“Jeroboam Sin-drome”
Click below to download the Cornerstone Connections leader’s guide and student lesson. This week’s resources also include two lesson plans and a discussion starter video which offer different ways of looking at the topic. Each lesson plan includes opening activities, scripture passages, discussion questions, and real-life applications.
1 Kings 12:16–14:20; 2 Chronicles 13
The life of Jeroboam is a classic case study of what happens when someone refuses to follow God’s leading.
SCRIPTURE PASSAGES
OVERVIEW
You know it’s going to be a bad day when on your way to school you get pulled over by the police because you were speeding. Rehoboam knew it was going to be a bad day when the tax collector he sent to Israel was stoned to death. Rehoboam was so scared that he took his soldiers and fled to Jerusalem. All of this happened because Solomon and the kings after him disobeyed God. Our lesson today will look at the story of Jeroboam and the rebellion of Israel against God.
OPENING ACTIVITY: BLIND TRUST
Supplies:
1. 3 Brown paper bags
2. Blindfold(s)
3. Something slimy (really ripe, peeled banana; leftover cold green beans, Jello, or anything else that won’t stain someone’s hand, but is rather gross).
4. Rubber snake or spider
5. Shredded paper
Instructions:
1. Before you show your students the bags, ask for a volunteer to help you with today’s lesson. Explain to them you are going to ask them to do something really brave. Hype this up and get them feeling a little nervous then pick your volunteer.
2. Blindfold your volunteer.
3. Arrange the bags on a table and ask the volunteer to open a bag, reach into the bag, and describe what they feel inside. This may take a little encouragement, but most will eventually reach into the bag.
4. Repeat this process with each bag
Alternate scenario.
Pick three students to blindfold and have them each put their hands in the bag to feel its contents, and then describe what’s inside.
DISCUSSION
1. What was it like to reach into a bag with unknown contents?
2. How did trust play a role in whether you were nervous about following the instructions that were given?
3. Would this activity make you more or less willing to do what you are asked without knowing the outcome?
4. How does your relationship with the one who asked you to open the bag affect your willingness to open the bag.
TRANSITION
If you have siblings, then you probably understand what it is like to have disagreements. What if those disagreements turned into anger, resentment, and abandonment? That is like what happened to Israel and Judah. Their family peace was broken by anger and frustration because neither side was listening to the other, so they decided to take their toys and go play in separate sandboxes. In our lesson today, we will learn some life lessons that will help us live in closer harmony with others.
BIBLE STUDY GUIDE
Read 1 Kings 12:18-24.
18 King Rehoboam sent out Adoniram, b who was in charge of forced labor, but all Israel stoned him to death. King Rehoboam, however, managed to get into his chariot and escape to Jerusalem. 19 So Israel has been in rebellion against the house of David to this day.
20 When all the Israelites heard that Jeroboam had returned, they sent and called him to the assembly and made him king over all Israel. Only the tribe of Judah remained loyal to the house of David.
21 When Rehoboam arrived in Jerusalem, he mustered all Judah and the tribe of Benjamin—a hundred and eighty thousand able young men—to go to war against Israel and to regain the kingdom for Rehoboam son of Solomon.
22 But this word of God came to Shemaiah the man of God: 23 “Say to Rehoboam son of Solomon king of Judah, to all Judah and Benjamin, and to the rest of the people, 24 ‘This is what the Lord says: Do not go up to fight against your brothers, the Israelites. Go home, every one of you, for this is my doing.’ ” So they obeyed the word of the Lord and went home again, as the Lord had ordered.
DISCUSSION
Think of the political system in the United States today. It is a mess. It doesn’t matter if you are a Democrat, Republican, Independent, or Libertarian our system is in crisis. Why, you ask? It’s not because Joe Biden is President. It’s not because Donald Trump is running for president again—It’s because, as a society, we aren’t listening to each other. It’s not just a United States problem either. Look at the Middle East. There is conflict all over the place because nobody is listening to the other side. This may be a little simplistic, but it would be a great place to start.
