to That to my own country verse 22 then Pharaoh said unto him, but what is thou lack with me? That behold thou seekest to go to thine own country and he answered nothing. How be it? Let me go in any wise now This is just one thing that happened and I'm speculating here, but I think that if it had Solomon not done You know committed his sins and gone after these strange gods and stuff I don't think that hey dad would have gone and wanted to have this desire to go back to his own people and become a Trouble unto King Solomon because God had granted him peace But now it's it's like we see as a direct result of Solomon being disobedient and Solomon's heart being turned away now God's starting to cause problems for him now, even though he's not raining the kingdom from him just yet He's starting to cause the problem He's starting to bring his judgment upon him through these various other people hey dad being one of them And I think he's he's working. Hey, that's hard, you know, God's working. Hey dad saying hey Why don't you go back to your own country and kind of working for him to get back and to cause these problems for? Solomon verse number 23 And we see that God's doing it because verse 23 says and God stirred him up another adversary God is stirring these people up God is is is working in these people's lives to get them To start causing problems for Solomon as a result of his sin verse 23 and God stirred him up another adversary reason the son of Eliada which fled from his lord hey daddy's their king of Zoba and He gathered men unto him and became captain over a band when David slew them of Zoba and they went to Damascus and dwelt Therein and rained in Damascus and he was an adversary to Israel all the days of Solomon Beside the mischief that hey dad did and he abhorred Israel and rained over Syria. So Israel wasn't at war with these people But they kept on causing all kinds of problems and creating mischief and and just really causing a lot of problems in the kingdom for Solomon in his days because God is it's kind of Stirring these people up to start start bringing these problems to Solomon and then verse 26 now we're going to be introduced to Jeroboam the son of Nebat Jeroboam son of Nebat very critical Figure in the Bible, especially during the time of the book of the Kings. He's referred to constantly He ended up doing some wicked things. We're gonna get into that In the coming weeks, but we're gonna see here his start and where he began look at verse number 26 and Jeroboam the son of Nebat an Ephrathite of Zerita Solomon's servant whose mother's name was Zeruah a widow woman Even he Lifted up his hand against the king and this was the cause that he lift up his hand against the king Solomon built Millo and repaired the breaches of the city of David his father and the man Jeroboam was a mighty man of valor and Solomon seeing the young man that he was industrious. He made him ruler over all the charge of the house of Joseph So Jeroboam, he's he's a he's a valiant man. He's a man of war. He's a mighty man. He's he's an industrious man He's a hard worker Solomon notices his about him. He says, you know what? I'm gonna hire this guy I'm gonna take him to be he's gonna work for me. I mean I could see here's someone who's doing a lot of work here's someone who's going places I want I'm working for me and He put him in the charge of the house of Joseph verse 29 and it came to pass at that time when Jeroboam went out of Jerusalem that the prophet Ahijah the Shiloh night found him in the way and he had clad himself with a new garment and they too were alone in the field and a hijack caught the new garment that was On him and rent it in 12p that is kind of funny. So Jeroboam's out there you got this brand new garment and he runs across a hija and and a hija takes hold the garment and he Chops it up into 12p. Like whoa, what are you doing, man? I just got this thing ready Why are you cutting up my clothes into 12 pieces? and it says In verse 31 and he said to Jeroboam take thee ten pieces for thus saith the Lord the God of Israel behold I will rend the kingdom out of the hand of Solomon and will give ten tribes to thee But he shall have one tribe for my servant David See again, we're seeing David being brought up and the influence that David had for his heart being right But he shall have one tribe for my servant David sake and for Jerusalem's sake the city Which I have chosen out of all the tribes of Israel because that they have forsaken me and have worshipped Ashtoreth the goddess of the Zidonians, Chemosh the god of the Moabites and Milcom the god of the children of Ammon and have not walked in my ways to do that Which is right in mine eyes and to keep my statutes and my judgments as did David his father How be it I will not take the whole kingdom out of his hand But I will make him Prince all the days of his life for David my servant's sake whom I chose Because he kept my commandments in my statutes But I will take the kingdom out of his son's hand and will give it unto thee even ten tribes So