2 Chronicles 12:14
And Rehoboam did evil because he did not set his heart to seek the LORD.
Sermons
A Heart not FixedJ. T. Davidson, D.D.2 Chronicles 12:14
RehoboamS. A. Browning.2 Chronicles 12:14
Rehoboam the UnreadySpurgeon, Charles Haddon2 Chronicles 12:14
True and False SeekingJohn Kerr Campbell, D.D.2 Chronicles 12:14
The Biography of RehoboamT. Whitelaw 2 Chronicles 12:13-16














I. HIS ANCESTRY.

1. The son of Solomon, the son of David.

2. The son of Naamah the Ammonitess, the daughter of Hanun the son of Nahash (2 Chronicles 10:1).

II. HIS KINGDOM.

1. Its extent. Judah, with a portion of Benjamin.

2. Its capital. Jerusalem, the city of the great King.

III. HIS REIGN.

1. The beginning of it. When he was forty years of age.

2. The length of it. Seventeen years; short in comparison with that of Solomon.

3. The character of it.

(1) Vigorous: "he strengthened himself" (ver. 13).

(2) Idolatrous: "he did evil, because he prepared not his heart to seek the Lord" (ver. 14).

(3) Troubled: "there were wars continually between him and Jeroboam" (ver. 15).

4. The end of it. Rehoboam slept with his fathers, and was buried in the city of David.

IV. HIS ACTS.

1. All written. From first to last (ver. 15). What a calamity to any man it would be to have all his deeds recorded on the page of history! Yet first and last every action of every man is being engrossed upon the page of God's book of remembrance.

2. Where written? In the book of Shemaiah the prophet, and in that of Iddo concerning genealogies. A small honour compared to being written in the book of life. Not so serious a matter to have one's deeds inscribed upon a perishing page by a human biographer as to have them graven "as with a pen of iron in the rock for ever," by the hand of God's recording angel upon the tablets of eternity.

V. HIS SUCCESSOR.

1. His name. Abijah, or Abijam (2 Chronicles 13:1).

2. His rotgut. In Rehoboam's stead. An honour to Rehoboam that he had a son like Abijah; a mercy to Judah that Abijah was better than his father. - W.

He prepared not his heart to seek the Lord.
I. HE DID NOT BEGIN LIFE WITH SEEKING THE LORD.

II. HE SHOWED NO HEART IN SEEKING THE LORD AFTERWARDS.

III. HE WAS NOT FIXED AND PERSEVERING SEEKING THE LORD.

IV. HE HAD NO CARE TO SEEK THE LORD THOROUGHLY.

( C. H. Spurgeon.)

I. IMPLIED OBLIGATION. To seek the Lord is the obligation of all This is suggestive —

1. Of the loss sustained. How is God lost to man? He has lost —

(1)The true knowledge of His character.

(2)The conscious enjoyment of His favour.

(3)The blessedness of communion with Him.

2. Of its retrievableness. For this purpose —

(1)God has revealed Himself to man in His own nature.

(2)The redemptive work of Christ is made known.

(3)The Holy Spirit performs His beneficent functions.

3. Of the importance of its recovery.

II. MENTAL CONVICTION. In Rehoboam we see mental conviction arising from knowledge of duty, promptings of conscience, consciousness of guilt. This is a mental state of frequent occurrence. It may be observed —

1. As the effect of truth. The Word of God is "a discoverer of the thoughts and intents of the heart." Felix. There are many Felixes.

2. As intensified by circumstances.

3. As critical in its results. How much depends on moments of conviction! They are often the turning-points of destiny. It does not seem that Rehoboam ever paused in his downward career from this time forward.

III. MORAL INFIRMITY. There was want of decision in Rehoboam. He did not prepare his heart to seek the Lord. This may be traced —

1. To sensual habits (2 Chronicles 11:18-23; 1 Kings 14:21-24).

2. To evil companionship.

3. To Satanic temptation.

IV. ACCUMULATED GUILT. "He did evil because," etc. This sin was parent of a host. He sinned in this neglect of known duty, and in what resulted from it. So do all who pursue a like course. They sin —

1. In resisting their convictions.

2. In self-depravation. "Beware lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin."

3. The depravation of others. Through his guilty conduct the people were corrupted. "One sinner destroyeth much good."

(S. A. Browning.)

The marginal reading is, "He fixed not his heart upon the Lord." This was a favourite expression of David's. "My heart is fixed, O God, my heart is fixed." "His heart is fixed, trusting in the Lord." Perhaps it was intended to draw a contrast between the character of Rehoboam and his far worthier ancestor. Religion is not a thing that can be taken up in a loose, careless manner. It claims the whole purpose and energy of the heart. In the "Pilgrim's Progress," Prudence wished to know from Christian how he was enabled to overcome his temptations and to persevere in the good and holy way. Christian's reply was, "When I think of what I saw at the Cross, that will do it; when I look upon my broidered coat, that will do it; when I look into the roll that I carry in my bosom, that will do it; and when my thoughts wax warm about whither I am going, that will do it." I cannot do better than follow in the line of the great dreamer's allegory.