What would happen if all the major players in the world would sit down, with an open mind, and listen to each other? How many of the world’s problems could be solved this way? Some of you may be thinking—its just not going to happen, but what if it did? Some of you may be thinking—have you forgotten about the sin problem? No! This world isn’t perfect and won’t be until Jesus comes, but talking together, listening, and putting your neighbor first is what Jesus shared in the Golden Rule.
Read 1 Kings 12:25-33.
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.”
28 After seeking advice, the king made two golden calves. He said to the people, “It is too much for you to go up to Jerusalem. Here are your gods, Israel, who brought you up out of Egypt.” 29 One he set up in Bethel, and the other in Dan. 30 And this thing became a sin; the people came to worship the one at Bethel and went as far as Dan to worship the other.
31 Jeroboam built shrines on high places and appointed priests from all sorts of people, even though they were not Levites. 32 He instituted a festival on the fifteenth day of the eighth month, like the festival held in Judah, and offered sacrifices on the altar. This he did in Bethel, sacrificing to the calves he had made. And at Bethel he also installed priests at the high places he had made. 33 On the fifteenth day of the eighth month, a month of his own choosing, he offered sacrifices on the altar he had built at Bethel. So he instituted the festival for the Israelites and went up to the altar to make offerings.
DISCUSSION
Read 1 Kings 13:1-34. (This is a long passage, but essential to the story.)
1By the word of the Lord a man of God came from Judah to Bethel, as Jeroboam was standing by the altar to make an offering. 2 By the word of the Lord he cried out against the altar: “Altar, altar! This is what the Lord says: ‘A son named Josiah will be born to the house of David. On you he will sacrifice the priests of the high places who make offerings here, and human bones will be burned on you.’ ” 3 That same day the man of God gave a sign: “This is the sign the Lord has declared: The altar will be split apart and the ashes on it will be poured out.”
4 When King Jeroboam heard what the man of God cried out against the altar at Bethel, he stretched out his hand from the altar and said, “Seize him!” But the hand he stretched out toward the man shriveled up, so that he could not pull it back. 5 Also, the altar was split apart and its ashes poured out according to the sign given by the man of God by the word of the Lord.
6 Then the king said to the man of God, “Intercede with the Lord your God and pray for me that my hand may be restored.” So the man of God interceded with the Lord, and the king’s hand was restored and became as it was before.
7 The king said to the man of God, “Come home with me for a meal, and I will give you a gift.”
8 But the man of God answered the king, “Even if you were to give me half your possessions, I would not go with you, nor would I eat bread or drink water here. 9 For I was commanded by the word of the Lord: ‘You must not eat bread or drink water or return by the way you came.’ ” 10 So he took another road and did not return by the way he had come to Bethel.
11 Now there was a certain old prophet living in Bethel, whose sons came and told him all that the man of God had done there that day. They also told their father what he had said to the king. 12 Their father asked them, “Which way did he go?” And his sons showed him which road the man of God from Judah had taken. 13 So he said to his sons, “Saddle the donkey for me.” And when they had saddled the donkey for him, he mounted it 14 and rode after the man of God. He found him sitting under an oak tree and asked, “Are you the man of God who came from Judah?”
“I am,” he replied.
15 So the prophet said to him, “Come home with me and eat.”
16 The man of God said, “I cannot turn back and go with you, nor can I eat bread or drink water with you in this place. 17 I have been told by the word of the Lord: ‘You must not eat bread or drink water there or return by the way you came.’ ”
18 The old prophet answered, “I too am a prophet, as you are. And an angel said to me by the word of the Lord: ‘Bring him back with you to your house so that he may eat bread and drink water.’ ” (But he was lying to him.) 19 So the man of God returned with him and ate and drank in his house.
