1 Kings 2:20
"I have just one small request of you," she said. "Do not deny me." "Make your request, my mother," the king replied, "for I will not deny you."
Sermons
A Mother's Noble Recognition1 Kings 2:19-20
A Ruler's Regard for His Mother1 Kings 2:19-20
The Power of MothersA. W. Hazen, D. D.1 Kings 2:19-20
What Mothers Can Do for Their ChildrenJ. N. Norton.1 Kings 2:19-20














The religion of God is the religion of man. True religion is the perfecting of our humanity.

I. MAN WAS MADE IN THE IMAGE OF GOD. This is His essential characteristic. The more He reflects this image, the more truly manly He is. The religion of the Bible restores His manhood.

II. THERE IS NO FACULTY IN MAN WHICH DOES NOT FIND ITS COMPLEMENT AND ITS DEVELOPMENT IN GOD. His reason finds in God alone the truth which it seeks. His heart only finds an object adequate to its power of loving in the God who is Love. His conscience has for its ideal and its law the Divine holiness. "Be ye perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect" (Matthew 5:48). His will derives its power alone from God.

1. The Son of God was the Son of man, and realized the true idea of humanity in His holy life.

2. The religion of God honours and exalts man, even as falsehood and error degrade and debase him.

3. The Divine morality is in profound harmony with true human morality, that law which is written in the natural conscience. The petty religiousness which says, "Touch not, taste not, handle not" (Colossians 2:21), and creates all sorts of artificial duties, is not in accordance with true piety, the one great commandment of which - love to God and man - approves itself at once to the gospel and to the conscience.

4. Be a man means, finally, Do thy duty like a man. Be one of the violent who take the kingdom by force. Let us be careful not to effeminate our Christianity by a soft sentimentalism. Let us learn from the Son of God to be truly men "after God's own heart." - E. DE P.

Be thou strong therefore, and shew thyself a man.
This is interesting in many ways, interesting as a picture, and as a specimen of counsel. It is an old man speaking to a young one, a king to his successor, an aged warrior to a youthful man of peace, a man of action to a man of knowledge, a dying man to a man on the threshold of his earthly career, one who had done with earth to one who was entering on its fulness, a father to a son, a David to a Solomon. When he advised Solomon to show himself a man, he attached no low and feeble sense to the term. David was a judge of manliness. Yet to his advice to Solomon to be manly he appends a description of character and of a course of action, which therefore was in his estimation manly, or at the least not unmanly. "Show thyself a man," he says, "and keep the charge of the Lord thy God, to walk in His ways, to keep His statutes, and His commandments, and His judgments, and His testimonies, as it is written in the law of Moses." Now all this is summed up in one word, and that is religion. In the opinion of King David, then, religion is manly. Religion then furnishes ample room for manly sentiments and manly courses of action. Nay, it requires them and makes them necessary.

I. IT INVOLVES THE CHOICE OF A GREAT OBJECT. It sets a man upon living for a great end, the greatest end that he can live for. To see grown-up men occupying themselves in petty concerns, suffering them to engross their thoughts and their time and their powers, making them their all, concentrating upon them their energies and their efforts, following them with a zeal, an earnestness, and a pertinacity utterly disproportionate and exaggerated, it is a pitiable sight, ridiculous if it were not also melancholy. This is puerile, boyish, effeminate. The things of a child are very proper things for a child. There is fitness, there is beauty, there is use, in his devotion to them. But how unseemly, how contemptible, how offensive, is such a devotion in a man. We judge of men by the elevation and magnitude of their pursuits. We think a fop a puerile creature, who lives to look pretty and smell sweet. And the man "whose God is his belly," who lives to eat, and lays out his mind on marketing and cookery, is another great child. Such men are still busy with their playthings a little changed in form. But does any man rise to the height of himself who lives for this world? Is there not in an such living the same sort of dwarfing and disparagement of the true greatness and dignity of human nature, the same sad incongruity and disproportion?

