Driven into misfortune by fear

The first king of the divi­ded king­dom of Isra­el in the north was Jero­boam. God pro­mi­sed him and his fami­ly that they would remain in power fore­ver if they only kept to one thing: To be faithful to the God of Isra­el. But Jero­boam was led by fear, which ulti­m­ate­ly led to the down­fall of his king­dom. Fol­lo­wers of Jesus Christ are cal­led to lea­ve behind all fal­se secu­ri­ties and trust God completely.

The promise of God gives a future!

This mor­ning we look at a sto­ry from the Old Tes­ta­ment. This sto­ry illus­tra­tes that the holy God can­not tole­ra­te any­thing bes­i­de Hims­elf. For this we dive deep into the histo­ry of the peo­p­le of Isra­el. It is the peo­p­le God has cho­sen. Its histo­ry is extre­me­ly eventful and usual­ly cha­rac­te­ri­sed by the fact that things never run smooth­ly. But this peo­p­le has a cen­tral mis­si­on. They are to be holy. Just as their God is holy. This is our the­me for the year. Holy means to be set apart for a spe­cial pur­po­se. This, in the case of Isra­el, is that they ser­ve God alo­ne. Set apart is shown in ethi­cal mat­ters and so the peo­p­le are dif­fe­rent from their envi­ron­ment in many ways of life. Sepa­ra­ti­on is shown in the fact that they have only one God and so they stand apart from the envi­ron­ment. The sepa­ra­ti­on is shown in God’s dealings with his peo­p­le. For he claims this peo­p­le for hims­elf and can­not tole­ra­te them fol­lo­wing anyo­ne else. The peo­p­le them­sel­ves are orga­nis­ed into tri­bes. From the­se, in turn, one is cal­led out, set apart from the rest, to take char­ge of the wor­ship. At the head of the peo­p­le was a reli­gious lea­der, the high priest.

The nati­ons around Isra­el had a king at their head. After some time in the land, the desi­re for a king aro­se. At that time, Samu­el was the reli­gious lea­der of the peo­p­le. Becau­se of the desi­re for a king, his posi­ti­on was also ques­tio­ned. But the peo­p­le want a king and come to Samu­el with this request. God gives him the fol­lo­wing ans­wer. « «Lis­ten to the voice of the peo­p­le, to all they say,» the LORD ans­we­red, «for it is not you they reject, but me. They no lon­ger want me as king. They are doing what they have always done sin­ce I brought them here from Egypt. For they have always for­got­ten me and gone after other gods. And now they are doing the same to you. Ful­fil their request, but warn them cle­ar­ly of how a king will rule over them» » (1 Samu­el 8:7–9 NLB). Until now, God clai­med for hims­elf the lea­der­ship of the peo­p­le. But he com­pli­es with the people’s wish, even though it is a rebel­li­on against hims­elf. The histo­ry of kings is not a glo­rious histo­ry over­all. Alre­a­dy the first king screws up bad­ly and so his roy­al dynasty is depo­sed and a new king comes to power. God hims­elf says about him: «[…] David, the son of Jes­se, is a man after my own heart. He will do ever­y­thing I want him to do». (Acts 13:22 NLB). Alt­hough God is oppo­sed to the estab­lish­ment of a roy­al house, he ful­ly backs King David. He gives him a pro­mi­se: «Your house and your king­ship shall be estab­lished befo­re me for all time, and your thro­ne shall be estab­lished fore­ver.» (2 Samu­el 7:16 NLB). Here one might think that things must final­ly turn out well for this peo­p­le. But alre­a­dy David’s suc­ces­sor is no lon­ger wal­king in his ways. King David is the stan­dard of jud­ge­ment for all the kings of Jeru­sa­lem. They are always mea­su­red against him. The tra­ge­dy is that most of them do not mea­su­re up. Alt­hough the­re would be so much bles­sing for them in their faithful­ness to God.

