The Kingdom Torn in Two
January 16, 2011
The Story - 14
When I think about the Bible, I picture it as one movie or television program which is cut into many parts. It’s like watching a television series or sequels that you don’t want to miss. Remember programs like The FBI, or Mission Impossible, Hill Street Blues, St. Elsewhere, and ER. The Star Wars movies or The Matrix. You knew the story would change, there might be some new characters, but there was a constant theme running throughout.
It’s kind of like the Bible. The Bible is one story about God’s love for you and I, and during the course of the movie called the Bible, we see many stories and themes emerging. Some good and some not so good.
Well, today, we’re looking at a not so good chapter in the life of the nation of Israel. We’re in chapter 14, or 1 Kings 12-16. So, let’s dig in.
The title of our chapter is The Kingdom Torn in Two. It sounds like a horror movie, and it kind of is.
Last week we took a look at Solomon’s life. He was the wisest man on the planet. But, Solomon also had a love for the good things in life and in order to support this and to support the military, the people were heavily taxed and many felt the burden of being forced into hard labor. Eventually, Solomon died and the king-dom was passed on to his son, Rehoboam. This is where our story today picks up.
The main characters are Rehoboam and Jeroboam, from the tribe of Ephraim.
We meet Jeroboam in 1 Kings 11, when he was a young soldier in Solomon’s cabinet. He was very successful and rose in leadership. A prophet of God came to Jeroboam and told him he was going to become the next king of Israel. But he would have to wait. But Jeroboam was impatient and tried to take the kingdom from Solomon, Solomon tried to have him killed and Jeroboam escaped to Egypt.
Now I want to tell the story from a couple of points of view.
There are always two stories taking place at the same time. There’s the upper story, in which we see God taking action. This is the viewpoint from God’s perspective. We learn that the Bible is not a compilation of 100's of unrelated stories, but in reality from God’s point of view, it’s one beautiful love story for you and I; and His desire to get us back.
Then there’s the lower story. That’s our story, where life happens. It’s the day to day events which occur in our world and how we react to them. Like paying the bills, sickness, eating together, relationships, it’s our every day life.
Firstly, we’ll look at it from the lower story, looking at it from our point of view.
Well, there’s a conflict which occurs. That’s true in most storylines. And there’s always a cause for the conflict to occur. The conflict is found in 1 Kings 12:1-14 -
1 Rehoboam went to Shechem, for all Israel had gone there to make him king. 2 When Jeroboam son of Nebat heard this (he was still in Egypt, where he had fled from King Solomon), he returned from Egypt.
3 So they sent for Jeroboam, and he and the whole assembly of Israel went to Rehoboam and said to him: 4 “Your father put a heavy yoke on us, but now lighten the harsh labor and the heavy yoke he put on us, and we will serve you.”
5 Rehoboam answered, “Go away for three days and then come back to me.” So the people went away.
6 Then King Rehoboam consulted the elders who had served his father Solomon during his lifetime. “How would you advise me to answer these people?” he asked.
7 They replied, “If today you will be a servant to these people and serve them and give them a favorable answer, they will always be your servants.”
8 But Rehoboam rejected the advice the elders gave him and consulted the young men who had grown up with him and were serving him. 9 He asked them, “What is your advice? How should we answer these people who say to me, ‘Lighten the yoke your father put on us’?”
10 The young men who had grown up with him replied, “These people have said to you, ‘Your father put a heavy yoke on us, but make our yoke lighter.’ Now tell them, ‘My little finger is thicker than my father’s waist.
11 My father laid on you a heavy yoke; I will make it even heavier. My father scourged you with whips; I will scourge you with scorpions.’”
12 Three days later Jeroboam and all the people returned to Rehoboam, as the king had said, “Come back to me in three days.” 13 The king answered the people harshly. Rejecting the advice given him by the elders,
14 he followed the advice of the young men and said, “My father made your yoke heavy; I will make it even heavier. My father scourged you with whips; I will scourge you with scorpions.” 15 So, the king did not listen to the people.
There’s our conflict. It appears from our point of view that Rehoboam made an unwise decision. He ignored the counsel of the elders and listened to the counsel of the younger men, who were serving him. This was a bad idea, and it created a major conflict. So, how was the conflict resolved?
