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Kingmaker: Characteristics of Positive Friendships
June 25, 2024 · 42 min
Pastor John Mark discusses the significance of positive friendships, emphasizing the impact of choosing the right people to call your closest friends.
Series "Pastor Talks" with John Mark Caton June 25, 2024 · 42 min · "Pastor Talks" with John Mark Caton
Pastor John Mark discusses the significance of positive friendships, emphasizing the impact of choosing the right people to call your closest friends. ...more Show the full description Show less Pastor John Mark discusses the significance of positive friendships, emphasizing the impact of choosing the right people to call your closest friends.
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John Mark is the Senior Pastor of the thriving Cottonwood Creek Church in Allen, Texas, where he has served since 1995.
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The Importance of Choosing the Right Relationships 0:00 That's it. That's it. So good. If you are new here, we are glad that you are here, whether in person or online. We have been in a series over the last couple of weeks, entitled Kingmaker. And we've been looking at some0:12 of the kings in the Old Testament. Many of them you haven't heard of or maybe you've heard of, but you don't know anything about them. And, we've been looking at over the last couple of weeks, decisions that are truly0:23 decisions that are kingmakers, but also kingbreakers. And, we can look in old testament and you can look whether it's in, the northern part of Israel or Judah once they divide a kingdom. There are some0:35 clear patterns, of kings who make good decisions. They are blessed, their house is blessed, and all of the nation is blessed. But, there are also some kings that make some bad decisions and as a result0:47 the nation suffers. A couple of weeks ago we talked about the idea of how do you fight your battles. We all go into battles. We all have battles. And we looked at a king that did a good job of surrounding0:59 himself with the right people and praying and seeking God's heart on how he goes into battle. And we looked at a king that made a bad decision. We talked about having a lasting influence. That all of these kings whether1:10 they were good or bad, they all had a lasting influence. A king that made good and godly choices, his family and and the nation was blessed. A king that made bad decisions, man, his influence1:22 suffered, but it was still a suffering negative influence that lasts for generations. We looked at the idea of what it takes to be a good father. And, we looked at a good king who was a good father, and a bad king who1:33 was a bad father. And, today I want to talk to you about how to create reliable relationships, or how to have good friendships. Man, as we journey forward in life,1:45 we have to surround ourselves with the kind of people that if literally they are riding in our chariot, we're gonna go back to that illustration we looked at last week, That they help us make good decisions. They keep us1:56 pointed in the right direction. They help us have a good and positive influence on those around us. They're just good people to have in the chariot. We're also gonna look at the idea of of we can create alliances with2:07 the wrong people and have the wrong people riding in our chariots. And, we're gonna ultimately suffer ruin. So, let's go back to our foundational verses from Solomon's, words in Proverbs chapter2:19 14 verse 11 about this series of kingmaker and king breaker. Here's what Solomon said in Proverbs chapter 14 verse 11. The house of the wicked will be destroyed, but the tent of the upright2:31 will ultimately flourish. Now, you you may not notice this, but what he's essentially saying is that if you have a house, now in those days, the people who had2:43 houses were the powerful people. They were the political leaders. They were the king. Remember, you hear it talked about all the way script through scripture. The house of Saul, or the house of David, or house of2:52 Solomon, or the house of this 1. But, he's saying, listen. It doesn't matter how powerful you are, and what kind of house you live in, or how long you lived in the palace. If you make wicked and bad3:04 decisions, your house, your legacy will be destroyed. However, on the opposite end of the spectrum, he says if you're a shepherd that's a nomad that lives out in a tent, If you make good3:16 and godly decisions, your house will flourish. So what Solomon is saying, it doesn't matter whether you're at the top of your game or at the bottom of your game, whether people think you're powerful or whether think,3:26 people think you have no power and no wealth and nothing you can contribute to society. Here's what Solomon says, listen, if you make bad decisions, it'll destroy your house, it'll destroy your tent.3:38 If you make good decisions, it'll influence and positively allow your house to prosper, and your tent to prosper. Look at the next words as we think about