Here we see Solomon reaping the blessing of having been David's next of kin. Solomon essentially becomes chosen by God due to God's covenant with his father David as shown in 1 Kings, Chapter 2: "King Solomon shall be blessed, and the throne of David shall be established before the LORD for ever." 1 Kings 2:45.
As Solomon's reign is being established and solidified after the death of Adonijah, Solomon is warned that this promise to David's lineage is conditional by David himself.
"...you, my son Solomon, acknowledge the God of your father, and serve him with wholehearted devotion and with a willing mind, for the LORD searches every heart and understands every motive behind the thoughts. If you seek him, he will be found by you; but if you forsake him, he will reject you forever." ~1 Chronicles 28:9
----Jump ahead a few years ---->
Solomon loved many foreign women (700 wives, princesses, and 300 concubines), along with the daughter of Pharaoh: Moabite, Ammonite, Edomite, Sidonian, and Hittite women, including women from nations that the Lord had said to the Israelites “You shall not enter into marriage with them, neither shall they with you, for surely they will turn away your heart after their gods.” Sure enough, just as God had said would happen, his wives turned away his heart from the One True God to chase after the false gods of his wives homelands including Ashtoreth and Milcom. Solomon did evil things in the sight of the Lord and built “high places” for other gods like Chemosh and Molech (child sacrifice). You really should click on the Molech link and read just how horrific and sickening that practice was.
Because Solomon disobeyed the Lord he is told that he has been disobedient by God and informed Solomon the He will, “surely tear the kingdom from you and will give it to your servant.” But because of God’s love for David, Solomon will be spared seeing this happen, it will happen to his son Rehoboam. Also, because of God’s relationship with David, one tribe will remain in the possession of Solomon’s son. The one tribe would obviously be Judah from which Jesus Christ would someday come.
The ironic thing here is that...although Solomon had more earthly wisdom than anyone else up to that point or probably since, it took God intervening and communicating directly to Solomon to make him realize that he had messed up BIG TIME. I believe we see a clear example here of the fact that wisdom of this world does not necessarily equate to wisdom of God or about God's will. Solomon may have been a "world knowledge" specialist or really smart when it came to relating things to worldly knowledge as we can see in Proverbs and Ecclesiastes but towards the end of Solomon's reign he becomes a real spiritual bonehead. This is due to his apostasy and slide away from God in his intellectual arrogance and close relation with pagan wives. The farther he moves from God the dumber he gets. Why? Solomon said it himself, "The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom, and the knowledge of the Holy One is insight" Proverbs 9:10 We could really learn a great lesson from this. Repeat that statement: "His slide away from God is due to intellectual arrogance and a close association to non-believers".
Now think about that for a few seconds.
Does it apply to you? Intellectual arrogance allows a man to rely totally on himself not God. This type of decisionmaking process means that man's opinion is all that matters and leaves absolutely no room for God (see Richard Dawkins a rabidly anti-God evangelical atheist or antitheist; it wouldn't even be proper to call this guy true atheist). It is often also coined as methodoligical naturalism. Pagan or non-believing mindsets or worldviews can only further exacerbate and encourage this type of thinking because they are already as far as anyone could get from God anyway and misery loves company. They appreciate the company because by accompanying them it reinforces their flawed and sinful logic. It hastened Solomon's apostasy and dulled his mind to what was proper in God's eyes. If not you, how many people do you know that this is happening to in you life (believer and non-believer alike)?
In these types of situations (Solomon's and ours) God raises up punishment. In Solomon's case it is three adversaries. We need to realize God raised the adversaries because He loved Solomon not because He hated him. He wanted Solomon to see the error of his ways on his own. The first being Hadad the Edomite. David and Joab had won a great victory over Edom and had eradicated the male population but Hadad had fled and escaped. David and Joab having died allowed Hadad to return to Edom and regroup. Hadad’s border raids were constant irritants to Solomon, constant reminders of Solomon’s disobedience to God (Wiersbe 442).
God also raised up Rezon the son of Eliada. He was the leader of a marauding band and ended up becoming a king in Damascus. He tormented Solomon in the same way the Hadad did.
We then have the domestic enemy or the “enemy within” Jeroboam. Jeroboam had been in charge of the forced labor in the house of Joseph. Jeroboam had an encounter previously with Ahijah the Shilonite who prophesied about Jeroboam taking over ten of the tribes of Israel as punishment to Solomon. Jeroboam was to reign over all his soul desired. Solomon sought to kill Jeroboam because of this so Jeroboam fled to Egypt and stayed there until the death of Solomon.
We do not know for sure if Solomon recovered from his apostasy. If Ecclesiastes is any indicator, he may have. It is a shame. He had everything...all he needed to do was be good in God's eyes. Instead he is an example of what not to do when you have it all.
Wiersbe, Warren. "David’s Unruly Sons." Bible Exposition Commentary: Old Testament Wisdom and Poetry (Bible Knowledge). Acambaro: Victor, 2003. 442. Print.
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