Nov. 19, 2000

2 Samuel 11-12; 1 Kings 3, 9, 11

Solomon: A Man like Us

1. Introduction

1. Illustration – Bruce Thielemann writes – There is a story that comes to us out of the long ago of a king who organized a great race within his kingdom. All the young men of the kingdom participated. A bag of gold was to be given to the winner, and the finish line was within the courtyard of the king’s palace. The race was run, and the runners were surprised to find in the middle of the road leading to the palace a great pile of rocks and stones. But they managed to scramble over it or to run around it and eventually to come to the courtyard. Finally all the runners had crossed the finish line except one. But still the king did not call the race off. After a while one lone runner came through the gate. He lifted a bleeding hand and said, "O King, I am sorry that I am so late. But you see, I found in the road a pile of rocks and stones, and it took me a while, and I wounded myself in removing them. Then he lifted the other hand, and in it was a bag. He said, "But, Great King, I found beneath the pile this bag of gold." The king said, "My son, you have won the race, for that one runs best who makes the way safer for those who follow."
2. Context – Today we’re going to take a look at a man who ran the race, but didn’t win. Please turn to 1 Kings 3, and stay there while I read another passage. Today we’re going to look at the life of Solomon and the way he ran the race.

1. Scripture Passages

1. In 2 Samuel 11 and 12, we see David committing adultery with Bathsheba, killing her husband, and taking her to be his wife. After Nathan the prophet confronted David, he confessed his sin and was forgiven. God took the life of the baby that Bathsheba conceived through the affair. 2 Samuel 12:24-25 tell us what happened next - Then David comforted his wife Bathsheba, and he went to her and lay with her. She gave birth to a son, and they named him Solomon. The LORD loved him; ²⁵ and because the LORD loved him, he sent word through Nathan the prophet to name him Jedidiah. Jedidiah means, "loved by the Lord." A baby with somewhat of a rocky start, but one whom the Lord loved. Let’s take a further glimpse into his life.
2. After David had passed his throne on to Solomon at God’s direction, Solomon did the two things most kings did: he got rid of all his enemies in order to consolidate his power, and he started making political alliances. 1 Kings 3:1-15 - Solomon made an alliance with Pharaoh king of Egypt and married his daughter. He brought her to the City of David until he finished building his palace and the temple of the LORD, and the wall around Jerusalem. ² The people, however, were still sacrificing at the high places, because a temple had not yet been built for the Name of the LORD. ³ Solomon showed his love for the LORD by walking according to the statutes of his father David, except that he offered sacrifices and burned incense on the high places. ⁴ The king went to Gibeon to offer sacrifices, for that was the most important high place, and Solomon offered a thousand burnt offerings on that altar. ⁵ At Gibeon the LORD appeared to Solomon during the night in a dream, and God said, "Ask for whatever you want me to give you." ⁶ Solomon answered, "You have shown great kindness to your servant, my father David, because he was faithful to you and righteous and upright in heart. You have continued this great kindness to him and have given him a son to sit on his throne this very day. ⁷ "Now, O LORD my God, you have made your servant king in place of my father David. But I am only a little child and do not know how to carry out my duties. ⁸ Your servant is here among the people you have chosen, a great people, too numerous to count or number. ⁹ So give your servant a discerning heart to govern your people and to distinguish between right and wrong. For who is able to govern this great people of yours?" ¹⁰ The Lord was pleased that Solomon had asked for this. ¹¹ So God said to him, "Since you have asked for this and not for long life or wealth for yourself, nor have asked for the death of your enemies but for discernment in administering justice, ¹² I will do what you have asked. I will give you a wise and discerning heart, so that there will never have been anyone like you, nor will there ever be. ¹³ Moreover, I will give you what you have not asked for—both riches and honor—so that in your lifetime you will have no equal among kings. ¹⁴ And if you walk in my ways and obey my statutes and commands as David your father did, I will give you a long life." ¹⁵ Then Solomon awoke—and he realized it had been a dream.
3. Let’s look at another snapshot in Solomon’s life. It’s found in 1 Kings 9:1-9 - When Solomon had finished building the temple of the LORD and the royal palace, and had achieved all he had desired to do, ² the LORD appeared to him a second time, as he had appeared to him at Gibeon. ³ The LORD said to him: "I have heard the prayer and plea you have made before me; I have consecrated this temple, which you have built, by putting my Name there forever. My eyes and my heart will always be there. ⁴ "As for you, if you walk before me in integrity of heart and uprightness, as David your father did, and do all I command and observe my decrees and laws, ⁵ I will establish your royal throne over Israel forever, as I promised David your father when I said, ‘You shall never fail to have a man on the throne of Israel.’ ⁶ "But if you or your sons turn away from me and do not observe the commands and decrees I have given you and go off to serve other gods and worship them, ⁷ then I will cut off Israel from the land I have given them and will reject this temple I have consecrated for my Name. Israel will then become a byword and an object of ridicule among all peoples. ⁸ And though this temple is now imposing, all who pass by will be appalled and will scoff and say, ‘Why has the LORD done such a thing to this land and to this temple?’ ⁹ People will answer, ‘Because they have forsaken the LORD their God, who brought their fathers out of Egypt, and have embraced other gods, worshiping and serving them—that is why the LORD brought all this disaster on them.’"
4. So we see that Solomon is loved by God from birth, that he is given wisdom (as well as riches and power) because he wanted to rule his people well, and the same promise God gave David – if Solomon walked with God, God would walk with him, always ensure one of his descendents would be on the throne, and keep Israel safe from her enemies. Why? Because, as John Maxwell says, everything depends on leadership. People will follow leaders. God doesn’t call them sheep for no reason! Solomon has it made! So what does he do with what God has given him? Let’s see.
5. 1 Kings 11:1-13 - King Solomon, however, loved many foreign women besides Pharaoh’s daughter—Moabites, Ammonites, Edomites, Sidonians and Hittites. ² They were from nations about which the LORD had told the Israelites, "You must not intermarry with them, because they will surely turn your hearts after their gods." Nevertheless, Solomon held fast to them in love. ³ He had seven hundred wives of royal birth and three hundred concubines, and his wives led him astray. ⁴ As Solomon grew old, his wives turned his heart after other gods, and his heart was not fully devoted to the LORD his God, as the heart of David his father had been. ⁵ He followed Ashtoreth the goddess of the Sidonians, and Molech the detestable god of the Ammonites. ⁶ So Solomon did evil in the eyes of the LORD; he did not follow the LORD completely, as David his father had done. ⁷ On a hill east of Jerusalem, Solomon built a high place for Chemosh the detestable god of Moab, and for Molech the detestable god of the Ammonites. ⁸ He did the same for all his foreign wives, who burned incense and offered sacrifices to their gods. 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." Solomon, as the expression goes, had the tiger by the tale! But he loved his foreign wives more that he loved God! Seven hundred foreign wives of royal birth and three hundred concubines! I think that Solomon rather than Julio Englesias should have sung "To All the Girls I’ve Loved Before!" Seriously, because of his refusal to obey what God commanded, the whole country paid. So what can we learn from Solomon?