it. Proverbs chapter 14 verse 34, he3:50 says, righteousness exalts a nation, but sin condemns any people. You know, as we think about this and we journey into another election season, how many of you know we're in election season? It's4:02 almost every day that that someone will come out and endorse this candidate or that candidate, and they're creating alliances along the way. Here's what that passage says, basically, if a nation makes good and4:14 godly decisions at the top, the people at the bottom in the tents will be blessed. However, at the same point, if people at the top, kings at the top make policies, this is a pattern in4:26 Israel, and it's certainly a pattern for our country. If they make bad decisions, the people in the streets, the people in the in the tents will suffer. So it's so important as we think about who's leading our country,4:38 and what policies are they gonna implement. Because here's what we understand, bad policies at the top in Israel influenced all the people all the way down to the tent negatively. They experienced curses. Good4:49 decisions at the top in Israel cause blessings for all people. So let's go back to this idea of who needs to be in our chariot. Last week I closed this with this idea of King Jehu,5:02 was going into battle and he knew that he needed to create the right friendships, the right proper alliances. And, he found this group of men who were called Rechabites, but we're going to be introduced to 1 of them, the5:14 leader of the Rechabites. And, here's what we know in God's word. These Rechabite guys were awesome dudes. They loved God, they worshiped God, they served God, even when the rest of Israel started serving Baal, they said5:25 we're not gonna do that. We're gonna serve the 1 true God. So King Jehu knows that he needs to create a reliant, an alliance with the right kind of people. And so here it is, look at it, second Kings chapter 10 verse 15.5:37 Says, Jehu greeted him, this is Erekhbaite, we're going to be introduced to him here in a second. He says, are you in accord with me as I am with you? Jehu was saying, he looked at this man, he goes listen, are you on5:49 my team because I'm on your team? Because we're both on God's team. And so, he just asked him a question before he said get up in my chariot he says, are we good? Are we heading in the right direction? Because if you're6:01 not going where I'm going to serve God, and worship God, and love God alone, you're not going to get in my chariot. And so notice the response. Jehonadab says, I am, he answered. He says, if so, Jehu said,6:13 give me your hand. So he did, and he helped him up into the chariot. So as we journey through this week's Kings, let me ask you a6:25 question. Right now who's in your chariot? Who have you created alliances with? Not just talking about your husband or your wife, I'm talking about your6:37 friends. Who have you put in the chariot next to you? Are you headed in the right direction? Are they the right kind of people? Because who's in your chariot truly6:49 does matter. We're going to talk here in a few minutes about a bad friendship. 2 people who are in the chariot headed the wrong direction, and that's King Ahab and7:01 Jezebel. Here's what I know over my 29 years, over 29 years of dedicating babies in 29 years, I have never dedicated a sweet little girl named Jezebel.7:14 Why? It goes all the way back to this example, That this whole lasting legacy is not always a positive 1, sometimes it is a negative 1. Interestingly enough, King Jehu7:27 in second Kings chapter 10, that I just talked about, get up in my chariot. If you go back to the chapter before that, it was Jehu that killed Jezebel. And so here we are on this journey7:39 that it really needs to it begs the question, who's in your chariot or whose chariot are you in? And it matters.7:52 So you say, alright pastor, if I'm going to choose the right people to be in my chariot, how do I do that? Look at it. Proverbs chapter 12 verse 26. It says the righteous, everybody say the righteous, they8:03 choose their friends carefully. That word carefully is that Hebrew word, by examining them, looking at them, talking to them, looking at the lifestyle. It says if you're going to be righteous,8:15 you will choose your friends carefully. You won't just let anybody in your chariot. You're going to make sure, that they're serving God and loving God and following God and worship God. Not perfect, no 1 is8:27 perfect. But their their general bent, their general direction is to do the right thing consistently over and over again. So, he says, the righteous choose their friends carefully,8:39 but the way of the wicked leads them astray. And So what he's saying, if you choose righteous people to put in your chariot chances are you're going to go in the right direction. However, if you put the wrong people in8:50 your chariot, or you get in the chariot with the wrong people, you're probably going to be led astray. You say, okay pastor, then what kind of people am I looking to invite into my9:01 chariot? You