Take your Bibles with me and turn to 1 Kings 12. 1 Kings 12. We are going to be looking tonight at the end of this chapter and some of chapter 13. It's a really interesting story that has a lot to teach us about God and how He works.

We are going to start in a second in verse 25.

Remember, Daniel preached on this last week, Solomon has died. Solomon must have had lots of children. That tends to happen when you have 1,000 wives. Some of those children are named elsewhere, but we really only know about one of them, a guy name Reheboam.

Reheboam becomes the king after Solomon dies, but Rehoboam is foolish, and because of his foolishness he splits the country in two.

And the northern half of the country follow a man named Jereboam.

Now, Jereboam wasn't related to Reheboam at all. Jereboam was a servant of Solomon's that lead a little bit of a revolt. He was a wise leader that Solomon identified young and gave a position of power.

In chapter 11 of 1 Kings, a prophet named Ahijah came to Jereboam and told him that God was going to rip the kingdom away from Solomon and make him the king of the ten northern tribes.

And God gave Jereboam a promise:

[!bible] (38) And it shall be, if thou wilt hearken unto all that I command thee, and wilt walk in my ways, and do that is right in my sight, to keep my statutes and my commandments, as David my servant did; that I will be with thee, and build thee a sure house, as I built for David, and will give Israel unto thee.
— 1 Kings 11:38 (KJV)

So Jereboam wasn't a rebel. He was doing what God told him to do.

And Jereboam's kingdom had a pretty solid start. God was behind it. The people were behind him. He was a talented guy. He had the promise that God would bless his kingdom. I don't know how you can get a better start than that.

But as we are going to see, Jereboam went downhill very fast. And as we continue to read 1 and 2 Kings and Chronicles, you are going too see Jereboam's name come up time and again and it will say something like "he did evil in the sight of thee LORD, and he walked in the ways of Jereboam, and in his sin that he caused Israel to sin."

Over and over it tells us Jereboam caused Israel to sin and here we are going to see exactly how he caused Israel to sin.

Let's start reading in verse 25 of chapter 12.

[!bible] (25) Then Jeroboam built Shechem in mount Ephraim, and dwelt therein; and went out from thence, and built Penuel. (26) And Jeroboam said in his heart, Now shall the kingdom return to the house of David: (27) If this people go up to do sacrifice in the house of the LORD at Jerusalem, then shall the heart of this people turn again unto their lord, even unto Rehoboam king of Judah, and they shall kill me, and go again to Rehoboam king of Judah. (28) Whereupon the king took counsel, and made two calves of gold, and said unto them, It is too much for you to go up to Jerusalem: behold thy gods, O Israel, which brought thee up out of the land of Egypt. (29) And he set the one in Bethel, and the other put he in Dan. (30) And this thing became a sin: for the people went to worship before the one, even unto Dan. (31) And he made an house of high places, and made priests of the lowest of the people, which were not of the sons of Levi.
— 1 Kings 12:25-31 (KJV)

Now what we are going to see tonight is exactly how a man with every advantage - God's calling, God's promise, and the people's support - managed to destroy it all through five devastating sins.

And these aren't sins that stopped being a temptation thousands of years ago - these are still sins God's people can fall into today.

Let's have a word of prayer and ask God's blessing on our message tonight, and we will start looking at these five sins.

Pray together

The first sin we are going to consider tonight as we look at Jereboam is...

Sin # 1 - He consulted his heart and his friends, but not God.

In verse 25, Jereboam did exactly what you would expect a new king to do. He established a capitol. He build himself a palace. He setup a government. He started to shore it up.

David and Solomon had had about a hundred year head start on Israel, and so Jereboam had some work to do and he seems to have gone about it with some gusto.

But in verse 26, we see the very beginning of Jereboam's slip. It says "and Jereboam said in his heart." Jereboam starts to worry. He starts to get insecure.

Remember, Jereboam had a promise from God. God promised that if he obeyed, that God would establish his kingdom. But God's promise wasn't good enough. He started to worry. He looked around and he realized that, humanly speaking, he had a problem.