1. So what?

1. Probably the most important lesson we can learn from the life of Solomon is that women are nothing but trouble! No, seriously, before you stone me, the most important lesson we can learn from the life of Solomon is this: it doesn’t matter how you start out in life; what matters is how you finish!
2. What does finishing well mean? Let’s take a look at some Scriptures that can help us understand what finishing well means.

• Luke 14:28-30 - "Suppose one of you wants to build a tower. Will he not first sit down and estimate the cost to see if he has enough money to complete it? ²⁹ For if he lays the foundation and is not able to finish it, everyone who sees it will ridicule him, ³⁰ saying, ‘This fellow began to build and was not able to finish.’" Finishing well means counting the cost before starting and making sure that you are willing to crucify your right to self-determination for the sake of Christ.
• John 4:34 - "My food," said Jesus, "is to do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work." Doing God’s will and completing His work for us not only sustains us but also is a mark of finishing well.
• Paul says in Acts 20:24 - However, I consider my life worth nothing to me, if only I may finish the race and complete the task the Lord Jesus has given me—the task of testifying to the gospel of God’s grace. Finishing well means considering nothing more important than doing God’s will.
• 2 Corinthians 8:11-12 - Now finish the work, so that your eager willingness to do it may be matched by your completion of it, according to your means. ¹² For if the willingness is there, the gift is acceptable according to what one has, not according to what he does not have. Finishing well again means completing what we start according to His will.
• James 1:2-4 - Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, ³ because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. ⁴ Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything. Finishing well means allowing the trials God lets into our lives to develop the kind of character He wants to see in us the most.
• And finally, Hebrews 12:1-3 - Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us. ² Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. ³ Consider him who endured such opposition from sinful men, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart. Bottom line – finishing well means getting rid of or allowing God to get rid of anything that stands between us and Him and sticking with Him no matter what happens. Jesus didn’t say trials wouldn’t come, but He did say that He would be with us in the midst of them and use them to develop us into people who can effectively shine His love through to a world that so desperately needs Him.

1. Illustration – Martin Bell, in The Way of the Wolf, writes – To live is to decide, to risk being wrong, to bet your life. Nothing could be more foreign to the ears of these analytical men who have come to observe the young man from Nazareth…. It is enough to be interested in this man, or fascinated by him or drawn to him. Either we stand ready to commit our deaths to him or we don’t. No one ever knows the Christ and then commits himself. Commitment is the one and only way by which we know the Christ. Commitment is also the only way by which we run the race, for we know not what it holds for us, but we know Who is leading us.

1. Conclusion

1. How well are you running the race? How well are you finishing? Overcoming a bad start is difficult, but not impossible, for all things are possible with God’s help.
2. So what are we going to do about it. Are we going to keep going the way that we have been going, or are we going to move forward in Christ and finish up the race in a way that is honoring to Him? Let’s take a few minutes of quiet and each one of us listen to what the Holy Spirit is saying to us.
3. No matter what kind of start or middle of the race you’ve had, what matters now is how you are going to finish. If you want to commit to finishing the race in a way that is honoring and pleasing to God, now’s the time to take action. Whether it’s just one area of your life or your whole life, if you are committing this morning to finish up the race the way God wants you to, please come forward right now. Come forward, kneel or stand, and tell God what He needs to hear from you so much. Tell Him that you are committing to following His leading no matter what, in order that you can finish the race well.
4. We’re going to pray together a prayer, written by a pastor in Ohio, that I shared with the council Thursday night: Lord, if it be pleasing to You, so be it. If it be to Your honor, Lord, be it done in Your name. Lord, if You see that it is expedient and profitable for me, then grant that I may use it to Your honor. But if You know it will be harmful to me, and of no good benefit to the welfare of my soul, then take this desire away from me…Lord, You know what is better for me; let this be done or that be done as You please. Grant what You will, as much as You will, when You will. Do with me as You know best, as will please You most, and will be for Your greater honor. Place me where You will and deal with me freely in all things. I am in Your hand; turn me about whichever way You will. Behold, I am Your servant, ready to obey in all things. Not for myself do I desire to live, but for You – would that I could do this worthily and perfectly! Amen.