14. May 2010 by Bernice Davis.

Hello Everyone: 

Today’s lesson has another one of my favorite stories in it.  It is the first case that was brought before King Solomon to test his wisdom.   It is the famous story about the two mothers who were quarrelling over a baby. 

I’m sure we are all familiar with it.  Here is the story:

I Kings 3:16 Then came there two women, that were harlots , unto the king, and stood before him. 17 And the one woman said , O my lord, I and this woman dwell in one house; and I was delivered of a child with her in the house. 18 And it came to pass the third day after that I was delivered , that this woman was delivered also: and we were together; there was no stranger with us in the house, save we two in the house. 19 And this woman’s child died in the night; because she overlaid it. 20 And she arose at midnight , and took my son from beside me, while thine handmaid slept, and laid it in her bosom, and laid her dead child in my bosom. 21 And when I rose in the morning to give my child suck , behold, it was dead : but when I had considered it in the morning, behold, it was not my son, which I did bear . 22 And the other woman said , Nay; but the living is my son, and the dead is thy son. And this said , No; but the dead is thy son, and the living is my son. Thus they spake before the king. 23 Then said the king, The one saith , This is my son that liveth, and thy son is the dead : and the other saith , Nay; but thy son is the dead , and my son is the living. 24 And the king said , Bring me a sword. And they brought a sword before the king. 25 And the king said , Divide the living child in two, and give half to the one, and half to the other. 26 Then spake the woman whose the living child was unto the king, for her bowels yearned upon her son, and she said , O my lord, give her the living child , and in no wise slay it. But the other said , Let it be neither mine nor thine, but divide it. 27 Then the king answered and said , Give her the living child , and in no wise slay it: she is the mother thereof. 28 And all Israel heard of the judgment which the king had judged ; and they feared the king: for they saw that the wisdom of God was in him, to do judgment.

Ohhh…   I love this story.    As you can see in the text, this story was used to validate the wisdom that God had given Solomon.  The scriptures teach that when all Israel heard of the judgment, they feared Solomon for they saw that the wisdom of God was in him to do judgment.

Have a great weekend everyone.   We will continue our journey on Monday.

Stay encouraged everyone and don’t forget to pray and read God’s word daily.

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13. May 2010 by Bernice Davis.

Hello Everyone: 

Today’s lesson has one of my favorite stories in it.  It is the story of how Solomon becomes the wisest man in the world.   It is a familiar text.  Let’s look at the story.

I Kings 3: 1 And Solomon made affinity with Pharaoh king of Egypt, and took Pharaoh’s daughter, and brought her into the city of David, until he had made an end of building his own house, and the house of the LORD, and the wall of Jerusalem round about. 2 Only the people sacrificed in high places, because there was no house built unto the name of the LORD, until those days. 3 And Solomon loved the LORD, walking in the statutes of David his father: only he sacrificed and burnt incense in high places. 4 And the king went to Gibeon to sacrifice there; for that was the great high place: a thousand burnt offerings did Solomon offer upon that altar. 5 In Gibeon the LORD appeared to Solomon in a dream by night: and God said , Ask what I shall give thee. 6 And Solomon said , Thou hast shewed unto thy servant David my father great mercy, according as he walked before thee in truth, and in righteousness, and in uprightness of heart with thee; and thou hast kept for him this great kindness, that thou hast given him a son to sit on his throne, as it is this day. 7 And now, O LORD my God, thou hast made thy servant king instead of David my father: and I am but a little child: I know not how to go out or come in . 8 And thy servant is in the midst of thy people which thou hast chosen , a great people, that cannot be numbered nor counted for multitude. 9 Give therefore thy servant an understanding heart to judge thy people, that I may discern between good and bad: for who is able to judge this thy so great a people? 10 And the speech pleased the Lord, that Solomon had asked this thing. 11 And God said unto him, Because thou hast asked this thing, and hast not asked for thyself long life; neither hast asked riches for thyself, nor hast asked the life of thine enemies ; but hast asked for thyself understanding to discern judgment; 12 Behold, I have done according to thy words: lo, I have given thee a wise and an understanding heart; so that there was none like thee before thee, neither after thee shall any arise like unto thee. 13 And I have also given thee that which thou hast not asked , both riches, and honour: so that there shall not be any among the kings like unto thee all thy days. 14 And if thou wilt walk in my ways, to keep my statutes and my commandments, as thy father David did walk , then I will lengthen thy days. 15 And Solomon awoke ; and, behold, it was a dream. And he came to Jerusalem, and stood before the ark of the covenant of the LORD, and offered up burnt offerings, and offered peace offerings, and made a feast to all his servants.

