Keep it Out of the House
This week we looked at the life of Solomon as we saw how Solomon did not keep the Word of God on his heart, and let his worldly possessions take precedence.
Video can’t be displayed
This video is not available.
Sermon Transcript
Auto-generated by YouTube
good morning welcome if you're new here among us my name is gene and i serve here at c3 church as your lead pastor and i wonder if there's anyone else here like me in this sense where as a kid you weren't just allowed to go and take whatever you wanted out of the fridge during the day right you're gonna ruin your appetite so we got three square meals a day and if if you finished all of your supper even if it was gross stew if then what then you could have dessert you could have a snack like a small bowl of ice cream or potato chips or something like that you got your treat now there weren't a whole lot of snacks in my house growing up so if you decided to sneak some of that stuff you got caught that was it only two kids in my house so there were only two possibilities right not good and you get in a lot of trouble for doing it so here was the key keep it out of the house if it's not good for you keep it out of the house no temptations now my dad liked to snack a lot so he found a workaround not in the house but surprisingly in the grocery store my dad would sample now i don't know if you remember this might be dating myself but that's okay they used to have these barrels in the grocery store giant barrels and they were as tall as me at this time filled with candy and you could get like the shovel and you could scoop it and it's a price per pound you don't care you put it in the bag and you mix and match sometimes it's very exciting well one quick thing grocery clerks out there everywhere i need to tell you something you need to do your job because they're not actually filled all the way up with candy it's just a bowl like a false bottom type of thing and if you don't fill them up regularly you will crush a child's dreams so just a side note here so i thought they were filled up all the way with candy or endless possibilities my dad would walk up to one of these barrels and he would sample but he had a routine it was very convincing you make a face like he was really thinking about it but this is a serious investment so i'm going to have to think about it as i walk around the entire grocery store and then come back and let's consider this purchase again and this would continue again and again if i followed him he would give me a piece to shut me up and this went on and on so i started thinking a lot about this shouldn't this apply to all the food in the grocery store like potato chips so i went on on my own in the potato chip aisle and i noticed there were no sample bags available grocery clerk not doing his job so i made one i opened a bag up and decided to sample and i followed my dad's routine i started walking around the grocery store but unlike the everlasting gobstopper the potato chip was gone pretty much as soon as i left the aisle that was a problem long walk for a potato chip so i decided to improve on my father's method i just walked around the aisle but even this seemed to take too long so i confined myself to that spot just kind of break dancing around as i took potato chips well this will get you caught especially if the grocery clerk is right there next to you while you're doing this whole thing and so he said what are you doing i said sampling what do you think he must be new he goes no you're stealing i was like oh new guy listen stealing is if i take the bag and remove it from the store without paying for it that's stealing the chips have not left the store and if you're still not convinced i'll go to the bathroom before i leave and leave the chips here in the store he didn't like any of that he did not like that answer so back in the day when you're allowed to do such things he grabbed me by like the coat of the scruff of the neck and dragged me to my parents is this your kid they lied with their faces but with their mouths they admitted it yes that's my kid he's been stealing potato chips that's where i stopped him again dad you need to explain this to him he's new it's called sampling you no shut up i'll take care of him when we get home and he promptly dragged me out of there so today we'll see that kids and dean they learn from our behavior and it has consequences today we find ourselves in the rest of the story we've been looking at the life of solomon and the writings attributed to solomon as well we were in ecclesiastes wisdom of solomon we saw a lot of advice we've also noticed that sometimes solomon doesn't take his own advice all the time or always lead by example going back to this section we're going to find ourselves in first kings 11 today but in first kings 10 we saw especially regarding the queen of sheba that solomon was accepting a lot of gifts a lot of flattery like 25 tons of gold a lot here in first kings 11 we're going to look at the end of solomon's reign we'll jump right into the text first kings 11 starting at verse 1. now king solomon loved many foreign women beside pharaoh's daughter he married women from moab ammon edom sidon and from among the hittites the lord had clearly instructed the people of israel you must not marry them because they will turn your hearts away to their gods yet solomon insisted on loving them anyway he had 700 wives of royal birth and 300 concubines what i'm doing right now is restraining myself that's what