You see, the kingdoms were split. He had a capitol in Israel, in the north.

But just because the kingdoms were split doesn't mean that the religion was split. The jews were still one people and they still served one God and God had only setup one place for them to worship him - the Temple - and the Temple happened to be in Jerusalem - right next to the palace of his rival Reheboam.

And that bothered Jereboam. He thought - "people are going to go down there to worship and they are going to change their mind. They are going to go back to the house of David and if enough of them do that - then he'll be king again and they will kill me."

Apparently this really troubled Jereboam. So he went to his friends. Verse 28 tells us He went and got some counsel. He asked people what he should do about this problem and apparently, he didn't get very good advise.

Because the next thing you know he's making golden calves.

Jereboam consulted his heart and his friends, but not God.

Listen, Jereboam had two things going for him that he chose not to use:

• He had a direct promise from God.
• He had the Bible's instruction.

He should have taken those worries to God. He should have trusted the word of God. He should have looked to the Bible for guidance about what to do.

Instead, he gave into his own insecurities and to the spirit of the day, and he tried to do things his own way.

Church, we have the word of God. When we are troubled, we should go to the word of God. We should seek direction from the word of God. When we are going through a dark time, we should hang onto the promises of God.

We should let God talk to us. Instead what we do too often is we talk to ourselves. We listen to everyone but God. We listen to the voices on Facebook. We listen to the books and magazines in the grocery store aisle. We listen to Dr. Phil or to Taylor Swift. We listen to Charlie Kirk or to Walters World. When we should be listening to the word.

The first sin we are going to consider tonight as we look at Jereboam is...

Sin # 1 - He consulted his heart and his friends, but not God.

In verse 25, Jereboam did exactly what you would expect a new king to do. He established a capitol. He build himself a palace. He setup a government. He started to shore it up.

David and Solomon had had about a hundred year head start on Israel, and so Jereboam had some work to do and he seems to have gone about it with some gusto.

But in verse 26, we see the very beginning of Jereboam's slip. It says "and Jereboam said in his heart." Jereboam starts to worry. He starts to get insecure.

Remember, Jereboam had a promise from God. God promised that if he obeyed, that God would establish his kingdom. But God's promise wasn't good enough. He started to worry. He looked around and he realized that, humanly speaking, he had a problem.

You see, the kingdoms were split. He had a capitol in Israel, in the north.

But just because the kingdoms were split doesn't mean that the religion was split. The jews were still one people and they still served one God and God had only setup one place for them to worship him - the Temple - and the Temple happened to be in Jerusalem - right next to the palace of his rival Reheboam.

And that bothered Jereboam. He thought - "people are going to go down there to worship and they are going to change their mind. They are going to go back to the house of David and if enough of them do that - then he'll be king again and they will kill me."

Apparently this really troubled Jereboam. So he went to his friends. Verse 28 tells us He went and got some counsel. He asked people what he should do about this problem and apparently, he didn't get very good advise.

Because the next thing you know he's making golden calves.

Jereboam consulted his heart and his friends, but not God.

Listen, Jereboam had two things going for him that he chose not to use:

• He had a direct promise from God.
• He had the Bible's instruction.

He should have taken those worries to God. He should have trusted the word of God. He should have looked to the Bible for guidance about what to do.

Instead, he gave into his own insecurities and to the spirit of the day, and he tried to do things his own way.

Church, we have the word of God. When we are troubled, we should go to the word of God. We should seek direction from the word of God. When we are going through a dark time, we should hang onto the promises of God.

We should let God talk to us. Instead what we do too often is we talk to ourselves. We listen to everyone but God. We listen to the voices on Facebook. We listen to the books and magazines in the grocery store aisle. We listen to Dr. Phil or to Taylor Swift. We listen to Charlie Kirk or to Walters World. When we should be listening to the word.

And here's the tragedy - we have something Jeroboam didn't have. We have the complete Word of God, we have the Holy Spirit living in us, and we have direct access to the throne of grace through prayer. Yet we still turn everywhere else first.