20 While they were sitting at the table, the word of the Lord came to the old prophet who had brought him back. 21 He cried out to the man of God who had come from Judah, “This is what the Lord says: ‘You have defied the word of the Lord and have not kept the command the Lord your God gave you. 22 You came back and ate bread and drank water in the place where he told you not to eat or drink. Therefore your body will not be buried in the tomb of your ancestors.’ ”
23 When the man of God had finished eating and drinking, the prophet who had brought him back saddled his donkey for him. 24 As he went on his way, a lion met him on the road and killed him, and his body was left lying on the road, with both the donkey and the lion standing beside it. 25 Some people who passed by saw the body lying there, with the lion standing beside the body, and they went and reported it in the city where the old prophet lived.
26 When the prophet who had brought him back from his journey heard of it, he said, “It is the man of God who defied the word of the Lord. The Lord has given him over to the lion, which has mauled him and killed him, as the word of the Lord had warned him.”
27 The prophet said to his sons, “Saddle the donkey for me,” and they did so. 28 Then he went out and found the body lying on the road, with the donkey and the lion standing beside it. The lion had neither eaten the body nor mauled the donkey. 29 So the prophet picked up the body of the man of God, laid it on the donkey, and brought it back to his own city to mourn for him and bury him. 30 Then he laid the body in his own tomb, and they mourned over him and said, “Alas, my brother!”
31 After burying him, he said to his sons, “When I die, bury me in the grave where the man of God is buried; lay my bones beside his bones. 32 For the message he declared by the word of the Lord against the altar in Bethel and against all the shrines on the high places in the towns of Samaria will certainly come true.”
33 Even after this, Jeroboam did not change his evil ways, but once more appointed priests for the high places from all sorts of people. Anyone who wanted to become a priest he consecrated for the high places. 34 This was the sin of the house of Jeroboam that led to its downfall and to its destruction from the face of the earth.
DISCUSSION
APPLICATION
The Great Controversy between God and Satan is about rebellion. Our lesson today is about rebellion. Satan rebelled against God. Israel rebelled against Judah. None of which was in God’s original plan. A prophet didn’t follow God’s instructions and it led to his death. What kinds of things do you rebel against in your life? To be clear, not all rebellion is bad. The war that created the United States for instance, Gideon against the Midianites, but rebellion against God is a whole different matter. Our lesson today showed us the end results of what happens when God’s plan is ignored. The great news is that Jesus came to redeem our rebellion and restore His children to their rightful place as children of God.
FOLLOW UP DISCUSSION
SCRIPTURE PASSAGE
LEADER’S NOTE
For a Relational Bible Study (RBS) you’ll want to get into the Scripture passage and encourage the youth to imagine participating in the story while it’s happening. Then you will be able to better apply it to your own situation today.
You will need to ask God for the Holy Spirit to be present as your small group discusses the questions (no more than 3-6 people in a group is recommended). Start with the opening question. It is a personal question and the answer is unique for each individual. There is no right answer and nobody is an expert here, so don’t be surprised when you hear different responses. You are depending on the Holy Spirit to be present and to speak through your group. Say what God prompts you to say, and listen to what others share.
Take turns reading the chapter out loud. Follow that with giving the students some time to individually mark their responses to the questions (a PDF version of the handout is available as a download). This gives each person a starting point for responding when you start to share as a group. Next, begin the discussion by asking the students to share what they marked and why on each question as you work your way through. Feel free to take more time on some questions than others as discussion warrants.
Encourage each person in the group to apply what is discussed to their personal lives and to share with the group what they believe God wants them to do. Then ask them to pray that God will help each of them to follow through in doing so. Remind them to expect that God will show them ways to live out the message of this passage in the coming week, and that they are free to ask others in the group to help hold them accountable.
OVERVIEW
This week’s lesson is more troubling than inspiring. King Solomon’s obsession with women led him away from God by his having so many wives (700) who had their own gods. Solomon, who prepared a magnificent temple for Yahweh, then followed up by creating temples for the many different gods of his foreign wives. And then he began joining them to worship their foreign gods (1 Kings 11). According to 1 Kings 11:9-13, because Solomon repeatedly broke the covenant God had made with him, he would lose his kingdom. But on account of his father, King David, Solomon would keep the kingdom until his death, but his descendants would lose it after that.