I. THE FIRST CONDITION OF A FIXED HEART IS A SIGHT OF THE CROSS. The world's religion ends with forgiveness; God's religion begins with it. There is nothing that imparts such solidity to character, and such strength and dignity to life, as conscious peace with Heaven.

II. The next thing is to LOOK UPON YOUR "BROIDERED COAT" — the righteousness that is "unto all and upon all them that believe."

III. Bunyan's pilgrim looked also oftentimes into the ROLL WHICH HE CARRIED IN HIS BOSOM. Habitual study of the Bible is indispensable to a healthy condition of the soul. McCheyne would not speak to any one in the morning till he had first of all heard the voice of God. It gives a tone to the whole day, when we begin the day with Him.

IV. "WHEN HIS THOUGHTS WAXED WARM ABOUT WHITHER HE WAS GOING," THAT GAVE FIXEDNESS TO CHRISTIAN'S HEART. You may be none the less shrewd as to the interests of time because you are wise as to the concerns of eternity; like a trusty pilot, who, though his eyes are on the stars, keeps his hand upon the helm.

(J. T. Davidson, D.D.)

I. There is what one may call NATURAL SEEKING. Seeking is the language of human want. The cravings of life will always demand attention. All the industries of the world, with their ten thousand beneficent developments, are the products of human wisdom to supply human wants. Human life is but a seeking in so many ways, from the cradle to the grave.

II. SEEKING THE LORD. This is not born of nature, but of grace. Seeking the Lord implies a conscious sense of weakness and insufficiency.

III. HEART PREPARATION. All true and successful seeking of the Lord comes of prepared hearts. The heart is always the part that makes our hearing, believing, praying, and doing right or wrong. As soon as the sun rises in the morning the birds are ready to go forth from their nests to sing. So it is with all the moral forces or faculties of the soul when the heart is prepared to seek the Lord. The heart is to the whole man what the main-spring is to the watch — it sets all the other powers in motion. "But as the bowl," says one, "runs as the bias inclines it, and as the ship moves as the rudder steers it," so man seeks as the heart prompts him. A prepared heart is a loving heart, "believing true and clean." It enters into the secret place of the Most High as a loving child enters into his father's home. Whence cometh this preparation? There must be some efficient cause to account for the differences we see among men. The difference between the common field and the garden to-day has been brought about by the application of human thought and manual skill. It is even so with respect to differences among men. As the garden did not enclose itself, or of itself become more fertile than the field, neither have men become different among their fellows or before God except by different resolutions of will and energy of character. Those who exercise no forethought or natural sagacity become as the man who built his house upon the sand.

IV. THE EVIL OF NEGLECTING TO PREPARE THE HEART. Men may do evil by failing to do well. Mere neglect is sufficient to ruin a man. A man need not be openly profane or wicked to be excluded from God's presence; he has but to neglect the means of grace, or to prepare his heart to seek the Lord while He may be found, to call upon Him while He is near.

(John Kerr Campbell, D.D.).

People
Abijah, Cushites, David, Ethiopians, Iddo, Jeroboam, Naamah, Rehoboam, Shemaiah, Shishak, Solomon, Sukkites
Places
Egypt, Jerusalem
Topics
TRUE, Didn't, Evil, Heart, Prepared, Seek, Seeking
Outline
1. Rehoboam, forsaking the Lord, is punished by Shishak
5. He and the princes, repenting at the preaching of Shemaiah,
7. are delivered from destruction, but not from spoil
13. The reign and death of Rehoboam

Dictionary of Bible Themes
2 Chronicles 12:14

     5016   heart, fallen and redeemed
     5038   mind, the human
     6156   fall, of humanity
     8741   failure

2 Chronicles 12:9-16

     5366   king

2 Chronicles 12:13-14

     8739   evil, examples of

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Contrasted Services
'They shall be his servants: that they may know My service, and the service of the kingdoms of the countries.'--2 Chron. xii. 8. Rehoboam was a self-willed, godless king who, like some other kings, learned nothing by experience. His kingdom was nearly wrecked at the very beginning of his reign, and was saved much more by the folly of his rival than by his own wisdom. Jeroboam's religious revolution drove all the worshippers of God among the northern kingdom into flight. They might have endured the
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture

Chronicles
The comparative indifference with which Chronicles is regarded in modern times by all but professional scholars seems to have been shared by the ancient Jewish church. Though written by the same hand as wrote Ezra-Nehemiah, and forming, together with these books, a continuous history of Judah, it is placed after them in the Hebrew Bible, of which it forms the concluding book; and this no doubt points to the fact that it attained canonical distinction later than they. Nor is this unnatural. The book
John Edgar McFadyen—Introduction to the Old Testament

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