Tuesday • 8/29/2023 •
Tuesday of the Thirteenth Week After Pentecost (Proper 16)
This morning’s Scriptures are: Psalm 5; Psalm 6; 1 Kings 1:38–2:4; Acts 26:24–27:8; Mark 13:28–37
This morning’s Canticles are: following the OT reading, Canticle 13 (“A Song of Praise,” BCP, p. 90); following the Epistle reading, Canticle 18 (“A Song to the Lamb,” Revelation 4:11; 5:9–10, 13, BCP, p. 93)
Welcome to Daily Office Devotions, where every Monday through Friday we draw insights from that day’s Scripture readings, as given in the Book of Common Prayer. I’m Reggie Kidd, and I’m grateful to be with you. This Tuesday in the Season After Pentecost our readings come from Proper 16 of Year 1 in the Daily Office Lectionary.
Preliminary thoughts on 1 Kings and Solomon. David’s final words to Solomon begin this way: “Be strong, be courageous, and keep the charge of the Lord your God, walking in his ways and keeping his statutes, his commandments, his ordinances, and his testimonies, as it is written in the law of Moses, so that you may prosper in all that you do and wherever you turn” (1 Kings 2:2b–3).
When 1 Kings was written, Judah was still undergoing exile in Babylon. Her future was uncertain, and her people were struggling. The account of Solomon’s accession to the throne therefore recounts the uncertainty that Bathsheba and Nathan had to overcome to bring to realization David’s earlier promise that Solomon would succeed him. And it details their struggle to ensure that transition. David knows that Solomon still faces challenges to establish himself, and he urges him to stay true to Yahweh in the midst of the struggle.
We too seem to find ourselves in a time of exile and struggle. We too could use a call to be strong, courageous, and faithful. So, today, a brief look ahead at the perils Solomon will face, and some successes and failures.
Image: Mönch Thomas (Kloster Eberbach), Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons Illumination from the Eberbach Monastery, Rheingau. The picture painted by the monk Thomas shows "Christ and Ecclesia" and adorns a commentary on the Song of Songs. Date: 12th century, second half
1 Kings recounts the determination—perhaps even ruthlessness—that Solomon displays in removing obstacles to his kingship (1 Kings 1–2). 1 Kings will also recount the challenge that Solomon faces in trying to heed his father’s call to walk in the ways of Yahweh. This is a Solomon leading a people for whom obedience to the Lord is not an easy thing.
1 Kings praises young Solomon’s request for wisdom above all things (1 Kings 4), and recounts an example of his extraordinary wisdom when he adjudicates a child-custody dispute between two women (1 Kings 3). 1 Kings also records the fact that he wrote 1,005 proverbs, studied God’s creation like nobody before him, and became known throughout the Ancient Near East as the wisest person alive (1 Kings 4).
And yet 1 Kings also notes the foolishness of Solomon’s hybrid religion: “Solomon loved the Lord, walking in the statutes of his father David; only, he sacrificed and offered incense at the high places” (1 Kings 3:3). He fulfills, grandly, David’s wishes that he construct a temple for Yahweh (1 Kings 5–7). In that temple he conducts a powerful dedicatory service (1 Kings 8). But his own worship will be divided between the temple he builds and the “high places” he tolerates and even builds up; as a result, “his heart was not true to the Lord as was the heart of his father David” (1 Kings 11:1–8).
May we strive in our day for a knowledge of our world and its people like Solomon’s, but with a faithfulness to God’s commands about worship. May we confess with the psalmist, “in your light we see light” (Psalm 36:9).
Worse, there are Solomon’s 700 wives and 300 concubines (1 Kings 11:1–13). Not to put things too inelegantly, all these relationships must have served as quite the laboratory for exploring the mystery and wonder of love between a man and a woman. These insights he crystallized in Song of Songs, his amazing paean to marital love, as this couple dances over the pages of this love song, wooing one another into embraces and kisses and pledges of love.
The Song of Songs was understood from the earliest interpreters as celebrating the interplay of Yahweh as Groom and Israel as Bride; understandably, Christian interpreters have long seen it as a forecast of the relationship between Christ and the Church. Nonetheless, 1 Kings understands that Solomon’s heart, divided among so many lovers and especially among the seductions of their various gods, leads him to idolatry.
May we in our day have the strength and the courage to love well and deeply, and yet in the bonds and within the boundaries that please God. Whatever our marital status, may we rejoice in the affections of the Divine Bridegroom who has sought out his Bride the Church, and who lovingly indwells the hearts of the members of his Bride (Ephesians 5).
“Be strong and of good courage, and act. Do not be afraid or dismayed; for the Lord God, my God, is with you. He will not fail you or forsake you, until all the work for the service of the house of the Lord is finished” (1 Chronicles 28:20).
Be blessed this day,
Reggie Kidd+