know the bible has a number of characteristics. Let me give you a couple of them. Number 1, someone you want to invite invite into your chariot is someone that's just a loving individual. They care9:13 about you, they love you, they encourage you. They're always lifting you up. That's the second 1. Not only do they love you, they'll encourage you. When you find yourself discouraged, they're going to encourage you.9:25 You also want to invite someone into your chariot that is a truth teller. That when you begin to head in the wrong direction, or make some bad decisions, they don't high 5 you. They're going to stop you9:37 and go, hey, do we really want to go there? See a lot of times we we live in a culture, a society today that we want people to love us and encourage us, but we don't want anybody to tell us if we're going the wrong9:48 direction. But part of the biblical characteristic of a good and godly friend is that they will look you in the eye and tell you the truth. That you are headed in the wrong direction. That's going10:00 to harm you. It's going to hurt your family. It's going to hurt, your reputation. Don't do that. So yes, we need someone loving. We need someone encouraging. We need someone who's a truth teller. We also need10:12 someone in our chariot that's forgiving. That they're going to look at us and if I accidentally harm them or hurt them, they're they're going to be quick to forgive. They're not going to hold a grudge against me. Here's10:23 another characteristic. You look at it in God's word, are they faithful to God? See see, when you're talking about putting someone in your chariot, the only thing you can do when you're in a10:35 chariot, in those days it was just a 2 person chariot, you were side by side. That you were going to talk about family, you're going to talk about faith, you're going to talk about life, and so you want to put somebody10:45 in your chariot, or you only want to get in a chariot with someone that is faithful to God. You want someone in your chariot, God's word says, that is constantly doing good for other people, not just10:57 you. See, I want to invite someone in my chariot, that they don't just bring me good, they bring everybody they come into contact with good. They're always looking for someone to11:09 serve, and encourage, and give away, and then finally, you might want to just write this down. You want someone in your chariot that's sticky. You say sticky?11:21 Yeah. When life falls apart, and you go through discouragement, and everything in your life seems to be a mess, that that person11:33 looks you in the eye, says I'm in it, and I'm in it to the end. We're either going to win together, or we're going to lose together. But, I'm not going to abandon ship right now.11:45 And so, child of God, we want someone loving. We want someone that's a truth teller. We want someone encouraging. We want someone that's doing good. But when life gets hard, you don't need to look over at the person in11:54 the chariot, and they're sitting there going to see them. You want someone that's gonna stick around through good and bad. Notice what Solomon said in Ecclesiastes. He says, 2 are better than 1. Don't ever go it12:06 alone. Don't ever go it alone. He says, 2 are better than 1 because they have a good return for their labor. In other words, it's important who gets in the chariot with us. If either of them falls down, here it is, the12:17 sticky part, 1 can help them up. But pity anyone who falls and has no 1 to help them up. And so, child of God this idea that we don't want to fight our battles alone, I need people in my12:29 chair, I need friends around me if I'm a man in here, I need men around here who are gonna love me and encourage me, affirm me, forgive me, but also tell me the truth. And when things get hard they look at me and they12:39 say, we're still in your chariot. Ladies, you need the exact same thing. Man, as you're journeying through those seasons of life where it just gets hard, that you've got someone that loves and affirms you and12:51 encourage you, lifts you up, does good to other people, but when your life falls apart ladies, that you've got ladies in your chariot that says we are with you. So this idea of13:03 relationships matter. So, as we think about the relationships we're going to look at today, we're going to look at a negative relationship and a positive. The negative, Ahab and Jezebel.13:15 King and queen of Israel and the northern tribes and all the evil that they did and what happened afterwards. But then we're gonna turn around and look at a positive relationship. King Solomon and this, figure named13:26 queen, the queen of Sheba. And they formed an alliance and a partnership, although they live 1200 miles away. And we're gonna see some positive, results of what a good friendship looks like. So here's the13:38 negative, first of all. Let's start with Ahab and Jezebel. Let me just read you a couple of verses. I could read you a lot of verses. But let me read you a couple of verses and and here's what