In the case of David’s son Solo­mon, it is his many wives that are his undo­ing. At the begin­ning he is faithful and stands by God, but over time he allows hims­elf to be sedu­ced into ido­la­try by his for­eign wives. He builds altars for the gods of their peo­p­les and sacri­fices to them. So God deci­des to snatch ten tri­bes from Solomon’s suc­ces­sor, King Rehoboam, and give them to ano­ther king. He lea­ves him only two tri­bes. For the nor­t­hern king­dom, God choo­ses Jero­boam as king. He pro­mi­ses him a good future. «If you will lis­ten to what I tell you, not for­sa­ke my way and ask my will, and if you obey my laws and my com­mandments as my ser­vant David did, then I will always be on your side. I will estab­lish with you a las­ting ruling dynasty, as I did for David, and I ent­rust Isra­el to you.» (1 Kings 11:38 NLB). If he is faithful, then God is faithful too. He wants to estab­lish a dynasty with him, as with King David. He pro­mi­ses him power over the ten nor­t­hern tri­bes, which will hence­forth always be cal­led Isra­el. The sou­thern tri­bes are cal­led the King­dom of Judah.

But the seces­si­on of the ten nor­t­hern tri­bes does not just hap­pen over­night. It can be explai­ned in earth­ly terms by the stu­pi­di­ty of the new king Rehoboam. He comes to power and wants to be even toug­her than his father. This infu­ria­tes the tri­bes of Isra­el, so they join Jero­boam. The lat­ter had fled to Egypt befo­re King Solo­mon and retur­ned after his death. «When the Israe­li­tes lear­ned that Jero­boam had retur­ned, they sent for him, cal­led a mee­ting and made him king over all Isra­el. Only the tri­be of Judah remain­ed loy­al to the roy­al house of David». (1 Kings 12:20 NLB). Alre­a­dy in the­se sto­ries the­re is so much to learn from them. But I want to empha­sise two things in par­ti­cu­lar. One is that God wants peo­p­le to hold on to him in faithful­ness. Second­ly, Jeroboam’s pro­mi­se actual­ly comes to pass and he beco­mes king over Isra­el. During this time he con­so­li­da­tes his king­dom and builds two capi­tals. He con­so­li­da­ted hims­elf poli­ti­cal­ly. He had not­hing to be afraid of. Becau­se he had the pro­mi­se of God and so he «only» had to con­cen­tra­te on fol­lo­wing him and giving him all the glory.

Overcome by fear!

Isra­el is divi­ded into the sou­thern king­dom of Judah with Jeru­sa­lem as its capi­tal and the nor­t­hern king­dom of Isra­el. After some time, the pro­mi­se of God in Jeroboam’s memo­ry faded visi­bly. After he had estab­lished and sta­bi­li­sed his king­dom poli­ti­cal­ly and soci­al­ly, he beca­me afraid. «Jero­boam thought to hims­elf: Now the rule will be res­to­red to the fami­ly of David. fall back. When the peo­p­le go to Jeru­sa­lem to sacri­fice in the house of the LORD, they will also sub­mit again to their mas­ter, King Rehoboam of Judah. Then they will kill me and turn again to Rehoboam king of Judah». (1 Kings 12:26–27 NLB). The dan­ger was not unfoun­ded, for God had cho­sen the temp­le in Jeru­sa­lem for the cul­tic cent­re. «Here my name will be hono­u­red fore­ver – in this house and in Jeru­sa­lem, the city I have cho­sen out of all the tri­bes of Isra­el». (2 Chro­nic­les 33:7 NLB). Thus the peo­p­le from the nor­t­hern tri­bes had to tra­vel to Jeru­sa­lem seve­ral times a year for the reli­gious holidays.

