-When He Comes to His Throne. 8th August, 2009   Small Voice     “I, therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you to walk worthy of the calling with which you were called, with all lowliness and gentleness, with longsuffering, bearing with one another in love, endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.”  (Ephesians 4:1-3)       Our Attitude when We Approach the Bible     Let’s think about the words, “God saw that it was good.” If you refer to these words when talking to people who read the Bible, many will think of the time of the creation when everything was being put in order and it was all good and beautiful in God’s eyes. Those who read the Bible a little more carefully, however, and are aware of the matter of our spirits-a matter that is hidden away in the Bible-and the change that can take place in our hearts through the Bible will be able to receive a certain assurance from these words, “God saw that it was good.” They may have the assurance when they came to believe God’s word, God, who looks at them through the cross of Jesus Christ, was pleased.     If the words, “God saw that it was good,” only appeared on the first, or perhaps the last day of the account of the creation, things would have been a little simpler. On the first day of the creation, it says, “Let there be light”; and there was light. And God saw the light, that it was good.” Then on the last day when everything had been created, if it had just said that “God saw that it was good,” we could simply have thought of these words as marking the beginning and the end. Our lives, too, would be a little simpler. We would need to think only about the beginning and the end. The problem is that in the process of the heavens and the earth being created, it says at various times that God saw that it was good. In Proverbs, too, it says, “Then I was beside Him as a master craftsman; and I was daily His delight, rejoicing always before Him” (Proverbs 8:30). Jesus became the delight of God the Father, and, as the Lord of creation, He rejoiced in His heart as He looked at all that He had created.     The history of Israel is related to the process of the creation of the earth and has unfolded with respect to the order of events of the creation. Through the Bible, we can see the process by which this nation developed in this world: how the promise that was given to Abraham was fulfilled in Isaac and Jacob, and how as a nation their descendants escaped from Egypt under the leadership of Moses. Through the Israelites, we can discover an image of ourselves and we can come to know the God who is watching over each one of us individually. When we come to understand these matters, a problem becomes solved in our hearts.     The question is, however, what about the problems that we face in our present lives? I live in this world with the assurance of faith in my heart and God’s word upholding me, but it is not simply a case of reading the Bible and living by faith. We know for sure that behind this, there is something called fellowship surrounding us. So what image do we find of ourselves in the Bible?     The passages that we examine from now on are a lesson to each of us individually. Each of us needs to examine his or herself in the light of the Bible. When we gather together in order to obey Jesus Christ’s command to “love one another” (John 13:34)-whether we refer to our gathering as “fellowship” or “church”-in the midst of this life that we live together as born-again Christians, we need to think about how to uncover an image of ourselves individually.     We are about to examine the content of First Kings. First Kings does not mark the beginning or the end of a particular story. Chapters 1 and 2 of First Kings deal with several events just before the death of David, King of Israel, who had served God all his life, and just before the ascension to the throne of Solomon, David’s son. Several incidents occurred in the process of the sovereign power over Israel being passed from David to Solomon, and these are recorded here. If you simply read through these chapters, they appear to be analogous with events you would expect to find in some historical novel or drama. A certain conspiracy is hidden away behind the political events, making it an exciting read. Most of the content of First Kings chapters 1 and 2 is omitted from the Books of Chronicles. If we examine First Kings chapters 1 and 2 very carefully, however, we are able to understand more deeply the content that appears from chapter 3 and in Second Kings.     We are about to take a look at First and Second Samuel first, in order to examine the beginnings of the events in First Kings. In First Samuel, we read of the childhood of the prophet by the name of Samuel and the story continues to tell of how, as an adult, he appeared as a judge amongst the Israelites. The king by the name of Saul also appears there, as does the young man by the name of David. At the end of First Samuel, we read the account of how David killed Goliath and King Saul’s emotional struggles as he became jealous of David’s growing popularity and pursued him continually.     Second Samuel begins with the words, “Now it came to pass after the death of Saul.” Second Samuel depicts the events in the life of David once he became king of Israel. It is not the image of David’s younger days that we find in First Samuel, but the image of the adult King David, and this we need to examine carefully, since he is a shadow of Jesus. In particular, David is a shadow of Jesus as God the Son who appeared to the Israelites in order to fulfil the Law, suffered and was crucified. Then, Solomon, the main character at the beginning of First Kings, presents us with an image of Jesus when He comes in His glory in order to judge the world, as the Bible says, “Ought not the Christ to have suffered these things and to enter into His glory?” (Luke 24:26).     When Solomon was king, there were two women, both of whom bore a son, and one of the babies died. As the two women were arguing over who was the mother of the living child, Solomon said that the child should be cut precisely in two, and through his command, it was revealed who the true mother was. (See 1 Kings 3) When it comes to this incident, we should not think simply that Solomon prayed to God and received wisdom in dealing with this situation. Of course, the Bible tells us that when Solomon asked God for wisdom rather than gold or silver, God gave him everything. Ultimately, however, this image of Solomon presents us with a picture of Jesus when He comes to this world in His glory and judges the nations, making a clear division between the sheep and the goats-when He comes as King of kings. Nevertheless, since both David and Solomon were only human, they made their mistakes and had their failures.     The chapters that we will be examining now-First Kings chapters 1 and 2-deal with the period of time just before David came to the end of his life of serving God as King of Israel, and his son, Solomon, took over as king. We read here about some incidents that occurred at that time, in the process of the sovereign power of Israel being passed to Solomon.     