1 Kings 14

Jeroboam had not obeyed the Word of God concerning the Lord's ordained system of worship. But when his son became sick, he sent his wife secretly to the Lord's prophet who had originally told him that he would be king. Jeroboam would not obey God. Yet he expressed confidence that the Lord's appointed messenger would know the truth about the future.

This strange combination of admiration for God's Word and an unwillingness to obey the Lord can take place not only in the life of an isolated individual. It can also characterize a whole society. When the Messiah came, He encountered a religious world that gave service to God with their lips, but their hearts were far from Him.

Jeroboam's wife was a visual parable of this double-mindedness. She went to the Lord's prophet to find out the secret providences of Almighty God, yet she disguised herself with the hope that her identity might remain hidden.

The prophet had unbearable news for her. His Word concerning the death of her son was quickly fulfilled. But the Lord's ambassador had more to say. God had “found something pleasing” in the house of Jeroboam only in the life of the boy who would die. In his honorable burial, he would be different than the other descendants of Jeroboam. The king's dynasty would come to an end in disgrace. The false worship of Israel would have consequences that would eventually result not only in the end of the line of Jeroboam, but in the discipline of the nation through the brutality of the Assyrians. These conquerors would come from a distant land and would scatter the northern tribes “beyond the Euphrates.”

The situation was not much better in the region of Judah to the south and in the Lord's chosen city of Jerusalem. They also worshiped false gods and committed indecent spiritual practices. The wealth and glory of Rehoboam's father, Solomon, would be slowly carried away over the generations that followed, and the troubles between the northern tribes and the southern kingdom would continue.

This would all take place according to the Word of the Lord. But that Word also contained promises of God's eternal mercy and grace to His people. How would God remain faithful to His promises of blessing and also true to these words of judgment?

In the cross we find the fulfillment of all the promises of God. Christ has taken the unbearable Word of God's wrath upon Himself for our sake. “Something pleasing” in the sight of God has been credited to our account because of Jesus. He is moving us toward the sincerity of true worship and joyful obedience.