The­r­e­fo­re, they were the­re under the sphe­re of influence of Rehoboam. As the well-known say­ing goes, fear is a bad advi­sor. Jero­boam, howe­ver, got more and more of it. God’s pro­mi­se was too litt­le for him and he deci­ded to take mat­ters into his own hands. «So the king reaso­ned. The­r­e­fo­re he had two gol­den cal­ves made and said to the peo­p­le, «It is too much trou­ble for you if you have to go to Jeru­sa­lem. Look, the­se are your gods who brought you out of Egypt!» (1 Kings 12:28 NLB). The jus­ti­fi­ca­ti­on to the peo­p­le is not in their fear, but rather in sup­po­sedly under­stan­da­ble reasons. Here he used the gre­at cir­cum­s­tances. Here the ques­ti­on to us also ari­ses. May faith cost some­thing? May it cost us time? May it even cost us money? May your faith also cost you your com­fort? What are we pre­pared to take on our­sel­ves for incon­ve­ni­ence? The para­dox of this flim­sy jus­ti­fi­ca­ti­on quick­ly beco­mes appa­rent. «This beca­me a sin for the peo­p­le, for they now went and even took the long jour­ney to Dan for it» (1 Kings 12:30 NLB). But to fol­low the­se two idol sacri­fices, the peo­p­le them­sel­ves take a long way. Is it not the case that when it comes to faith, ever­y­thing is often too much for us. But vol­un­t­a­ri­ly we do much more wit­hout it being a cramp for us. How much can YOUR faith cost you?

Back to Jero­boam. I think he real­ly wan­ted to pre­ser­ve the faith in the God of his ances­tors. But he resor­ted to syn­cre­tic prac­ti­ces. So the choice of figu­re for his two sta­tu­es was also not­hing new in the histo­ry of this peo­p­le. The peo­p­le of Isra­el had been ens­laved in Egypt long ago. But God led them to free­dom with a strong hand. After the lea­der of the peo­p­le had been away for a while, they wan­ted a God who could be seen, felt and expe­ri­en­ced. So the chief priest cast a calf. The ori­gi­nal Hebrew text uses exact­ly the same wor­ding as for Jero­boam, except that he cast two cal­ves and not just one. By describ­ing the­se cal­ves as gods of deli­ver­ance from Egypt, they depri­ve the actu­al aut­hor of the most incisi­ve and decisi­ve event. For this is repea­ted­ly cited as justification.

But Jero­boam moves fur­ther and fur­ther away. First he replaces the God of Isra­el with two cal­ves. Then he gra­du­al­ly installs his own priests. Priests who are not from the tri­be of Levi, whom God has cho­sen for this task. He also builds high shri­nes, alt­hough God only cho­se one temp­le and one place. Jero­boam put the two cal­ves in two dif­fe­rent places. One was to Bethel, which was cen­tral­ly loca­ted in the south. It was cen­tral­ly loca­ted and the road to Jeru­sa­lem pas­sed through the­re. It was its­elf only 17 kilo­me­t­res to the north. Dan, on the other hand, was in the far north of Isra­el. The sacri­fice and wor­ship of the­se calf sta­tu­es beca­me a stumb­ling block. «This beca­me a sin for the peo­p­le […]» (1 Kings 12:30 NLB). Just as the kings of Judah are always com­pared to David, the kings of Isra­el are com­pared to Jero­boam, but not posi­tively. Out of a total of 19 kings, 16 wal­ked in the sin of Jero­boam. This con­sis­ted of fol­lo­wing other gods. But the peo­p­le of Isra­el were actual­ly set apart for God. But becau­se they did not fol­low, they were torn from inti­ma­cy with God. Final­ly, the nor­t­hern king­dom dis­ap­pears from the sce­ne in its inde­pen­dence. The sum­ma­ry sounds like this: «For when the LORD sepa­ra­ted Isra­el from David’s king­dom, the Israe­li­tes cho­se Jero­boam son of Nebat to be king. But he led Isra­el into gre­at sin by caus­ing them to no lon­ger fol­low the LORD. And the Israe­li­te peo­p­le con­tin­ued to fol­low the wrong ways of Jero­boam.  It per­sis­ted in the sin of ido­la­try until the LORD final­ly remo­ved it from his pre­sence, as he had fore­told through all his ser­vants the pro­phe­ts. In the end, the Israe­li­tes were taken from their land to Assy­ria, whe­re they live to this day». (2 Kings 17:21–23 NLB). Jero­boam tried to pre­ser­ve his king­dom hims­elf, but he even­tual­ly lost it – pre­cis­e­ly becau­se of his own attempt.