And that’s exactly what happened. Solomon’s son, Rehoboam, lost 10 of the tribes who denounced him and selected Jeroboam to be their king of Israel. The remaining tribes of Judah and the small tribe of Benjamin, often just considered together as “Judah,” kept Rehoboam as their king who reigned in Jerusalem.
Jeroboam became king of the 10 northern tribes of Israel with a new capital in Shechem. But he feared the people would gradually return their loyalty to Rehoboam because of their participation in the temple services in Jerusalem and the annual festivals there. So Jeroboam created an alternate worship for the 10 tribes of Israel under his kingship. He even created a golden calf (sound familiar?) and put it in Dan in the north, and another golden calf and put it in Bethel in the south. He then told the Israelites that those were the two places to worship, not Jerusalem.
One problem Jeroboam had was that none of the priests from the tribe of Levi were willing to serve at the worship sites with these idolatrous idols. So Jeroboam recruited anyone who was willing to do the job—quite different from the priesthood God had instituted at Mount Sinai. Jeroboam himself led out in his new festival by offering sacrifices and incense on the altar of the golden calf in Bethel, not far from Judah and Jerusalem. This is the setting for the unusual story found in 1 Kings 13.
Let’s read it and ask the Holy Spirit to guide our thoughts and see how this relates to our lives today.
Prophetic Message(s)
Read it in the Bible or hear a human messenger—which would you prefer?
Read 1 Kings 13:1-34.
By the word of the Lord a man of God came from Judah to Bethel, as Jeroboam was standing by the altar to make an offering. 2 By the word of the Lord he cried out against the altar: “Altar, altar! This is what the Lord says: ‘A son named Josiah will be born to the house of David. On you he will sacrifice the priests of the high places who make offerings here, and human bones will be burned on you.’ ” 3 That same day the man of God gave a sign: “This is the sign the Lord has declared: The altar will be split apart and the ashes on it will be poured out.”
4 When King Jeroboam heard what the man of God cried out against the altar at Bethel, he stretched out his hand from the altar and said, “Seize him!” But the hand he stretched out toward the man shriveled up, so that he could not pull it back. 5 Also, the altar was split apart and its ashes poured out according to the sign given by the man of God by the word of the Lord.
6 Then the king said to the man of God, “Intercede with the Lord your God and pray for me that my hand may be restored.” So the man of God interceded with the Lord, and the king’s hand was restored and became as it was before.
7 The king said to the man of God, “Come home with me for a meal, and I will give you a gift.”
8 But the man of God answered the king, “Even if you were to give me half your possessions, I would not go with you, nor would I eat bread or drink water here. 9 For I was commanded by the word of the Lord: ‘You must not eat bread or drink water or return by the way you came.’ ” 10 So he took another road and did not return by the way he had come to Bethel.
11 Now there was a certain old prophet living in Bethel, whose sons came and told him all that the man of God had done there that day. They also told their father what he had said to the king. 12 Their father asked them, “Which way did he go?” And his sons showed him which road the man of God from Judah had taken. 13 So he said to his sons, “Saddle the donkey for me.” And when they had saddled the donkey for him, he mounted it 14 and rode after the man of God. He found him sitting under an oak tree and asked, “Are you the man of God who came from Judah?”
“I am,” he replied.
15 So the prophet said to him, “Come home with me and eat.”
16 The man of God said, “I cannot turn back and go with you, nor can I eat bread or drink water with you in this place. 17 I have been told by the word of the Lord: ‘You must not eat bread or drink water there or return by the way you came.’ ”
18 The old prophet answered, “I too am a prophet, as you are. And an angel said to me by the word of the Lord: ‘Bring him back with you to your house so that he may eat bread and drink water.’ ” (But he was lying to him.) 19 So the man of God returned with him and ate and drank in his house.
