The Old Testament book of 1 Kings starts out with the a dying King David, and two parties fighting for succession rights to the throne of Israel. There is Adonijah’s party and Solomon’s party. Both parties believe their candidate should be king, and things get messy.
Then again, what can we expect when it comes to people wanting power? Has it ever been different in the history of civilization? In order to get power, to gain control over those who oppose you, you have to beat the competition. You have to maneuver, manipulate, attack, defend, calculate and ultimately win at any cost. It’s the way of human politics (unfortunately).
The episode that describes the fight for power between the parties is very… well, human. Adonijah’s party and Solomon’s party are doing all the manipulating, politicking, and trickery that their human intelligence can conceive to secure the throne.
Adonijah’s strategy is shock and awe. He decides to simply declares himself king, just like that. 1 Kings 1:5 says, “Now Adonijah the son of Haggith exalted himself, saying, ‘I will be king.’ And he prepared for himself chariots and horsemen, and fifty men to run before him.” “Hey everyone, I’m Adonijah, and I’m going to be king.”
Adonijah also strategizes by getting the support of the people of influence that served his father (David) as king. Then the party throws a huge party celebrating Adonijah’s self-coronation. Sigh…oh boy.
Solomon’s party opts for a more subtle campaign strategy. Solomon’s mother (Bathsheba), and friend Nathan the prophet, orchestrate conversations and events in King David’s presence in order to manipulate David into selecting Solomon as king (the reality during this time was that the King himself would choose a successor if it was unclear as to who the successor should be).
Nathan and Bathsheba choose their words wisely and carefully. They are very calculating. They even go as far as leveraging their personal relationships with the king and positions of power to get what they want. Sigh…oh boy.
Both parties, once again, manipulate, calculate, defend, and attack. This is the human way.
Eventually, Solomon is named king. Do you know why Solomon is named king? It’s not because Bathsheba and Nathan were the better campaign managers and strategists, it was because Solomon was the king that God wanted. Period.
What’s my point? Regardless of all this human activity, all the politicking, slandering, manipulation, and calculating, God’s will, in the end, prevails. This kind of stuff doesn’t block, barricade, manipulate, or changed the fixed will of God.
Certainly, God has a permissive will (meaning that there’s flexibility within God’s will to take into account human will and behavior (hence sin in the world)), however, God also has a fixed will (meaning his will that cannot be changed, trumped, bought, or manipulated). Amen to that?
I suppose that the 2020 American Presidential Elections may be comparable to all of this. God has chosen his leader, and there’s no way around it. Our responsibility is to be the prayerful people of God who are committed to being instruments who will faithfully discern his will and participate in carrying out that will.
