- [Narrator] Three people who refused to listen to God.
Number one, Jonah.
Jonah was plagued by numerous issues.
Aside from his tendency to act emotional
at any given opportunity, he had a much deeper issue.
He attempted to reject God's word
because he did not want God's enemies to be saved.
And you might believe Jonah was correct
because it doesn't get much worse than the Assyrians.
They flayed people alive
and used some of the most heinous torture techniques
documented in history.
Jonah witnessed the northern kingdom of Israel
be captured or scattered by them.
Imagine his rage when God told him
to deliver a warning message to them.
Although the message stated that God would destroy Nineveh,
a great city in Assyria, Jonah recognized a catch.
If the people repented, God would relent.
So he fled on purpose to keep the word from reaching them
so they could face judgment.
Jonah 1:1-6.
The word of the Lord came to Jonah son of Amittai
'Go to the great city of Ninevah and preach against it
because its wickedness has come up before Me.'
But Jonah ran away from the Lord and headed for Tarshish.
He went down to Joppa,
where he found a ship bound for that port.
After paying the fare, he went aboard
and sailed for Tarshish to flee from the Lord.
Then the Lord sent a great wind on the sea,
and such a violent storm arose
that the ship threatened to break up.
All the sailors were afraid
and each cried out to his own god.
And they threw the cargo into the sea to lighten the ship.
But Jonah had gone below deck,
where he laid down and fell into a deep sleep.
The captain went to him and said,
'How can you sleep? Get up and call on your god!
Maybe he will take notice of us
so that we will not perish.'"
And this doesn't sound very good to us.
How could Jonah, a God-fearing man,
wish destruction on anyone?
But if we're completely honest,
there were a few Ninevites in our lives
who we'd prefer to see reap the benefits
of the havoc they'd caused in the past.
We might not go quite that far.
However, if we are permitted to testify against them,
we can retort, "Bah, they've caused me far too much pain
so I'll pass this one on to another Christian."
Jonah finally obeyed God and it was a success.
However, Jonah was not happy with their redemption.
"I knew that you are a gracious and compassionate God
slow to anger and abounding in love,
a God who relent from sending calamity.
Now, Lord, take away my life
for it is better for me to dive than to live.
But the Lord replied, 'Is it right for you to be angry?'
Jonah had gone out and sat down at a place east of the city.
There, he made himself a shelter, sat in its shade,
and waited to see what would happen to the city.
Then the Lord God provided a leafy plant
and made it grow up over Jonah to give shade for his head
to ease his discomfort
and Jonah was very happy about the plant.
But at dawn the next day, God provided a worm
which chewed the plant so that it withered.
When the sun rose, God provided a scorching east wind
and the sun blazed on Jonah's head so that he grew faint.
He wanted to die and said
'It would be better for me to die than to live.'
But God said to Jonah, 'Is it right
for you to be angry about the plant?'
'It is,' he said, 'And I'm so angry I wish I were dead.'
But the Lord said, 'You have been concerned about this plant
though you did not tend it or make it grow.
It sprung up overnight and died overnight.
And should I not have concerned for the great city
of Ninevah in which there are more than 120,000 people
who cannot tell their right hand from their left,
and also many animals?'"
Number two, Cain.
Cain, the farmer who slew his brother.
When a person takes the life of another,
they have no greater negative impact.
To the shame of humanity,
our historical paths are littered with murderous acts.
Here's a terrifying thought.
As I speak these words,
somewhere someone is planning to kill another.
And as you hear these words,
the intended victim of that insidious scheme will soon die.
It all started at the dawn of human history.
Now the man Adam was having marital intercourse
with his wife Eve, and she became pregnant and had Cain.
She had just created a man just like the Lord did.
Genesis 4:1-8, Amplified Bible.
"Now, the man Adam knew Eve as his wife,
and she conceived and gave birth to Cain, and she said,
'I have obtained a man, baby boy, son,
with the help of the Lord.'
And later she gave birth to his brother Abel.
Now Abel kept the flocks of sheep and goats,
but Cain cultivating the ground.
And in the course of time, Cain brought the Lord
an offering of the fruit of the ground.