II. THERE IS MANLINESS AGAIN IN DECISION, FIRMNESS, AND CONSTANCY OF PURPOSE. It is characteristic of children that they do not know their own minds, that they are the sport of whim and caprice, unsteady, vacillating, freakish, easily diverted from their aim, easily discouraged by difficulties, deficient in persistency, resolution, and concentration. When we see a child more fixed and consistent in the choice of an end than children are wont to be, we call him precocious, a manly child; and if this quality is not so prominent as to be premature and unnatural, we say it augurs well for the boy's future. To see a grown man the victim of fugitive preferences, impressions, and impulses, "a wave of the sea, driven with the wind and tossed," is wretched. We say then that fixedness, concentration, steadfastness, are attributes of a man, are essential to the development of a truly manly character. And where are they so exhibited as in religion, if it be genuine and true? What else so tends to form and foster them? What else so draws the whole life as it were to a single focus? — so forces all its streams to run into one reservoir? What else gives life such unity, coherence, and connection of parts?

III. THERE IS MANLINESS IN INDEPENDENCE; and this is emphatically a religious virtue. The Christian must be singular, and pursue a path not trodden by the multitude. And he must be content ordinarily to pursue it in the face of misconception, misconstruction, remonstrance, and derision. This is to no small extent "the offence of the cross." To be unlike others, to be looked upon with curiosity, to be thought affected or ostentatious, is trying. So, to keep a separate and isolated position, to be one by one's self, and stand an anomaly and exception, self-centred and self-sustained, without the ordinary props of human opinion and usage, requires largely independence of character. Independence is a quality of manhood. A child is a conformist and a copyist. It leans upon the parent, and holds itself up by clinging to an older person, as the ivy hangs upon the tree or wall It goes in leading strings, and looks timidly out for examples and precedents and authorities. To think and act for himself, to mark out his own line of action and pursue it, to have the reasons and the law of his actions in himself, and not to swerve from his path at dictation or censure or contempt, is to vindicate one's maturity, to act the part of a man. Does not religion then stand vindicated from the charge of unmanliness? And is not David s counsel to Solomon his son justified and sustained — Be manly and be religious, be manly in your religion, and religious in order to be manly? Is not religion successfully rescued from one of, the most effective and damaging aspersions that is ever cast upon it — that it is unmanly, that it is a suitable thing for the softer sex, and pretty in children, but not at all fit for robust, hardy, deep-thinking, bold-acting men? It is not in the slightest degree true.

(R. A. Hallam, D. D.).

The dignity of man appears from his bearing the image of his Maker. God has, besides, enstamped a dignity upon man by giving him not only a rational, but an immortal existence. The soul, which is properly the man, shall survive the body and live for ever. The dignity of man also appears from the great attention and regard which God hath paid to him. God indeed takes care of all His creatures, and His tender mercies are over all His works: but man has always been the favourite child of Providence.

I. MAN HATH A CAPACITY FOR CONSTANT AND PERPETUAL PROGRESSION IN KNOWLEDGE.

II. MAN HATH A CAPACITY FOR HOLINESS AS WELL AS KNOWLEDGE. His rational and moral faculties both capacitate and oblige him to be holy. His perception and volition, in connection with his reason and conscience, enable him to discern and feel the right and wrong of actions, and the beauty and deformity of characters. This renders him capable of doing justly, loving mercy, and walking humbly with God.

III. THAT MAN HATH A CAPACITY FOR HAPPINESS, EQUAL TO HIS CAPACITY FOR HOLINESS AND KNOWLEDGE. Knowledge and holiness are the grand pillars which support all true and substantial happiness; which invariably rises or falls, accordingly as these are either stronger or weaker. Knowledge and holiness in the Deity are the source of all his happiness. Angels rise in felicity as they rise in holiness and knowledge. And saints here below grow in happiness as they grow in grace, and in the knowledge of holy and Divine objects.

IV. THAT MAN HATH A CAPACITY FOR GREAT AND NOBLE ACTIONS.

1. We may justly infer from the nature and dignity of man, that we are under indispensable obligations to religion. Our moral obligations to religion are interwoven with the first principles of our nature. And, as man is formed for religion, so religion is the ornament and perfection of his nature. The man of religion is, in every supposable situation, the man of dignity. Pain, poverty, misfortune, sickness and death, may indeed veil, but they cannot destroy his dignity, which sometimes shines with more resplendent glory under all these ills and clouds of life.