happened. Ahab,13:50 lets Jezebel and his chariot with him, and here's what happened. In the 38 year, 30 eighth year of Asa the king of Judah, by the way this is in the southern kingdom, Judah, but what we're gonna see is Ahab's in the14:01 north. Ahab, son of Omri, became king in Israel. That's the north. Alright. And he reigned in Samaria over Israel for 22 years. Look at verse 30. Ahab, son of14:13 Omri, did more evil in the eyes of the Lord than anyone before him. Now, that is saying a lot. There have been a lot of evil kings throughout the14:25 northern tribes or the northern Israel's, history. And for this statement to be made, he did more evil than anyone before him. That says a lot.14:37 This dude was bad. You say, alright pastor. What did he do that made him so bad? Let's just read it. Look at verse 31. He not only considered it trivial to commit the sins of Jeroboam, alright. Now, let's just stop you14:49 there. If if you heard it a couple of weeks ago, I taught on Jeroboam. Say pastor, what were the sins of Jeroboam? Well, the the sins of Jeroboam basically, were a couple.15:01 When God split the kingdom in the north and south, he sent a prophet to Jeroboam. And he said, you're gonna be the king over the north and I'm actually gonna give you 10 tribes of Israel. The prophet tore his robe15:13 into 12 pieces, that's 12 tribes of Israel. He gave Jeroboam in the north 10 of those tribes and left Judah in the south with only 2 of the tribes. But God also through the prophet told15:24 Jeroboam, you're gonna be able to reign and I will bless you if you honor me and serve me and worship me. And God also through the prophet looked at Jeroboam, the king of the north and he says, listen15:36 now when you go up there you still need to let the people come back to Jerusalem that was in the south and worship. So that was the key, is that Jeroboam was going to be a blessed king, a mighty king15:48 if he let the people continue to worship in Jerusalem. What's the first thing that happened to Jeroboam? What is a sin of Jeroboam? He went up there and got insecure. And he said, he said this, he said, you know what? If15:59 I keep letting the people go from the north down into Jerusalem, they will no longer worship me and serve me, but they will run a return to their king down in the south. And so, instead of Jeroboam trusting God,16:11 and here in the blessing of the prophet, he decides to do 2 things. He instead of letting the children of Israel go all the way to Jerusalem to worship, just north of the southern16:23 border there in a place called Bethel Jeroboam built altars to Baal and the Asherah. And, he basically said we're still going to worship God, but we're not going to all go all the way down16:35 in Jerusalem. Then he built another 1 up in the northern part of the northern tribe, a place called Dan. And then he also built 2 golden calves. 1 for Bethel and 116:47 for Dan. And by the way, I don't know if you know this, this is biblically accurate, but building golden calves is not a good thing. Am I right? It never works out. So the sin of Jeroboam was16:59 that he he created 2 new places of worship and built 2 golden calves for the people to worship. What it says is Ahab committed the17:11 sins of Jeroboam. He looked at Jeroboam and says, hey, we don't need 2 places to worship. We need 20. We don't need 2 golden calves. We need 20. We don't need 1 extra17:23 god. Let's do Baal, let's do Asherah, let's do everything. So, he went way beyond in leading the children of Israel away from worshiping God. Now, continue to read. Here's the second thing he did. Number 1, committed the17:34 sins of Jeroboam. Number 2, he married that woman Jezebel. She was a Sidonian, so he had a marriage. He he invited her up into his chariot. Here's the third thing he did. He began to17:45 serve Baal and worship him. Now, what we see about Jeroboam, Jeroboam never actually served Baal and worshiped him. He built places for the children of Israel not to go to Jerusalem. But,17:57 Ahab comes down and says, not only am I gonna build these altars, I'm actually going to stop serving God, and I'm going to start serving Baal and the Asherah's. Why? Because Jezebel served18:09 them. And so, here's the sin. Look at the next 1. He says, not only that, he set up an altar of Baal in the temple of Baal he had built. He actually built these temples for Baal,18:21 in Samaria. Ahab also made an Asherah pole, and did more to arouse the anger of the Lord, the God of Israel, than anyone did before him. Now, if we think about this negative relationship, anytime you18:33 just Google an image of Ahab and Jezebel, I will promise you there will be something sinister about the image. It won't be 1 of these sweet couples. It'll always have Jezebel kinda18:50 story of this couple, these 2 people in the same chariot, it was just 1 evil thing after another evil evil thing after another evil thing. When you look at these 2,19:02 if you go to the new testament Paul in first Corinthians 15, my guess is maybe you've shared this with your teenager, you've heard somebody share. Anybody ever heard the verse where it says bad company corrupts good19:11 morals? Let me tell you what, with these 2, neither 1 of them had good morals. It was bad company making other bad company worse company. And, you see over and19:23 over, they were just going down and they were doing everything they could. You say, alright pastor, this negative relationship, the 2 bad people in the same chariot, what happened? Let me give you 4 thoughts. 