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[0:00] 1 Kings, 1 Kings chapter 10, 1 Kings chapter 10. 1 Kings chapter 10, as we just continue to make our way through Scripture, and we're in the process of making our way through the book of 1 Kings.

[0:16] We've covered a lot of ground over the last several years, and we're covering a lot of ground in the life of Solomon, in particular right now, in 1 Kings chapter 10.

[0:27] And we will pray, we'll get started, we'll kind of put it in context for us, and then we'll get right into our text. Our text will be the entire chapter, so several verses there, but something that needs to be read in bulk.

[0:42] So let's pray. Lord, thank you so much. Thank you for this day, God. Just thank you for just the opportunity we have of fellowship. Thank you for the opportunity we have of encouragement by spending time with brothers and sisters in Christ.

[0:58] Lord, thank you for the time we have to get into the Word of God with one another, to study it, to open it up, and to read it, to see what it has to say, not only in times past, but what it has to say for us today.

[1:11] God, we pray that you be with all that goes on throughout this building, throughout this place this evening. Lord Jesus, we ask that you be glorified in the teaching and the fellowship of the saints.

[1:21] We ask that you be exalted among our youth and our children. We just ask that in all things, you get all the glory and honor and all the recognition, and we ask it all in Jesus' name.

[1:33] Amen. Amen. You know, Wednesdays are becoming an exciting time at War Trace Baptist Church. It is always kind of chaotic, and I like the chaos. I feed off the chaos, so that's good.

[1:46] But when we start seeing all the kids running around and things of that nature. 1 Kings chapter 10. Okay, at this point, we're quite a ways into the reign of Solomon. Solomon is at least 24 years into his reign.

[2:03] In the fourth year of Solomon's reign, Solomon, the son of David through Bathsheba. Okay, we're going to get all this setting in right context so that we can hopefully understand what's going on.

[2:15] Solomon is a king of peace. He's not a king of war. His father, David, was a man of war, but also described as a man after God's own heart.

[2:26] Solomon is a man of peace and prosperity. The kingdom is expanding under his reign. Thanks in large part to the victories of David and the alliances of David and the respect that many people had for David.

[2:40] But he fulfills a great role in the nation of Israel in that God uses him to construct the temple of which David had a vision after the great sin of David of numbering the people near the end of his life.

[2:55] So Solomon, in the fourth year of his reign, begins construction on the temple of the Lord. You know you've heard it, and I'll keep saying it over and over again. One of the great wonders of the ancient world took seven years to construct the temple.

[3:08] Then he began to work on his own house, and it took 13 years to build the palace. So it was a 20-year construction project. In the 24th year of his reign, they dedicate the temple because while the house construction was going on or the palace construction was going on, they're also constructing the furnishings and things of that nature to go inside the temple.

[3:32] The Shekinah glory of God falls in the temple. They have this great worship service. They have a 14-day celebration rather than just a 7th-day celebration. They really have this great festival where they're sacrificing and worshiping, and Solomon is praying, and he's on his knees with his hands outstretched to heaven, and God speaks to him for the second time.

[3:51] He hears the voice of God the second time. He hears it when he comes upon the throne. If you remember so many chapters ago, Solomon was probably in his upper teens, anywhere between 16 to 18, when he ascended the throne and was given such charge of the nation, and God said, what do you want from me?

[4:12] You know, ask anything you want, and he asked for wisdom. God granted the wisdom. He said, I'm going to also give you what you don't ask for. I'm going to give you wealth and honor and all these things. Then God puts his condition on there, and I'll give you longevity of life and reign if you will follow me and walk in all the ways of your father David.

[4:29] Conditional covenant there. So Solomon does this. He's praising, and God speaks to him again and reaffirms this covenant and in the reaffirmation of it, it says the same thing, that, you know, you'll have a long reign.

[4:42] One of your children, one of your descendants will not fail to reign upon the throne of your father David if you will follow me and obey me with all of your heart, with all of your mind. So there's the condition attached.