But Abel brought an offering
of the finest firstborn of his flock and the fat portions.
And the Lord had respect, regard, for Abel
and for his offering; but for Cain and his offering,
he had no respect.
So Cain became extremely angry, indignant,
and he looked annoyed and hostile.
And the Lord said to Cain, 'Why are you so angry?
And why do you look annoyed?
If you do well, believing Me
and doing what is acceptable and pleasing to Me,
will you not be accepted?
And if you do not do well, but ignore My instruction,
sin crouches at your door; its desires for you,
to overpower you, but you must master it.'
Cain talked with Abel, his brother, about what God had said.
And when they were alone working in the field,
Cain attacked Abel, his brother, and killed him."
Why are you angry and why has your countenance fallen?
God dealt with Cain through loving confrontation
rather than automatic affirmation.
God made it clear that if Cain did well,
he would be accepted.
Of course, God knew the answers to the questions he asked,
but he wanted to know
and to resist the pull toward violence and anger within.
Cain was warned by God about the destructive power of sin.
Cain could either resist sin and be blessed
or he could succumb to sin and be devoured.
We prevent sin from rolling over us
by allowing God to master us first.
Without God as our master, we will be slaves to sin.
It is worth noting that the first killing occurred
within the second generation of humanity.
This points to an undeniable theological truth
revealed in Genesis chapter four.
We are not sinners simply because we have sinned.
We sin because we are sinners.
The problem is in the heart.
If you genuinely believe in God,
you will do what He says when He says it
and in the manner He desires.
Cain came in his own way and Abel came God's way.
The way these men addressed God
demonstrated the sincerity of their faith.
Later in the Bible, the writer of Hebrews
explains it this way.
Abel offered God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain,
and through his faith, he was commended as righteous
because God commended him for his offerings.
And through his faith, he still speaks, though he is dead.
1 John 3:10-12, Amplified Bible.
"By this, the children of God
and the children of the devil are clearly identified.
Anyone who does not practice righteousness,
who does not seek God's will in thought,
action, and purpose, is not of God, nor is the one
who does not unselfishly love his believing brother.
For this is the message which you, believers, have heard
from the beginning of your relationship with Christ,
that we should unselfishly love
and seek the best for one another
and not be like Cain, who was of the evil one
and murdered his brother Abel."
And why did he murder him?
Because Cain's deeds were evil
and his brothers were righteous.
That's God's appraisal of the offerings of Cain and Abel.
Abel's offerings are righteous. Cain's offerings, evil.
Number three, Solomon.
The story of Solomon
is one of the more sorrowful stories in the Bible
and it is also one of the more disappointing stories.
Solomon engaged in all of the Lord's activities
specified in Deuteronomy 17:16-17
as inappropriate for rulers.
Deuteronomy 17:16-17, Amplified Bible.
"Further, he shall not acquire many war horses for himself
nor make the people return to Egypt
in order to acquire horses to expand his military power
since the Lord said to you,
'You shall never return that way again.'
He shall never acquire multiple wives for himself
or else his heart will turn away from God.
Nor for the same reason shall he acquire
great amounts of silver and gold."
He amassed wealth in the form of Egyptian horses,
silver, gold, and wives from other countries.
This was the start of his ultimate downfall
and it was all because he fell right into the trap,
compromising his faith in God
and following the wicked ways of the pagan nations
he was associating with despite the Lord's warning.
1 Kings 9:4-7, New American Standard Bible.
"As for you, if you walk before Me
as your father David walked
in integrity of heart and honesty, acting in accordance
with everything that I have commanded you,
and if you keep My statutes and My ordinances,
then I will establish the throne of your kingdom
over Israel forever, just as I promised
to your Father David, saying,
'You shall not be deprived
of a man on the throne of Israel.'
But if you or your sons indeed turn away from following Me
and do not keep My commandments and My statutes
which I have placed before you,
but you go and serve other gods and worship them,
then I will cut Israel off from the land
which I have given them.
And the house which I have consecrated from My name,
I will expel from my sight.
So Israel will become a saying
and an object of derision among all peoples."
Solomon, as a result, lost God's blessing.