1, their19:34 sin increased. Their sin increased. If you just start to start reading about Israel under Ahab and under Jezebel, you see the people expressed immorality19:46 in the streets. There was sin everywhere. There was also a season and a time when when Ahab and Jezebel took whatever they wanted from the people. Right next to Ahab, there was a guy named Naboth. You can19:58 read about this. Naboth had a had a beautiful vineyard. And the king goes over to him, Ahab goes over to Naboth and he says, hey Naboth, I I love your vineyard. It's right next to my vineyard. I'd love to buy your20:09 vineyard. Naboth said, no. I don't want to sell it. It's been in my family. Plus, you married a Sidonian woman and we're not allowed this to transfer hands, so we're not gonna do it. So Ahab goes back to20:21 Jezebel and says, hey, I wanted to buy the vineyard, but he said no. Go read the story. Jezebel said, yeah, he won't say no for long. She began to conspire20:33 against Naboth and had him killed. And so, as you look at Ahab and Jezebel, when they were in the chariot headed the wrong direction, 2 people with bad morals and bad character,20:45 sin increased. As a matter of fact, you read about the season and the time when Ahab and Jezebel were in leadership. It says the people did not even like to walk around the streets because20:57 the turmoil. Anybody hear about that in our country these days? Because it's difficult and hard. So number 1, a bad relationship will always cause sin21:09 to increase. The second consequence of bad relationship is their faith will decrease. Their faith will decrease. See, Ahab grew up at least wanting to worship the 121:21 true God, intermarried with Jezebel, and all of a sudden he stopped even pretending he was worshiping God, and started serving the bells. Jezebel actually ordered all the prophets of God21:33 to be killed. Go read it. They just went through in the true prophets of God. They were saying, repent, turn back to God. She just started having them killed. Beyond that Jezebel had, you might want to write this down,21:45 850 of her own prophets of Baal and her own prophets of Asherah that it literally says they ate off her table. So she fed the21:56 king's food and the king's palace to these 850 prophets of Baal, while at the same time she was ordering that the prophets of God would be killed. That's when you encounter Elijah.22:09 Elijah begins to see what is taking place and Elijah prays that there would be a drought in the land and for 3 and a half years God brings a drought on the children of Israel. And all the prophets of Israel are being22:20 killed. Now there were some of them that were hidden in the caves because people came along and says we're gonna protect them, we're gonna feed them food and water, Obadiah did this. And so what happens is after 3 and a22:30 half years, believe it or not, Elijah is walking towards Ahab. And although it's Ahab and Jezebel's decision that has called caused this drought and the curse to come upon22:42 Israel, Ahab immediately looks at his at Elijah and says, you are the troubler of Israel. Child of God, let me just tell you as you journey through your life and relationship, when you look22:54 at the bad things that are going on in some of the places and spaces in our country, If you call it out, people will call you the problem. Have you understood that? If you hold the biblical fidelity and biblical faith,23:05 and you begin to call out unrighteousness and wickedness, guess what? They're gonna say you're the problem. And that's exactly what Ahab did to Elijah. He says, you troubler of Israel. Elijah says, no, no, no. It wasn't23:16 me. And that's when Elijah says, hey, I got an idea. Let's all meet on Mount Carmel. How many of you heard of that experience? That was because Jezebel had been slaughtering the prophets of God and she was feeding the23:28 prophets of Baal and Asherah even though there was a famine in the land. They meet up there and God shows up in a powerful way in the children of Israel. The children of Israel begin to slaughter the prophets of Baal.23:40 And you would think, okay. Once Ahab and Jezebel were up on Mount Carmel, saw their 850 prophets, cried out to a God that didn't show up, that didn't burn up the altar, then Elijah23:51 prays a simple prayer, God shows up in a powerful way. Then you're like, okay Ahab and Jezebel are going to repent. Is that what happened? Absolutely not. That is not what24:03 happened. As a matter of fact, she doubles down on her anger and begins to pursue after Elijah. And Elijah runs to a