[4:54] I say all this because the 10th chapter is really, we see Solomon in all of his height and all of his popularity, but we're one chapter removed from what happens in chapter 11, and that's the great falling away.

[5:05] So we want to see all these things in our proper context because this is where Solomon's at. His faith hasn't been tested on the battlefield. Rather, his faith is tested in the ease of prosperity, which quite honestly is one of the harder tests.

[5:21] The old saying in the military are there are no atheists in foxholes because when the bullets are flying and things are desperate and people cry out to something or someone.

[5:34] But yet in those moments of ease and those moments of prosperity and those moments of comfort seem to be where Satan does his greatest work. And that's where the trial that Solomon is facing is being battled.

[5:49] And if we're just bone-level honest, that's where most of us face our greatest trials too. It is in the joys and the pleasures and concerns of this life.

[6:03] And we see the wisest man in all of Scripture who is battling on that same front. So I want you to see in 1 Kings chapter 10 the popularity of King Solomon.

[6:15] Remember, last time we were together, Sunday night, if you were here, we reaffirmed that Solomon was a good king. Great king, really.

[6:27] If you look at his economical impact, his military impact, his expansion, he's a good king. But being a good king and even a great king does not necessarily mean he is a faithful man.

[6:41] Right? But we see here, not only is he good, he's also very popular. So we see in the 10th chapter. Now when the queen of Sheba heard about the fame of Solomon concerning the name of the Lord, she came to test him with difficult questions.

[6:56] So she came to Jerusalem with a very large retinue with camels carrying spices and very much gold and precious stones. And when she came to Solomon, she spoke with him about all that was in her heart.

[7:07] And Solomon answered all her questions. Nothing was hidden from the king which he did not explain to her. When the queen of Sheba perceived all the wisdom of Solomon, the house that he had built, the food of his table, the seating of his servants, the attendance of his waiters and their attire, his cupbearers and his stairway by which he went up to the house of the Lord, there was no more spirit in her.

[7:30] Then she said to the king, It was a true report which I heard in my own land about your words and your wisdom. Nevertheless, I did not believe the report until I came and my eyes had seen it. And behold, the half was not told me.

[7:41] You exceed in wisdom and prosperity the report which I heard. How blessed are your men. How blessed are those who, these, your servants who stand before you continually and hear your wisdom.

[7:53] Blessed be the Lord, your God, who delighted in you to set you on the throne of Israel because the Lord loved Israel forever. Therefore, he made you king to do justice and righteousness. She gave the king 120 talents of gold and a very great amount of spices and precious stones.

[8:09] Never again did so much abundance of spices come in as that which the queen of Sheba gave king Solomon. Also, the ships of Hiram which brought gold from Ophir brought in from Ophir a very great number of almond trees and precious stones.

[8:25] The king made of the almond trees supports for the house of the Lord and for the king's house also lyres and hearts for the singers. Such almond trees have not come in again nor have they been seen to this day.

[8:37] King Solomon gave to the queen of Sheba all her desire which she requested besides what he gave her according to her royal bounty. Then she returned and went to her own land together with her servants.

[8:51] Now the weight of gold which came into Solomon in one year was 666 talents of gold. Besides that from the traders and the wares of merchants and all the kings of the Arabs and the governors of the country, King Solomon made 200 large shields of beaten gold using 600 shekels of gold on each large shield.

[9:13] He made 300 shields of beaten gold using three minas of gold on each shield and the king put them in the house of the forest of Lebanon. Moreover, the king made a great throne of ivory and overlaid it with refined gold.

[9:27] There were six steps to the throne and a round top on the throne to the throne at its rear and arms on each side of the seat and two lions standing beside the arms. Twelve lions were standing there on the six steps on the one side and on the other.

[9:42] Nothing like it was made for any other kingdom. All King Solomon's drinking vessels were of gold and all the vessels of the house of the forest of Lebanon were of pure gold.

[9:54] None was of silver. It was not considered valuable in the days of Solomon for the king had at sea the ships of Tarshish with the ships of Hiram.

