Author Archive for: meiling

Hi GAMErs,

Today’s passage is 1 Kings 12:25-33.  As usual, I encourage you to open your Bible and read the passage yourself first.  See what you can glean with the Holy Spirit’s help. Then read the GAME sharing below.  Let’s go! 

1 Kings 12:25-27 (NIV) 
25 Then Jeroboam fortified Shechem in the hill country of Ephraim and lived there. From there he went out and built up Peniel. 
26 Jeroboam thought to himself, “The kingdom will now likely revert to the house of David. 
27 If these people go up to offer sacrifices at the temple of the LORD in Jerusalem, they will again give their allegiance to their lord, Rehoboam king of Judah. They will kill me and return to King Rehoboam.” 

On verses 25-27:  Jeroboam is now king of Israel (i.e. all the tribes of Israel other than Judah and Benjamin).  King Jeroboam goes to Shechem, the very place where Rehoboam had been crowned king and sets up his house there. Jeroboam fortifies Shechem to make it as secure as he can.  But despite fortifying his house, Jeroboam still feels insecure.  Verse 26 says that “Jeroboam thought to himself”.

Hi GAMErs,

Today’s passage is 1 Kings 12:1-15.  As usual, I encourage you to open your Bible and read the passage yourself first.  See what you can glean with the Holy Spirit’s help. Then read the GAME sharing below.  Let’s go!

1 Kings 12:1-5 (NIV) 
1 Rehoboam went to Shechem, for all the Israelites had gone there to make him king. 
2 When Jeroboam son of Nebat heard this (he was still in Egypt, where he had fled from King Solomon), he returned from Egypt. 
3 So they sent for Jeroboam, and he and the whole assembly of Israel went to Rehoboam and said to him: 

On verses 1-5:  Israel is about to make Solomon’s son Rehoboam the next king of Israel.  While in Egypt, Jeroboam hears about this, returns to Israel at this crucial juncture in Israel’s history.  Jeroboam reconnects with the Israelites and together they approach the king with a request:

Hi GAMErs,

Today’s passage is 1 Kings 11:26-43.  As usual, I encourage you to open your Bible and read the passage yourself first.  See what you can glean with the Holy Spirit’s help. Then read the GAME sharing below.  Let’s go! 

1 Kings 11:26-30 (NIV)
26  Also, Jeroboam son of Nebat rebelled against the king. He was one of Solomon’s officials, an Ephraimite from Zeredah, and his mother was a widow named Zeruah.
27  Here is the account of how he rebelled against the king: Solomon had built the supporting terraces and had filled in the gap in the wall of the city of David his father.

On verses 26-30:  Here we read of Solomon’s greatest human adversary, Jeroboam.  Jeroboam came from a tough background.  His mother Zeredah was a widow, probably meaning that Jeroboam’s father Nebat was not around for significant parts of Jeroboam’s life (v26).  Nonetheless, Jeroboam was a leader, becoming one of Solomon’s officials (v26). 

Hi GAMErs,

Today’s passage is 1 Kings 11:14-25.  As usual, I encourage you to open your Bible and read the passage yourself first.  See what you can glean with the Holy Spirit’s help. Then read the GAME sharing below.  Let’s go!

1 Kings 11:14-25 (NIV)
14  Then the LORD raised up against Solomon an adversary, Hadad the Edomite, from the royal line of Edom.
15  Earlier when David was fighting with Edom, Joab the commander of the army, who had gone up to bury the dead, had struck down all the men in Edom.
16  Joab and all the Israelites stayed there for six months, until they had destroyed all the men in Edom.
17  But Hadad, still only a boy, fled to Egypt with some Edomite officials who had served his father.

On verses 14-25:  In verses 14-22 we read of Hadad, an Edomite prince who, despite coming from a royal family, endured some incredible hardship.  When Hadad was just a young boy, Hadad lost his parents and his family when the Edomites were at war with the Israelites.  Hadad would flee to Egypt and be given many of the material comforts that royalty would come to expect.  Still, there was a pain in Hadad’s heart that none of those material comforts could heal, and a drive to get revenge on the country that was responsible for killing his parents.