Solomon may have been as young as 20 years old
when he ascended to the throne.
He was given an incredible opportunity.
The final account of Solomon's life, however,
is one of disappointment.
1 Kings 11:1-3, Amplified Bible.
"Now King Solomon defiantly loved many foreign women
along with a daughter of Pharaoh: Moabite,
Ammonite, Edomite, Sidonian,
and Hittite women from the various nations
of whom the Lord said to the Israelites,
'You shall not associate with them,
nor shall they associate with you
for the result will be
that they will turn away your hearts to follow their gods.'
Yet Solomon clung to these in love.
He had 700 wives, princesses, and 300 concubines,
and his wives turned his heart away from God."
Solomon's polygamy was first a problem
because it was contrary to God's initial plan
of one man and one woman being united together.
Second, marrying these women from neighboring nations
was clearly forbidden as God had warned
that such women would turn the hearts of the Israelites
away from following their gods.
Solomon, unfortunately,
ignored these facts hundreds of times.
The extent to which Solomon disobeyed this crucial command
is astounding.
His wives converted him to idolatry exactly as predicted.
1 Kings 11:4-8, New American Standard Bible.
"For when Solomon was old, his wives turned his heart away
to follow other gods and his heart
was not wholly devoted to the Lord his God
as the heart of his father David had been.
For Solomon, became a father of Ashtoreth,
the goddess of the Sedonians,
and of Milcom, the abhorrent idols of the Ammonites."
So Solomon did what was evil in the sight of the Lord
and did not follow the Lord fully
as his father David had done.
Then Solomon built a high place for Chemosh,
the abhorrent idol of Moab,
on the mountain that is east of Jerusalem
and for Molek the abhorrent idol of the sons of Ammon.
He also did the same for all his foreign wives
who burned incense and sacrificed to their gods.
In terms of abstaining from idolatry,
verse four indicates that King David's heart
was entirely faithful to the Lord his God,
but Solomon did not follow in his father's footsteps
in this regard.
He built idolatrous shrines in the Mount of Olives
east of Jerusalem.
So the Lord said to Solomon, 'Since you have done this,
and you have not kept My covenant and My statutes,
which I have commanded you,
I will certainly tear the kingdom away from you,
and will give it to your servant.
However, I will not do it in your days,
only for the sake of your father David;
but I will tear it away from the hand of your son.
Yet I will not tear away all the kingdom,
but I will give one tribe to your son
for the sake of My servant David,
and for the sake of Jerusalem which I have chosen.'"
He now declared that as a result of Solomon's idolatry,
the kingdom would be taken from him
and given to one of his servants.
It would not, however, take place during Solomon's lifetime
and not all 12 tribes would be taken
from the house of David.
Solomon's son would receive one tribe.
1 Kings 11. "Then the Lord stirred up an adversary
against Solomon, Hadad the Edomite;
he was of royal dissent in Edom, F."
We know very little about Solomon's death.
He left behind a son who was a bigger fool than he was
and a country that was deeply divided.
We're curious if Solomon ever returned to the Lord.
I believe he did.
I believe we have Solomon's personal testimony
in the book of Ecclesiastes.
He came to the conclusion that the Lord
is the true answer to experiencing joy in one's life.
How did history's wisest man turn away from God?
How could a leader whose talents and singular focus
had previously made him the talk of the world
deviate from his calling?
The same temptations that Solomon faced
are faced by every other leader today
When we arrive, it's easy to lose our desire
for growth and greatness because we've met our objectives.
How quickly we reach a state of contentment
and how quickly we begin our downward spiral.
Take note of how Solomon perceived
the deterioration process.
Distractions, he wondered from his call to lead
and be a beacon to the nations.
Adversaries, God rose up adversaries
to guide him back to his priorities and call.
Number three, he got preoccupied with himself
rather than his calling, which is a sign of self-absorption.
Number four, the absence of God's presence
symbolized by the removal of his anointing.
Number five, the pursuit of pleasure.
As time went on, he grew even more preoccupied
with his personal satisfaction.
The vacuum was number six on the list
and it took him ultimately tiring of his aspirations
to realize that he was empty.