For when Solomon grew old, his wives turned his heart after other gods, and he was not wholeheartedly devoted to the LORD his God, as his father David had been.When Solomon was old, his wives turned away his heart after other gods; and his heart was not perfect with Yahweh his God, as the heart of David his father was.For it came to pass, when Solomon was old, that his wives turned away his heart after other gods: and his heart was not perfect with the Lord his God, as was the heart of David his father.For it came to pass, when Solomon was old, that his wives turned away his heart after other gods; and his heart was not perfect with Jehovah his God, as was the heart of David his father.
3 sermons cite this verse
… your behavior. That's exactly what happened to Solomon. He followed in his father's footsteps. And we find the sad epitaph of his life in first Kings 11 verses three and four. Look at how Solomon's life ended. And he had 700 wives, princesses, and 300 concubines. And his wives turned his heart away. For it came about when Solomon was old that his wife turned his heart away after other gods. And his heart was not wholly devoted to the Lord his God as the heart of David his father had been. Although Solomon chose not to learn from his father's mistake until it was too late. The fact is you and I can learn from Solomon's mistakes. Late in life, he collected these Proverbs and he talked about the cost of sexual immorality. What happens to a person who falls into sexual immorality? Just jot down some of these verses. Proverbs 5, verses 3 to 5 and 8 to 9. For the lips of an adulteress drip honey, and smoother than oil is her speech. But in the end, she is bitter as wormwood, sharp as a two-edged sword. Her feet go down to death. Her steps lay hold of Sheol. Keep your way far from her and do not go near the door of her house, lest you give your vigor to others and your years to the cruel one. Proverbs 6, verses 26 and 27, for on account of a harlot, one is reduced to a loaf of bread and adulteress hunts for the precious life. Can a man take fire …
… And there's a phrase in 1 Kings 11, too, where it says, Solomon clung to these in love. He had 700 wives who were princesses, 300 concubines, and his wives turned away his heart. For when Solomon was old, his wives turned away his heart after other gods, and his heart was not wholly true to the Lord his God, as was the heart of David his father. That phrase, though, Solomon clung to these in love. Remember, this was the same word that Joshua used back in Joshua 23.8, when he says, you know, as Joshua is dying, he pulls his leaders together. He says, you are to cling to the Lord. This is who you cling to. And that's what Solomon, it seemed like that's the way he started. But then later, his heart was turned and he saw these women and it says Solomon clung to them in love. And his heart wasn't wholly true to the Lord his God. then in verse 9 it says and the Lord was angry with Solomon because his heart had turned away from the Lord the God of Israel who appeared to him twice God gets angry with Solomon it's like gosh I revealed myself to you remember what I revealed to you in that dream is that you can have anything you want and I've shown myself to you and then you did the exact thing that you knew that would lead you away from you. …
And moreover, these temporal advantages, as they are considered, have a strong tendency to render us self-confident. When a man has been advanced in the world by means of his own industry and skill, when he began poor and ends rich, how apt will he be to pride himself, and confide, in his own contrivances and his own resources! Or when a man feels himself possessed of good abilities; of quickness in entering into a subject, or of powers of argument to discourse readily upon it, or of acuteness to detect fallacies in dispute with little effort, or of a delicate and cultivated taste, so as to separate with precision the correct and beautiful in thought and feeling from the faulty and irregular, how will such an one be tempted to self-complacency and self-approbation! how apt will he be to rely upon himself, to rest contented with himself, to be harsh and impetuous; or supercilious; or to be fastidious, indolent, unpractical; and to despise the pure, self-denying, humble temper of religion, as something irrational, dull, enthusiastic, or needlessly rigorous! These considerations on the extreme danger of possessing temporal advantages, will be greatly strengthened by considering the conduct of holy men when gifted with them. Take, for instance, Hezekiah, one of the best of the Jewish kings. He, too, had been schooled by occurrences which one might have thought would have beaten down all pride and self-esteem. The king of Assyria had come against him, and seemed prepared to overwhelm him with his hosts; and he had found his God a mighty Deliverer, cutting off in one night of the enemy an hundred fourscore and five thousand men. And again, he had been miraculously recovered from sickness, when the sun's shadow turned ten degrees back, to convince him of the certainty of the promised recovery. Yet when the king of Babylon sent ambassadors to congratulate him on this recovery, we find this holy man ostentatiously displaying to them his silver, and gold, and armour. Truly the heart is "deceitful above all things;" and it was, indeed, to manifest this more fully that God permitted him thus to act. God "left him," says the inspired writer, "to try him, that he might know all that was in his heart." Let us take David as another instance of the great danger of prosperity; he, too, will exemplify the unsatisfactory nature of temporal goods; for which, think you, was the happier, the lowly shepherd or the king of Israel? Observe his simple reliance on God and his composure, when advancing against Goliath: "The Lord," he says, "that delivered me out of the paw of the lion and out of the paw of the bear, He will deliver me out of the hand of this Philistine." And compare this with his grievous sins, his continual errors, his weaknesses, inconsistencies, and then his troubles and mortifications after coming to the throne of Israel; and who will not say that his advancement was the occasion of both sorrow and sin, which, humanly speaking, he would have escaped, had he died amid the sheepfolds of Jesse? He was indeed most wonderfully sustained by Divine grace, and died in the fear of God; yet what rightminded and consistent Christian but must shrink from the bare notion of possessing a worldly greatness so corrupting and seducing as David's kingly power was shown to be in the instance of so great a Saint? The case of Solomon is still more striking; his falling away even surpasses our anticipation of what our Saviour calls "the deceitfulness of riches." He may indeed, for what we know, have repented; but at least the history tells us nothing of it. All we are told is, that "King Solomon loved many strange women . . . and it came to pass when Solomon was old, that his wives turned away his heart after other gods; and his heart was not perfect with the Lord his God, as was the heart of David his father. For Solomon went after Ashtaroth, the goddess of the Sidonians, and after Milcom, the abomination of the Ammonites." Yet this was he who had offered up that most sublime and affecting prayer at the Dedication of the Temple, and who, on a former occasion, when the Almighty gave him the choice of any blessing he should ask, had preferred an understanding heart to long life, and honour, and riches. …