[10:04] Once every three years the ships of Tarshish came bringing gold and silver ivory and apes and peacocks. So King Solomon became greater than all the kings of the earth in riches and in wisdom.

[10:18] And all the earth was seeking the presence of Solomon to hear his wisdom which God had put in his heart. They brought every man his gift articles of silver and gold garments weapons spices horses and mules so much year by year.

[10:32] Now Solomon gathered chariots and horsemen and he had 1,400 chariots and 12,000 horsemen and he stationed them in the chariot cities with the king of Jerusalem.

[10:44] The king made silver as common as stones in Jerusalem and he made cedar as plentiful as sycamore trees that are in the lowland. Also Solomon's import of horses was from Egypt and Q and the king's merchants produced them from Q for a price or purchased them or procured them from Q for a price.

[11:03] A chariot was imported from Egypt for 600 shekels of silver and a horse for 150 and by the same means they exported them to all the kings of the Hittites and the kings of the Arameans.

[11:16] Here we see the popularity of King Solomon. No other king is the nation of Israel seen and no other king will the nation of Israel see like King Solomon. What a good king he was and what popularity he enjoyed not just in his own land but really on a large scale.

[11:35] The nation of Israel Solomon's their third king and my how far they've come. The first king we see is the people's king we see Saul who is made king that's the man that was head and shoulders taller than everybody else and everybody looked at him and said he's got to be king it was the people's choice.

[11:51] The second king was David and that was God's choice and now here we have Solomon who is everybody's choice. Everybody loves Solomon. He is very popular among the nations.

[12:02] He is very popular within his own nation except for we see some disgruntledness later on. We'll see that very quickly as God begins to raise up adversaries to him and some of the adversaries will be people from in his own land who felt the weight of his popularity by being overburdened with labor.

[12:22] So we'll get to that. But here we see the popularity of King Solomon and hopefully we'll also see the danger that it has for us today by way of application because we're not just looking at some things that took place in past history.

[12:36] We're looking at past historical events which God has ordained that we would study in present sense. So there has to be an application. What we have in scripture is not a complete record of history.

[12:50] We have in scripture the record of God's interactions with man throughout history. And so there are things that we can learn and things that we can be amazed about. Before we really get into the text we must be reminded with all the popularity and with all the wonder with everything else like that Jesus refers to this event and reminds us and we need to stand in wonder of this that when the queen of Sheba came and stood in awe and wonder of all that Solomon possessed Jesus says that God closed the flowers of the field with greater splendor than King Solomon.

[13:25] So as great and as wondrous as observing him may have been let us never go oh I wish I could have seen it when we have the opportunity each and every day to see God do wondrous and far above and beyond right before our eyes as we look upon his creation which testifies to his greatness.

[13:43] The only reason we would think oh that would be amazing to see is because we would fall into the same trap and many people did and be overwhelmed with the man and forget to look at the provider of the man. So here we see the popularity of King Solomon.

[13:57] Number one we see the attraction of his wisdom the attraction of his wisdom. The queen of Sheba did not desire to come see Solomon because Solomon was a wealthy man.

[14:09] Very clearly from the text the queen of Sheba was pretty wealthy herself. She had a large retinue she had 120 shekels of silver that's about two and a half tons she had about five thousand pounds not silver of gold that she brought to Solomon that's quite a bit of money right?

[14:26] She had all the spices and all the other wares and all the other goods so she wasn't drawn by his wealth she had enough wealth of her own but the one thing that she kept hearing about the text tells us that when the queen of Sheba heard of everything that was going on in Solomon concerning the name of the Lord right?