that looks like and in fact they did turn his heart away from the lord in solomon's old age they turned his heart to worship other gods instead of being completely faithful to the lord his god and his father dave his father david had been solomon worshipped ashtereth the goddess of the sidonians and molech the detestable god of the ammonites in this way solomon did what was evil in the lord's sight he refused to follow the lord completely as his father david had done got to be a little bit of hyperbole there so these marriages may have been very expedient type of political marriages but it doesn't excuse it nor does it excuse the fact that he was worshiping other gods if we keep reading the text we see that it's really really really bad molech is a god associated with sacrificing children really bad so he's doing some of this worship he's doing it the women are doing it some of this worship is sacred places like the mount of olives those of you know the bible well no that's bad really bad stuff so god appears to him a third time first kings eleven nine the lord was very angry with solomon for his heart had turned away from the lord the god of israel who appeared to him twice he had warned solomon specifically about worshiping other gods but solomon did not listen to the lord's command so now the lord said to him since you have not kept my covenant and have disobeyed my decrees i will surely tear the kingdom away from you and give it to one of your servants but for the sake of your father david i will not do this while you're still alive i'll take the kingdom away from your son and even so i will not take the entire kingdom i will let him be king of one tribe for the sake of my servant david and for the sake of jerusalem my chosen city so here we see that sometimes what parents do have consequences for the children and this is one of those cases so here's what happens god builds up adversaries to fight against solomon first haydad then reason then jeroboam let me get to a very important part of the story so solomon is at a point where he's rebuilding terraces and parts of the walls he's doing construction projects all the time and this guy jeroboam is a really capable worker so he puts him in charge of ephraim and manasseh those are joseph's sons those tribes he's good at it but god is going to use him in a similar way to the way he used david against saul and it'll get interesting first the prophet elijah appears on the scene he meets jeroboam in a field they're alone he has a nice cloak on he takes the cloak off prophets do crazy things to symbolize stuff and what he does is he tears the cloak into 12 pieces they represent 12 tribes of israel he gives 10 of the pieces to jeroboam and he said god is going to tear the kingdom away from solomon like i've torn this cloak he's going to give you 10 of these tribes but solomon is going to keep one for the sake of david he's going to remember him and his family is going to rule in jerusalem judah now if you're good at math you're saying what happened to the other tribe it's pretty simple if you read the bible a lot tribe of levi they're the priests they don't get their own share of the land the people are supposed to take care of the priests and so probably that also if you read the text carefully the tribe of benjamin is always associated in judah they kind of hang out in judah a lot down there so that's what it is so solomon's going to be in charge of technically one judah but three tribes the temple is there in jerusalem so this is all stated prophetically the demise of solomon now it's bad solomon tries to kill jeroboam and so this is a very sad like a pitiful kind of ending like saul was if you remember he tried to kill david he knew that david was going to take take over so he's behaving the same way now so it's a really sad ending to an otherwise glorious and prosperous reigns so the worship of idols that's what it's all about as you read the bible leads to their downfall so the women led to the idols to the downfall so here we see the text kind of converges again if you're new we've been talking about how some of the books of the bible run in parallel it's the same story from a different author a different angle gives us some different details those details were not in second chronicles but now the end of his reign is there so we'll look at both of them first kings 11 41 the rest of the events in solomon's reign including all his deeds and his wisdom are recorded in the book of the acts of solomon solomon ruled in jerusalem over all israel for 40 years when he died he was buried in the city of david named for his father then his son rehoboam became the next king so we've got the holidays coming up christmas coming up that won't be next week it'll be the week after now you can see second chronicles is really similar but we got more books and this is another example if you know the word really well you know those aren't in my bible there are other books like the one we looked at last week except we don't have these they're gone now before i continue on to how this applies to us aside from eating too much candy and stealing chips in the grocery store there's kind of an elephant in the room if you've been paying attention and so i'm going to address it if you remember heather when we were in proverbs said that they were written most of them king solomon to his son singular it's not plural there ray obama we're going to see what happens to him now if you're really observant and you read the word a lot you'll