cave and hides, remember the story. And Elijah says, God I wish I would just die.24:16 And God shows up to him and says, Elijah why are you in a cave? Why are you isolated and alone and in a cave? I didn't call you to preach in a cave to nobody. I called you to preach in24:28 the streets to everybody. And so child of God, when people begin to attack you for your faith and your walk, understand this, it is not our call to go hide in a cave. It is our call24:39 to stand firm and faithful in the streets. In your house, in my house, wherever you work, that's what we do. Now when you think about Jezebel, if you journey not only through the Old24:51 Testament, but all the way through the New Testament, go to Revelation chapter 2. When when when Jesus is talking to the churches, 7 churches in Israel, and he calls 1 out for having25:03 a Jezebel spirit. If you're on social media, anybody ever heard about the Jezebel spirit? You hear a lot of people talking about it today. Well, the church has the Jezebel spirit and and we gotta we gotta get it out. Can25:15 can I just tell you, here what is the Jezebel spirit? I want you to know, so if somebody says it, you'll hear it. First of all, a church in the Jezebel spirit would be rampant with sexual immorality, or they25:26 would be deviant in their sexual, immorality teaching. The second thing is they would be in full blown idol worship. They would have false teachers that abound. They would also go the25:38 go so far as they cause other people in their church to follow in the same direction. So, could there be elements of the Jezebel spirit in certain churches across our nation? I think the answer is25:50 yes. There are some denominations that have headed that way, and they're gonna compromise in every way, in every space, but not all of them. Now, but also I want you to know, and when you think about a Jezebel spirit,26:00 don't ever get this idea that your call from God is to scoop all the Jezebels up and bop them on the head. Alright? Y'all actually supposed to laugh more at that because that's a bunny foo foo26:12 reference. Right? That I just threw it. Did y'all get that? And that was genius and y'all just missed it. See, I think there are a lot of times I see this a lot. I see a lot of people that they think they've been called26:25 to point out Jezebels, and point out someone this, and point out someone that. And a lot of times they do it on social media without even communicating or talking to anybody. They just wanna lob bombs26:37 at people. Listen, we need to be faithful. We need to be loving. We need to teach God's word and we're gonna do it here. Alright? But we also wanna understand that our call is ultimately to point to God. Here's the third26:47 thing that happened to them. Not only did sin increase, faith decreased, their reputations were destroyed. As I just shared with you earlier, I've never dedicated to Jezebel. Because of her life and everything that26:59 she did, man no 1 wants to name their wonderful little daughter Jezebel. Maybe a couple of dogs, right? But not this. And if you think about always, boy anybody ever heard the phrase the27:11 ties that bind? This was a tie that needed to unbind. Alright. They didn't need to be together. They need to didn't need to stay together because it's difficult. And then finally, what happened? Sin increased, faith27:23 decreased, the reputations were destroyed, and the nation suffered. The nation suffered because of the evil policies and the evil decisions that they made from the top.27:35 See, chaos from the king always creates mayhem in the streets. It always does. And, if you go to the end of story of, of Jezebel, if you don't know how she27:46 died, this King Jehu I just told you about. He rides into town and she is she is standing up in her window in the palace. And how did she die? He looked at the men that were surrounding her, said27:58 throw her out. They chunk her out. I can only imagine the coroner, alright, in this autopsy. I'm not going to show you pictures of this, but just go with me here. So the coroner's in there and he's doing28:10 the autopsy on Jezebel, and he's got his little assistant over taking notes, and he goes cause of death thrown out of a window. So the scribe says thrown out of a window. And then the coroner says,28:23 yeah, but she was also trampled by horses, so write write that down there. And she's trampled by horse. And he goes, and she was also eaten eaten by dogs. Alright? And finally he just looks up and says, just check28:35 all of the above. Just check all of the above. Alright? When you think about her unrighteousness her end was a full consequence of them heading in the wrong direction. So that's a negative28:47 relationship. Don't get in the wrong chariot with the wrong person, and don't allow the wrong person to be in your chariot. What about this positive friendship? If you go look in God's word there's this28:58 relationship that forms between the king of king of Sheba and Solomon. Solomon powerful and wealthy and this queen of Sheba who lives