[14:45] so it wasn't his testimony that he was proclaiming the name of the Lord it was what the Lord God had done for Solomon and the reason we know that the wisdom is what she is seeking is because she comes with riddles she comes with all these hard sayings some translations say some say difficult questions but she came with these riddles and she began to pose them to Solomon and it tells us that he began to answer them one by one by one and there wasn't one thing hidden from him so we see that that which God had gifted him with his wisdom was the very thing that was beginning to attract attention from around the world at least in his known world there she came and she wanted to see this man who was supposedly so wise and supposedly could answer any difficult question and supposedly had an answer for everything because the Lord his God had given this information or this wisdom to him and the word tells us that he answered every question every difficult saying every hard question he did it and over again and we're reminded later in the text that as he began to prosper and as he began to enlarge the nation of Israel and he began to enlarge their territory it says and all the kings or all the kingdoms were seeking

[15:59] Solomon's wisdom it was the wisdom that was attracting the nations now when we look at that we can see that the very thing that God gave him the gift of wisdom was that what is what was being used as an attractive agent so God's giftedness was drawing the nations to him that's a wonderful thing because God has called his people to be bearers of his glory to display his what it looks like to walk in covenantal relationship with him in the Old Testament in particular God had promised gifts and blessings upon individuals and upon the nation of Israel and upon tribes and upon clans and he said and I would do it so that the world would take notice right remember this concept scripture okay one of the most gracious things that

[17:01] God ever did was call Abram out of the land of the era of the chaldeans that's gracious and the reason it's gracious is because Abram is just one man in the land of the era of the chaldeans which is the birthplace of idolatry who's running around worshiping all these other false idols just like everybody else and he's blending into the crowd until God calls him Abram doesn't do anything that earned the favor of God Abram doesn't do anything to make God choose him in grace God called Abram I love the story of Abram by the way it's so instrumental in scripture you say Abram yeah Abraham we're not to Abraham yet so Abram at this point right you'll bear with me as we see this application okay at least I hope you do he calls him out and we know there's some delay there and we wonder why because if you look at it God says come follow me you and your household right take Sarai your barren wife and you come follow me into the land that I will show you but there's a delay because

[18:07] Abram goes to Haran about halfway and stops it's not until we open up the book of Acts that we find out why he stopped and the reason he stopped is because he took his father along with him too and then it says when we open up our text that after his dad died Genesis chapter 12 God reappeared to him again and reaffirmed this covenant I chose you right because we have this tendency that when God's calling us we want to bring other people along too because God's calling all of us right he's not just calling us and that's how God called him to leave behind and to trust him and Abram said well maybe if I take dad along maybe if I take my nephew along maybe if I do all this right because Lot's with him who causes greater problems later on by the way that would be Lot right Abram has to rescue him after the king's defeat anyway God was calling Abram and he wanted to make a nation out of Abram but Abram's half obedience led to this great delay but God is so patient God is so faithful God waits until his dad dies and he says okay now let me take you the rest of the way and he goes the rest of the way he comes into what we now call the promised land that's gracious because God is calling a man to make a nation and the reason he's calling a man to make a nation is so that the nations with an S will see a difference in the nation of

[19:24] Israel and be drawn to worship God he wants to so bless the old man and the barren wife that people have to step up and take notice right and he so chooses the most unlikely individual so that when these things take place man all of a sudden people begin to notice that God is doing something right and out of Abram comes the descendants that can't be numbered and God is showing his glory he's showing his wonder and you say I thought we were in kings stay with me God is displaying this so that the nations will come to him that's the beauty of the old testament that we find transferred to the church in the new testament right we exist so that the nations will know what it looks like to walk in relationship with the holy God now we have go fast forward all these years here's the man Solomon that all the nations are attracted to his wisdom and they're seeing his wisdom and they want to know about his wisdom but all they do is they walk away and go man that guy is smart did you see the gold on his table did you see how his servants were dressed did you see the staircase that he ascended to go to his throne do you notice this because this is our second thing the first thing is the attraction of his wisdom number two is the acknowledgement or the yeah the acknowledgement of the witnesses the queen of Sheba said when I heard the report I didn't believe it but when I came half of the truth wasn't even told me it so far exceeds and she saw how his descendants his descendants served him she saw how they were dressed she noticed the table that he said it with all the gold flatware right she noticed how he walked up these grand steps this throne like nobody else I mean pure ivory overlaid with gold I mean do we really need that I mean you know she noticed no other king has this and so now all of a sudden she's not overwhelmed with the presence of