notice that in first kings four in passing it's hard to catch when he's talking about all his officials he has two daughters just mentions them in passing they're married to his officials he's sleeping with 1 000 women and only has three kids what kind of birth control was he using okay now that we're beyond that you shouldn't speculate a lot of people will be like no no he probably had 100 kids the word of god only wants us to know that he has three kids and so that's it we don't speculate here no that's what it wants us to know we shouldn't no more anyway interesting i got to get over that so here's the thing what caused his downfall well i already answered that question but we're gonna look at it so deuteronomy and the law it gave him the reason he shouldn't be doing that we looked at this briefly a few weeks ago we'll look at it again deuteronomy 7 3 you must not intermarry with them these foreign women's women women's do not let your daughters and sons marry their sons and daughters for they will lead your children away from me to worship other gods then the anger of the lord will burn against you and he will quickly destroy you but if you remember that is not the only problem if we hop over to deuteronomy 17 16 the king so if you want a king someday here's the context says the law of moses the israelites if you want a king someday great i'm going to give you some instructions if i'm not good enough basically is what he's saying god deuteronomy 17 16 the king must not build a large stable of horses for himself or send his people to egypt to buy horses for the lord has told you you must never return to egypt what have you been reading twelve thousand horses solomon has okay the king must not take many wives for himself because they will turn his heart away from the lord and he must not accumulate large amounts of wealth and silver or gold for himself like 25 tons a year when he sits on the throne as king he must copy for himself this body of instruction on a scroll in the presence of the levitical priests he must always keep that copy with him and read it daily as long as he lives that way he will learn to fear the lord we've been talking about that his god by obeying all the terms of these instructions and decrees this regular reading will prevent him from becoming proud never a good thing in the bible and acting as if he is above his fellow citizens it will also prevent him from turning away from these commands in the smallest way and it will ensure that he and all his descendants will reign for many generations in israel solomon broke every single one of them in a big way a big big way 25 tons of gold not to mention like the 9 000 pounds sheba gives them hiram gives them the same amount tons of gold so there's so much silver the bible says that it was worthless in solomon's day he went nuts 12 000 horses off the charts also he's either not in the word or he's definitely not obeying it so downfall not being in the word not listening to god and obeying it as well surrounding yourself with temptations keeping things around us that are going to cause us to sin there's a context here we're not under the law of moses anymore i don't think anybody in here is a king right but there's a context foreign women in his case but in our case keeping things around us that are going to lead us astray so this is the beginning of the downfall of the entire kingdom it will lead to the destruction of the temple that he built everything gets destroyed 70 years in exile for the people horrible horrible punishment so if we fast forward about 480-ish years so what's going to happen is they're going to get put in exile then after seven years in exile they're going to come back so you have ezra nehemiah king cyrus okay persians take over the babylonians they come back and so when we look at ezra nehemiah used to be a set two books put together we noticed something he comes back nehemiah is really like a governor and he's there to help him build the walls that's what he's there for ezra's the priest so he's rebuilding the walls towards the end of the book he notices something that these people too have married foreign brides and so back then in that context it's a bad thing nehemiah makes note of something nehemiah 13 26 wasn't this exactly what led king solomon of israel into sin i demanded it's in nehemiah's voice there was no king from any nation who could compare to him and god loved him and made him king over all israel but even he was led into sin by his foreign wives how could you even think of committing the sinful deed and acting unfaithfully toward god by marrying foreign women even solomon was led astray he's pointing to the beginning of this downfall now in our case especially if we're not a king of israel it may not be foreign women leading us astray but in our lives are there things that we're lusting after that are turning our hearts from the lord as god warned solomon jesus also warned us in parables matthew 13 mark 4 luke 8 parable of the sower it says it's the initiation of the parables and from that point he doesn't teach in anything except parables and he doesn't like to explain himself to normal people so having eyes they do not see isaiah ears they do not hear it's prophetic he explains it on the side to his disciples so the parable of the sower goes kind of like this there's a farmer scattering seed some of that seed lands on pavement rocks and then immediately a bird comes down and takes the seed some of the seed lands on not so good soil rocky soil so