Look at 1 Kings 12:16-17 —
16 When all Israel saw that the king refused to listen to them, they answered the king:
“What share do we have in David, what part in Jesse’s son?
To your tents, Israel! Look after your own house, David!”
So the Israelites went home. 17 But as for the Israelites who were living in the towns of Judah, Rehoboam still ruled over them.
Now skip down to verse 20, and we read, When all the Israelites heard that Jeroboam had returned, they sent and called him to the assembly and made him king over all Israel. Only the tribe of Judah remained loyal to the house of David.
So, how was the conflict resolved? By the dividing of the kingdom. This once strong, powerful and united kingdom has been broken in two.
If you’ve been marking your maps in the book, then you should pull it out and we can do two things right now. Let’s draw a circle around the area given to the Israelites by God. Then draw a line through that circle just above Jerusalem, and that is where the kingdom was divided.
As a result, the nation is weakened. To the north we have king Jeroboam, and he will be over 10 of the 12 tribes of Israel. And they will be called the nation of Israel or Samaria. And in the south, it’s king Rehoboam, who will be over 2 tribes, Judah, and the small tribe of Benjamin.
Now, if we change the point of view of this story from the lower story to the upper story, where we see God’s point of view, we’re going to see something a little different. In our eyes the division was caused by an unwise decision by a young king.
But when you look at this from the upper story perspective, we will see something very different. You see, it wasn’t Rehoboam’s decision which caused the split, it was his father’s decision, it was Solomon’s decision, years before that.
There’s a phrase in military aviation which goes like this. The accident already occurred, we’re just waiting for the plane to arrive at the crash site. What does that mean? It means the accident occurred miles before the actual accident occurred, when the pilot or a member of the flight crew made a fatal decision, or there was something mechanical which was already wrong with the plane. This is when the accident actually occurred, now it’s a matter of time until the plane arrives to the actual crash site. The fatal accident occurred back here, it’s just going to take time to arrive at it’s final destination.
This is precisely what happened to the nation of Israel, when Solomon was the pilot, he made a series of fatal decisions which were very important to God. However, the impact wasn’t immediately felt, but they would be felt years later; which guaranteed the future crash of the nation of Israel.
If you turn back to chapter 13, on the last page of that chapter; we see this fatal error, in 1 Kings 11:9-13 ~
9 The LORD became angry with Solomon because his heart had turned away from the LORD, the God of Israel, who had appeared to him twice.
10 Although he had forbidden Solomon to follow other gods, Solomon did not keep the LORD’s command.
11 So the LORD said to Solomon, “Since this is your attitude and you have not kept my covenant and my decrees, which I commanded you, I will most certainly tear the kingdom away from you and give it to one of your subordinates.
12 Nevertheless, for the sake of David your father, I will not do it during your lifetime. I will tear it out of the hand of your son.
13 Yet I will not tear the whole kingdom from him, but will give him one tribe for the sake of David my servant and for the sake of Jerusalem, which I have chosen.”
Often times from a human perspective, even leaders think we’re in charge of things, only to discover God has an upper story plan which He’s working out. That’s what we see here. When Rehoboam realizes that Jeroboam has been made king of the northern part, Israel, which gives him an advantage; Jeroboam decides to go into battle with him in order to win back the 10 tribes he’s lost.
But the Lord intervenes, and in 1 Kings 12:24, tells Rehoboam, ‘Do not go up to fight against your brothers, the Israelites. Go home, every one of you, for this is my doing.’” So they obeyed the LORD and went home, as the LORD ordered.
Now Rehoboam’s decision not to take the advice of the elders and to take the counsel of his younger friends was an unwise decision. But this wasn’t the cause of the division in Israel. God is using Rehoboam’s immaturity to accomplish his upper story plan.
Well, as this part of the Bible is coming to an end, the director wants us to have a theme that grabs us and causes us to think about our real lives. The director wants you to be captivated by what this means in your life. I think there are 2 main themes running simultaneously.
One comes from the upper story. The theme is that God has a plan, and that plan cannot be thwarted. And God always keeps His promises. God promised to use the nation of Israel, and Israel was supposed to reveal God and bring Jesus to us; who would be the ultimate One to forgive our sins. To give every single one of us who was separated from God, an opportunity to come into an eternal relationship with the one true God, through Jesus Christ – who came from the tribe of Judah.
