Born To Win Podcast - With Ronald L. Dart

It has been 62 years since the death of Solomon. For 62 years there have been two Israels: the House of Israel, now with a capital in Samaria; the House of Judah, capital in Jerusalem. You can cast your mind back 62 years from today and get a feeling for the passage of time even if you weren’t alive then. There are many old people who still remember King Solomon. And with the reign of King Ahab in Samaria, we can see how quickly a nation can go to ruin under bad leadership—how quickly they can go down the drain. And they were never, in all their history, able to find their way back.As the book of 2nd Kings opens, the scene changes from the wretchedness of King Ahab to the reign of Jehoshaphat in Jerusalem. It is more than a little confusing, simply reading straight through these books, because they are not in strict chronological order—instead interleaving events of the two kingdoms. At the end of 1 Kings, the editors dispose of King Ahab:So the king died, and was brought to Samaria; and the

Not everyone gets this, but let me have a run at it anyway: God does not care for centralized authority. That is not to say he hasn’t allowed it. And I realize that, in one sense, everything that happens is allowed by God or it wouldn’t have happened. But there is another sense in which God seems to say, Okay, what you are asking for is not the best thing for you, but I will let you do it and work with you in it. But, you are going to have considerably more pain if you go this way. A case in point is the occasion when Israel asked for a king. God didn’t like it, but he allowed it. He then proceeded to tell them what was wrong with the idea. Nevertheless, they insisted, and God didn’t reject them out of hand because of it.But there is one thing that comes through to me in that story. (This was discussed back in the series before this, on the Book of Samuel.) It is that God endorses and supports maximum freedom for a people, and that he recognizes that power corrupts. Consequently, when

In my time, I have followed a lot of election campaigns. I remember sitting in a car, in the rain, in England listening to the Democratic National Convention on the BBC when Lyndon Johnson was nominated. But in all my years of following elections, I have never seen anything quite like this election season. The political process has always been a little crazy, but this one is really strange—and I find myself wondering every time it rolls around, Is this the best we can do?As a nation, we probably expect too much of our leaders and too little of ourselves. Like everyone else, I marvel at the weakness of people running for office, and I sometimes forget that they are merely a reflection of ourselves. I recall those famous lines from Abraham Lincoln about government of the people, by the people, and for the people and I don’t see how we can escape responsibility for what our leaders do and don’t do. We can’t sidestep that issue. If there are no strong leaders before us, it is our fault.I w

I simply cannot imagine a greater prophet than Elijah. He was not a smooth man, like I suspect Isaiah was. Isaiah was a poet, and a great one at that. I see no hint of poetic utterance in any word Elijah ever spoke. But then, every prophet that God ever called was chosen for the job at hand and for the people he was sent to talk to. One prophet was a sheep herder; another a fruit picker. They were pretty much ordinary men until God made them extraordinary. And as far as I can tell, none of them were really looking for the job when they got it. They were not self-assured men, either. Take Elijah as a case in point.No prophet who ever lived, before or since, has had the massive validation that Elijah got. He stopped the rain for three-and-a-half years just to get everyone’s attention. Then he called down fire from heaven in the sight of all the people in the most dramatic way possible. Having ridiculed false prophets in the most graphic of terms, he had the people bring them down from the mountain and kil

He is the archetype of all prophets; his name was Elijah. Probably one of the reasons he is so well known is because he is so persistent in the Bible—he keeps cropping up. He was to come just before Jesus (John the Baptist, everyone sees, fulfilled that) but most students of prophecy expect him to come again at the end time. This naturally leads to a lot of pretenders. I have met three or four Elijahs myself.If you recall the caricature of a man with a long beard, wearing a robe, and carrying a sign that says, The End is Near, you have an idea what these self-appointed Elijahs looked like. And self-appointed is the word. Most modern, would-be prophets are self-appointed. Prophets, you know, are a dime a dozen. The real Elijah—the prototypical prophet—was emphatically not self-appointed, and God took him out of his toolbox to say what needed to be said. He stepped up to the plate and delivered one short sentence.And Elijah said, As the Lord of hosts lives, before whom I stand, I will surely s

I was standing, looking out an open window in my hotel room at Victoria Station in London one night. My wife and I had been to the theater, had just got back in, and opened the window for a little fresh air. I heard a rumble, uncharacteristic of London weather, and I remarked, I hope that’s thunder. It wasn’t. The IRA had set off a bomb two blocks from our hotel in a trash bin along the street. No one was hurt, but it was a little disconcerting. I can’t help wondering what the IRA realistically hoped to gain in all this. Were they really doing their thing with a goal in mind, or are they like bunch of Ozark boys turning over outhouses on Halloween?I am persuaded that, in all too many cases, people who are fighting in wars have long since forgotten what the war is all about. They don’t remember the grievance or, if they do, they have only heard about it from their great-great-grandfathers and never, in all their lifetime, experience the grievance in question. Why on earth did the Irish