it can't get a good root so when it comes up it gets scorched burned some of the seed lands among the thorn bushes and stuff and because it has all this stuff crowding around it it can't reach its potential it can't grow up some of that seed lands on fertile soil that seed gets a good root produces fruit 30 60 100 times as much disciples what does it mean let me tell you and you got to get this part right seen a lot of people actually famous people too get this wrong but the word tells us what it is jesus explains the seed is the word of god the seed is the word of god the soil types are like us depending on what state of reception that we're in so the seed falls on rocks doesn't get in there and so satan's the bird that comes and takes it away some seed they're kind of into it they're like the sunday to sunday christians nope gets scorched jesus says that for a reason it's supposed to make you think of something and what about the seed that lands among the thorns he tells us mark 4 18 the seed that fell among the thorns represents others who hear god's word but all too quickly the message is crowded out by the worries of this life the lure of wealth and the desire for other things so no fruit is produced then it's a nice fertile soil good root the word is really deep in there and so fruit 30 60 100 times we get the point we must have the word of god planted firmly in us did you notice first three are failures failures there's no like both jesus gives one option it's the fourth option that's it the word of god must be firmly firmly rooted in us without the temptations or distractions of this world there isn't another option solomon he had the word clearly and he was worn by god he even reiterated those things in his writings amazing he was wise but even solomon even solomon had his heart turned away from the lord even solomon he had it all going for him amazing even the temptations got him on the women again do you think now we don't speculate a lot here but just for a moment indulge me do you think any of solomon's wives got jealous didn't they they got jealous do you think he had that problem because if i'm looking at it from the outside and i'm thinking solomon is creating an environment that is ripe a garden that is ripe for jealousy don't you think was there bickering going on between the women how do you think they felt i don't know maybe it's like esther 12 months of beauty treatments fine send me to the spa for a while now here's the thing maybe we don't have as many wives as solomon right i hope nothing better not preach it lonnie now here's the thing i'm not going to speak for the women because i'm not a woman husbands do we create an environment now women you can just take the application i'm just going to speak for myself because i know what's good for me do we create an environment that creates jealousy do we do that perhaps we flirt a little bit with a woman we like perhaps we oogle over movie stars on the tv you're probably thinking oh come on seems innocent right there's something some couples do we haven't done this and i'll explain to you why in a moment it's not what you think and i had to check this because it's like a pop culture thing apparently it's called the hall pass he's like he's really going to talk about the hall yes i saw it on tv right so it's the celebrity pass here's the premise we're married and if you run into that movie star you get to sleep with that movie star that's the whole path right it's a holopad celebrity pass somebody nod their head getting scared so anyway it's a thing i saw it on friends so anyway it's like a hall pass you get something like that or whatever and it works kind of because here's the thing you're never going to run into that celebrity and even if you do they don't want you and that's the thing right you're just not that beautiful so so it works right so you're like it's never going to happen now here's the reason my wife and i never did that if you know my story you know i knew a lot of famous people so it could definitely happen so we never did that that was the real reason or was it here's the thing about it now i got you laughing i'm going to ruin it it's actually very harmful it's actually very harmful because there's truth in jest there's truth and just and what it actually says you're not good enough if i run into a woman that looks like that you're out you're done i'm gonna leave you home so you can watch one of their movies while i'm sleeping with her it's not it's hurtful it says you're not good enough and even in jest that's not okay these things seem innocent start small sin does on that slippery just small a flirt just going to talk to her a little bit just going to oogle a little bit i'm going to make a little hall pass joke but then it gets bigger and bigger and here's the other thing what if your spouse took you up on it would it be innocent then what if the other brought up this point it's a good one what if you found someone who just kind of happened to look a lot like that celebrity that count would it be cool the other way around would it be innocent then ah gene it's just imaginary stop spoiling my fun because sin is fun isn't it but it's still hurtful and it usually leads to something wrong one small step at a time into bigger sin until the bigger sin doesn't look so big anymore but it's just imaginary you know what else isn't imaginary we may not be kings we may not have access to 1 000 women we kind of do though right on our phone thousands and thousands of women right