this prophet comes to Jeroboam and he's saying look here's what's gonna happen Solomon sin now that he's got people going after these strange gods. So for that reason God's gonna gonna separate this he's gonna he's gonna take it away from Solomon's son He's gonna take it away from Solomon and you're gonna get Ten parts you're gonna be the king over ten tribes And he's gonna leave one unto Unto David's household just as a memorial for David, right? And he said they're gonna be over Jerusalem and obviously there's one left and you got the Levi Terrace so they're one of the tribes but so he says they're gonna get one you're gonna be ruler over ten and he explains fully it's because they got off his other gods and He's telling them that They didn't keep my commandments and my statutes. So I'm gonna give you ten verse number 36 says And he explains to he says I'm not gonna give it to you in Solomon's days but in his son's days He's given the timeline saying be ready for this You're gonna get kit you're gonna be king over over ten of the tribes in the days of Solomon's son verse 30 verse 36 and unto his son Will I give one tribe that David my servant may have a light all way before me in Jerusalem the city Which I've chosen put my name there and I will take thee and thou shalt reign according to all that thy soul desireth and shalt be king over Israel and it shall be If thou wilt hearken unto all that I command thee and wilt walk in my ways and do That is right in my sight to keep my statutes and my commandments as David my servant did that I will be with thee and Build thee a sure house as I built for David and will give Israel unto thee This is the same thing that he told Solomon's the same thing. He told David right his standard hasn't changed you say look I'm gonna bless you. You're gonna have this kingdom I'm gonna ensure it you're gonna you're gonna do great if you just follow my commandment Just keep your heart right and keep doing right by me and I won't have to come in and judge you I won't have to come in and take it away from you But we're gonna see later that Jeroboam just completely does the opposite and it takes a lot less time than it did for Solomon to Screw up verse 39 and I will for this afflict the seed of David but not forever He says I'm gonna cause them problems I'm gonna flick them but not forever verse 40 Solomon sought therefore to kill Jeroboam and Jeroboam arose and fled into Egypt unto Shishat king of Egypt and was in Egypt until the death of Solomon So because of this whole story Solomon finds out basically what happened Solomon finds out that this guy's you know the kingdom is gonna be taken away from Solomon and it's gonna be given to this guy and He's out to kill him now this just shows you where Solomon's heart was Solomon didn't hear that and go. Oh man, I screwed up God's angry with me because I've totally screwed up here and now my son is gonna have to pay the consequence of what I did and Maybe I should get things right with God Maybe I should humble myself and just go to God and beg and plead with him God, please don't take the kingdom away I'm sorry. Is that what he didn't know instead? He tried to kill Jeroboam. What did Jeroboam do to him? Nothing Jeroboam was an industrious man Jeroboam as far as Solomon's concern was doing everything right? It's not Jeroboam's fault that God chose him Right, but it's the same way see Solomon ended up with the same attitude as Saul When Saul found out that the kingdoms rent from you and I'm giving it to someone better than you Right, and he knew that David had the Spirit of God upon him. What did Saul try to do? He was continually trying to kill David This is what happens when when people's hearts Get fall out and are not right with the Lord and and you're just completely walking in the flesh And that's all I could think of is just a well. I'm just gonna kill this guy. That's not an answer That's not gonna work for him and you know At that point he's fighting against God God's appointed this man and you're gonna go out and try to kill him. Good luck trying to fight against God Wrong choice Solomon, let's keep reading I'm gonna finish up the chapter and there's a couple things I want to go over real quick So Jeroboam goes and he flees he goes in Egypt he's saying okay well forget this He's trying to kill me and he knows that his reign isn't coming until Solomon's son reigns anyways, right? So he he takes off he goes to Egypt He's safe there until Solomon dies and he comes back verse 41 and the rest of the acts of Solomon and all that he did and his wisdom are they're not written in the book of the Acts of Solomon and the time that Solomon reign in Jerusalem over all Israel was 40 years and Solomon slept with his fathers and was buried in the city of David his father and Jeroboam his son reigned in his said so now we were concluding at the end of this chapter the life of Solomon We have said all his great works all the great things he did Unfortunately ended up his life in a very very bad way Not the way that that we should