Hope From the Word

Announcer: Despite heavily one-sided evidence supporting a biblical worldview, the age-old conversation between the atheist and the Christian rages on. I was reading a debate where the atheist was saying how much religion has caused all these problems in the world. The Christian guy was saying a few thousand people died in the Crusades, and a few thousand people died in this religious war, and a few thousand other people died in this religious war, but let's just look at how many people died—deaths caused by atheistic regimes in the 20th century. Just take Communist Russia, Nazi Germany, and China. 100 million deaths caused by atheistic regimes just in the last 100 years.

It's funny because the article contrasted this debate to some debates that were held in the 1800s when they felt that they were on the verge of all these scientific breakthroughs. Darwin had just come out with his theory, and it was going to be the Age of Enlightenment and the Age of Science. Right around the corner came the 20th century and 100 million people killed in atheistic regimes. More problems, not less.

Calvary Chapel of Marlton presents Hope From the Word. We'll get back to Pastor Bill Luebkemann in a second. We've just begun a new study in 1st Kings this week. As we head into chapter two, David has ruled for 40 years and realizes it's time to hand the reins over to his son, Solomon. But before he does, he leaves him with some valuable parental advice. Completely obey the Word of God. That's good advice for all of us to heed. Here's Pastor Bill.

Bill Luebkemann: We are in 1st Kings chapter two, where we're going to read the final words to David. You can read more about what he had to say over in Chronicles, a more detailed account of his final words. But we saw last week in 1st Kings 1 how Adonijah, Solomon's brother—his older brother—tried to set himself up as king and tried to declare himself king. Through that episode, Nathan the good prophet and Bathsheba, Solomon's mother, got together and approached King David and reminded him of his promise that Solomon would be king after him. David appointed Solomon to be the next king.

Solomon is the king now. David is still alive, but now David is going to give his final charge to Solomon in chapter two. David is going to pass on, and Solomon is going to solidify his reign. We'll begin with verse one. "When the time drew near for David to die, he gave a charge to Solomon his son." He knew his time was coming to an end. He knew he was human and that, like all other humans, his lifetime was going to end. As much as he loved God and was a man after God's own heart, and as many campaigns and battles as he had fought, and as great and mighty as his kingdom was, he knew his number was up here as well.

He had appointed Solomon to be king after him, and now the time is even closer still. He's going to give a charge to his son—some things that he should be doing, thinking about, and considering as he takes over as king of the nation. Verse two says, "I am about to go the way of all the earth. So be strong, show yourself a man, and observe what the Lord your God requires. Walk in His ways and keep His decrees and commands, His laws and requirements, as written in the Law of Moses, so that you may prosper in all you do and wherever you go, and that the Lord may keep His promise to me."

"If your descendants watch how they live and if they walk faithfully before Me with all their heart and soul, you will never fail to have a man on the throne of Israel." David starts out here by saying again that it's about time for him to leave this ball of dirt. From dust he came, to dust he goes. His atoms and molecules are about to dissolve and depart, and that's going to be the end of him. He tells Solomon, "Don't cry for a long time. Don't go to pieces. Now is the time to be strong and be a man."

I don't know if he had reason to believe that Solomon wouldn't do that, but Solomon would be facing some obstacles along the way. Some of those obstacles he's going to mention in this chapter, and certainly he was aware of other obstacles. David had a lot of wisdom also. Solomon did face many obstacles, and I wouldn't for a minute think that David was not aware of what many of them were. Solomon needed this encouragement, and he followed it to some degree. Unfortunately, he didn't follow it enough.

David said, "Be strong, show yourself a man. Put away whatever childish things you might still have lingering on in your life and act in a grown-up capacity. Observe what the Lord God requires. Follow His ways, walk in His ways, and keep His decrees, commands, laws, and requirements as written in the Law of Moses." He's a grown-up now, and what he needs to be doing is walking after the ways of the Lord. Solomon started out doing this pretty well, but later on in his life, he was led astray by many of his wives and concubines, of which he had many because he never met a woman he didn't want to marry. He should have taken this advice to a greater degree.

His father told him to walk in the Lord's ways, keep the Lord's decrees, commands, laws, and requirements as the Law of Moses said. You should do that just because you should do that, because God said you should. But even more than that, you should do that so that you may prosper in all you do and wherever you go. I don't think we should be doing these things just so that we can prosper. If we're following God just so that we can get more stuff, then I think that we're doing it for the wrong reason. But we will prosper if we do follow Him.