on our phones nowadays you don't need to be king to have access to that many women and women men again i'm staying in my lane not a woman so i don't know what you do but maybe i don't know and what jesus teaches about that applies here too because guess what it's not imaginary it's not imaginary and like solomon these women will turn your hearts away from the lord now if you are accessing these women you may think and this is what i've heard it's a victimless crime that's what i've heard i'm not hurting anyone but yourself it's not first of all if you're doing that you're supporting a very evil thing you're supporting it a very evil thing and think oh i didn't pay for it you got another like or a view they monetized those you know here's the other thing what if that woman was your daughter what if that woman was your sister or your niece is it still victimless now jesus says it's not victimless matthew 5 27 he is speaking you have heard the commandment that says you must not commit adultery but i say his standard is higher notice but i say anyone who even looks at a woman with lust has already committed adultery with her in his heart jesus says that even looking at a woman with lust is adultery those women have turned your heart away from the lord you cannot have it both ways you are either in love with the lord or in lust with those women there's nothing in the middle mutually exclusive it's the motive that matters so now the other thing here is i'm hoping i'm hoping that if you're leading others or you're parenting or whatever i'm hoping that you're not telling others that this is okay i'm hoping that you're not saying that's okay go do that or i don't do that but you shouldn't do that so if you are doing that how are you following your own advice his word for that hypocrite we hate that word probably because a lot of people are guilty of it we don't like that being called out hypocrite bothers us the word just bothers us coming out of our mouths i don't even like saying it there were some things that bothered jesus hypocrisy was like right about at the top of his list he hated it now here's the thing it's a big word but i think we all understand what it means it means we're saying one thing teaching people to do one thing and then doing another probably when they're not looking that's the simple form of it if we get to matthew 23 it's a very famous chapter because it's the seven woes they don't like reading that in church a whole lot it doesn't make anybody feel good but that's not jesus's point here in 23 24 or 25. it's a hard read woes to the religious leaders he's basically saying don't follow these people because they say one thing teach one thing and then do another and he continues matthew 23 13 what sorrow woe to you awaits you teachers of religious law and you pharisees hypocrites for you shut the door of the kingdom of heaven and people's faces you won't go in yourselves and you don't let others in either what sorrow woe to you awaits you teachers of religious law and your pharisees hypocrites for you cross land and sea to make one convert and then you turn that person into twice the child of hell that you yourselves are don't follow this type of leader is what jesus is saying but condemns them and also in our wanderings we have the ability to lead others astray and if you know the word well mark 9 for example jesus gives some very serious warnings about that what happens to people remember the millstone being tied around their neck and thrown into the sea we're actually called to live this out by example the advice we give we are to live it out by example and i will tell you as evidence of our salvation as evidence of our salvation i talked about something a lot of christians don't know these popular teachings wrong fear appears 365 in the bible fear not nope nope maybe 100 times it says more fear the lord and that was the key we learned to not sinning so much the nanny cam is always there there's no safe place we can go that god won't see it there's nothing in secret and we will be judged for it that's another popular teaching christians will say they'll espouse this well you're not going to be judged you're good no if you're going and doing all those things there's no evidence that you're going to be saved that's what the word says there's another thing people god will judge us it says this i'll give you all the scriptures if you want then we can go through it again christians judgment begins with us it doesn't peter begins with us but guess what people are always judging us by our fruit we're the only bible a lot of people see that's a correct one that's pretty popular but unfortunately people don't like following that one people will decide whether they are going to become christians or not and if you're a christian i'm going to say this based on your behavior that's it they'll make the decision maybe you're wearing a cross maybe you're praying maybe you got the jesus fish on the car but the answer is often i'll just take the cross off i'll take the then you're missing the point you're missing the point why then what's the motive so i can do whatever i want what no keep the fish on there change your behavior that's what you're supposed to do they know we're christians and when they find out and we treat them like garbage they go i don't want to be a christian heather my wife she'll tell you i'm not going to say who she was watching close relative i'm a christian i'm the church lady i do every it's like if that's what a christian looks