Leaving the false securities behind

The dif­fi­cul­ty that ari­ses in enga­ging with Old Tes­ta­ment texts is the ques­ti­on of what they say for me per­so­nal­ly. One way is to ask what I can learn from the core mes­sa­ge. Here it is a ques­ti­on of what I do with pro­mi­ses that God gave me. The­se can be per­so­nal, but they can also con­cern bibli­cal pas­sa­ges. Espe­ci­al­ly tho­se whe­re Jesus Christ makes a pro­mi­se to his fol­lo­wers. Do I trust in them or do I try to ful­fil them mys­elf? What is my moti­va­ti­on? Trust or worry/fear? Jesus hims­elf makes a state­ment that sums up the life of Jero­boam. «Whoe­ver tri­es to keep his life will lose it. But he who gives up his life for me will find true life.» (Matthew 16:25 NLB). What does this state­ment do to you? What is your moti­va­ti­on? Con­cern or trust?

I would like to return to the sto­ry of Jero­boam and Rehoboam. For I have still with­held one part from you. For after the ten nor­t­hern tri­bes had bro­ken away from Judah, Rehoboam wan­ted to regain all power. But God had ano­ther plan and sent him a mes­sa­ge. «Tell Rehoboam son of Solo­mon, king of Judah, and all the peo­p­le of Judah and Ben­ja­min and the rest of the peo­p­le, «Thus says the LORD: Do not go up and fight against your kins­men the Israe­li­tes. Go back home, for what has hap­pen­ed was my will!» And they obey­ed the mes­sa­ge of the LORD and went home, as he had com­man­ded them.» (1 Kings 12:23–24 NLB). Rehoboam adhe­red to this mes­sa­ge and blew off his own initia­ti­ve. But he does not walk away a loser despi­te losing part of his power. For God bles­sed him.

Jero­boam was afraid that the peo­p­le would lea­ve him becau­se of the Temp­le in Jeru­sa­lem. But he hims­elf made it worse. «But the priests and Levi­tes from all Isra­el con­tin­ued to hold to Rehoboam. The Levi­tes even left their hou­ses and their pos­ses­si­ons and went to Judah and Jeru­sa­lem, becau­se Jero­boam and his sons had for­bidden them to ser­ve the LORD as priests.» (2 Chro­nic­les 11:13–14 NLB). Through his own initia­ti­ve, which was cha­rac­te­ri­sed by fear, he streng­the­ned the king­dom of Rehoboam of Judah even more. «From all over Isra­el, peo­p­le who wan­ted to wor­ship the LORD God of Isra­el flo­cked with the Levi­tes to Jeru­sa­lem, whe­re they were allo­wed to sacri­fice to the LORD God of their ances­tors. In this way the king­dom of Judah was streng­the­ned. […]» (2 Chro­nic­les 11:16–17 NLB). Both kings did some­thing that did not plea­se God. Rehoboam is reasonable, but Jero­boam does not chan­ge. What can we learn from this sto­ry for our lives? To put it blunt­ly: lack of trust in God and self-initia­ti­ve, which con­tra­dict God’s com­mandments, result in ali­en­ati­on from God.

Possible questions for the small group 

Read Bible text: 1 Kings 12:20–32; Matthew 16:25)

1. Do you under­stand how one united king­dom beca­me two?
2. Jero­boam was pro­mi­sed a glo­rious future by God. Are the­re pro­mi­ses of God in your life? (per­so­nal or from the Bible)
3. Are you easi­ly dis­trac­ted by fear or worry?
4. Have you tried to do things yours­elf, but it went wrong in the end?
5. How do you deal with the state­ment of Jesus Christ in Matthew 16:25?
6. Can you trust God to be good to you? Why is this dif­fi­cult for you?