The incidents described in First Kings chapters 1 and 2 was a very sensitive one. I read these chapters several times as I thought about their content. When I first read these passages, everything seemed quite straightforward. In certain respects, I entertained only very elementary thoughts such as, “I mustn’t behave in this way,” and “People like this should not be allowed to appear amongst us.”     This is only a short text, but as I examined it further and thought about the words spoken by David in these two chapters, the things that David said to Solomon, and Solomon’s first actions after he became king, I became curious as to why David gave these commands to Solomon before he died and told him to be sure to do as he told him. It was then that I came to understand through the content of Second Samuel that this provides a very pointed message for us today in our lives as born-again Christians and for the fellowship of which we are a part.     This is not simply an account of events in the course of the history of Israel or of past events in the history of the world. The words of the New Testament-gospel verses that we know so well, verses about eternal redemption-still seem fresh, real and alive to us when we read them. Yet events recorded in the Old Testament within the history of Israel long ago, do not seem very close to our present reality. They seem somewhat distant from the truth that accomplished within our hearts, and we read the Bible with thoughts that are connected to a different period in time. Even though this part of the Old Testament contains an account of events that were recorded about three thousand years ago, however, they are the words of the living God, and so we cannot help but acknowledge that they are also addressed to us as we live our lives today.     Some complex characters appear in these chapters with names such as Adonijah, Joab, Abiathar the priest, Abner, Amasa, and Shimei. As we read about these people, if we start thinking about who they resemble from amongst the people we know, we will miss things of far greater importance. As we read these passages, it is more helpful to think about what God is saying to us through these words.     The Heart of David who had been Accepting Joab     Let’s read from first Kings chapter 1.       “Now King David was old, advanced in years; and they put covers on him, but he could not get warm. Therefore his servants said to him, ‘Let a young woman, a virgin, be sought for our lord the king, and let her stand before the king, and let her care for him; and let her lie in your bosom, that our lord the king may be warm.’ So they sought for a lovely young woman throughout all the territory of Israel, and found Abishag the Shunammite, and brought her to the king. The young woman was very lovely; and she cared for the king, and served him; but the king did not know her.”  (1 Kings 1:1-4)       As David grew old, he began to feel the cold, so a woman was brought to him. At that time, David already had several wives, but this woman was not a wife to him; her role was to attend to him and keep him warm. First Kings begins with this account.       “Then Adonijah the son of Haggith exalted himself, saying, ‘I will be king’; and he prepared for himself chariots and horsemen, and fifty men to run before him. (And his father had not rebuked him at any time by saying, ‘Why have you done so?’ He was also very good-looking. His mother had borne him after Absalom.)”  (1 Kings 1:5-6)       Haggith was one of David’s wives and her son, Adonijah was David’s fourth son. Absalom was David’s third son and was born to him by a different wife. Second Samuel tells how Absalom’s younger sister, Tamar, was raped by their elder brother Amnon. Absalom harbored a grievance against him in his heart and several years later he killed Amnon. From that time on, Absalom’s heart began to change. He fled to the place where his maternal grandfather was a tribal leader, and then, several years later, he returned and mustered an army. He created some political power for himself, raised a rebellion and made it necessary for David to flee from Jerusalem.     This happened after David had made the mistake of arranging for Uriah who was husband of Bathsheba to be killed in battle. I do not know whether it was because of this, but things happened in the course of David’s life, which do not seem to make sense. He even had to deal with his own son rising up against him and seizing his sovereign power.     In the end, however, Absalom died, and David returned to Jerusalem and lived out the rest of his reign from there. But then, the next of his sons, Adonijah had his eye on the throne. David had definitely promised that Solomon was to be his successor; he had told Solomon this in advance. Even so, Adonijah raised himself up.       Then he conferred with Joab the son of Zeruiah and with Abiathar the priest, and they followed and helped Adonijah. But Zadok the priest, Benaiah the son of Jehoiada, Nathan the prophet, Shimei, Rei, and the mighty men who belonged to David were not with Adonijah.  (1 Kings 1:7-8)       When Adonijah, disregarding David’s wishes, rose up to seize the sovereign power after David, there were people who rushed in to join him. Amongst these people, the first name that is recorded is that of Joab, the son of Zeruiah. Zeruiah was David’s older sister, making Joab his nephew. This man by the name of Joab appears again and again in the book of Second Samuel. He stood beside David, and carried out precisely all the work that needed to be done. In this way, he carried out some really important work, and yet he was like a thorn in David’s side. He was a merciless man who would kill without hesitation at the slightest provocation or when a situation was not to his liking. There is no way we can understand him if we judge him by our present moral standards.     It is also difficult for us to understand how David accept Joab. David is one of the most well-known of the people who appear in the Bible. Since he was born of the house of Judah, was the first king that was prophesied, and was accepted by the Israelites, when we read the Bible, we take his side. Consequently, even though we are reading the Bible, we tend to think simply that David acted as he did because he was kind-hearted.     When we consider this, however, first we need to think about what kind of person Joab was (since he participated in Adonijah’s rebellion), what he had done in the past, and what thoughts were flowing through David’s mind to make him accept Joab continually. Without understanding this, it is impossible for us to accept the brothers and sisters around us in our present time. At times, it is helpful to take a look inside the minds of people like David who appear in the Bible. We need to think about the kind of heart that David must have had in order that, in his position, he was able to continue to protect and watch over people like this who were like thorns in his side.     Considering these events as they unfold like a historic novel, the many incidents that occurred against the backdrop of Israel, and all the complex emotional relationships, what significance do all these hold for us as Christians living in our present time? The Bible is not just the words of God recorded for the Jews to read; hidden away within these words, there is definitely the wisdom we need in our lives today to deal with the many emotions th

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