like i never want to be one never greedy with money charging their children interest on loans not speaking to them whatever it is really if that's a christian count me out you don't have to do a lot to chase people away and i would assert and i think there are a lot of you here that are getting sick of it too i would assert that christians are doing a much better job at chasing people away from the faith than bringing people in right if you're on that side of the aisle you can't get in and i'm going to make that the most important thing to talk about in the whole world but jesus check this out not a popular portion of scripture second peter 1 10. so all that dear brothers and sisters work hard to prove work hard to prove that you really are among those god has called and chosen did you know the bible said that new testament so dear brothers and sisters work hard work hard not hardly work at this work hard to prove that you really are among those god is called and chosen do these things and you will never fall away do these things and then you will never fall away then then god will give you a grand entrance into the eternal kingdom of our lord and savior jesus christ so how steps of obedience so if we look at the sermon on the mount in matthew 5 where we were jesus will continue and he'll say matthew at 5 29 he didn't say matthew so if your eye even your good eye causes you to lust gouge it out and throw it away it is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell jesus talks about hell a lot doesn't he and if your hand even your stronger hand causes you to sin cut it off and throw it away it is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into there it is again hell now clearly this is not literal it's called hyperbole but jesus is doing it to get your attention or not literally don't go and cut your hand off please when you go home not literal but his point is what he says about the consequences that is dead serious it is dead serious so here's the thing we need to get rid of the temptations don't pull your eye out but get rid of the things your eye is looking at keep it out of the house good advice keep it out of the house that's it we need to keep it off the phone practical steps why do you have that app or that thing or whatever it is why do you have it there anyway this extends itself to other sin when i want to really just spend time with the lord take a sabbath a little note comes up in my phone i'm giving you help practical steps don't check facebook because a lot of people that i know they're claiming to be christians they're just not on there and it makes me really angry because my job is to try to bring people into the faith for love gave you like the the cheap i'm not going to name the chain right the the the gym you know where like people just get the little keychain thing just say they go to the gym they go a couple times nobody gets in shape because it's like there's no good trainers there or anything but they give people shirts right so like take the shirt off you're embarrassing me it's not good for the brand well if christianity is a brand these people are not good for the brand i just say this when i owned a gym the fighters before a fighter got up okay we're gonna do it you know what i would say to them don't embarrass me it was kind of mean but funny don't embarrass me i kind of feel like this is what jesus is saying you're embarrassing me it feels like that as a pastor so i open up facebook only on work days because it's work you're embarrassing me you're embarrassing me you're embarrassing me some of you are good though posting scriptures good job but just stop doing it out of context you cannot do all things applied to your football game you're annoying don't do that anymore but i take it off my phone i'm like this is gonna so it's not just things like the women are sex it could be that right but it's things that are gonna tempt you to unnecessary anger so ask yourself why do you have it there why are you playing with that fire get rid of it take it off the phone if it's a person at work quit your job there's a lot of there's a worker shortage okay people don't tell me you need that job it's not the only job in the world if there's someone at work that's capturing your heart quit because the lord is far more important than your career just being real we may have had things that have turned our hearts away from the lord but we need to turn from them in repentance and turn back to the lord it's not over people if you've done it you still got a chance come back to jesus we need to fall out of lust with the world and in love with the lord jesus tells us how we know if we love him and we are in him in a lot of places but here john 14 21 those who accept my commandments and obey them are the ones who love me and because they love me my father will love them and i will love them and reveal myself to each one of them if we turn the page john 15 10 when you obey my commandments you remain in my love just as i obey my father's commands and remain in his love jesus is our ultimate example we must look to him we must abide in him all of the time all of the time i pray for you lord i thank you for this day this church that is your body the body of christ strengthen us lord turn our hearts back to you if we've been doing something wrong going down the wrong road turn our hearts back to you by the power of your holy spirit god fill us strengthen us empower us give us the desire to love you completely i asked this in jesus name you