How God Expresses His Love for UsSýnishorn

God’s Sad Choice

God’s Story

The nation of Israel is at its zenith. God is in his lavish glory-home while history’s wisest king reigns on his throne. And Israel thrives.

King Solomon pours out wisdom to foreign leaders. He builds ships. He restores cities. He collects horses and chariots.

He also collects wives — one thousand of them. Most are foreigners, women God has forbidden his people to marry because of their worship of dark gods. Solomon loves his wives and is soon pledging his love to their vile gods. He sets up idolatrous altars — even to the detestable god Molek — outside Jerusalem.

Because of Solomon’s ghastly sin, God is going to rip away the kingdom. But because of his promise to David, God will wait a generation. The prophet Ahijah anoints a hard-working manager, Jeroboam, to be king over ten of Israel’s tribes.

Once Solomon dies, the kingdom splits; Jeroboam becomes king in the north, while Solomon’s son Rehoboam reigns over Judah in the south. Sickeningly, Jeroboam crafts two golden calves for the ten tribes to worship — he doesn’t want his citizens worshiping in Jerusalem. The people of Israel don’t just fall from their highest point; they crash.

The King’s Heart

God’s nation hadn’t completely followed his commands to remove the foreigners and their demonic idol influence from the promised land. And evil was getting a hold on God’s people. The cosmic war that had been playing out since before creation was playing out on the stage of God’s nation.

The All-Knowing One was well aware of the downward spiral that lay ahead for the northern ten tribes of Israel. He knew that they would never turn back to him. So he anointed a new king over the northern tribes and caused the nation’s split.

Something similar had happened earlier in human history — when sin and darkness had made God’s people morbidly sick. God had known that the only way to bring redemption was to flood out the evil and begin again (see Genesis 6 – 8). Perhaps his motivation for splitting the nations was the same. Israel would end — she was just too sick — but he would continue to move the story of salvation forward through Judah.

Insight

The idol-worshipers in the promised land often represented their gods as standing on the backs of calves and bulls. It was intended to be a sign of their strength. Jeroboam’s calves were likely symbolic of God’s strength, although he didn’t put an “image” of God riding on their backs. Like Aaron (see Exodus 32:4 – 5), Jeroboam attempted to combine the pagan calf symbol with the worship of the Lord. But it wasn’t what God had commanded.