any of us should be ending our lives turn if you would to Galatians 6 and 2nd Timothy Chapter 4 I'm gonna close with with a couple of scripture from the New Testament here See had Solomon kept serving the Lord I believe that he would not have the trouble from all those other people, you know God's raising up these these stirring up these adversaries Because I believe the fear of God would still be in them to not go and cause trouble because Solomon's worshiping the Lord and and would have that you know, and you know, it's when the children of Israel doing right and Even it's not not the whole nation even with just individuals like when Abraham was doing right? He's following the Lord knew what the Lord said God protects him When even when Jacob, you know, he put the fear of Those people or he put the fear of God basically in you know, and the other people round about When they were worried Abraham's worried that oh man the other people the nations are gonna come they're gonna kill me They're gonna do something God made sure that nobody harmed him God made sure the same thing with Jacob, right when when he was getting into trouble and his children went and killed people He put the fear in The nation's roundabout so that they wouldn't they wouldn't do anything to him and That's the faith that's required to serve God that we know that hey look if we're gonna do what's right We don't have to worry about what the world is gonna do We have to worry about what the heathen are gonna do. We don't have to worry about all these various people We don't have to worry as Jeroboam and Sonibah does we're gonna see later that that the people are gonna turn against you Look when God ordained you to be king You don't got to worry about the people leaving you because God's put you in that position You don't have to turn to these false idols and build these calves You don't have to worry, you know, if Solomon wouldn't have would have just listened to God. He wouldn't have to worry about about Jeroboam the son of Nebat taking over the kingdom from him If he was doing that, which is right now But these troubles happen to Solomon as a result of him trashing his testimony and becoming a big hypocrite And that is is is probably one of the worst things that he did We need to make sure that we finish strong and not fail at the end of our life Especially someone like Solomon. I mean everybody's looking to him his his life was being known and remember we saw this earlier last week I believe it was when the Queen of Sheba heard the fame of Solomon Concerning the name of the Lord Remember that? We went over that that was his fame was concerning the name of the Lord And I said I preach on that and said hey That should be us that should be what we're striving to do not to get all a whole bunch of fame for ourselves But get a fame concerning the name of the Lord that at least we could be associated with Hey bring a lot of glory and honor into God's name and doing his great work for the Lord And when Solomon built the temple and he had all these people and he had all these Sacrifices everything going on and the news spread around the world the Queen of Sheba heard about it They've heard his fame concerning the Lord When you're doing things like that. It's all the more important to keep yourself in check and That you keep your testimony right and that you don't get involved in these sins and you Stay the course unto the end because now that man Solomon who had done all these great things in the minds of all the heathen round about when they see oh Wasn't that great after all what he did wasn't that important It wasn't that big of a deal because he ends up going and serving these other gods anyways He didn't really believe in what he did Because look at what ended up happening to him. He's just a big stinking hypocrite and That brings the nail the glory and honor away from God Through that man sin and disobedience and you end up causing way more damage When you get involved in these things now it also underscores the importance why we don't We don't Put faith in man But we have faith in God Now it's a big disappointment and it's really discouraging and it's sad when men of God end up caving in and Falling and succumbing to pressure, but we should never be looking to any one individual No matter how on fire they are right now no matter how much they're bringing glory on our God No matter how much if that you don't want to be in the position where if a man falls It's going to destroy your faith in God Because men are sinners and men fall and The truth of the matter is what Solomon did doesn't change who God is It doesn't change the truth of God doesn't change how great God is it doesn't change any of that But when people end up because it does happen people end up looking to a man and They're gonna see well if you're a reflection of who God is Then why do I want anything to do with your God? when you end up doing all these things right in it, and this is the reality of the situation this is what people look at and It's important for