God's
Faithfulness: Our Faith-Rest. 1 Kings 1 – 11
Review
What happens in 1 Kings chapters 1-11 covers a forty-year period. There
are three basic divisions contextually. The first two chapters cover the
establishment of Solomon’s throne as the kingship passes from David—God’s
chosen kings, the one to whom God gave an unconditional covenant—to Solomon.
That talks about Solomon’s accession to the throne, the various executions that
take place, following his accession to the throne of David his marriage to the
daughter of Pharaoh.
In 3:1-29 we have the rise of Solomon. His first love is God. (That
bears a hint of foreboding at the beginning of the third chapter but we don’t
see its fruition until we get to chapter eleven) He loves the Lord with all his
heart, soul, mind and strength, he is obedient to God. When God comes to him
and says he will give him all that he asks Solomon demonstrates tremendous
humility and rather than asking for power or riches or the defeat of his
enemies he asks for wisdom because he is grace oriented. He is humble and
because he loves the Lord God is going to favour him and bless him with
everything he didn’t ask for along with wisdom. He is the most blessed of all
the kings of
Then he blesses Solomon in chapter nine with a conditional covenant, not
unconditional like David’s. Because Solomon fails to live up to those conditions
by being obedient like his father David he is going to come under divine
discipline. The eleventh chapter describes the divine discipline and the
decline of Solomon because of his second love, his love for his wives. Chapter
three starts off with his love for God; chapter eleven starts of with his loves
for his wives. His polygamy is politically motivated and leads to idolatry,
multiculturalism, internationalism, and as a result of that God indicts him for
those sins and outlines his punishment. But because of God’s grace and love for
David (stated twice) God does not bring about the extremities of the discipline
in Solomon’s time, but postpones it until after his death. He had led the
nation into idolatry and as the king of
So when we think through this section we have in the first two chapters
the establishment of Solomon’s throne; chapters 3-10, the rise and the glory of
Solomon’s kingdom and how God blesses him; and in chapter eleven the disloyalty
of Solomon, his decline, and God’s discipline on Solomon for his idolatry.
At the beginning of the book we see that David is old, bordering on
senility, physically weak and disengaged. What happened in the first chapter
what we see is that God secures Solomon on the throne of David in fulfilment of
his promise to David in the Davidic covenant. It is not just a story about
inheritance, about transitions or revenge; it is a story about how God is
fulfilling His promise to David. God had forbidden David to build the temple
but according to 1 Chronicles 22:9ff he would allow his son to build the
temple, and that would be Solomon. In 1 Kings 1 David’s son Adonijah is
attempting a coup. He is going to conspire with Joab, David’s general, and
Abiathar the high priest. Abiathar convinces Adonijah that he would make a
better king than Solomon and so they involve themselves in this coup that
Adonijah is planning.
But God works behind the scenes and we see how the information leaks
out. The prophet Nathan finds out about it, and Zadok the priest, and a plan is
worked out to foil the lot. As Adonijah s preparing an incredible ceremony word
gets back to David. Nathan and Bathsheba make a plan to alert David. David
immediately takes charge and generates a plan to have Solomon anointed before Adonijah
can be anointed. Solomon is anointed king and when word of this gets to
Adonijah and those who are supporting him the co-conspirators flee in terror.
Adonijah himself flees to the altar on the temple mount, the worship site where
the temple will be built, to grab hold of the horns of the altar in order to
seek sanctuary and protection from Solomon’s vengeance.
What we see in this chapter are two basic doctrines. We have the
faithfulness of God to His covenants and to His promises. He is faithful. Even
though we don’t have the overt expression or description of God here God is the
one who is making sure that the information gets to David and that the attempt
to usurp the throne from Solomon is shut down. And David operates on the
faith-rest drill. That is what gives David the strength and the courage to do
the right thing, because he knows that God promised to give the throne to
Solomon. So David acts firmly and with direction and shows fantastic leadership
at this point because he trusts in God’s promise. That is what happens when we
are operating on the faith-rest drill. The foundation is trusting His Word, and
when we grab hold of the promises of God it changes our mental attitude. We are
not grabbing hold of God’s promises if it is not changing our mental attitude.
When we grab hold of the promises of God and have that confidence in Him then
we are going to change the whole dynamic of our mental attitude.
In chapter two we have the establishment, the securing of Solomon’s
throne at the time of David’s death. We summarise it by saying that God secures
Solomon on the throne through the wise decisions of David and Solomon in
dealing with their enemies. Where did they get this wisdom? They got this
wisdom from the Word of God. As we take in the Word of God and as the Holy
Spirit makes it usable in our souls [epignosis/e)pignwsij] then when we use
it and as we develop skill in practicing and applying it we develop what the
Old Testament refers to as wisdom—that skill at living. So as we practice the
Word of God that wisdom develops. That is what we see here, they make wise
decisions. We have a repeated statement, a thread that runs through these two
chapters, that indicates God will bless Solomon and establish the throne of
David forever. See
In the rest of the chapter, following the death of David, Solomon has to
deal with the left-over problems from his father’s administration which were
not only David’s enemies but also his own enemies. He knows from divine
viewpoint that they represent the enemies of God who would seek to destroy the
lineage that God has promised to David for the line of the Messiah. This isn’t
just a political problem, it is a plan of God/spiritual problem. God has
promised that the descendants’ seed will go from David and Solomon is the
designated heir, and if there is a successful coup against Solomon then this
violates the promise that God has revealed. So it is up to them to do something
about it. We learn later on that this is a conditional promise to Solomon and
because of disobedience he is going to miss that path of blessing, but for now
they don’t know that. Solomon has to deal with the problems raised by Adonijah,
Abiathar, Joab and Shimei. Each of these have played into the hands of the
enemy of God, which of course is Satan, and so Solomon must deal with them on
the basis of the Mosaic Law. First of all he deals with them in grace but they
each show that they aren’t to be trusted. They continue to reveal their inner
character flaws and their betrayal of Solomon and it is for this reason that
they are executed.