2. This subject may help us to ascertain the only proper and immutable boundaries of human knowledge: such boundaries of our knowledge as arise from the frame and constitution of our nature, and not from any particular state or stage of our existence.

3. This subject gives us reason to suppose, that men, in the present state, may carry their researches into the works of nature, much farther than they have ever yet carried them. The fields of science, though they have been long traversed by strong and inquisitive minds, are so spacious, that many parts remain yet undiscovered.

4. The observations, which have been made upon the nobler powers and capacities of the human mind, may embolden the sons of science to aim to be originals. They are strong enough to go alone, if they only have sufficient courage and resolution. They have the same capacities, and the same original sources of knowledge, that the ancients enjoyed.

5. We are under indispensable obligations to cultivate and improve our minds in all the branches of human knowledge. All our natural powers are so many talents, which, in their own nature, lay us under moral obligations to improve them to the best advantage. Being men, we are obliged to act like men, and not like the horse or the mule which have no understanding.

(N. Emmons, D. D.)

On the sixth of March, in the year 1741, the brilliant statesman, William Pitt, afterwards Earl of Chatham, felt it necessary to apologise from his place in the House of Commons for what he styled "the atrocious crime of being a young man." The sneers at youth which provoked this wrathful protest are seldom heard to-day. In this more democratic age the value of young men as a factor in human affairs is better understood. The elder Disraeli has pointed out that "almost everything that is great in" the story of the race has been done by youth, and Thomas Carlyle has taught us that the history of heroes is the history of young men. We remember that in war the victories of Hannibal and Alexander, of Clive and Napoleon, were the triumphs of young men; that Innocent m. and Leo X., the greatest of the Popes, had won the tiara before they were thirty-seven, and that Martin Luther at five-and-thirty had achieved the Reformation. We remember that Pascal and Sir Isaac Newton had written their greatest treatises before they were thirty; that Raphael and Correggio among painters; Byron, Shelley, and Keats among poets; Mozart, Beethoven, Mendelssohn, Schubert, and Bellini among musicians — these, and many more too numerous to quote, had won their place among the immortals and died while they were yet young men. We have come to recognise that the qualities which command success — dash, courage, hopefulness, fertility of invention and resources — are often more abundant in youth than in age; and knowing how largely young men have made the world's history in time past, we look to young men as the history-makers of time present and to come. There is little peril to-day of our despising young men on account of their youth; we rather need to be warned against despising old men on account of their age. The position which young men thus take in modern life adds a tone of deeper emphasis and keener urgency to the ancient, familiar, and inspiring exhortation of my text. The injunction echoes the words which Moses addressed to Joshua when he entrusted him with command. A thousand years later we meet it again in Paul's appeal to Timothy: "Thou, therefore, my son, be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus," as also in the exhortation to the Corinthians, when Timothy was coming amongst them: "Watch ye; stand fast in the faith; quit you like men; be strong!" Again and again in profane history, in the pages of Homer, Herodotus, or Xenophon, we find great chieftains charging their followers in the same strain. modern history likewise takes up the call, Latimer in the fire exclaiming: "Be of good comfort, Master Ridley; play the man!" Nelson at Trafalgar sounding the war-cry: "England expects every man to do his duty." Every mother who sends her son into the world breathes the spirit of it.. The words imply an ideal. John Trebonius, Martin Luthers schoolmaster, always took his hat off to his schoolboys. "Who can tell," he would say, "what man there may be here? "There was wisdom in the act, for among those boys was the solitary monk that shook the world. Yet it is not every man who becomes all that we mean by a man. Vanity emasculates some. and they become — not men, but the show-blocks of their hatter, the lay-figures and walking advertisements of their tailor. Indolence destroys others, and they become — not men, but manikins dependent on the charity of their relations, and parasites that live by suction. Vice is, the degradation of others, until, sinking below shame, unworthy utterly of the human form — erect, divine," they become as swine in sensuality or as wolves in brutal ferocity. But even if men escape these degradations they may still remain immeasurably below the standard implied in this great word, "a man."