20 While they were sitting at the table, the word of the Lord came to the old prophet who had brought him back. 21 He cried out to the man of God who had come from Judah, “This is what the Lord says: ‘You have defied the word of the Lord and have not kept the command the Lord your God gave you. 22 You came back and ate bread and drank water in the place where he told you not to eat or drink. Therefore your body will not be buried in the tomb of your ancestors.’ ”
23 When the man of God had finished eating and drinking, the prophet who had brought him back saddled his donkey for him. 24 As he went on his way, a lion met him on the road and killed him, and his body was left lying on the road, with both the donkey and the lion standing beside it. 25 Some people who passed by saw the body lying there, with the lion standing beside the body, and they went and reported it in the city where the old prophet lived.
26 When the prophet who had brought him back from his journey heard of it, he said, “It is the man of God who defied the word of the Lord. The Lord has given him over to the lion, which has mauled him and killed him, as the word of the Lord had warned him.”
27 The prophet said to his sons, “Saddle the donkey for me,” and they did so. 28 Then he went out and found the body lying on the road, with the donkey and the lion standing beside it. The lion had neither eaten the body nor mauled the donkey. 29 So the prophet picked up the body of the man of God, laid it on the donkey, and brought it back to his own city to mourn for him and bury him. 30 Then he laid the body in his own tomb, and they mourned over him and said, “Alas, my brother!”
31 After burying him, he said to his sons, “When I die, bury me in the grave where the man of God is buried; lay my bones beside his bones. 32 For the message he declared by the word of the Lord against the altar in Bethel and against all the shrines on the high places in the towns of Samaria will certainly come true.”
33 Even after this, Jeroboam did not change his evil ways, but once more appointed priests for the high places from all sorts of people. Anyone who wanted to become a priest he consecrated for the high places. 34 This was the sin of the house of Jeroboam that led to its downfall and to its destruction from the face of the earth.
1. Why did a prophet of Judah go to Bethel to deliver a message?
2. How did the Israelite king relate to this unnamed prophet from Judah?
3. Why didn’t the prophet accept Jeroboam’s invitation for a palace meal?
4. Why did the second prophet lie to the first prophet?
5. What made the first prophet’s death an “act of God”?
6. What good came out of this tragic story?
7. How do you determine whether or not a message really is from God?
8. How do you respond when God sends you a message you don’t like? What is your response when you like the message from God?
SUMMARY
A faithful prophet delivered God’s message to a disobedient and rebellious king, who commanded his soldiers to seize the prophet. But with a miraculous intervention, with the altar self-destructing and the king’s outstretched hand becoming paralyzed, the prophet became the commander of the situation. King Jeroboam pled for the prophet to pray on his behalf. The prophet did, and the king was physically restored. You’d think Jeroboam would obey God from that time forward, but he didn’t. The faithful prophet followed God’s message to return immediately to Judah, and then he believed a lying prophet whose message was the exact opposite of what God had told the first prophet. Strangely, the disobedient prophet was killed by a lion. He wasn’t able to have an honorable burial in his homeland. Yet the lying prophet buried the disobedient prophet in his own family burial space. What a strange, strange story. Look at the application options as you consider God’s message for you from this story, and how you will live this week.
APPLICATION
How do you discern God’s message(s) and how do you obey them? How much time are you given mercy? What does it take for you to change your ways when you disobey God? Here are some ideas for applying this week’s Bible study from 1 Kings 13 to your life this week. Put one of these into practice, or something else the Holy Spirit inspires or nudges or informs you to do to live for God this week.
Obedience is the right thing to do, but that doesn’t mean we always obey. Sometimes it seems easy (I want to do it already) and sometimes it seems hard (I don’t want to do it at all!). And there are times when doing the right things seems clear (I should forgive my friend) and other times when it seems fuzzy (should I stand up for my friend when my friend isn’t making a good choice?).