Prosper doesn't mean just getting more stuff either. Hopefully, "prosper in all you do and wherever you go" means prosper in many other ways besides the material sense. But also, it means that the Lord may keep His promise to David. The Lord had made a specific promise to David, and the promise was this: "If your descendants watch how they live and if they walk faithfully before Me with all their heart and soul, you will never fail to have a man on the throne of Israel." The Lord had made a very specific promise to David, saying that David was the king of Israel and that David's descendants will be also the kings of Israel.

"Your son will be a king and his son, and his son after him, and his son after him. Your descendants will continue to be the kings if they do these things." This was a promise God made to David, and He was going to fulfill that promise to David's children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren out of respect for David. So David says to Solomon, "Do these things and you're going to get blessed because the Lord made a promise to me. Do these things so that the Lord will keep His promise to me."

It's almost like he's saying, "You can get the benefit of what the Lord promised to me. The Lord made me this promise, but you're going to get to cash in on it. You're going to get to enjoy the benefit. You're going to get to reap the reward and redeem the blessing." I don't play the lottery, and I figure my chances of winning the lottery are only a tiny bit less than someone who does play. But my dad always tells me, "If I win the big one, I'm going to give you this much and your brother this much." Great, but I'm not expecting to get anything.

Since I don't play, I don't have much chance of winning. But my dad says if he wins, he's going to give me some. That's a promise he made to me. It's the same thing here. David is saying, "I got this promise here and you can cash in on it. You're my descendant. If your descendants watch how they live and if they walk faithfully before Me with all their heart and soul, you will never fail to have a man on the throne of Israel."

Now, verse five: "You yourself know what Joab son of Zeruiah did to me—what he did to the two commanders of Israel's armies, Abner son of Ner and Amasa son of Jether. He killed them, shedding their blood in peacetime as if in battle, and with that blood stained the belt around his waist and the sandals on his feet. Deal with him according to your wisdom, but do not let his gray head go down to the grave in peace." He's now addressing these guys—Abner and Amasa—and what happened to them because of Joab.

Abner was a guy who was serving Saul, and when Saul died and David was taking over the kingdom, Abner was working for Ish-bosheth, who was the son of Saul. Ish-bosheth had part of the kingdom, and David had part of the kingdom. Abner was the commander under Ish-bosheth, and Joab was the commander under David. So they were enemies. Abner had come over to David and had agreed to switch over to David's side and had come in peace. He worked out a peace treaty and agreed to bring everyone from his side over to David's side.

David had received him in peace and made a deal with him and sent him away in peace. When Joab heard about it, he wasn't happy—perhaps because he was jealous. He felt like Abner was going to take away some of his authority. But almost certainly a big part of it was because Abner had killed Joab's brother. Joab had a brother and during the fighting, when Abner was working for Ish-bosheth and Joab was working for David, Joab's brother, Asahel, was pursuing Abner. Abner said, "I don't want to harm you. I don't want to hurt you. Stop pursuing me. Leave me alone. Go chase someone else."

He kept telling the kid, "Get lost. Leave me alone." Finally, he didn't have any choice but to kill him. It was a proper killing done in battle. Abner, now having signed a peace treaty with David and agreeing to end the hostilities and coming together in a time of peace, and David sending him away in peace and having reached an agreement with him—Joab didn't like that. He was unhappy about that. Joab ignored that and, in cold blood, murdered Abner even though there was peace between them.

A similar thing happened with Amasa. David had bypassed Joab at one point and put Amasa in charge of a particular part of the army. Joab murdered him as well and shed his blood, and it was not in battle. David did not take Joab's life at that time, but now David is telling his son, "Joab killed these guys. He shed their blood in peacetime as if in battle. Deal with him according to your wisdom, but do not let his gray head go down to the grave in peace."

I've given him a reprieve. I've given him a longer life. I've given him a moratorium on the death penalty. He's had a pardon for a certain period of time. He's had a delay in the execution of judgment on him. He's gotten away with it for this period of time, but he can't get away with it forever. At some point, judgment has to come. Joab was an intensely loyal guy to David, but he also did what he thought was the right thing. He was loyal, but he wasn't real good at following instructions.

He was loyal to David, but he didn't follow orders well. He did what he thought was the right thing to do. By the way, Joab also gave support to Adonijah, Solomon's older brother—another reason for Solomon not to trust the guy. David tells him, "You're a wise guy. You have a lot of wisdom. Just put him on your list and deal with him appropriately." On the other hand, verse seven: "But show kindness to the sons of Barzillai of Gilead and let them be among those who eat at your table. They stood by me when I fled from your brother Absalom."