[21:41] Jehovah because what's going on is the presence of Solomon is beginning to exceed the reality of the Lord God and the acknowledgement of those who witnessed it was man that guy knows a lot but they don't say because I think scripture scripture is just as powerful in what it doesn't say as opposed as not only as what it does say we don't want to split hairs and read things into text but we noticed that he was gifted these things because of the Lord but nobody leaves talking about the Lord they all leave talking about Solomon let's bring it up to modern day times in case we wonder if this still happens today that is when the recipient of the gift and even the gift becomes more important than the giver of the gift when the messenger of the gospel becomes more popular than the gospel he preaches we're in trouble right the reason we see so much happening in churches today we use the term churches loosely there we see so many mega church and mega pastors failing is because the popularity of the individual begins to exceed the message that he's declaring and quite often if you listen to it you don't really want to follow the message anyway and I'm not going to name names I'm not one of those guys it's just that's the reality when you begin to put any messenger ahead of the message you're in trouble you really are I remember I was a new believer not not very long in faith but I was already kind of wrestling with this God was calling me to some kind of ministry somehow and I knew he kind of wanted me to teach and at that time I was young so I thought it'd be a cool youth teacher we worked for youth forever but I thought I would never get old so I'd always be this cool youth teacher right and so I didn't know what that looked like and and I had I was actually between jobs I was getting ready to start another job so I had a few days there so I went hung out with our pastor who's my mentor in the faith and I thought man it's gonna be cool I'm gonna go hang out with the pastor I wonder what pastors do it was I was like I just don't know what pastors do you know I was I was so young in the faith I didn't know I was like it's so cool I get to go hang out with him so I went to his office and he looked at me he said hey we got to go up on this hill here there's it's called strawberry mountain I don't know the exact name of it he said we got to go up that mountain because I lost my glasses yesterday digging for rocks with one of our deacons so you know what I did with the pastor all day I walked around the woods looking for his glasses that's what we did we prayed before we left we never found his glasses but I mean that's how I hung out with this pastor right this great man of

[24:40] God because he lost his glasses and so we walked around in the woods all day long looking for his glasses I'd love to tell you we had some like great spiritual encounters up there but we didn't it was hot it was miserable and it just wasn't that fun and I was like man can't you just keep your glasses you know not sit them down anywhere but I realized right then that that pastor is just a man just like everybody else right and the message messages he was declaring were speaking to my heart but it wasn't because he was something other than that it's just because he was the vehicle that God was using so we run danger there but we also run danger listen and this happens in our culture so much when those who sing the praises of God become more popular than the very praises they're singing when the performance gets greater than the praise it's what happens in so many of our churches right and we're not here to bash it we're not here to beat it we're just we're just saying that we need to be reminded of it now I believe there's a vehicle for praise for every genre and every every generation and I'm one of those one time you know I've listened to Christian rap over the years and I've done just about every genre of Christian music and I had a gentleman old school old line thing one time he looked at me he goes he said well you wouldn't want a man drive a garbage truck to come pick your daughter up and take her on a date would you and I looked at him I said you know if that garbage truck is all he had and he really loves my daughter then

[25:59] I would let him drive a garbage truck to pick up my daughter and take her on a date it was my way of saying that if this genre is music is all that the guy is all that the people will listen to and God can use it to speak to their hearts and minds and the truth of it I said because I can promise you I read every lyric before I ever recommend a song to anybody and some people may disagree with my I don't know what my study of music there on that because I haven't really studied it but I said you know we have to be careful the vehicles we limit that God can use but when the performer gets greater than the praise then all of a sudden we're in trouble and it's like that when any distribution of the gift gets greater than the giver of the gift we're in trouble right when people leave and they walk the greatest testimony that we can ever have when anybody comes to our service or comes into our church will be people even go man the Lord was in that place right we have to be careful there if we if they leave go all those people were friendly and they were loving and we want them to say all that but if they never leave talking about the Lord then we haven't really worshipped because the acknowledgement of the witnesses of Solomon was man he knows a lot but they never say anything they say very little about the temple of the Lord what I tell you it's one of the great wonders of the ancient world they don't even talk about it they talk more about his table and his steps than they do about the temple wow it's amazing right so we we see the attraction of his wisdom the acknowledgement of the witnesses number three we're looking at the popularity of