Wow, I love this story.    There are a couple of things that I want to point out.   The text opens with saying that Solomon took the daughter of Pharaoh as his wife.   This was a very strategic move.   You will discover that Solomon had a very peaceful reign compared to the other kings and one of the reasons is that he married the daughters of his surrounding enemies which caused a peace alliance. 

The other point that I would like to make is that the temple was not built yet.  If you recall, David had a desire to build God a house and God said that it would be built through his son because of all the bloodshed on David’s hands. 

Solomon will soon begin his construction of the temple, but currently they are sacrificing at high places.  Solomon was at Gibeon (a high place) offering sacrifices and the Lord appeared to him in a dream.  God allowed Solomon to request anything that his heart desired and Solomon asked for the knowledge to lead God’s people.

God was so impressed with the request that he granted Solomon’s desire  for wisdom and understanding but also gave him what he did not ask for which was riches and honors.  God promised Solomon that there would be no one ever that would compare to his riches or his wisdom.   He thereby became the wisest and richest man that there was or ever will be.

Tomorrow, we will study a test of Solomon’s wisdom.

Stay encouraged everyone and don’t forget to pray and read God’s word daily.

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12. May 2010 by Bernice Davis.

Hello Everyone: 

In our last lesson, we learned what happened to the priest Abiathar and Joab who had also sided with Adonijah to take the throne from Solomon.  In today’s lesson, we discover what happens to Shimei.  Shimei was the man that cursed David when he went out of the city gates as he was running from his son Absalom in his attempt to take the throne away from David. He threw rocks at David and his men and cursed them. 

Here is the story:

I Kings 2: 35 And the king put Benaiah the son of Jehoiada in his room over the host: and Zadok the priest did the king put in the room of Abiathar. 36 And the king sent and called for Shimei, and said unto him, Build thee an house in Jerusalem, and dwell there, and go not forth thence any whither. 37 For it shall be, that on the day thou goest out , and passest over the brook Kidron, thou shalt know for certain that thou shalt surely die : thy blood shall be upon thine own head. 38 And Shimei said unto the king, The saying is good: as my lord the king hath said , so will thy servant do . And Shimei dwelt in Jerusalem many days. 39 And it came to pass at the end of three years, that two of the servants of Shimei ran away unto Achish son of Maachah king of Gath. And they told Shimei, saying , Behold, thy servants be in Gath. 40 And Shimei arose , and saddled his ass, and went to Gath to Achish to seek his servants: and Shimei went , and brought his servants from Gath. 41 And it was told Solomon that Shimei had gone from Jerusalem to Gath, and was come again . 42 And the king sent and called for Shimei, and said unto him, Did I not make thee to swear by the LORD, and protested unto thee, saying , Know for a certain , on the day thou goest out , and walkest abroad any whither, that thou shalt surely die ? and thou saidst unto me, The word that I have heard is good. 43 Why then hast thou not kept the oath of the LORD, and the commandment that I have charged thee with? 44 The king said moreover to Shimei, Thou knowest all the wickedness which thine heart is privy to , that thou didst to David my father: therefore the LORD shall return thy wickedness upon thine own head; 45 And king Solomon shall be blessed , and the throne of David shall be established before the LORD for ever. 46 So the king commanded Benaiah the son of Jehoiada; which went out , and fell upon him, that he died . And the kingdom was established in the hand of Solomon.

