YOUR FINAL ANSWER?
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Opening Prayer
Holy Spirit, fill my heart to overflowing with the truth of the gospel; help me to share its life-saving message with others.
Read 2 CHRONICLES 10:1—11:4
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2 Chronicles
2 Chronicles 10
1 Rehoboam went to Shechem, for all the Israelites had gone there to make him king.
2 When Jeroboam son of Nebat heard this (he was in Egypt, where he had fled from King Solomon), he returned from Egypt.
3 So they sent for Jeroboam, and he and all Israel went to Rehoboam and said to him:
4 “Your father put a heavy yoke on us, but now lighten the harsh labor and the heavy yoke he put on us, and we will serve you.”
5 Rehoboam answered, “Come back to me in three days.” So the people went away.
6 Then King Rehoboam consulted the elders who had served his father Solomon during his lifetime. “How would you advise me to answer these people?” he asked.
7 They replied, “If you will be kind to these people and please them and give them a favorable answer, they will always be your servants.”
8 But Rehoboam rejected the advice the elders gave him and consulted the young men who had grown up with him and were serving him.
9 He asked them, “What is your advice? How should we answer these people who say to me, ‘Lighten the yoke your father put on us’?”
10 The young men who had grown up with him replied, “Tell the people who have said to you, ‘Your father put a heavy yoke on us, but make our yoke lighter’-tell them, ‘My little finger is thicker than my father’s waist.
11 My father laid on you a heavy yoke; I will make it even heavier. My father scourged you with whips; I will scourge you with scorpions.'”
12 Three days later Jeroboam and all the people returned to Rehoboam, as the king had said, “Come back to me in three days.”
13 The king answered them harshly. Rejecting the advice of the elders,
14 he followed the advice of the young men and said, “My father made your yoke heavy; I will make it even heavier. My father scourged you with whips; I will scourge you with scorpions.”
15 So the king did not listen to the people, for this turn of events was from God, to fulfill the word the LORD had spoken to Jeroboam son of Nebat through Ahijah the Shilonite.
16 When all Israel saw that the king refused to listen to them, they answered the king: “What share do we have in David, what part in Jesse’s son? To your tents, O Israel! Look after your own house, O David!” So all the Israelites went home.
17 But as for the Israelites who were living in the towns of Judah, Rehoboam still ruled over them.
18 King Rehoboam sent out Adoniram, who was in charge of forced labor, but the Israelites stoned him to death. King Rehoboam, however, managed to get into his chariot and escape to Jerusalem.
19 So Israel has been in rebellion against the house of David to this day.
2 Chronicles 11
1 When Rehoboam arrived in Jerusalem, he mustered the house of Judah and Benjamin-a hundred and eighty thousand fighting men-to make war against Israel and to regain the kingdom for Rehoboam.
2 But this word of the LORD came to Shemaiah the man of God:
3 “Say to Rehoboam son of Solomon king of Judah and to all the Israelites in Judah and Benjamin,
4 ‘This is what the LORD says: Do not go up to fight against your brothers. Go home, every one of you, for this is my doing.'” So they obeyed the words of the LORD and turned back from marching against Jeroboam.
Reflect
What is your strategy for making decisions?
Rehoboam’s succession seemingly went smoothly, but his honeymoon was short-lived. A rival emerged, not from within the family but from outside. Jeroboam used Solomon’s death to return from banishment in Egypt1 and to challenge the status quo. Resentment, which had been building, now found a release valve through him. It was a time for a new start and a new attitude. The delegation made it clear that while Solomon was a great king, he had taken a great deal from the people, and it was time to rebalance the resources. Rehoboam wisely deferred making an immediate response and instead sought counsel from both the older, experienced figures in the nation and among his own contemporaries. Unsurprisingly, they had quite polarized views. However, Rehoboam had already made up his mind.
He wanted to be seen as a tough king rather than a servant king. His adversarial response showed how far his lifestyle had isolated him from the people and how much he lived within the echo chamber of his own prejudices. Modern politicians in the UK are accused today of living in the Westminster bubble, with little awareness of the problems people face or the impact of their policies on daily life. How grateful we are that our King came down to our level and ‘made his dwelling among us.’2
With a few rash words, the immature king opened the door for four hundred years of strife, weakness, and, eventually, the destruction of the entire nation. His response ignited the flame of rebellion, and the nation became divided by civil war. Ten tribes sided with Jeroboam in the north, and two tribes (with Levi) sided with Rehoboam in the south. God’s prophet prevented the matter from escalating instantly into all-out war, and for a time, an uneasy truce existed between the two rival forces.
Apply
‘Life is a matter of choices, and every choice makes you.’3 Let us learn to choose wisely today.
Closing prayer
Father, I ask that you give me wisdom to make right choices and not simply endorse the choices I have already made.
1 1 Kings 11:26—40 2 John 1:14 3 John C Maxwell, Success is a Choice (HarperCollins Leadership, 2020), 4.
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