Unless above himself he can

Erect himself, how poor a thing is man!

What, then, is this ideal? What is it that every woman puts into her love and every man into his self-respect when we sound the challenge: "Show thyself a man? What are the marks by which a sterling manhood may be known.

I. ONE MARK OF MANHOOD IS STRENGTH. "Be thou strong, therefore, and show thyself a man." In the notion of an ideal man we all include the attribute of physical strength. It is true that some have asserted their manhood in spite of bodily infirmity. The Apostle Paul carried the Gospel over two continents, notwithstanding that he was half blind and paralysed. Richard Baxter, the most voluminous writer and most successful pastor of his day, was a lifelong invalid. Dr. George Wilson was accustomed to deliver his lectures with a great blister on his chest. Bishop Butler, who wrote the Analogy of Religion, and James Watt, inventor of the steam engine, were both so harassed with bile and consequent melancholy as to be constantly tempted to make away with themselves. The lives of such men are notable illustrations of the triumph of mental energy over bodily infirmities, and should encourage those of us who suffer from constitutional debility; but they do not make physical weakness either natural or desirable. Young men ought to be strong, ought to take pleasure in vigorous exercises, ought to remember the ancient proverb: "The glory of young men is their strength." In this matter of physical culture I say to every young man: "Shew thyself a man." More, however, than either physical or mental strength, as sunlight is more than moonlight or starlight, is moral strength. In the high firmament of ideal manhood, moral strength is the greater light that rules the day. You must put the dement of conscience, you must put love for righteousness and hatred of evil-doing into your conception of manly vigour, or you never can truly say of any man what Marc Antony said of Brutus: —

The elements were

So mixed in him that Nature might stand up

And say to all the world — this was a man.

II. A SECOND MARK OF MANHOOD IS SAGACITY. Milton asks: "What is strength without a double share of wisdom?" and then he adds: "Strength is not made to rule, but to subserve, where wisdom bears command." He that would show himself a man must couple sagacity with strength; for we live in a world of illusions, which are like traps at a young man's feet. You young men of this new generation are face to face with what Carlyle described as "the Everlasting No." To every precept of heaven the devil brings a "No." "Fear God and keep His commandments." "No," says the devil; "indulge your passions." "Man's chief end is to glorify God and enjoy Him for ever." "No," says the devil; "man's chief end is to glorify himself and enjoy his own way." "He that findeth his life shall lose it, and he that loseth his life for My sake shall find it." "No," says the devil; "let every other man be damned, body and soul, and what does it matter to you? This "Everlasting No" meets us at every call of duty, and has to be resisted and foresworn once and for ever, or we cut ourselves adrift from every possibility of achieving the ideal manhood. Thousands of men to-day are crippled and emasculated by this negative of unbelief. Their loss is incalculable. Themselves are stripped of blessing, and their influence is emptied of power. To the devil's "Everlasting No" do you oppose God's "Everlasting Yes." Be positive and practical; add sagacity to strength.

III. A third mark of manhood is saintliness. A saint is one who lives unto God, and in whom God's will is law. Here manliness completes itself. Man being created in the image of God, we can regard none as attaining the ideal of manhood who does not in thought, purpose, impulse, and deed reflect the God in whom he lives, moves, and has his being; and is not this what we mean by saintliness? Saintliness includes honesty, for it accepts the golden rule: "Whatsoever ye would that men should do to you do ye also to them"; and does not Pope affirm " an honest man's the noblest work of God"? Saintliness includes the service of others; for every saint is a follower of Him who "came not to be ministered unto, but to minister and give His life a ransom for many." And does not Lord Lytton remind us —

That man is great, and he alone

Who serves a greatness not his own

For neither praise nor pelf.

Content to know and be unknown,

Whole in himself!Strength, sagacity, saintliness — these three, and the greatest of these is saintliness, if any one of us would show himself a man.

(W. J. Woods, B. A.)