When you settle in to read the Bible, you run into any number of difficulties—none of them fatal, of course. The sense of the Bible is not that hard, it is just that the writers of the Bible wrote, not only in a different language, but out of a different culture. Things that would be important to the modern reader don’t even cross their minds. There are mysteries in the Bible, to be sure, but there is enough plain talk for us to know where we stand with God. The more difficult problem is that the modern reader is used to history being presented in a certain way. The ancient writers of history operated on somewhat different principles.One of the confusing things, for example, about reading the Book of Kings is the structure of the book. 1 Kings tells the story of the division of Israel into two kingdoms. After that, the story interleaves the parallel history of the two kingdoms and it is easy to get lost. There are any number of Bible handbooks and encyclopedias that provide charts and chronologies

At the Last Supper, after washing his disciples' feet, Jesus said something of singular importance. He said, You call me master and lord, and you say well for so I am. The American reader is likely to take these two words, master and lord, as synonyms; but when the King James translators sat down and wrote this out, the head of a school was a master. Even to this day in most English schools the person who runs the school is the headmaster. Consequently, they chose the word master because to their English readers it would convey the idea of a teacher; and not merely a garden-variety, run-of-the-mill teacher, but a significant master of his subject.Jesus said, You call me teacher and lord, and rightly so because that is what I am. The words in the Greek mean a master of a school and a sovereign lord, so they are not synonyms at all; and they define two very different relationships that a person will have with Jesus Christ. So let's take a closer look at these two words, these two relationships, and their signif

By now, everyone realizes that we have a leadership crisis, not only in our country, but in the world at large. I wonder how we got to this place? Where does leadership come from and, maybe more importantly, where does it go? I believe that leadership is a gift from God, and if you’ll spare me a little time, I’ll explain to you why I think that. First, two statements about gifts from God, one from James and one from the Psalms:Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning.James 1:17 KJ2000You have ascended on high, you have led captivity captive: you have received gifts for men; yea, for the rebellious also, that the Lord God might dwell among them. Blessed be the Lord, who daily loads us with benefits, even the God of our salvation. Selah.Psalm 68:18–19 KJ2000For some reason, we would tend to assume that God only gives his gifts to people who deserve them. I used to think so. I would ha

Never take counsel of your fears. The saying is often attributed to Andrew Jackson who also, plainly, read his Bible. It is fascinating how often fear strips a man of victories already won. This was the case with one Jeroboam, the son of Nebat. After the death of Solomon, God handed him the largest portion of Israel—10 of the 12 tribes. He was a good man, and an energetic leader. But he was afraid that, having made the break with Solomon’s son Rehoboam, the people would eventually return to the unity of the Temple. It was not an unreasonable fear except for the fact that God had given him the kingdom and stood surety for it. This fear led him to a decision with disastrous long-term consequences.Therefore 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 your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt. And he set the one in Beth-el, and the other put he in Dan. And this thing became a sin: for the people wen

When you read those books of the Bible that contain the history of Israel, the lessons come at you one after the other. There is a man in the Book of Kings named Jeroboam, for example, who will embody several of them. Jeroboam is described as a mighty man of valor. Now, what that means in biblical-speak is that he was a fighter, and very good at it. He was a good man, an able man, and King Solomon promoted him and placed him over all the affairs of the house of Joseph. That made him the head man in the tribes of Ephraim and Manasseh in the north. But he had a higher endorsement than that of Solomon, with whom God was, by this time, thoroughly disappointed.And it came to pass at that time when Jeroboam went out of Jerusalem, that the prophet Ahijah the Shilonite found him in the way; and he had clad himself with a new garment; and the two were alone in the field: And Ahijah caught the new garment that was on him, and tore it in twelve pieces: And he said to Jeroboam, Take you ten pieces: for thus says the Lord

When you are reading the history in the Bible, you have to resist the temptation to see things in terms familiar to the modern reader. Take the idea of cities, for example. Solomon has finished the Temple, and somewhere along the way, he has married the daughter of Pharaoh.Well, Pharaoh wants to give his daughter a present, so he goes up along the coastal plain and takes a city named Gezer. He slew the Canaanites who live there, burnt the place with fire, and then gave it to his daughter as a present. What kind of a present is that! Gezer probably wasn’t much of a town to start with. Now his daughter gets, as a present from her dad, a lot of burnt-out houses, and a few hundred corpses of Canaanites. What is this?What you need to take away from the account is that it wasn’t the houses that were important, it was the real estate. Gezer might have controlled a few hundred square miles of good agricultural land. And it may also have provided a prime location for an outpost—a fortress, if you wil

One of the most incredible museums that the world has ever known was also one that hardly anyone ever got to visit; it was the temple that King Solomon built. When the construction of the Temple was finally complete, Solomon brought in the things that King David had dedicated—silver, gold, furnishings—and placed them in the Temple’s treasuries. What a museum it must have made…but the general population never got to go in. Nevertheless, the grand opening still made for quite an enjoyable party. You’ll find the story of this celebration, and the dedication speech that accompanied it, in 1 Kings, chapter 8.1 Then Solomon assembled the elders of Israel, and all the heads of the tribes, the chiefs of the fathers of the children of Israel, unto king Solomon in Jerusalem, that they might bring up the ark of the covenant of the Lord out of the city of David, which is Zion.2 And all the men of Israel assembled themselves unto king Solomon at the feast in the month Ethanim, which is the s