After David dies Adonijah is going to make an underhanded claim to the
throne. He is going to send Bathsheba in to make a request that Abishag should
be given him as a wife. In that culture when any woman who was in the harem of
the king who became the wife of another it was a sign that that other man was
trying to usurp the authority and power of kingship. So this is clearly a
statement on Adonijah’s part that he was still trying to make a claim to the
kingship. Therefore he is going to be executed for treason. Abiathar is treated
in grace, he is the high priest; he is banished for his treason but is not
executed. Joab is executed for, as it is stated in
Chapters three and four. Solomon made a treaty with Pharaoh, married his
daughter and brought her to the city of
In chapter three we see that God deals with Solomon in grace and
personally appears to him in a dream, offering to give him whatever he desired.
Solomon requests wisdom. He shows tremendous humility here. Rather than
requesting that God destroy his enemies or give him power or wealth he requests
wisdom. In response God blesses Solomon by not only giving him wisdom but
saying that because he asked for wisdom and not these other things He would
also give him these other things in abundance more than anybody else. So the
remainder of Solomon’s story really emphasises and illustrates the greatness of
God’s blessing upon him, all the way up through chapter ten. The last half of
chapter three, starting at v. 16, gives the illustration of Solomon’s wisdom in
solving the problem between the two harlots who both laid claim to one child,
and how he dealt with that shows his wisdom. Chapter four is another illustration
of his wisdom for there we see it displayed in his organisation and
administration of the kingdom. The empire is going to run smoothly and well.
Major doctrines that we see in chapters 3 & 4 have to do with humility and
grace orientation. They go together. When we are oriented to God’s grace we
know that nothing is from who and what we are, it is all based on who God is
and what Jesus Christ has done for us. Everything that we have comes from God;
it doesn’t come because of our talent. Chapter 4 describes all of this blessing
that God gave to Solomon and begins to hint at his worldwide fame. It closes
with an emphasis on Solomon’s love and devotion to God. He writes over three
thousand proverbs and over one thousand psalms extolling the greatness of God’s
character. He is a man oriented to God—oriented to grace and to doctrine.
Chapters 5-9 focus on the building of the temple. His preparations in
chapter 5 are developed, his organisation is evident. He goes to Hiram king of
1 Chr 22:6-9 Then he called for his son Solomon, and charged
him to build a house for the LORD God of
Chapter seven gives the detailed descriptions of the temple and its
furniture. Chapter eight gets into the great dedication of the temple. It
covers the initial bringing of the ark into the temple an how Solomon honoured
God in terms of the correct approach and circumstance, obeying the Law making
sure that all of the protocol was correct, and as the ark is brought into the
temple then the dwelling glory of God fills the house of the Lord—v. 11. God
makes His dwelling on earth in
When we get into the next part of the chapter from 8:22ff we have
Solomon’s great prayer of dedication, the longest prayer in the Bible. It has
been seen that all of the requests that Solomon makes are based upon the
cursing judgments in Leviticus 26, the cycles of discipline. Again and again
and again Solomon pleads with God to be faithful to His Word—reference to God’s
promise that if Israel turns to Him He will restore her to the land.
In chapter nine God again appears to Solomon and gives him a conditional
promise of a dynasty. 1 Kin 9:4, 5 NASB “As for you, if you will
walk before Me as your father David walked, in integrity of heart and
uprightness, doing according to all that I have commanded you {and} will keep
My statutes and My ordinances,
From
Then we have chapter eleven where God indicts Solomon for covenant
unfaithfulness. The description of his violation of the covenant and the Law
and the indictment is given in the first eight verses. 1 Kings 11:1 NASB
“Now King Solomon loved many foreign women …” That stands in contrast to what we saw in 1
Kings 3:3 where Solomon loved the Lord. He becomes distracted, he loses focus,
and he loses his priorities. He has shifted his focus from trusting God to
trusting in human alliances. When he brings in these foreign women they bring
with them their national gods and he begins to compromise, setting up altars
and worship centres for these false gods, and this is a violation of the first
commandment. It is an act of political treason against God who is the true King
of Israel. [11:4] “For when Solomon was old, his wives turned his heart away
after other gods; and his heart was not wholly devoted to the LORD his God, as the
heart of David his father {had been.}” So God announces the judgment that the
kingdom would be torn from him and then we see how God raises up these
adversaries during the last 10-15 years of Solomon’s reign. It is through Jeroboam
that God is going to bring this discipline on the nation.
What is the lesson? It is that we can really trust God. God is true to
His Word no matter what is going on in the human realm. When we step out and
try to solve problems on our own without trusting in His Word then the
consequences are divine judgment and divine discipline, and then there is a
whole realm of unintended consequences that flow as a result of that which we
can’t imagine. Solomon’s defection from God in the last years of his reign arguably
can be seen in a big part of the problems that we see in the
The only solution to life’s problems is God’s solution, and that begins
with trusting Him to be faithful to His Word.