He does not have to use everyone in Israel. And what we see here is the unfolding of God’s decision to use a remnant of Israel to keep His promises. It appears that Jeroboam is the good guy. He rallies around the cries of the people and comes to their aid because they were being overtaxed, over-burdened and over-worked. He uses the cries of the people to gain an entrance into leadership and it looked like he’s the savior of the day. He has 10 tribes and it looks like God is removing Rehoboam and his family from the line of leadership in the nation. But that’s not what was happening at all.
It turns out that God was shrinking the remanat whom He would use. And it turns out that Jeroboam is a bad guy. When he thought the people might head back to Jerusalem to worship, he had two golden calves built and told the people to worship these. This way they would not have to go back to his rival.
But, it’s through the remnant of Judah that God will bring us Jesus.
And for those who profess Jesus as Lord and Savior, we are part of the New Testament church. In Matthew 16:18, Jesus said, “I will build my church.” It’s an upper story declaration. Jesus said it, and it will happen and nothing will change it. At First Baptist Church we have a decision to make, we can be included in that or not. Jesus is going to build His church, the question is, will we have the audacious kind of faith, trust and belief to align our lives as individuals and as the church with the upper story of Jesus and what He is going to accomplish?
It shouldn’t matter if it’s a popular decision or not, we are to take our clues from God, no exceptions. The kind of church we’re called to be is one which will not compromise the Word of God, but instead, follows the Word so that we can bring glory and honor to God as we lead others to life transformation through Jesus Christ. That’s the type of church we are called to be. It’s what I expect us to be.
There’s also a theme in the lower story, and I will close with this. There’s a ripple effect from all of our decisions. Just like when we drop a pebble in still water, we see the ripples. And so it is with our lives and the decisions we make, and the stakes go up when you’re the leader because of the number of people who are brought into the good and bad decisions you make.
We saw the negative impact of the decisions Solomon made. It impacted his son and it impacted a nation all because this wise man made many unwise decisions. We also learned that we don’t use people to build authority, we use authority to build people.
I can envision Solomon’s grandchildren gathering together, in a weak and smaller nation which is being bullied by the pagan nations surrounding them. As they talk with the town’s people, they recall stories from their grandparents, about the days in which people came from all over the world to learn from their nation. Stories about how strong and prosperous the nation once was, for a moment they smile.
But, now they are weak, pitiful and struggling. And the grandkids are reminded it started with decisions their great grandfather made many years before. And it’s had this type of effect on us.
But we can also spin this to the positive, can’t we? We can have a legacy of decisions which have great impact on our families and on those around us. Like parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, friends — who unashamedly claim Jesus, and then demonstrate that faith and life to their families. To model the life of faith in front of one another. To show humility, to demonstrate love in action, to offer grace and even to seek repentance, even from those we love.
We do this at home, at church, at work, at school. We do this wherever we go. We demonstrate Christ. We make decisions, conscious decisions . . . always, always to follow Christ.
And if you’re one of the people in this room who has been negatively affected by a leader, a parent, a boss, a teacher, a pastor, and their poor decision has created a ripple effect which has dramatically impacted your life, then I would invite you to be courageous, to acknowledge it and get help to deal with it, and to put it behind you and move on and start something fresh within you.
You know that I was not raised in a Christian home. In fact, my parents disdained the church. It’s not that they didn’t like some Christian folks. But they didn’t like what the church stood for. I grew up in a home that was to a degree anti-Christian.
And someday I envision my grandkids are sitting around with the other towns people and they’re talking about how strong and prosperous their lives are, how filled with spiritual connection to God their lives are, and how blessed they are. And one of the grandkids will say our grandfather who was born way back in 1958 made a break in the mid 80's, and something new was started in the Deutsch family. Christ came into the family and our lives were never the same again. That’s what I want. Even with all my faults.
Listen to this, in the time of the divided kingdom there were 38 kings in the north and south. Of those kings there were only 5 good kings who had the audacity to do what was right in the eyes of God. I invite you to be like one of those 5 kings — Asa, Jotham, Jehosaphat, Hezekiah and Josiah. . .
. . . who stands up and follows the Lord and creates a ripple effect we have yet to know. How great that will be.
