Like Unto It, But Not It

1 Kings 12:31 “And he made an house of high places, and made priests of the lowest of the people, which were not of the sons of Levi.”

1 Kings 12:32 “And Jeroboam ordained a feast in the eighth month, on the fifteenth day of the month, like unto the feast that is in Judah, and he offered upon the altar. So did he in Bethel, sacrificing unto the calves that he had made: and he placed in Bethel the priests of the high places which he had made.”

1 Kings 12:33 “So he offered upon the altar which he had made in Bethel the fifteenth day of the eighth month, even in the month which he had devised of his own heart; and ordained a feast unto the children of Israel: and he offered upon the altar, and burnt incense.”

I hope and pray God opens your and my eyes to the amazing truths, of which I will barely scratch the surface of, in 1 Kings 12 today.

… In 1 Kings 12, Rehoboam the son of Solomon becomes king. He’s going to be the fourth king in Israel’s history since they started having kings… Saul, David and his father Solomon being those who were king before him.

… The tribes of Israel convene at his coronation to make a request of him that conditions their service to him… “Thy father made our yoke grievous: now therefore make thou the grievous service of thy father, and his heavy yoke which he put upon us, lighter, and we will serve thee.”

What they’re asking Solomon’s son is… “could you just lighten the load a bit?” And it’s a pretty reasonable request. Jesus said his yoke is easy and his burden is light, couldn’t Rehoboam just do that for them? Couldn’t he just take things back to what God wanted and required of the people, not what Solomon his dad had?

You see, things had gotten pretty bad, pretty heavy, under king Solomon’s yoke. It had started so well, at one point it was a blessing to be in the service of God under him… but as Solomon turned away from God, his reign and dominion became very heavy on the people. It became all about him and his name, Solomon himself was very unhappy and unfulfilled despite having everything anyone could ever want in this life… who would want to be under that?

When a government turns away from God, things get bad for the people. And when a church has leadership who turns away from God, and makes being a Christian a heavy, hard and horrible exercise… it’s just time until they rebel against it and throw that off and run to something, or someone, else.

Being saved is a feast! Not a funeral. I love being a Christian, I love what Jesus has done in my life, that doesn’t mean life is always easy… but I have to be careful I’m not in some yoke someone or something else has put on me and not God. …I don’t know if you know what a yoke is, but a yoke is a wooden thingamajig that goes across the oxens neck to make sure they all pull together.

For instance, marriage is described as a yoke, meaning that two become one, and pull together in the same direction and same mind… if you yoke an ox and an ass together it doesn’t go so well, but if you yoke oxen together something will get done. Christians take note!

When the yoke and service and burden gets too heavy, people want to throw it away, and fair enough, anything other than Jesus Christ’s yoke is ultimately unbearable. I wouldn’t want your yoke on my neck nor mine yours. Breaking off the yoke happens all the time in Christianity, just think, somewhere today in someplace some young person who’s grown up in church has grown sick of something that became too heavy for them and they’re going to try a new one that fits and feels a bit better.

Let focus on the story, and we find Rehoboam shows us that stupid people can often occupy positions of leadership. He was so foolish in how he dealt with this, but it also revealed his heart in how he responded, because he could’ve been kind to the people, but instead he was horrible. People are not to use, they’re to love and serve.

Rehoboam had asked the people to give him 3 days to formulate a response… wasn’t very instant in season and out of season, but fair enough I guess! …and so he did what lots of people do when they don’t know what to do… he asked others what he should do.

But if you don’t go to God’s word and instead take a poll from very fallible people in what you should do in big decisions of life, you’re setting yourself up for big problems down the road.

Granted, some people are better than others, and in this case, the old men advised him to be kind and comforting to the people, and listen to their request, but his buddies told him basically to crack the whip and tell them they ain’t seen nothing yet… and he listened to them.

…And the rest is history, because the Bible says that this rough answer caused them to rebel until this day. …Far reaching consequence!

“So when all Israel saw that the king hearkened not unto them, the people answered the king, saying, What portion have we in David? neither have we inheritance in the son of Jesse: to your tents, O Israel: now see to thine own house, David.”

This happens still today.

Look, serving God shouldn’t be a grief to you. Nor should it be made to be a grief. Make sure you aren’t serving people, because they will make it grievous… and then you’ll end up doing what Israel did… you will reject Jesus over man’s stupidity like they rejected David over Rehoboam’s stupidity.

… let that sink in. Because the Bible is profound. You go to church, or grow up in it, or whatever, and you reject Jesus because of what person x does or did. Don’t you think that’s a bit foolish? Doesn’t it show you didn’t know Jesus? It never ceases to amaze me that people throw Jesus out over the actions of someone that doesn’t even know Jesus.

