King Solomon’s story makes me tremble. As I write this, in my Bible reading he still hasn’t plunged. He’s doing right, much that is religiously impressive. He has dispositions and actions which are evidently godly, kingly traits that are genuinely pleasing to God.
Godliness Exemplified
For example, “Solomon loved the Lord” and showed forth extreme selflessness as he asked for wisdom to lead God’s people rather than asking for money, or pleasure, or fame (1 Kings 3:3, 8). He displayed admirable piety and passion for God in his prayers of dedication to the temple (1 Kings 8). His wisdom shone in how he instructed his “son” how to live a life fearing the Lord (Proverbs). And unless we think this was all swift and brief, may we also not forget that he had a constant, long-term faithfulness as he spent twenty years planning and building the temple (1 Kings 9:10).
These are no small feats! And we also can’t be so shallow as to say that through it all he had ulterior motives or that he didn’t love the Lord. Story evidence suggests and explicitly says he did: “Solomon loved the Lord” (1 Kings 3:3).
Then the Enticements Came
But then… (Oh, may we tremble at the reality of then, at the reality of time, at the fact that in every single moment change occurs, that apart from grace we can do nothing to please God, that we must be kept by our God moment by moment—“prone to wander, Lord, I feel it”.) Then, the enticements came:
Women. Sex. Pleasure.
Horses. Strength. Power.
Other gods.
It didn’t all happen at once. It rarely does. The story isn’t as detailed as we might wish (Solomon’s downfall is only found in one chapter: 1 Kings 11), but it seems he slides a bit here and there, realizing he could could fudge some and still be king.
And so, step by step, he slipped disastrously down.
How Can We Know We’re Not in Solomon’s First Act?
This makes me tremble; I hope it does the same for you, too. We could meditate more on Solomon’s specific areas of sin, but for that I encourage you to read the account in 1 Kings 1-11. Instead, in this post and the next I want to attempt to answer this sobering question: How can I know I’m not merely in Solomon’s first act? How can you?
Once we truly feel the weight of his piety, godliness, and accomplishments (only briefly listed above), we can’t help but ask this question. For surely even as Bible-believing, Christ-loving Christians, you and I don’t have godly, God-honoring track records like Solomon did! And we’ve see this with other people we’ve know, too: seemingly godly, Christ-loving Christians who for various reasons turn away from him later in life.
So again, how can you and I know this isn’t us? How can we have peace that we’re not merely living in Solomon’s Act One, with a tragic Act Two to follow?
How Can We Know We’re Not to Fall Like Solomon? Take Hold and Take Heed
The biblical answer to such a question is a twofold paradox.
1) Take Hold of the Promises of Perseverance for Assurance of Salvation
On one hand, we can take hold of the assurance of salvation and the promises of perseverance. We should have assurance that “those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified” (Romans 8:30). Someone cannot be justified and not make it to glory. We cannot be genuinely saved and fall away. “No one will snatch them out of my hand” (John 10:28).
With these promises, we look in the face of all the trials, fears, and temptations that attack our faith and declare, “If God is for us, who can be against us?…[Nothing] will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 8:31, 39).
We as Christians can take hold of God’s promises of perseverance and have a genuine, robust assurance of salvation: “The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God” (Romans 8:16).
2) Take Heed Lest You Fall and Note the Severity of God
But that’s not all the Bible has to say about the issue, and we must keep this paradox in tension: We can have a genuine assurance of salvation through the persevering promises of God, and, on the other hand, tremble and fear that we could fall away. We have God’s promises of assurance to his own, but we also personally take heed lest we fall.* This paradox is biblically correct and fitting.
This point we often miss in modern evangelicalism. We take hold of wonderful promises of assurance listed above. We celebrate them and apply them (and often too flippantly to anyone who confesses to “believe in Jesus”), but we can forget that the same book of Romans that gives us such wonderful promises like Romans 8 also gives us stern warnings like Romans 11:
“They were broken off because of their unbelief, but you stand fast through faith. So do not become proud, but fear. For if God did not spare the natural branches, neither will he spare you. Note then the kindness and the severity of God: severity toward those who have fallen, but God’s kindness to you, provided you continue in his kindness. Otherwise you too will be cut off” (Romans 11:20-22).
Did you catch that? “Otherwise you too will be cut off.”
And the same Paul who gives us the assurance that the Spirit bears witness to us personally that we are children of God also warns Christian “brothers”:
“For I want you to know, brothers [so this is addressed to confessing Christians!], that our fathers…drank from the spiritual Rock that followed them, and the Rock was Christ. Nevertheless with most of them God was not pleased…Now these things took place as examples for us, that we might not desire evil as they did…Therefore let anyone who thinks that he stands take heed lest he fall” (1 Corinthians 10:1, 4-5, 12).
In other words: Christian, take heed lest you fall, like others have before you.
We should, then, tremble when we read a story like Solomon’s or remember people we knew who were solid Christians but then shipwrecked their faith. We cannot not just glibly pass it off. Instead, we fear: “So do not become proud, but fear…Note the kindness and severity of God.” We personally watch out lest we fall away: “Take heed lest [you] fall.”
How This Paradox Works
So as Christians we a) have wonderful promises of assurance and b) should be fearful and take heed lest we in time abandon ship. In brief, we both take hold of the promises and take heed of warnings. Both these are necessary for us as Christians.
But how can these work together? We’ll consider that in the next post.
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* To be clear, the Bible does not teach that someone who is genuinely saved can fall away from salvation. It does teach, however, that many who profess to be believers may not be. In this case, they never “lost their salvation.” Rather, they overtime prove they were never truly saved. Verses like 1 John 2:19 and Hebrews 3:14 prove this. This will be covered more fully in the following post.
