Allen Jackson - Legacy, Eternity and You - Part 1
The title for this talk is, "Legacy, Eternity, And You," and it's really a bit of a reflection on the readings we're doing. I hope you do the daily Bible reading with us. If you don't, I would like to invite you to. You don't have to wait till January to begin. We, as a community of faith, we read through our Bibles each year in a systematic way, and there is something that I have discovered. To my embarrassment, it took me many years, but there is something significant and profound in reading through the scripture together. We're just beginning the book of 1 Kings, so if you're not reading along, join us. That's the historical books in the Bible. There's a bit more narrative to that than there was to Leviticus. I mean, God put Leviticus in there. It has great value, but he doesn't read it every week.
I mean, he's just like occasionally, but we just started in 1 Kings and it seemed like an important point to kind of step back into the narrative because the monarchy, that brief period in Israelite history where they had the kings and the nation was unified, really slipped past them very quickly. And I think if we can grasp what's happening in that portion of the text, it will make the remainder of the Old Testament much more meaningful. So, that's a bit of our target. We started the reading these days is about Solomon, one of the most celebrated of the Hebrew kings, arguably the wealthiest and, depending on how you measure it, some would say one of the more successful.
And I wanna look at the legacy that he left, but I really wanna look at it in the context of our own lives. I just, I'm sure it's because of the events in my life in recent weeks and months. My mother's passing has been a powerful reminder to me that we're all on a temporary assignment, no matter who you are, no matter how vibrant your faith, or how robust your physical well-being may be. I think in church world, typically we kind of give lip service to this principle, but I'm not sure it's our reality, or that we believe it's that real. I think we tend to think it's just some motivational ploy from the pastor, or the leader, to try to get a heightened commitment from us. And I assure you, that's not my goal.
I want to remind you as kindly as I can, not in a morbid way, but there's a point ahead of you when your strength will fail and you will step into eternity. And at that point, your future is already determined. There will not be a second chance, or a review. There's no mulligan. So, I have some questions I would put to you just for reflection, I'm not looking for an immediate answer, but what are you investing in? I know we're in church and the answer's Jesus to almost every question, so you answer these away from here. What are you investing in? What are you longing for? And what are you striving for? What are you investing in? What are you longing for? And what are you striving for? I brought two passages. I put them at the beginning of the notes.
Hebrews 9 says, "As just as man is destined to die once, and after that to face judgment," the author of Hebrews is pointing out something most of us would prefer just not to think about. We all have two appointments that are inescapable. You can't call in sick, you can't send a replacement. One is death, and following death is judgment. And it's a real thing. For the Christ follower it's not a judgment of destiny, it's not a judgment of heaven or hell, it's a judgment for what you've done with your life. And it's possible to survive that judgment and make your way into the kingdom of God, but to have all of the consequences of your life fail to make the test, to lose all the rewards you imagine might have been yours. And that would be a tragic way to step into eternity.
People say some foolish things, some rather naive things. "Pastor, it doesn't matter to me. I just wanna be there". Really? Can you imagine standing at the altar with a couple who were preparing to take their wedding vows, they look at one other and say, you know, "I don't really wanna be a good husband or a good wife. I just want to be present". "I'm not striving to make this a remarkable marriage. I just want to get my name on the certificate". We say some rather nonsensical things amongst ourselves. Sometimes we say them in well-meaning ways, but we say them with a lack of awareness of scripture that is stunning and with a degree of presumptive that makes me very uncomfortable.
Jesus clearly said there'll be people that approach him and say, "Lord, Lord". And he'll say, "I'm sorry, I don't know who you are". And they'll say, "We did miracles in your name". And he'll say, "Depart from me. You have no part of my kingdom". We draw these lines like they're so clear and they're so immutable and they're so certain and I don't want you to be frightened of your eternity, but I don't want you to live with this arrogance that causes you to imagine that there's something so immutable that we don't need to live with a reverence for God. And I think the life of Solomon is a very good point to enter into this discussion.
I brought you a second passage, its Revelation 20. It's very near the end of the book, and it says, "The sea gave up the dead that were in it, and death and Hades gave up the dead that were in them, and each person was judged according to what he had done. Then death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. The lake of fire is the second death. If anyone's name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire". Please don't ever equate attending church with serving the Lord, they're not the same. I'm an advocate for attending church. I do it a lot. But I do not imagine that my service to the Lord will be measured in terms of my willingness to attend church, and I don't want you to imagine that either. I want you to be prepared for eternity. I want you to lay up treasure in heaven.