literally 1200 miles away. She's a pagan29:10 who has been searching for the 1 true God. And she gets discouraged and disgruntled with the gods that she has and she realizes these aren't the real gods. But she hears about this guy named Solomon.29:23 And she says he is wealthy, he is wise, he is powerful and he loves his god and his god blesses him. So listen, this powerful queen of Sheba travels with an29:34 amazing caravan 1200 miles. This pagan searching for the 1 true God. Looking for a man who had incredible character as a leader, as a weapon. And so, here's what we29:46 see. When you think about image, you go Google some images of the Queen of Sheba and Solomon. You're gonna you're gonna see these wonderful images. They all have smiles on their face unlike what you saw of Ahab and29:58 Jezebel. Why? Because when you look at their relationship, and I'm just gonna show you a few verses of it. There are a number of key principles we can glean about what it really means and how we can30:10 have a positive relationship. So here's thought number 1. You ready? If you have a positive friendship it is always formed in person. Write that down, face30:22 to face. I know we live in a social media age, and you can look around and find friends all over the place, but I want you to know your best friendship is that person that you can develop and you30:34 can carefully look at and examine, and you can invite them in personally to your chariot. Notice what you see. Pick it up as we read. As you look at it, verse 1. It says, when the queen of Sheba30:46 heard so this is pagan queen 1200 miles away is dissatisfied with the gods that she serves. It says, when the queen of Sheba heard about the fame of30:57 Solomon and his relationship to the Lord, she came to test Solomon with hard questions. Looks at verse 2. It says, after arriving in Jerusalem 1200 miles journey with a great caravan with31:09 camels carrying spices and large quantities of gold and precious stones, She does what? She says, I want to establish a relationship with this person, but I want to do it face to face,31:21 in person. And so she journeys towards him and says, listen I want to get to know you. I love this about Solomon, and let this be a challenge to all of us. 1200 years away,31:33 miles away, she heard 2 or 3 things about Solomon. Number 1, he was wise. We want people to think of us that way. Do you walk with wisdom?31:45 Number 2, he was wealthy. He was clearly a smart businessman. He was a hard worker, but number 3, he clearly had a relationship with God that went beyond his household31:57 and others heard about it. So if you think about pastor, what kind of a friend do I want to be? If I want people to hear about me, what do I want them to hear? I would say those couple of things. Number 1, that you are a32:08 hard worker. When people walk into the office, whether you're at the top of of the org chart, at the bottom of the org chart, they look at you and say, hard worker, wise person, clearly loves God.32:20 And those are the kind of people we want to establish relationships, and those are the people that we want to invite into our church. Here's number 2, positive friendships have open and honest dialogue. She came to32:31 question him. Pick it up in verse 2. She came to Solomon and talked with him about all that she had on her mind. Solomon answered all of her questions. Nothing was too hard for the king to answer. And32:43 when the queen of Sheba saw the wisdom that Solomon had and the palace that he had built, the food that was on the table, the seating of the officials and the attending servants in their robes and his cup bearers. Now32:53 listen, she's just noticing all this and the burnt offerings. In other words, when she showed up, he didn't hide his religiosity. He looked at her and says, you know, part of what I do is I33:05 sacrifice burnt offerings to God. I I worship my God and burnt offerings he made in the temple of the Lord. And she was overwhelmed. So a positive relationship is not33:17 1 way. It is a give and take. It is an opportunity for someone to ask you, man we want to invite people. Ask us about our faith. And sometimes I'll have a ready answer and a solid answer and a good answer and I will tell33:28 you after I pastor all these years, there are still sometimes someone will say, hey, what do you think about this story or that story? And I'll go, let me get back to you. It's been a while since I've preached on that.33:38 But I love this, that she came asking questions about her faith, this pagan gentile queen, and Solomon just began to answer questions over and over again. Why? Because he was wise. 1 of the33:50 most confounding stories, to a lot of people about Solomon's wisdom is found over in second Kings where, it says Solomon 1 day was in his court, and 2 women came in. 134:01 carrying a dead baby and 1 carrying a live baby. How many remember the story? It was a story about 2 moms who lived in the same house in the same place. They both had infant sons, infant34:13 children. And during the