There a couple of things that I would like for you to notice in our story.  We are given two key people who are officials in Solomon’s administration.   Benaiah has replaced Joab and is now captain over the hosts and Zadok has replaced Abiathar as the priest. 

As you can see in our story, Solomon is lenient with Shimei and tells him to build him a house in Jerusalem and stay there.  He was not allowed to cross the borders of the brook Kidron.  Shimei liked the saying and agreed that it was fair and good.  He kept the promise for three years and then his servants were found missing and he went to look for them.  Word got back to King Solomon that Shimei had left Jerusalem and Solomon senf for him.  

He reminded him of the oath that he was under and that because he broke it, that now the evil that he had done to his father he would now pay for it.

Solomon sends word to have him killed and our text closes with “the kingdom was established in the hands of Solomon.”

We will continue our journey on tomorrow.

Stay encouraged everyone and don’t forget to pray and read God’s word daily.

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11. May 2010 by Bernice Davis.

Hello:

I’m back.  Welcome back from the Mother’s Day Weekend.  I spent the weekend in Detroit watching the closing play of Madea’s Big Happy Family and staying over to hear a friend of mine speak at a fundraiser hosted by Pastor Marvin Winans for their community development and projects.  It was awesome and the Perfecting Church in Detroit is doing phenomenal things to help support the disadvantaged in their communities.  I was so impressed and proud of their kingdom work.

I just returned home on today and one of my first tasks was to return to posting.

For those of you that may be just joining me, we have been doing a study of the monarchy.  Monos means one and arcy means rule or government so it means the rule of one person.  Israel had three monarchs. They were Saul, David and Solomon.  After the reign of Solomon, the kingdom will split and you will then have kings that will reign over Judah and Israel but in our study, we have these three kings who reigned over the nation when it was united as Israel only.

We have studied the life of Saul and we just finished studying the life of David and before I had left for Australia, we had begun our study of the last monarch Solomon.

Before David passed, he gave specific instructions to his son Solomon to get rid of the people in his administration that had caused unnecessary bloodshed or had been responsible for attacks on the administration of David.

Solomon opened his reign with taking care of those people which included Joab who was the commander of the army and Adonijah which was the son of David and brother of Solomon.  If you recall, Joab disobeyed David by killing David’s son Absalom when David had clearly instructed that he be not hurt in battle.  Joab went on to side with Adonijah in his attempt to secure David’s throne after his death. 

Solomon destroys both of them and our closing text dealt with him removing Abiathar, the priest from his position fulfilling the word of the Lord given to Eli that all his sons would be cut off.  Abiathar was the last descendant of that line that would reign as priest. 

Our study ended with this story.   Tomorrow, we will begin anew.  Please go back and read the last couple of posts before I went to Australia so that you will be familiar with the subject matter again.

Again, thanks for your patience and I will see you in web land on tomorrow. 

Stay encouraged everyone and don’t forget to pray and read God’s word daily.

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7. May 2010 by Bernice Davis.

Hello Everyone:

I arrived back home on this week but jumped straight into the Mother’s Day Week at our spa which next to Christmas is our busiest season.    Been working all day and falling asleep at night as soon as I get home because I am still on Australian time.  I am so sorry for the two weeks off, I think this is the longest time in my two years of posting that I have taken off.

Traveling to Australia and returning Mother’s Day Week really threw things off for me.   I will begin posting again and Monday and don’t worry, I will give you a thorough review before we dive back into it so you can recall.

Have a wonderful Mother’s Day to all the mothers.  This is such a hard day for me.  I miss my mom so much and even though the pain gets easier (or should I just say, you learn to live with it) there are somedays that are just harder than others and Mother’s Day is one of those days.

My husband is in Jamacia, so I will be hanging out with friends just trying to get through the day.

Take care and Cheerish your Mom on this mother’s day.   Life is so short and you just never know when.

Stay encouraged everyone and don’t forget to pray and read God’s word daily.

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