FBC Daily Devotional – November 12, 2021

Faith Baptist Church

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Well, a good Friday morning to you. Here we come to the end of another week, looking to head into the weekend.

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I hope you're planning on gathering together on the Lord's Day with God's people. This Sunday we have a guest missionary.

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He's heading to Ireland. He and his wife are heading to Ireland to serve as missionaries.

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Dan Herman, and he'll be with us for the day. He'll be speaking in the

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Sunday school hour, and we'll be introducing him and hearing his testimony in the morning service. And then he'll basically have the evening service to share with us his burden for the country of Ireland.

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And I have a little soft spot there because I've got some Irish blood in me myself, but anyway, he'll be sharing his ministry, his burden for the people of Ireland, and sharing a message as well in the evening service.

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So I hope you can make it on the Lord's Day. It should be a good day of ministry of the

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Word. Well today, we're in 1 Kings chapter 2, primarily, and then a few verses into chapter 3.

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And you remember this guy Adonijah? This was Solomon's older half -brother.

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He had different mothers, but Adonijah was older than Solomon. Solomon is the king.

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Adonijah wanted to be, and he very selfishly and in great deal of pride endeavored to make himself the king.

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Adonijah did. He assumed that it was his to take, and David put him in his place and established

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Solomon as the king, which was what God had intended. And so Solomon has become the king, and Solomon graciously told

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Adonijah, go home and behave yourself, essentially. So even though he realized that Adonijah's ambition may not be totally destroyed.

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He may still want the throne for himself. Solomon just basically said,

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I'm not going to take your life. Just go home and behave yourself. But then we come to chapter 2, and Adonijah Adonijah has an eye for this young woman

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Abishag. And if you remember who Abishag was, she was the young woman who was basically conscripted to keep

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David warm. It seems a little strange to us, but nevertheless, that was her job.

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David's an old man, his circulation is terrible, and Abishag's job is just to just keep his hands and his feet warm, if you will.

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And that's it. So, I mean, there was never She wasn't a concubine. She wasn't a wife or anything like that.

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She just kept him warm. Well, she must have been an attractive woman, and Adonijah had an eye for Abishag, and he wanted to marry her.

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Now, in the in the scheme of things, the way things were set up,

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Abishag would be considered part of David's estate, if I can put it that way.

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I mean, again, she wasn't a wife or chattel or anything like that, but she was connected with David.

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And when Adonijah asked to marry Abishag, he was asking for a connection there that was a risky connection.

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He enlists Bathsheba, Solomon's mother, to ask Solomon for Abishag, and so she goes and asks him.

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And Solomon's response to us on the surface may look to be pretty harsh.

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I mean, it doesn't look harsh. It is. Solomon responds and says, no way.

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Instead, Adonijah has just signed his death warrant, and he sends an emissary to take

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Adonijah out and execute him. Now, wow, that seems incredibly harsh.

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His own half -brother. Why in the world would Solomon do that? How could that be justified?

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All right, well, we have to keep a couple things in mind. One of them is a little bit of history.

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Adonijah's older brother was Absalom, and you remember Absalom.

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Absalom was a rebel who drove David out of Jerusalem, drove him off the throne, and almost succeeded in usurping the throne and displacing

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David as the king. Absalom is Adonijah's older brother.

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Solomon is very well aware of that connection. He is also very well aware that Adonijah had himself tried to become the king, to usurp the throne, or at least to assume that it was his to take.

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So from Solomon's perspective, Adonijah is a very real threat, and his heart seems to be one that has the throne as a target.

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And this desire to marry Abishag, the way Solomon sees it, is a it's kind of like the the tactic of Absalom, ingratiating himself with the people to get their favor, to gain their favor, making connections with those who should have been loyal to David and so forth, and to turn their loyalty to him.

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That's what Absalom did, and Solomon sees the same kind of tactic here on the part of Adonijah.

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This would be considered an act of treason, in other words. What happens to traitors?

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It used to be that treason was a capital offense, and it should still be a capital offense.

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We're in recent years, have not been treating true acts of treason as they should be, but nevertheless, it's a capital offense.

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It's potentially destructive to the nation. So Solomon acts, and he acts swiftly.

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So that's what's going on here, and I just wanted to point that out in what seems to be a rather harsh thing.

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God has given the throne to Solomon. The line of the Messiah is to come through him.

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If Adonijah has his way and gets the throne as he wants it, Solomon would be executed.

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There would be no Jesus. All right, that's a good thing to keep in mind.

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The other thing I wanted to point out very quickly here, in this one verse in chapter 3, is a summary verse, and it should cause us to stop and ask ourselves a question.

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So chapter 3, verse 3, begins with a speaking favorably of Solomon, and says

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Solomon loved the Lord, walking in the statutes of his father David. Well, that's great.

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That's wonderful. What a wonderful testimony. But then there's this except clause.

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It says, except that he sacrificed and burned incense in the high places.

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There was just this little thing, just this little problem, and it should cause us to pause and consider, are there any exception clauses following the positives in my life?

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What are the exceptions that I'm allowing that really I shouldn't be? This is one thing to have a great testimony, to love the

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Lord, to be pursuing his word, wanting to learn his word, and all the rest of those very good things.

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You're a good family man, you're a good wife, you know, you're a submissive child.

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You are what you ought to be in the calling of life that God has given you, except for this little area.

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What's that little area? Let's get rid of that. Let's get rid of that. Father, I pray that from these couple of things in Kings, you will challenge us.

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Challenge us with our loyalties, may they be with King Jesus. Challenge us to think about, what are we allowing as exceptions in our lives?

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I pray that whatever that is, we would be removing those things.

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Speak to us. We pray in Jesus name. Amen. All right. Well, once again, have a good rest of your

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Friday and a wonderful weekend and hope to gather together in the Lord's house on this coming