night, 1 of the children died and the mom of the 1 who died snuck over to the other mom who had the living infant and switched babies in the middle of the night. And so when the34:24 lady woke up, the next day her baby was dead. Then she begins to look at her baby and she goes, that's not my baby. Everybody say moms know. Mom's know. Moms know. So she looked down at this baby and her34:36 hands that are dead and go, that's not my baby. And the other lady said, no that's your baby. That's your baby. No, it's not your baby. So begin to argue about it. They can't settle it. They go to a lower court.34:46 Ultimately gets before Solomon. Remember the story? Solomon looks at him and and by the way, this is before DNA testing if you didn't know this. Just just FYI. Solomon looks at these 2 ladies and says, tell me the34:58 story. 1 of the ladies says, well hey listen, here's what happened. I went to bed with my baby, it was alive. I woke up and it was dead. I began to examine the baby and I realized it's not my baby. She switched babies,35:09 that's my baby who's alive. Well the other lady tells the story, no, no, no, no. This is my baby, it's always been my baby, it's alive. That's her dead baby, she just wants my dead baby. She wants my alive baby. And so35:20 Solomon is sitting there, he goes both these stories, sound good to me. Remember what Solomon did? He said bring me a sword, I'm going to cut it in 2 and I'm going to give each of you half.35:32 Newsflash, Solomon didn't want to cut the baby in half. There are times that I read these blog posts, how could Solomon do that? You know what Solomon wanted to do? Determine who the mom was.35:45 Because the lady who wasn't the real mom said that sounds good to me. Cut it in half. The lady who was the real mom said no let it live, give it to her. And, Solomon in his wisdom looked35:57 at it and says you're the mom. Because a mom wants her child to live and not die. And those kind of wisdom that those kind of ideas just begin to permeate Solomon's wisdom and his reign, even36:09 hard decisions and hard spaces. Here's the third thought, a good friendship will always be filled with positive affirmations. That someone's going to encourage you. They're going to36:21 love you. They're going to applaud you. They're going to say, well done. Good job. You want people. Yeah. You want people that will tell you the truth, but you also want people that affirm you. Notice how the queen of36:32 Sheba did this. Look at verse 6. She said to the king, now she's looked at everything, she's questioned him. She says, listen, by the way, Solomon, I got some good news for you. Says, the report I heard36:43 in my own country about your achievements and your wisdom is true. That's good. That's an affirmation. She goes, but I did not believe these things until I came and saw them with my own eyes.36:55 Indeed, not even half was told to me. In wisdom and wealth, you far exceeded the report. Here's the affirmation. Queen Yeshiva says, you had a reputation37:07 of being wise and godly and loving and and wealthy. And she goes, I couldn't even believe it. But I show up and not only half was told to37:19 me. You're more wise and you're more religious and you're more special than anybody could imagine and I love this. Now listen, a queen does not have to affirm a king. Do you understand that? But she says37:31 you're amazing. And then Solomon turns around and says so are you. So are you. So here's what we want, I want people in my chariot who are going to affirm me, and I get the opportunity to affirm37:43 them. Here's the fourth thing. Positive friendships always speak openly about their faith. The people you want in your chariot are ones that will speak openly with37:55 you about your faith. They won't tell you to hide that, won't tell you to make that a part of just just your Sunday only retreat. Gonna talk about it over and over again. You say, will you see this? Look at verse 9.38:05 Would you would you just pick it up? She says, praise be the Lord your God who has delighted in you and placed you on the throne of Israel. This is her praising him. Because of the Lord's eternal love for38:17 Israel, he has made you the king to maintain justice and righteousness. I love this. She comes and shows up and she goes, here's what I understand Solomon. Your faith,38:29 your worship of God, your love of God, it's not a small thing, it's a big part of who you are. Child of God, that's who we want to be. We want to be men and women of character and wisdom and amazing work ethic, but also38:41 pointing others to faith and affirming others. If you fast forward to the new testament, Matthew chapter 12, Jesus is talking with the Pharisees. And as he's talking to the38:52 Pharisees, he actually mentions the queen of Sheba. And he's challenging the Pharisees who who won't open their eyes and that see and see that he is the son of God and they won't praise God.Show more In this video 0:00 The Importance of Choosing the Right Relationships
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