The last words of any one, as he takes his departure for the eternal world, are always of interest to those left behind. Even the last utterances of the criminal on the scaffold will be read by thousands, who would not have listened to one word of his when he stood begging at their door. The last words of great and good men, when spoken to those near and dear to them, are therefore of especial interest.

I. THE CHARGE OF THE DYING FATHER. It is that of a king to his successor, who is soon to ascend the throne of Israel. The position is so responsible, the charge will be long and weighty. But no; how short the address, how few the directions — "Show thyself a man" Be a man, that is all. Yes, but that is everything. Be a man, such as God made; not the distorted, crooked, perverted creature sin has made.

II. WHAT IS IMPLIED IN THIS CHARGE. Vir was the word the Romans used for man, and from which our word virtue comes. Virtue, too, with them meant courage, heroism. Whatever therefore is virtuous is manly. Truthfulness is a virtue, and therefore manly. God is truth. Man is most manly when most like God, for he was made in the image of God. Honesty is paying our just debts, paying honour to whom honour is due, exercising supreme love to God, and loving our fellow-men as ourselves (Matthew 22:27). Hence, a true man, a real man, must be a Christian and a gentleman. Temperance, patience, kindness, gentleness, unselfishness, are all virtues, and therefore manly. The gentleman's code of honour is found in Philippians 4:8.

III. THE FOUNDATION OF MANHOOD IS STRENGTH. Strength of purpose, will-power, determination, self-control, power to resist popular customs when wrong, prevalent vices that have become aristocratic, fashions and habits of evil that have fastened on people whom you consider above you in age, experience, and profession; power to be called eccentric, odd, queer, to be sneered at. You need a courage that will not dilly-dally with evil, but at the first solicitation say "no," that will "dare to do right, dare to be true." Hence in this brief charge the very first accents are, " Be thou strong." David knew it required strength.

IV. THE SOURCE OF THIS STRENGTH IS IN GOD. Moses, Joshua, Paul, Luther, Wesley, were men of mighty power, and they all found their strength in God.

V. THE IMPORTANT AIM OF THIS CHARGE WAS THE RIGHT DEVELOPMENT AND FORMATION OF CHARACTER. This should be the first aim of every young man. This is the first aim of the Gospel, now so often overlooked in this busy, bustling, noisy age. Paul's first; instruction to Timothy was, "Take heed unto thyself." Deceit, falsehood, lust, etc., are all intruders. Cast them out, show thyself. Let not the animal reign, but the man. Be a man, and then you will be what every true man is — a king.

(G. H. Smyth.)

To be a man requires a trinity of qualities: a strong body, a full-orbed mind, and a spiritual nature.

1. Young men, it is your duty to cultivate your physical strength by athletic sports, gymnastics, and other exercises that will help to fortify the noble temple in which God has housed your mind and soul. It matters not how valuable the possessions that are stored in a house, if the house is insecure or the roof leaky. It is no credit to a man to be so careless about the house in which the priceless treasures of mind and spirit are placed that the building becomes worn out before its time. If you and I are going to do efficient work in this the busiest age of the world's history, if we are to hold our own in the fierce competition of this the greatest of all commercial periods, we will need sturdy muscles, stout lungs, healthy livers, and good digestion. A man handicaps himself seriously in the race of life who pays no regard to the rules of health. On the other hand, a man with a healthy body has better chances of success, because health inspires him with hope and ambition. Thomas Carlyle gave to the world a jaundiced view of many things because he had a weak stomach. What misery he caused in his own home, and in the life of that patient martyr-wife of his, has been revealed in the letters of Jane Welsh Carlyle. Many a man who most sacredly keeps the Ten Commandments breaks with impunity the laws of health.