us to keep our testimony Pure and true unto God so that we don't give The the adversaries the opportunity to speak evil against God based on our actions And it's also just important for us to be doing what's right by God anyways, right? So it's you know, there's multi-purpose there of obeying God's Word. We don't want to bring but especially the more You're known for doing what's right the more you got to be diligent and taking heed that you don't fall and Making yourself sure man and if and every once in a while that means you got to slow down a little bit Just make sure hey, I'm Not gonna fall I'm you know, I'm not going so fast and letting things get to my head too much That You know the things are gonna get out of control We need to maintain sobriety We need to maintain humility in our life and know that hey, we're gonna try to keep ourselves from From From a great disaster look at Galatians 6 verse number 9 the Bible reads and let us not be weary in well-doing For in due season we shall reap if we faint not see I think what ended up happening with Solomon I think Solomon lost a lot of rewards. I Think Solomon was was doing great with what he had done in his life and his achievements But because of his basically stumbling and falling and and not getting back up to finish that race near the end of his life He lost a lot of what he had accumulated up to that point unfortunately, yeah, but you know the Bible says here Let us not be weary and well-doing for a new season. We shall reap if we faint not 2nd Timothy chapter 4 look at verse number 7 Similar concept we see the Apostle Paul near the end of his life 2nd Timothy chapter 4 verse number 7. I have fought a good fight. I Have finished my course. I have kept the faith henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness Which the Lord the righteous judge shall give give me at that day and not to me only But unto all them also that love is appearing Apostle Paul earned himself a crown not having isn't talking about salvation Apostle Paul was saved by grace or faith like all of us are But he attained and earned a crown that God's going to give him he earned Rewards that's gonna be granted to him in heaven as a result of him fighting the good fight Keeping the faith finishing the course and finishing strong That's what's gonna get us our rewards and we want to make sure that we are Keeping that Always in our minds and then Revelation 2 and 3 I'll read this for you Revelation 2 10 says fear None of those things which thou shalt suffer Behold the devil shall cast some of you in a prison that you may be tried and you shall tribulation 10 days be thou Faithful unto death and I will give thee a crown of life Again, another crown. I say you be faithful you stick with it. You stay the course. I know it's scary You're gonna be throwing in a prison. You'll be facing death You be faithful all the way on the death. I'm gonna give you a crown In Revelation 3 11 behold. I come quickly hold that fast which thou hast that no man take thy crown Hold on to it. Hold on tight to the end. We need to we're in a race. We need to finish our race We need to finish it strong. It's a marathon. It's not sprint So don't get so caught up in thinking it's a sprint that you're gonna burn yourself out and fall and not finish the race Keep in mind the the prize keep in mind the goal keep in mind Yourself and your own flesh and sin and take heed to yourself so that you don't fall and and fall after the example of Solomon Solomon gave us a lot of examples many good examples and Unfortunately some bad examples here as well But let's learn from them. Let's not fall into the same trap that that Solomon fell into let's let's use God's Word He gave this word, you know, all these stories to us for a reason. Let's let's apply these to our lives and And not make those same mistakes as far as have a word of prayer I'm do Heavenly Father God we thank you so much for your your words God we pray that you would please just continue to open up the scripture to us help us to Learn these great truths that you have for us help us to make the right decisions in our life Lord I pray for all of the the Individuals in our church here that are unmarried that are going to be looking to get married one day I pray that you would please help them to have guidance and wisdom and finding a spouse dear Lord and that you would You you would just stir up their spirit to to stay true to your word and not to get caught up in this fake notion of love This this superficial love that Solomon got caught up into When he when he married 700 wives and had 300 concubines your Lord and help us help us not to get deceived by the the media by the the the Hollywood movies and the the the music industry that wants to tell you what love is help us to get our definition of love and our understanding of love from your word and That that these individuals would find someone who's truly going to love them and that they could love Reciprocately and and Serve you with one heart dear Lord. It's in Jesus name we pray. Amen