#DailyDevotion Don’t Look For Advice Until You Hear What You Want To Hear

August 29th

Read 1 Kng 11:42—12:19

1Ki 12:6-11  Then King Rehoboam took counsel with the old men, who had stood before Solomon his father while he was yet alive, saying, “How do you advise me to answer this people?”  (7)  And they said to him, “If you will be a servant to this people today and serve them, and speak good words to them when you answer them, then they will be your servants forever.”  (8)  But he abandoned the counsel that the old men gave him and took counsel with the young men who had grown up with him and stood before him.  (9)  And he said to them, “What do you advise that we answer this people who have said to me, ‘Lighten the yoke that your father put on us’?”  (10)  And the young men who had grown up with him said to him, “Thus shall you speak to this people who said to you, ‘Your father made our yoke heavy, but you lighten it for us,’ thus shall you say to them, ‘My little finger is thicker than my father’s thighs.  (11)  And now, whereas my father laid on you a heavy yoke, I will add to your yoke. My father disciplined you with whips, but I will discipline you with scorpions.'”

 

Pride comes before the fall and youth are prone not to listen to the advice of their elders.  King Rehoboam does a good thing by seeking out the advice of the old men who stood before his father.  They give him some pretty good advice.  Apparently, Rehoboam doesn’t care for that advice and goes to his young friends who have no experience.  It looks like he prefers their advice over that of those who are experienced.  In doing this, the Lord’s Word comes true which was spoken by the Lord to Solomon.  The kingdom would be divided and Judah would have but a small portion of Israel to rule over.

 

It is unfortunate that we in our sinful state will either ignore or overlook that advice which we don’t want to hear.  We have the voice of experience which has been molded with wisdom but it won’t justify what we want to do.  So we keep seeking out counselors until we find someone who agrees with us so we may justify our actions.

 

We also do the same thing with Holy Scripture.  We know what the Scriptures say or maybe we don’t but we are looking for some “religious” knowledge and we turn to those who may know what the Bible says about something.  When we find out it goes against what we want to do, we either find another teacher who will explain away what the scripture says or we may simply ignore it and make up our own minds as to what we want the Bible and God to say.

 

In doing so, we too will lose the Kingdom our Heavenly Father has planned on giving us.  It’s not that our Father in Heaven doesn’t want to give us  the Kingdom nor does He desire for us to not be happy, joyous and free.  But He has designed life to be a certain way and has told us in His Word what that is.  Our sinfulness keeps us from seeing that His way is a way which generally leads to a better life.  It’s not always an easy life and because of the sinfulness of others and ourselves even when we are doing our best to follow His way things still do go wrong, but following His way can help prevent that from being our fault.

 

When do fall however, we can be certain that if we admit our faults, confess our sins and seek out His forgiveness on account of the King of Kings, our Lord Jesus Christ, the Kingdom’s door will be open to us and we will be welcomed as His children.

 

Lord Jesus Christ, ever give us the Holy Spirit, that we might seek to live our lives according to Your Word and not according to the desires of our sinful flesh.  And when we do fail, grant us repentance unto life everlasting. Amen.