I wanna have a great celebration with the people with whom through I made the journey through time. But that's not something that happens randomly or accidentally, and I think while we're reading through these historical books and we see the reviews of all these individuals, it's worth reminding you're gonna be introduced to many people whose names are very difficult to pronounce, but the characterization of their lives is not difficult to understand. They'll be identified as evil or wicked or godly or some mix thereof. But they're all people of the book, they're all covenant people of God. They're descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. They have a family heritage of the supernatural and the miraculous. They're living in a Promised Land. They have temples to worship at and priests that will make sacrifices on their behalf.
And yet, a very significant percentage of them fail to enter into the kingdom, or the purposes, of God. It should capture our attention. Jesus talked about broad paths and narrow gates, and I don't wanna live presumptively. So, it's a tale of two kings. I'd like to compare a bit Solomon and his father who preceded him on the throne, King David. We'll start with Solomon because it's the reading portion for these days. 1 Kings chapter 10 gives us a summary of Solomon's life. "King Solomon was greater in riches and wisdom than all the other kings of the earth".
Wow, that's not bad. He accumulated more and learned more than anybody. Hard stop. Wow. I went to Riverdale and I was in the solid top 50% of my class. Yeah, they're not gonna cut that in stone anywhere, I promise. "The whole world sought audience with Solomon to hear the wisdom God had put in his heart. Year after year, everyone who came brought a gift: articles of silver, gold, robes, weapons, spices, horses and mules. Solomon accumulated chariots and horses: he had fourteen hundred chariots and twelve thousand horses, he kept them in chariot cities with him in Jerusalem. The king made silver is common in Jerusalem as stones, and cedars plentiful as sycamore-fig trees in the foothills".
Not everywhere in the world has cedar trees with the same abundance that we enjoy them in middle Tennessee. "Solomon's horses were imported from Egypt, the royal merchants purchased them from Kue. They imported a chariot from Egypt for six hundred shekels of silver, and a horse for a hundred and fifty. And they exported them to all the kings of the Hittites and the Arameans". Just a summary, if you'll allow, of Solomon. And this is my perspective. If you gave me another week, I'd probably come up with an additional list, but this was a good beginning point. Solomon has a God-designed role. He's chosen to be king of the covenant people of God. It's not some arbitrary thing, it's not some accidental thing. In fact, I'm gonna do my best to suggest to you that Solomon had every reason to be an overwhelming success.
The things that would bring momentum to you, put the wind at your back, seem to all be present in Solomon's life. He has a God-designed role for his life. Secondly, he has generational momentum. He comes from a family who have a strong faith life. I mean, his father is David. That's not bad. I mean, he wasn't perfect but there was only one of those and we killed him. Just as, you know, if you're mad at your parents because they weren't perfect, nobody is. It's not a fruitful way to spend the rest of your life in anger and bitterness and resentment. Some have parents who are completely evil, and I would readily acknowledge that is something that has to be overcome, and by the power of God it can be.
But that was not Solomon, Ahab was not his father, David was. He had a generation of momentum. Thirdly, he lived in a season where there was great opportunity. He didn't live in a time of great war or turmoil. Solomon was born to the purple. Purple is usually assimilated, attached to royalty. He was born in the palace. We'll look at David in a minute. David was a shepherd. He had to hide as a fugitive in En Gedi. It's hard to imagine Solomon hanging out for a few months at En Gedi. I mean, where's his servants gonna stay? I mean, he was born to a season of tremendous opportunity. He inherited phenomenal wealth. The throne that he occupied was secured by his parents, David and Bathsheba, and the most powerful people in the nation. He has international cooperation.
The kings from the surrounding nations are interested in supporting him and helping him. The opposition that exists is less powerful than he is. I mean, he was born into a season and a place and a time where the opportunity before him was truly remarkable. On top of that, he enjoyed God's blessings. He had some very unique gifts from God. So do we. We have more freedom and liberty. We have more abundance than any people in history. You know, we're walking through a very difficult economic season, and I suspect it will be more difficult before there's a real significant change in it, but our responses are interesting. You know, we act as if someone else should provide opportunity for us and someone else should shape a dream.
Folks, the liberties and freedoms and abundance we have that have shaped our lives and our nation for decades and decades have come from a worldview that was based in the Word of God. I have traveled around the world. The things that describe our lives are not typical, they are certainly not global. And while we've been busy dismantling the things that brought stability and prosperity and opportunity to us, we're still stamping our feet like petulant children, expecting those opportunities to be ours. That wasn't the challenge that Solomon had. He was born to a season of tremendous momentum.
Solomon modeled the humility that brought the blessing of God to him. His character was intact enough that he could respond to God in a way that the blessings of God would come to him. Look in 1 Kings 3. He said, it's a prayer, "Lord my God, you've made your servant king in place of my father David. But I'm only a little child and I don't know how to carry out my duties". That's not what you would expect him to say. Remember what Nebuchadnezzar said? I mean, they were both ancient near eastern monarchs. They shared power in a very similar way. They could confiscate whatever they wanted to confiscate, and execute whomever they wanted to execute. Nebuchadnezzar had a statue made of himself out of gold and said, "You will bow down and worship it, or I'll take your life".
