April 12th, I Kings 1-2
So the lesson for the day is that God gets to decide who is King. All of the trouble that comes to us from this story happens as a result of a person making the decision that he is going to be King. The power to want what we want is a stronger power than asking what God wants. A lot of the trouble in life comes from this issue.
As we've talked on Thursday Nights at church, there is an uneasiness about the level of violence contained in these stories. It stems from our way of life that from A-Z is less (note the word less) violent than the world of the OT or even parts of our world today. In parts of our world 10-12 year old boys are expected to be soldiers and don't even know that they should have a bike and play little league baseball. We have different norms.
But secondly all of the violence in this story could have never happened had the leadership of Israel decided this collectively before someone decided individually AND all the players would have submitted well to the decision. That could have been the story and chapter two could have been written about different events.
There is a chapter two in all of our lives. Chapter two is based on the decisions of chapter one. The good news is that God desires to be part of every chapter. But that is really our responsibility. What chapter is next for you? How are the events of the previous chapters going to have impact on "the rest of the story." (Hear Paul Harvey's voice!!!)
I also hope you realize the blessing of chapters. Drawing something to an end and having a new beginning. Israel's in a new chapter with Solomon as their new King. Chapters graciously come to a close in our life so that something new can happen. All the chapters are related, God is in them all, what gets written in them is partly our responsibility(not all, look at Job).
David's commission to Solomon is Chapter 2:1-4... a worthy read, with a healthy dose off foreshadowing!
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