And so the people of Israel found a new person to put their faith and trust in. They ran from Rehoboam into Jeroboam’s arms. …There is a whole market for your controversies and grievances, dear reader. There’s many open arms waiting for disenchanted Christians. Jonah found a ship at Joppa going to Tarshish easy, and you will find something or someone else’s arms to run into to take you further from God’s will, all because yes, people are stupid, but also, you weren’t serving God.

How many people cross the aisle right to left or left to right, probably more the former than the latter, but neither is the solution. You’re meant to look unto Jesus, and even if you’ve had bad experiences under bad leadership, you’re also a sinner, and all that doesn’t excuse you rejecting Christ or your need to know and trust him for yourself “I held him, and would not let him go” Stop holding onto religion and grievances and starting holding onto Christ!

I haven’t even gotten to where I quoted from! Because as you read along, ten tribes of Israel decided to make Jeroboam king and follow him instead. And he gave them an easier version of the same thing, but which was not the same thing, nor the real thing… just a Satanic substitute “having a form of godliness”.

Jeroboam gave the people a religion “like unto” the true service of God. Just read it yourself, it is exactly what he did! Perhaps this is you reader, perhaps you’ve run to something like unto the real thing, but that is not the real thing. Maybe you’ve run from legalistic to lascivious, from fundamental to liberal… or vice versa… you’re still not making progress if it was never about the truth of Christ.

Did you know when you read 1 Kings 12 you get a look inside Jeroboam’s heart too? You can see his motives, that’s what God’s word reveals… the heart, the motives… and the real reason why he gave this religion to them which the Bible says was devised in his heart… not given by God. Watch out for Satan’s devices!

See, from Jeroboam’s perspective in this chapter… Jeroboam got a good deal, he went from being a nobody, just working hard …to being king of ten tribes. And he wanted to keep it that way, he wanted to keep his position, and he was worried what might happen if the people returned back to the real service of God, they might kick him out.

You know all these false churches out there, you know what they are really worried about? You actually getting saved and sold out to God. Yes it’s ironic, because they’re places supposedly in the service of God, as Jeroboam’s religion was, but they fret over you finding the real thing… because when you find the real you realize how bad the false thing is. That’s why they don’t care if you have an NIV or ESV or MSG or whatever… they just don’t want you having the Authorized KJV.

When you find Jesus for yourself, everyone and everything loses it’s grip and control over you. They lose your service because you now serve God. They lose their clout and control. And they would lose their position in your mind and your service in their cause.

The Bible is very clear to say that Jeroboam made a religion that came from his own heart, not from the word of God. If your service of God comes from your heart and is not found in truth, you’re being set up for a fall. Because our heart is deceitful an desperately wicked above all things… it’ll fool you. It will lie to you. It will mislead you.

Jeroboam fashioned his religion so similarly to the true worship of God so that they could say and truly believe they were worshipping the Lord also… even though it was as painfully obvious as could be that it was not, just look at the two calves he put in their cities. How did they never know these calves were wrong? It’s not like the word of God in Exodus didn’t warn them about it… but they had people keeping the Bible from them.

Because guess what else Jeroboam did, he put the lowest of the people as priests. Is that any different today. But why would he do that? He was bringing the standards down wasn’t he. See, you have to remember God is holy above all else, he’s not just like you and I, nor is his service, and when we put the lowest of the people in positions of representing Christ, anything goes now, that’s why you have churches where there is no holiness, purity, judgment, righteousness, truth, doctrine. Men of God in pulpits are not meant to be cool and relatable and likeable, they are meant to be right.

It is serious stuff, because in going from Rehoboam to Jeroboam, the people were no better off. I don’t know what you have today… a Rehoboam or a Jeroboam… both are bad. I hope you are holding Christ. Its understandable getting sick of a heavy legalistic dead church, but it’s also not the solution going into a church that has forsaken the Bible, thrown doctrine out, and the truth is based on doing what your heart tells you not what God says.

Neither side of the see saw is the right place to be. My goal is that you just know Jesus Christ for yourself, serve him, and do it in sincerity and in truth and don’t get taken for a ride by anybody. Smarten up to what people and institution’s motives are in attracting and keeping your membership. Yes they were dedicated, yes they enjoyed serving God that way… no doubt… but the Bible says it was sin. And that’s what matters. I hope the Holy Spirit ministers 1 Kings 12 to you in the way he sees fit… make sure you have IT, not just something like unto it… every collector knows that counterfeits have no value, close though they can be requiring the greatest experts verification, that’s why you need the word of God, only the real thing has worth… God bless you and have a great day.

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