And when we first meet Solomon, he has a very different attitude. He said, "I'm just a little child. I don't know how to do my job. Your servant is here among the people you have chosen, a great people, too numerous, to count or number. So give your servant a discerning heart to govern your people and to distinguish between right and wrong. For who is able to govern this great people of yours"? I believe that's a genuine expression of humility. "I need your help. I'm in over my head. Your people are remarkable and they deserve remarkable leadership. Would you help me"? The rest of that section says that God was so pleased with his prayer because he didn't ask for wealth or power over his enemies or fame, that he said, "I will give you a wisdom that will not be exceeded. And beyond that, I'll give you all the things you didn't ask for".
I mean, that's a pretty powerful beginning. The throne is secure, the borders of the nation are secure, your leadership has been cemented, and now God said he's gonna give you supernatural wisdom and wealth and power over your enemies. Solomon had a vision. We can argue over the effectiveness of it, but he saw a nation far beyond the one he inherited. The boundaries are pushed, the nation flourishes, tribal loyalties that have been a problem, and we could argue, a stumbling block, are diminished. He puts a whole new structure in place. He had a vision for what God had given him to do. He wasn't just sitting in the palace, enjoying the privilege. And the seventh thing I gave is, he reigned a long time.
1 Kings 11, "Solomon reigned in Jerusalem over all Israel for forty years". God gave him a long tenure. I mean, he built a temple. I mean, there is really no period in all of Israelite history that can compare with the season when Solomon led and when he reigned and ruled. The international influence of Israel, the wealth of Israel. He built a fleet of trading ships on the Red Sea. The leaders of the world, it's one of the only times in ancient history or modern history where Israel was looked at as a thought leader. Modern Israel is certainly a technological leader, but they're widely reviled as well. Solomon led in a remarkable, remarkable period of time, but I want you to see the New Testament commentary, and I'll start with Jesus's comment because this is really the one that captured my attention as I was thinking about Solomon. Jesus had a comment on Solomon's life.
It's in the Sermon on the Mount, it's Matthew chapter 6, and Jesus is cautioning us, his audience, and us as well, about not being distracted by focusing on the appropriate priorities, not being overcome with worry. And he says, "Why do you worry about clothes? See how the lilies of the field grow. They don't labor or spin. Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all of his splendor was dressed like one of these". That's Jesus's comment on Solomon, that as beautiful as the lilies are, he said they're truly remarkable, God takes care of them, that Solomon in all of his wealth and all of his power and all of his splendor wasn't comparable with the lilies.
Did you get it, Jesus's commentary on Solomon? He was fashionable. Solomon was a fancy dresser. Solomon had a real sense of style. Rings a little hollow, doesn't it? All the opportunities, all the achievements, all the accomplishments, and yet when Jesus comments about it. Now, there's more in the New Testament, not a lot, but in Acts chapter 7 it says, "It was Solomon who built the house for him". Solomon was allowed to build the temple. David delivered the blueprint, he delivered the resources to do it with. Solomon was allowed to oversee the construction, but there's very little attributed to him around that. One last thing, in Matthew chapter 12, Jesus again, he said, "The Queen of the South will rise at the judgment with this generation and condemn it; for she came from the ends of the earth to listen to Solomon's wisdom, and now one greater than Solomon is here".
Jesus refers to Solomon's wisdom. I mean, it's the celebrated part of Jewish and Israelite history, but if you do just the briefest, the most casual analysis of Solomon's life, his wisdom led to political disaster. His diminishment of the role of the tribes ultimately led to a civil war. He lived through a relational crisis, his foreign wives. He left the nation spiritually bankrupt. Following his reign there's unprecedented turning to idolatry. It's hard to imagine that in one generation we go from King David, who danced in the streets before the ark with such enthusiasm that he embarrassed, if not humiliated, some of his family, to King Solomon, who turns the nation on a pathway to almost unbridled idolatry. The New Testament commentary on Solomon, with all the momentum and all the gifts and all the wealth and all the accomplishments, a fancy dresser is probably not the legacy you wanna leave.
Hey, I love the idea that God recruits unlikely characters. I know that's how I got on the team, and I suspect it's true for you as well. Don't let the things that you're not convince you that you can't do everything that God has called you to be. We stand in his strength, not ours. Let's pray:
Father, I thank you that you've chosen us, you have selected us, and you will give us everything we need for triumphant lives. I praise you for it in Jesus's name, amen.