We Christians have an anxiety about us—about who we are, about our failures, about our differences, about our spats—and we let these anxieties prevent us from doing and saying things that need to be said and done; not only in church, but in the community and in the world.Peggy Noonan - Patriots, Then and Now Link 1 | Link 2

Do you suppose God would ever call a man to be a lawyer or, perhaps, a governor? (And, no, I am not about to tell a lawyer joke.) There is a funny thing about Christian thinking when it comes to a divine calling. We tend to think of God's calling having solely to do with church work or ministry. But is that the right view of the matter?There are two men in the Bible who cause me to think otherwise. They weren't called to be lawyers, but they were nonetheless called to a surprising vocation. Let me tell you their stories:Once upon a time, there was a man named Jacob who had 12 sons—all born to him while out of country. The last was born of the wife that Jacob loved. He was named Joseph, which means added because he was added well beyond the expected family. And because he was the son of Jacob’s old age and of his most loved wife, he was a favorite son, and Jacob made him the famous coat of many colors.When the lad was a mere 17 years old, he was bringing performance reports to his father that did n

Sometimes, in the Bible, you come across descriptions, details, and lists that can be a little hard to follow. One example of this is the description in 1 Kings 6 of the construction of Solomon’s temple. It’s not too easy to work your way through it, and there are just too many details missing to get an accurate picture. You can find artists’ conceptions of it in publications and on the internet, but they are all different. Still, when you read through it you get a general impression of the size, the shape, the importance of the building.And it came to pass in the four hundred and eightieth year after the children of Israel were come out of the land of Egypt, in the fourth year of Solomon’s reign over Israel, in the month Ziv, which is the second month, that he began to build the house of the Lord. As for the house which king Solomon built for the Lord, the length thereof was threescore cubits, and the breadth thereof twenty cubits, and the height thereof thirty cubits.1 Kings 6:1&ndas

In Gibeon the Lord appeared to Solomon in a dream by night: and God said, Ask what I shall give you. And Solomon said, You have shown unto your servant David my father great mercy, according as he walked before you in truth, and in righteousness, and in uprightness of heart with you; and you have kept for him this great kindness, that you have given him a son to sit on his throne, as it is this day. And now, O Lord my God, you have made your servant king instead of David my father: and I am but a little child: I know not how to go out or come in. And your servant is in the midst of your people whom you have chosen, a great people, that cannot be numbered nor counted for multitude. Give therefore your servant an understanding heart to judge your people, that I may discern between good and bad: for who is able to judge this your so great a people?1 Kings 3:5–9 KJ2000As far as I can tell, by this time Solomon was grown. But this is the way that he looked at himself—as a naïf, as a person who had no s

Nothing is ever easy in the Middle East, and the transition from the man who was Israel’s greatest fighting king to her greatest peacetime king was stormy. It wasn’t that there was a problem between David and Solomon. The problem was another son (probably David’s oldest) who decided to usurp the kingdom while David was, he thought, too weak to do anything about it.His name was Adonijah and, ironically, he was the brother of Absalom. He had the same mother, and his father David had doted on him as he had on Absalom. David, it seems, was a great judge of men except when it came to his own children. Even so, it wasn’t his will that Adonijah succeed him. He had made a promise to appoint Solomon as king.Adonijah made a very strong power move. You could call it an attempted coup, but I think he thought of it as merely establishing himself in his rightful position. He also had Joab and Abiathar (the leading general of the army and a well-known priest, respectively) with him. They had a big co

Abraham, the father of the faithful, is obviously the greatest figure in the Old Testament. But the greatest man in the history of Israel has to be King David. He was not only a king, he was a prophet. David was not a priest, and he never attempted to usurp the office of the priesthood as Saul did, but he was a man after God’s own heart. He was a man’s man, who men could admire and follow. He was also in the direct line of the Messiah to come. He was, simply put, a type of Christ.The last chapters of 2 Samuel appear to contain appendices to David’s life and career. They are in no special order, but seem to have been copied onto the end of the scroll before it was finally considered finished. In 2 Samuel 23, we have what are said to be the last words of David. We’ll hear from him after this, but this seems to be what David wanted to record as a kind of legacy.Now these are the last words of David. David the son of Jesse said, and the man who was raised up on high, the anointed of the Go

Halloween is an odd event—very odd, in a way, because in its origins it was not evil; it was actually good. A number of you probably know that Halloween is All Hallows Even; in other words, All Hallows Eve—the evening before All Hallows. And All Hallows is All Saints day. And, originally, All Saints Day (November 1st) was the day when all the saints were honored. In other words, it's a time that the Church had set aside to honor those people who had lived exemplary lives, who had blessed others by their lives, and were considered saints by the Church at that time.October 31st, though, among non-Christian Celtic people, was a different matter altogether. It was the festival of Samhain. What you may not know is the fact it was also New Year's Eve in Celtic and Anglo-Saxon England at that time. It was actually the end of the old year and the beginning of the new. It took place in the autumn, as a matter of fact. It was an occasion for fire festivals, they lit huge bonfires on top of hills to frighten