Today’s passage: 1 Kings 12:16-33
Helpful thoughts:
- Israel (The northern 10 tribes) came to that announcement prepared to abandon the king.
- Adoram was the man who represented the very things for which Israel left Rehoboam’s rule. The king was either being very foolish, or he was using Adoram as a litmus test to feel out just how serious Israel was about seceding. Either way, he learned just how serious they were and he fled.
- The tribe of Benjamin was split between the two kingdoms.
- God had just given Jeroboam a kingdom, evidently he did not trust God to preserve it for him.
Questions to consider:
- Where have we seen the idea of the golden calf before (Exodus 32:4)? What was Jeroboam’s motivation for making these calves, replacing the feasts, and making priests from every tribe? What was the real purpose for the creation of this new false religion?
- Why was this new religious practice destructive, even though it was initially patterned after the real thing? Once man decided it could be altered, who was now in control?
- How was the history of Israel (And now the kingdom of Judah) trending? Are things getting better or worse? Were the problems from without or from within? Is there a man among the twelve tribes that can right all these wrongs? What are the repeated failings of all Israel supposed to help us to see? What kind of Messiah do we need?