1 Kings 11:23-33

 

May 25, 2021

 

 God also raised up as an adversary to him, Rezon the son of Eliada, who had fled from his master Hadadezer king of Zobah.   And he gathered men about him and became leader of a marauding band, after the killing by David. And they went to Damascus and lived there and made him king in Damascus.   He was an adversary of Israel all the days of Solomon, doing harm as Hadad did. And he loathed Israel and reigned over Syria.

 

Jeroboam the son of Nebat, an Ephraimite of Zeredah, a servant of Solomon, whose mother's name was Zeruah, a widow, also lifted his hand against the king.   And this was the reason why he lifted his hand against the king. Solomon built the Millo and closed the breach of the city of David his father.  The man Jeroboam was very able, and when Solomon saw that the young man was industrious, he gave him charge over all the forced labor of the house of Joseph.   And at that time, when Jeroboam went out of Jerusalem, the prophet Ahijah the Shilonite found him on the road. Now Ahijah had dressed himself in a new garment, and the two of them were alone in the open country.   Then Ahijah laid hold of the new garment that was on him and tore it into twelve pieces.   And he said to Jeroboam, “Take for yourself ten pieces, for thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, ‘Behold, I am about to tear the kingdom from the hand of Solomon and will give you ten tribes  (but he shall have one tribe, for the sake of my servant David and for the sake of Jerusalem, the city that 

 

I have chosen out of all the tribes of Israel),  because they have forsaken me and worshiped Ashtoreth the goddess of the Sidonians, Chemosh the god of Moab, and Milcom the god of the Ammonites, and they have not walked in my ways, doing what is right in my sight and keeping my statutes and my rules, as David his father did. 

 

It matters not how God comes against a man, in Solomon's case it was two adversaries, one was an outlaw with a band of worthless men, of low values.  We have witnessed our President inviting the family of George Floyd to the Whitehouse in memory of their son.  George Floyd was an evil man who spent most of his life in prison for crimes against others.  I have yet to see the President honor a family that has lost their life by dying in the line of protecting the public as our police do every day.  We lost 138 of these men and women, of all colors whose job it is to keep the peace and address bad guys, who are breaking the law so far this year.  How many bad guys did the police shoot and kill this year?  (Offices down memorial page)  I look for a site that would give me a truthful account of how many unarmed black men in 2019, one group said 8 but the fact-checkers said they were wrong it was 13.  Now 13 is a long way from what one would believe by reading the New York Times, you would believe it was a number in 1000.

 

There is no excuse for the police officer that held Floyd on the ground, many questions in my mind as to why anyone would remove a handcuffed man from a squad car, it all seems a little crazy.  My reason for using this example or the adversary like the media, the Democrat party, ignorant of people who only get information from one source, believes what some group sends them on Facebook or some tweet.  Could that be we as a nation or under the judgment of a Holy God?

 

From the Back Porch,

 

Bob Rice