2 Chronicles 10:8–9: “But he rejected the counsel which the elders had given him, and consulted the young men who had grown up with him, who stood before him. And he said to them, ‘What advice do you give? How should we answer this people who have spoken to me, saying, “Lighten the yoke which your father put on us”?'”

September 27th, 2023 by Pastor Ed in devotional

After Solomon’s death, his son Rehoboam became king. The people came to him and asked that he lighten the hard service they had been under with his father Solomon. We notice that it says Rehoboam asked advice of both the old and young counselors, but nowhere does it say he sought God’s counsel. We shudder to think how often we have failed to seek God first, before all others. For this king, it was a decision that split the kingdom, and it never recovered.

President Abe Lincoln said this about seeking the counsel of the Lord:

I am confident that the Almighty has His plans and will work them out . . . I have always taken counsel of Him, and referred to Him my plans, and have never adopted a course of proceeding without being assured, as far as I could be, of His approbation. I should be the most presumptuous blockhead upon this footstool if I for one day thought that I could discharge the duties which have come upon me since I came into this place, without the aid and enlightenment of One who is wiser and stronger than all others.

How we need to remember to lean on the Lord and not our own understanding or the understanding of other mere mortals.

“LORD, keep us from our own self-confidence this day.”