[27:33] Solomon look at the acquiring of his great wealth Solomon's a wealthy man and I don't think it's coincidental that the amount of gold that came into Solomon's reign every year was 666 talents that number 666 means something in scripture for that's the number of man right he was full of man he had all that man could ever want he was the greatest of men at that time and he was just acquiring all this wealth because not only did the queen of Sheba bring more spices than had ever been brought he also had the ships of Hiram who were out there bringing all these trees and these almond trees and they were making musical instruments sure they were giving them to the musicians but that's cool they were speaking more of the trees that were being made to make the instruments than they were the praise that were being sang on the instruments he had all this stuff that was coming in and all this this stuff I mean they were bringing in peacocks right why do you bring a peacock in the nation of Israel unless you just want to say I got everything in case you wonder if that's what he was doing read the book of Ecclesiastes he was saying I got everything and he had all this stuff he was acquiring all this well and one of the things that God told in the book of Deuteronomy that the king should not do was amassed wealth they shouldn't do it but he was he was just acquiring and acquiring and acquiring and God also says that they should not amass horses and he does and God had also said well even if you do get horses don't go back to Egypt to buy the horses he goes to Egypt buy the horses because the Egyptian horses were better than anybody else's and the nation of Israel knew that firsthand it was their chariots who traced them all the way to the Red Sea but you know God has a way of overcoming those horses and chariots because he can part the waters and and put them back real quick so it doesn't really matter how good your chariot is if they can't swim underwater if they're not some marine chariots they don't do you any good so what we see here is that

[29:27] Solomon is is kind of overlooking all that thing and he's bringing in this wealth and he has it he has cities built for his horses and his horsemen he has all this stuff right and if riches are the way to faithfulness then Solomon has it he really does one of my favorite preaching books of all time any preacher that ever enters the ministry and I know him or if he's been in ministry for a long time always ask him I say have you ever read D. Martin Lloyd-Jones's book preaching and preachers no if he hasn't I'll usually buy him a copy and send it to him I actually give him about three times I'll ask him again if they keep saying no then I'll eventually buy him a copy and send it to him preaching and preachers is just almost a must read for regular church his studies on the Sermon on the Mount so if you're not a preacher read his studies on the Sermon on the Mount it's wonderful his breakdown of the Beatitudes and just really the whole study of the Sermon on the Mount it's one of the most amazing books I've ever read but Martin Lloyd-Jones living in the early 20th century died in 1981 but in the height of World War

[30:33] One he is in med school and so he ends up becoming a doctor general practitioner one of the he understudied one of the greatest doctors in England and London at that time and really was doing some fantastic work he grew up around the church but in his own testimony he said never given his life to Christ never really surrendered because you have to understand church history at that time the preaching wasn't very evangelical he's like you know if you're gonna be saved you'll work out your own salvation we're not gonna tell you anything about it we'll just see what the Lord does but the thing that drew him to salvation one of the great things was in his doctor practice very early on he noticed that when he went to the poverty-stricken side of London there are all these ailments and he kind of expected it because they weren't educated they didn't have money they didn't have resources they didn't have cleanliness so they expected all these ailments but the surgeon that he worked under was like the doctor and the surgeon for the king and he began to notice the same ailments also existed in the wealthiest of the people and a great majority of their ailments had nothing to do with a scientific reason for their ailments it was really the moral choices they were making so he began to realize the problem with man is not a matter of education it's not a matter of financial situation it's not even a matter of cleanliness man has a problem no matter how good life is when you open up the book of Ecclesiastes because we're still talking about his acquiring and amassing of great wealth scholars Bible scholars go back and forth as to who wrote the book of Ecclesiastes many people think it's

