My wife must not
live in the palace of David king of Israel, because the places the ark of the
Lord has entered are holy
(2 Chronicles 8:11).
Even though Solomon
had been warned not to intermarry with the nations, he amassed 700 wives and
300 concubines. When the reigning Egyptian Pharaoh offered his daughter in
marriage to the King of Israel in order to solidify their uneasy alliance,
Solomon brought his new wife to Jerusalem. Knowing her presence in David’s
palace would be displeasing to God, he did not move her in there, but skated
the issue by building her a brand new palace.
Solomon did what we
often do; he compartmentalized his life: I’ll keep my Israeli wives
here in this palace, and I’ll keep my foreign-born wives over here, and never
the twain shall meet. God won’t even notice. God did notice, and Solomon’s dalliances hurt not only him, but the
entire kingdom. As Solomon grew old, his wives turned his heart
after other gods (1 Kings 11:4).
Solomon thought he
could handle it, but he was lying to himself. When we think, “This is my home
life, this is my work life, and this is my spiritual life,” we’re lying to ourselves too. We may think we can get away with
it, but eventually it catches up with us.
TODAY’S MEDITATION
Are any parts of your life
incongruent with the rest? Any little inconsistencies you hope God won’t
notice? What are you going to do about that this week?
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