So Jereboam's first sin is one we fall into to - listening to everyone but God.

We see Jereboam's second sin next. Verses 28-29 say this:

(28) Whereupon the king took counsel, and made two calves of gold, and said unto them, It is too much for you to go up to Jerusalem: behold thy gods, O Israel, which brought thee up out of the land of Egypt. (29) And he set the one in Bethel, and the other put he in Dan.

Jereboam's second sin is...

Sin # 2 - He made worship a matter of convenience instead of obedience.

You see, it was kind of inconvenient for people to go all the way down to Jerusalem to worship. It was more inconvenient now that it was a whole other country.

So as a matter of convenience, Jereboam offered alternatives. He basically made two alternative temples, one at the Northern part of Israel in Dan and another in the southern part of Israel in Bethel.

This was a lot more convenient for the Israelites. It was like, we don't need to go to Chicago - we can get Portillo's in Champaign. They were putting the Temples right in their back yard.

The only problem with this is that God had never told them to do this. In fact, God had specifically setup the Temple in Jerusalem and that was where the people were to come to worship.

It was inconvenient before too. The Temple (and tabernacle) had been there a long time. That was God's plan.

You know, I think we put ourselves in danger when we make serving God and worshiping God a matter of convenience. When we start making changes to remove things in our life to make it easier.

• Oh, we don't need to come to church all the time. We can just come once a month.
• Oh, we don't even need to come, we can just watch online.
• That church over there, they have fifteen services, and I can wear whatever clothes I want.

Convenience.

We want drive-through spirituality. We want microwave Christianity. We want to have it our way, on our schedule, and with no bother. But what if God didn't design it that way?

Remember what Jesus told His disciples, He said "take up thy cross daily." (Luke 9:23) (That doesn't sound very convenient.)

Paul told us we are to present our bodies a living sacrifice. (Romans 12:1) (That doesn't sound very convenient.) He told us to "endure hardness as a good soldier." (2 Timothy 2:3) (That certainly doesn't sound convenient.)

Listen, he started by ignoring God's word. Then he made worship a matter of convenience, and when he did that, he set himself up perfectly for the third sin.

Sin # 3 - He made God in His own image.

Amazingly, Jereboam made golden calves. Now when you read that - what do you think about? You think about Aaron right? You think about what Aaron did when Moses was up on Mt. Sinai.

You would think that Jereboam would know how this story ends - but apparently he doesn't and he makes golden calves.

Now, why golden calves? Why did both Aaron and Jereboam make that to represent God? (And they were both trying to represent our God, not make a new one.)

Most of the people I've read say that the calves were a symbol of strength. Gold was a symbol of riches. To them, God was represented by strength and riches.

I want you to understand something about our religion. It is a religion that, for the most part, doesn't have symbols.

In the Old Testament, Judaism was a religion with no idols. There were to be no symbols or representations of God. "Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image" Do you know why?

Because God is so big and so awesome, that no artist can represent Him. And when we do, we limit God.

Is God rich? Yes. Is God strong? Yes. But God is so much more than that. And when we make a symbol, an image of God, we are limiting God. We are making God small.

And when we do that - invariably - we miss things. We emphasize things we shouldn't.

God has given us a perfect representation of Himself - its called this book and He's given us a perfect image of Himself - its His Son Jesus Christ. When we think of who God is - God wants us to think of Christ.

And I said earlier we don't really have any symbols, but that isn't true, we have one God given symbol, and it is the symbol of the cross. When we think about God, we should think about the cross - because there is nowhere like the cross that shows us how great our God is.

The cross shows us His severity for sin, but it also shows us His love for sinners. The cross shows us His power as Christ rose from the dead, and His care for us defeating our sin.

Listen, do not think that because we no longer bow down to golden cows, that we don't have idols anymore. The apostle John wrote to believers long after they had stopped worshiping little statues and said "Little children, keep yourselves from idols."