2. The development of the body, however, is not all that makes up man. A prize-fighter has a well-developed body, but his influence does not count for much outside of the prize-ring. There is a mind to be cultivated and a soul. The man who devotes himself entirely to physical development will be apt to forget the needs of the other two parts of his nature. If all the energy in a man's nature is running to brawn, there will be nothing left to run to brain. The men who have compelled the world's attention have not been physical giants hut men of mental and moral muscle. Napoleon, Wellington, and Grant were not great in body. If the ideal of a perfect man consisted only in physical qualities, we should be lower in the scale than certain animals. The ex surpasses a man in muscular strength; the antelope in speed; the hound in keenness of scent; the eagle in eyesight; the rabbit in acuteness of hearing; the honey-bee in delicacy of taste; the spider in fineness of nervous energy. So we cannot measure a man by his body, nor by his material possessions. We have advanced beyond the age in which the world counted as its greatest heroes Hercules, Ajax, Croesus, Miltiades. The world to-day is ruled not by muscle, but by mind and heart. The bravest are the tenderest, the loving are the daring. A young man's value to the world and to himself depends largely on the cultivation of his intellect. Just as in the cultivation of the body you have to regard suitable food and proper exercise, so in the development of the mind you have to consider the kind of food. Every young man ought to mark out for himself a course of reading in history, biography, poetry, and philosophy. Another thing: As you would not knowingly take into your system diseased meat, or decayed fruit or vegetables, in like manner you will not desire to poison your mind by the reading of impure books. The quality of our thoughts determines the quality of our character. Impure thoughts are worms which eat away the tissues of moral character. The man who falls a victim to temptation is the man whose character has become worm-eaten. Guard most sacredly the door of the mind, and keep it closed against the entrance of evil thoughts. Had General Grant been a man of weak will, he never could have carried the campaigns of the Civil War through to success. Yet his memoirs reveal a man with a heart as tender as a girl's, hating war and disliking the very sound of a gun, but possessed of such self-command that to foresee a thing necessary to be done was to command, even though he had to fight it out on one line all summer. Opposition, discouragement, difficulties, never can keep a man of will power down. The party leaders at Rome thought they would get rid of the ambitious young Caesar, so they gave him a commission which necessitated a prolonged absence from Rome and a difficult expedition into the heart of an un-civilised and unexplored region of country. They said: "Rome never again will hear of young Caesar." But the young man conquered Gaul, and returning after a campaign of ten years seized the sceptre of imperial power. It is a sad thing to see a man in whom the will power has gone to decay. Dr. Maudsley, the English scientist, says the beginning of recovery from mental derangement is always a revival of the power of the will. When an expert in an insane asylum finds a patient able to execute some new plan of conduct, and to hold himself in the pursuit of it for hours at a time, he is apt to say that that man will soon go out of the asylum.

3. Let me now come to the final quality that goes into the makeup of symmetrical manhood, and that is the spiritual nature. Physical strength is good, but it is only the cellar foundation of the house. No one would be content to live in the cellar, no matter how well stocked it might be with provisions and other comforts. He would at least want to have another storey to the building, and we have spoken of the intellectual development. But to stop with that would be like dwelling in a library, or art gallery, and never having any higher rooms where we might come into fellowship with the Creator, and with His Son, our Saviour. To change the figure, lev me say that to neglect the spiritual nature, as some men have done, equipping the physical and mental natures with everything needful, is like building a splendid ship and leaving off the rudder. The spiritual nature in a man is the rudder which controls his thoughts and purposes. Sometimes a ship at sea is found flying the signal, "Not under control." That is a very terrible signal. The splendid athlete who can win a boat race, or in the arena knock out his opponent, may be only a baby in his moral manhood. A man with muscles strong enough to fell a horse may be weak enough to yield to some subtle temptation. The secret is spiritual character. You remember what men said of the noble Greek who governed his city by unwritten laws — "Phocion's character is more than the constitution." The power of character in Lamartine was such that during the bloodiest days in Paris he never bolted his doors, and once when he rose to speak the one who introduced him said: "Sixty years of a pure life are about to address you." Emerson says there was a certain power in Lincoln, Washington, and Burke not to be explained by their printed words. John Milton said: "A good man is the ripe fruit our earth holds up to God." If the Roman youth were elevated in spirit by standing one day each week in a room devoted to the statuary of great heroes, and making vows to their imaginary presence, how much more are we ennobled when we go into the presence of the infinite and eternal Jehovah, who is able to impart to us the transforming influence of His Holy Spirit.

(D. H. Martin, D. D.)

Homilist.
This is the parting advice of a king to his son, whose right it was to grasp the sceptre as it fell from the pallid hand of his dying father.