[32:20] Solomon he refers himself as the preacher some believe and I'm not you know I'm not going to necessarily tell you where I'm at on this some believe that it is a pseudo Solomon writing after Babylonian captivity so much later writing kind of third person in the person of Solomon to show that even Solomon his greatness failed that the greatest man in the nation's history didn't get it right but one theme that we find through the book of Ecclesiastes and even the preacher himself says it in the second chapter of Ecclesiastes it is a fool who amasses wealth for in the end it does nothing but bring vanity it is vain but yet we see Solomon amassing and acquiring great wealth one of the stepping stones to get us to the 11th chapter finally let's stop here you see the attraction of wisdom the acknowledgement of the witnesses the acquiring of great wealth and the attention of the world we just repeat this refrain because it's something that needs to be repeated it's the attention of the world what God had declared to be a billboard was indeed shining but the world's attention was misguided it was put on a man not the one who rose him to power not the one who gifted him with wisdom not the one who declared he would have great wealth the attention of the world was on the nation of Israel for the first time they were expanding they were prospering and they had a beautiful temple and for the first time in that nation's young history well young by that time they've been a nation longer than we've been a nation but they that nation's history in this ancient world everybody was looking at them right one of the great wonders of the world was there but all the attention was focused on a single individual and we know that because he's the one the kings are seeking he's the one everybody desires to be around he's the one everybody wants to be and rather than reflecting that attention and that glory to its proper source Solomon just absorbed it and by absorbing it he was setting himself up for what is to come now you know God's covenant with Solomon was conditional if you will obey me and walk in all my principles so Solomon doesn't have a long life he dies in his mid-50s not a long life a descendant of

[35:15] Solomon does reign upon the throne not because we'll read where I'm getting ahead of myself not because of the promise that God had made to Solomon but because of the unconditional covenant that God had made with David a man after his own heart because God is faithful to keep his covenants and we're reminded of all of this because when we read the history of the nation of Israel we kind of get caught in the mundane right man especially here I mean we're gonna make one more chapter and then we're gonna Solomon dies and it's you know it's the good king the bad king the good king the bad king the bad king the bad king the bad king the good king the bad king you know all those guys and we're just kind of like oh wow what's going on here we just have this constant reminder that the seed that God promised in the garden that the seed that God promised to Abraham and Sarah that the seed that God promised to David won't be found in the book of first and second kings it won't be found in the book first and second chronicles we don't find that seed until we open up the book of

[36:23] Matthew it leaves us longing for someone else it leaves us longing for the one who builds the true temple it leaves us longing for the one who will not fail it leaves us longing for the one who owns the world and laid it aside and came to us didn't acquire wealth but took on our humility that he may redeem us it leaves us longing again I'm in the middle of sermon preparation too for Sunday right it leaves us longing for the one that all of the world should have been looking at but as the book of Isaiah says he was so despised and forsaken that everybody turned their face towards him and no man would look upon him he leaves us longing for that one because Solomon is as good as man gets but it's not good enough it's not good enough and we're reminded that he was popular he was a good king he was a great leader but he fails we'll see it next chapter fails because we don't need popularity and wealth and and people being drawn to us we don't need those things right it's faithfulness of the heart and devotion of the life the thing that judges Solomon is not his bank account not his chariot cities not his horsemen it's not his God doesn't come to him and say you don't have enough lines on the steps of your pal your throne God doesn't come to himself well you shouldn't have used that

[38:06]  God comes to him says there's something wrong with your heart when we talk in the 11th chapter God's going to speak to Solomon the third time and it'll be the last time and God's going to talk to him about his heart because in his popularity there's one thing that he neglected and that was devotion and we see that in 1st Kings chapter 10 thank you my brother you you