Each of us have a tendency to make God in our own image. To worship an imaginary god of our creation - not the God of the Bible.

• We make a God who never gets angry
• We make a God who asks nothing of us
• We make a God who always blesses but never disciplines
• We make a God who never challenges our politics
• We make a God who is like a cosmic vending machine - we put prayer and and we get blessings out.
• We make a God who would never judge people.
• We make a God who wants us to be happy and doesn't care if we are holy.
• We make a God who basically gives us everything we wanted in the first place.

Do you see how this happens? This isn't an accident. There is a pattern here:

• First we ignore the word of God.
• Then we elevate convenience.
• Then detached from the word, we are free to start remaking God in our image.

And this leads us to the fourth sin of Jereboam:

Sin # 4 - He lowered God's standards.

Look at verse 31:

(31) And he made an house of high places, and made priests of the lowest of the people, which were not of the sons of Levi.

God had setup a system in the law for who was to be priests. It was one family. The family of Levi. The family of Aaron.

But apparently Jeroboam had a hard time getting them to sign up for his golden calf experiment, so he had to lower the qualifications. He didn't abandon his plan, he lowered his standards. He had to make it so anyone who wanted to could become a priest.

God had made the priesthood holy, set apart, a special and exclusive thing an Jeroboam said "anyone can do this thing, just sign up on the dotted line."

Listen, when we ignore God's word, when we make our convenience paramount, when we make God in our own image - it always leads to lowering God's standards.

It never fails, when people start down this path it leads to clearly ignoring God's standards. If you look around and you see churches where the pastors are women, or the pastor has been divorced, or the church members are living in open sin and everyone seems ok with it, you can be sure God's word stopped being the authority a long time ago.

It's the Romans 1 progression: People do not want to retain God in their knowledge, so they make their own religion, and they eventually throw out all of God's commands.

Now, let me wrap this up by giving you Jereboam's fifth sin:

Sin # 5 - He ignored God's warning signs.

Now, we don't have time tonight to get into chapter 13. That will be next Wednesday's sermon. But I'll give you an overview:

God sent a prophet from Judah to confront Jereboam about this false religion, and Jereboam didn't like what he said and point to him and said something like "arrest that man." And as his arm was out, his hand just withered.

Jereboam ended up begging the prophet to pray so God would heal his hand and God did.

That seems like a pretty clear warning and a pretty clear picture of how real God is. Doesn't it?

But here is what I want you to see. Look down to verses 33-34.

[!bible] 1 Kings 13:33-34 - KJV 33. After this thing Jeroboam returned not from his evil way, but made again of the lowest of the people priests of the high places: whosoever would, he consecrated him, and he became one of the priests of the high places. 34. And this thing became sin unto the house of Jeroboam, even to cut it off, and to destroy it from off the face of the earth.

Even though God sent a prophet and did a miracle on Jereboam's own body, he still hardened his heart and didn't turn back to God.

Think about this - God literally dried up his hand in front of everyone at his own altar, then healed it when the prophet prayed. You can’t get a clearer sign than that. Yet he hardened his heart.

And here is the lesson for us: if you start down this path where you ignore God, you'll likely keep ignoring God even to the end.

Friends, the human heart has an incredible capacity for self-deception. We can ignore the clearest warnings, rationalize the most obvious signs, and harden ourselves against even miraculous interventions.

God’s discipline in your life, conviction from His Word, warning voices from godly friends - these are all opportunities to turn back. Don’t ignore them like Jeroboam did.

Tonight we’ve seen how Jeroboam’s five sins work together: • He consulted his heart instead of God’s Word • He chose convenience over obedience • He remade God in his own image • He lowered God’s standards to fit his plans • He ignored God’s clear warnings

And the tragic result? His entire dynasty was “cut off and destroyed from off the face of the earth.”

But here’s the good news - as long as you’re breathing, it’s not too late. Don’t be like Jeroboam. When God’s Spirit convicts you, when His Word challenges you, when He sends warning signs through circumstances or godly counsel - listen. Respond.