Barzillai was one of the supporters of him when he was fleeing and helped him out greatly. David wanted Barzillai to come back with him to Jerusalem and wanted him to eat at his table. Barzillai said, "I'm an old man. I can't really make that journey, but remember my family if you don't mind, and my sons, and look after them." David said to Solomon, "Show kindness to this guy's family. They were good to me, and they'll be good to you also."

"And remember you have with you Shimei son of Gera, the Benjamite from Bahurim, who called down bitter curses on me the day I went to Mahanaim. When he came down to meet me at the Jordan, I swore to him by the Lord: 'I will not put you to death by the sword.' But now, do not consider him innocent. You are a man of wisdom. You will know what to do to him. Bring his gray head down to the grave in blood." I like that. "You'll know what to do with him, but just in case you don't, let me tell you: bring his gray head down in blood."

This guy Shimei was a descendant of Saul's family, and he cursed David as he came out. He pelted David and all the king's officials with stones, though all the troops and special guard were on David's right and left. As he cursed, Shimei said, "Get out, get out, you man of blood, you scoundrel! The Lord has repaid you for all the blood you shed in the household of Saul, in whose place you have reigned. The Lord has handed the kingdom over to your son Absalom. You have come to ruin because you are a man of blood."

This guy was cursing David, and he was obviously wrong. He was incorrect because the Lord was not repaying David, and He was not bringing David to ruin. He was incorrect about the Lord handing the kingdom over to Absalom. Nothing he said was right. David was being repaid because of a sin in his life, but the kingdom was restored to David. David is now telling Solomon, "Remember this guy. I promised him I would not kill him with the sword, but I did not promise him that you wouldn't kill him with the sword. I promised him I would not. You have wisdom. You do whatever you think is right."

Then, verse 10: "David rested with his fathers and was buried in the City of David. He had reigned 40 years over Israel—seven years in Hebron and 33 in Jerusalem. So Solomon sat on the throne of his father David, and his rule was firmly established." Here we have the end of David's reign and the beginning of Solomon's reign.

Now, verse 13. Adonijah being up to his old tricks, hasn't learned his lesson. He's up to no good. We see that mankind is basically sinful. I was reading a debate in World Magazine last night. It was a Free Thought debate—the atheist versus the Christian. The atheists call themselves the free thinkers, although there's nothing free about what they think about because they're well-locked into the same old tired arguments. He was saying how much religion has caused all these problems in the world.

The Christian guy said, "Yeah, the Crusades. A few thousand people died in the Crusades and this religious war. A few thousand people died in this religious war, and a few thousand others died in this religious war. But let's just look at how many people died—deaths caused by atheistic regimes in the 20th century. Let's just add up the atheistic regimes. Just take Communist Russia, Nazi Germany, and China. 100 million deaths caused by atheistic regimes just in the last 100 years." That makes all the religious wars small compared to the wars caused by atheistic regimes. People who say religion causes problems in the world—those religious problems pale when compared to the problems of people who don't believe in any religion.

It's funny because the article contrasted this debate, which was held earlier this year, to some debates that were held in the 1800s when they felt that they were on the verge of all these scientific breakthroughs. Darwin had just come out with his theory, and it was going to be the Age of Enlightenment and the Age of Science. All these problems were going to be eliminated and mankind was at the dawn of a new era. So many things were going to be solved. Right around the corner came the 20th century and 100 million people killed in atheistic regimes. More problems, not less. It's interesting to see how the arguments of atheists just go around and around in circles and don't prove anything at all.

Announcer: You've been listening to Hope From the Word. We're currently in the study of 1st Kings. You can hear this message or more Hope From the Word with Pastor Bill Luebkemann by going to ccmarlton.org. Pastor Bill's messages can also be found by downloading the Hope FM app on your smartphone or tablet. Or if you prefer to listen via podcast, you can find Hope From the Word wherever you find your podcasts.

We'd love to have you join us at Calvary Chapel of Marlton, either in person or online. Our Sunday service begins at 10:00 AM, and there's a Wednesday evening service at 7:00. To catch us online, you can subscribe to our YouTube channel at Calvary Chapel of Marlton or just go to our website for the link: ccmarlton.org. And if you would, take a moment to write to Pastor Bill. It would be such a blessing to us. We're thankful each and every time we hear what God is doing in our listeners' lives, and we want to pray for you too. Either email us through the website at ccmarlton.org or call 856-983-1662. We'll continue our study of 1st Kings next time on Hope From the Word with Pastor Bill Luebkemann, a presentation of Calvary Chapel of Marlton.