THE FALL OF A NATION. 1st Kings 14 A God-given heritage does not guarantee a successful future. A family, an assembly - even a nation - can fall into sin and all its consequences in a very short time. When people do not want, nor are willing, to bow to a greater authority than themselves, their religious activity is made to fit their lifestyle rather than the other way around. When a leader attempts to mislead others into doing what he wants, that reveals his consciousness of guilt. There may be protestations of faith in the Lord, but confusion follows when God is considered a mere magical power. The King of kings and Lord of lords is not a mere force but the Supreme Person of the universe. We need to remind ourselves and others over whom we have any influence of this fact. A wrong understanding of the holiness and omniscience of God is one of the characteristics of modern-day idolatry.
Deception had become second nature to Jeroboam, and he thought his wife could disguise herself and not be known by the prophet Ahijah. When Jeroboam sent his wife to the prophet under false pretenses in his anxiety over the illness of his young son, the outcome was that he was made aware of the disaster the Righteous, Holy God of Israel would bring on his whole family because of his actions. Jeroboam’s household would all die and not have a decent burial except for the young child. God, in mercy, spared the young son by an act of compassion in sparing him the suffering and disgrace Jeroboam had brought on his family and the northern tribes. God respected the “little good” that was in Jeroboam’s child by allowing him a normal burial.
This mindset comes from idolatry, in which, at the expense of what is right, one seeks approval for what one wants. It reduces our humanity to the point where we act like animals: physical desire and passion rules. Pleasure becomes the reward rather than righteousness. Sacrifice becomes a punishment instead of a holy privilege. Human-made gods like materialism, fame, money, and pleasure replace God. Changing societies change the values by which humanity has maintained an effective everyday living, and the standards of righteousness God gives in His word are discarded as unreasonable, unrealistic, and obsolete to modern-day living.
In righteous people, as Israel was intended to be, God wants people to help others, seek peace, and appreciate it. Our enthusiasm and passion are to direct our lives to the building up of others, not for selfish reasons. Sacrifice and praise are directed to our Lord and His honor, rather than success and personal gain being the object of life. A person, a family, an assembly, or a nation cannot long survive unchecked evil.
Jeroboam and his whole family would be rejected except for one innocent child who had not reached the age of conscious sin. Even more would be affected by Jeroboam's sin because he made Israel sin. One of the results of evil leadership is its awful consequences on others. Jeroboam drove Israel from "following the Lord and made them sin a great sin" [2 Kgs.17:21]. A man of great promise whom God calls to lead His people can bring irreversible consequences on the people of God by compromising truth and mixing it with error. Each of the kings of Israel was judged by the example of the wickedness of Jeroboam, who “Made Israel to sin.” Only Ahab was worse.
After Jeroboam died and his son Nadab had a brief reign of about a year, Baasha ruled as Ahijah prophesied. Instability in Israel's leadership led the whole nation to be "like a reed shaking in the water." Apparently, records of the kings of Israel were kept, but they are not part of the chronicles of kings in the Bible.
It is a grievous disservice to those who follow when leadership in a family and an assembly, like that of a nation, turns away from the normal, tried, and proven values passed on to us from the scriptures. Records were kept by those whose work was to maintain a historical account of the nation. Revisionist histories have been written by those who want to reject the morals and standards by which we have lived for many years. Behind that is the desire to excuse ourselves from our own evil practices by putting a negative light on those who have wisely guided us in times past in righteous ways.
Similar religious departure practices took place in Judah under the rule of Rehoboam, the son of Solomon. There were "high places, images, and groves" on which idols were placed on "every high hill" and under every large tree. The Canaanite practice of sexual perversion in the name of religion took place in that same generation. Moral perversion was mixed with religious practices. Male and female prostitutes were associated with idolatry. Judah’s sin of religious perversion spread like an unchecked disease until it was “On every high hill and under every green tree.”
In our lifetime, the nation has embraced as right and usual that which had been condemned in the past because it undermined the standards of morality by which we have lived and prospered. This nation, too, will fall when the foundations of normal human living are removed. "If the foundations be destroyed, what shall the righteous do?" When the fear of God is gone from a family and the truth of God from an assembly, when the standards of God are gone from a nation, everything has lost its value and is useless, no matter how valuable it may seem to us at the time. Holiness, by faith in God, involves morality, ethics, and separation from evil. When a person is a child of God, this will be evident in character and conduct.
The strength of Judah was gone, and only five years after Solomon died, the Egyptian army came and took the treasures Solomon had made. All of the costly things Solomon had made were taken away by the king of Egypt, before whom Rehoboam was powerless. What had taken a long time to make and was of unmeasured value was gone in a moment. Power, glory, and wealth can be quickly lost under corrupt and immoral leadership. The only legacy Rehoboam left was a continual civil war between the northern tribes and Judah.
Many things can change in 20 years or less, depending on who leads the people. What a nation once looked up to and thought was the best was lost when the next generation rose and began to lead without regard for those who had the experience of a lifetime. Under pressure from younger people with little or no leadership experience, they want to be like those around them so they can be popular. They chose not to heed the commitment to God and His Word because it does not fit with what is “acceptable to the majority.”
It happens today in many different ways and venues. In nations with political leaders and churches that want to attract large numbers of people to their meetings, changes are taking place that leave respect, reverence, and dignity to one side. Even families stray from the heritage they learned when they were younger and find old-fashioned integrity and honor of little value. In less than 20 years, they have rejected the things and manner of life that past generations have proved to bring satisfaction and meaning to life.
Only when trouble or an unsolvable problem arises do they stop to try and ask God for help? Usually, their plans do not take God into consideration because the holiness of character and righteousness of life cramp their style of life. In 20 years or less, there will be spiritual desolation. The solid foundation of truth on which they were built has been left unused, and now they build their lives on sand and silt that do not stand the test of adversity, suffering, and loss. In the past 20 years, the nation has floundered on the quicksand of untested laws without a standard. And the generation to come is impounded and imprisoned by deceit.
The same thing holds true when a company of God’s people abandons the truth that stabilized the assembly for many years. When they are numerically feeble, the temptation to turn from truth to calm their fears leads a church to lose character in less than 20 years if it gets its eyes off the word of God and focuses on how many people attend the gatherings of God’s people. In a family where the parents read the Bible and pray with their children each day, when their children's children decide they will no longer stay by that habit, that family's spiritual dimensions shrivel and die. In 20 years or less, there will be darkness and sighs of regret.