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Thursday, June 11, 2009

A King, Part 1

So since we are fully into Kings and Chronicles now, I thought I write about being a king. When I read the Chrono the first time I read The Way of the Wild Heart at the same time. It goes through the stages of the masculine journey. The final stage being king. Here are the stages:
Beloved Son - knowing you are loved and delighted in.
Cowboy - learning you have what it takes, adventure and hard work
Warrior - knows he has what it takes, and uses his strength to fight for others
Lover - not necessarily having to do with a woman, but gaining a sensitive side and able to love God's beauty
King - You have authority and a position for several people, and you are in that position as the highest servant.
Sage - When the time comes to pass the torch, but still involved to give counsel.

So a king uses his power and authority for others.

Let's look at Jeroboam son of Nebat. 10 times the bible says, the "sins of Jeroboam son of Nebat" and twice it says "ways of Jeroboam." What were the sins of Jeroboam?

Jeroboam became king, but was not part of the line of David. David was king and Solomon seceded him. However Solomon didn't follow God so he took 10 of the tribes of Israel and gave them to Jeroboam. 2 tribes remained in the line of David with Rehoboam to keep God's promise to David. Then the two kings almost went to war. On page 692 (June 1):

Jeroboam thought to himself, "The kingdom will now likely revert to the house of David. If these people go up to offer sacrifices at the temple of the Lord in Jerusalem, they will again give their allegiance to their lord, Rehoboam king of Judah"..."Here are your gods O Israel, who brought you up out of Egypt." One he set up in Bethel, and the other in Dan. and this thing became a sin...Jeroboam built shrines on high places and appointed priests from all sorts of people, even though they were not Levites.

So Jeroboam set up places to worship in his part of the country to keep his kingdom and stay king. This caused the people to follow other gods. 2 Chronicles 11:16-17 says, "Those from every tribe of Israel who set their hearts on seeking the Lord, the God of Israel, followed the Levites to Jerusalem to offer sacrifices to the Lord, the God of their fathers." So even the priests and the people who followed God left Israel and went to Judah. Imagine what Israel must of been like. They started worshipping other gods, had a bad leader and all their most spiritual people left.

The point is that Jeroboam was not a good king because he had the people worship him. the people were there to make him king, not him being king to help the people. Eldredge writes, "That is what a good king does-he uses all he has to make his kingdom like the kingdom of heaven for the sake of the people who live under his rule." 2 Samuel 5:12 says, "And David knew that the Lord had established him as king over Israel and had exalted his kingdom for the sake of his people Israel." "We are given power and resources and influence for the benefit of others." "When you look at the lives of the bad kings - the contrast becomes clear. Life is all about them. The kingdom revolves around their happiness (quotes from Way of the Wild Heart)." So we can see the difference between the two. Jeroboam could have been grateful that God made him king because he had no birth right in it, and let people go away from his rule or given it back to Judah. Instead he made it about him, and the kings that followed made it worse and worse. Someone at our chrono meeting even said that Israel never had one good king. So that power that a king wields is not just for present time, but also for the future. Even on the numbers it doesn't make sense. Lots of people sacrificing for one man or one man sacrificing for others. If you are in a position of leadership or in charge of something that is your kingship. You are not there for your glory, but to serve for those under you.

I just wanted to share this definition of a king as we read about the kings. We will see a leader soon in the OT that exemplifies a good king. I'll point it out when we get there. Part 2 will come much later. This is something I find very interesting, and I hope it helps some.

3 comments:

Tera Chau said...

woooooow GREAT post! I love it!!!

(Sad that the northern kingdom did not have ONE good king, I think only Jehu was some what good because he destroyed the worship of Baal but he wasn't consistent in his obedience to God.)

Teena Phamster said...

Good stuff Justin. I can't wait to read about the good king. Thx 4 contrasting the book, 'Wild at Heart' with 1 Kings. I definitely want to be a leader who serves and give to those in my care rather than be selfish.

Justin Seibel said...

You are right about Jehu. He destroyed Baal and the the recent bad kings' families. Something cool about Jehu is that he was a commander before he was king. So like the way of the wild heart says you have to be a warrior first, he was. Which is good, but he wasn't close to God. There's a different attitude with him and that's not exactly like David. Also, David didn't kill Saul because he was the Lord's anointed, but Jehu killed the king of Judah and Israel. God told him to do it, but that's different than David.