I. BE THOU STRONG.

1. Not boastful severest conflict, when many are fainting.

2. How is this strength obtained? From God alone, through our Lord Jesus Christ. How from Him? Repent of all sins. Resolve to break from all sins, and live a devoted Christian life. Cultivate personal trust in Christ as your Saviour, and believe that God for His sake pardons and saves you.

II. SHOW THYSELF A MAN. Lot it not be a mere inference, but a palpable fact; a demonstration. "Show thyself." Men put a value upon us according to how we show ourselves. Don't leave it to others to show that you are a man; do it yourself. Not an angel, but a man. There is no instrument God can use in so many ways and places, and with such wonderful success, as a devoted Christian who can show himself a man — a man who has the tear of sympathy for the sorrowing, a word of comfort for the bereaved, and a word of hope for the downcast and desponding.

(Homilist.)

The sword presented by the Emperor William to his little son, the Crown Prince, on his tenth birthday, contains an inscription on its blade, of which the following is a translation: "Trust in God. Be brave in combat to preserve honour and glory. He who fights bravely, relying on the help of God, is never overcome. All your powers of body and mind belong to your country. To my dear son William, May 6, 1892. — WILHELM R."

True manliness is to stick to your principles if they be good and right. When Garfield was a lad at Williams College, he climbed up Mount Greylock one day with many of his companions, and spent the night on the mountain top. Seated around a camp fire they sang college songs and told stories all the evening. At length Garfield took a Testament out of his pocket, and said: "Boys, it is my custom to read a chapter before going to bed and have a prayer. Shall we have it together?" And they all did. We admire the boy for his courage.

Mr. Mortimer Mempes, in his World's Children, gives some remarkable specimens of the Spartan training in courage that the boys of Japan must all undergo. All kinds of games are played to test the character in this particular of the children. They are told thrilling stories of dragons and giants, and, when worked up to terror, each boy has to go into a darkened room and bring out a strand of wick which is burning in a dish of oil; and this, too, with a smiling face, absolutely unruffled. Another favourite game is to gather in a lonely graveyard, under a tree, and plant flags in a haunted spot. Then each boy is made to walk up the avenue alone, pull out a flag slowly, with dignity, and without a nervous tremor. So, having borne the yoke in his youth, his courage is believed to be equal to all demands upon it in later life.

On one occasion when Whitfield was surrounded by a mob, and began to show symptoms of alarm as the stones flew in all directions, his wife, standing by his side, cried out, "Now, George, play the man for God." We are to play the man in the battle of life because God made us to be manly and not unmanly; because the Son of Man came upon earth to show us how to suffer and be strong; because if we fear God we shall have no other fear.

(Quiver.)

People
Abiathar, Abishag, Abner, Absalom, Achish, Adonijah, Amasa, Anathoth, Barzillai, Bathsheba, Benaiah, David, Eli, Gera, Haggith, Jehoiada, Jether, Joab, Maacah, Maachah, Ner, Shimei, Solomon, Zadok, Zeruiah
Places
Anathoth, Bahurim, Gath, Hebron, Jerusalem, Jordan River, Kidron, Mahanaim, Shiloh
Topics
Deny, Desire, Face, Making, Nay, Petition, Refuse, Replied, Request, Turn
Outline
1. David, having given a charge to Solomon
3. of Reverence
5. of Joab
7. of Barzillai
8. of Shimei
10. Solomon succeeds
12. Adonijah, moving Bathsheba to ask unto Solomon for Abishag,
13. is put to death
26. Abiathar, having his life given him, is deprived of the priesthood
28. Joab fleeing to the horns of the altar, is there slain
35. Benaiah is put in Joab's room, and Zadfok in Abiathar's
36. Shimei, confined to Jerusalem, by occasion of going to Gath, is put to death.

Dictionary of Bible Themes
1 Kings 2:20

     4847   smallness

1 Kings 2:12-25

     5119   Solomon, life of

Library
The Horns of the Altar
WE MUST tell you the story. Solomon was to be the king after David, but his elder brother, Adonijah, was preferred by Joab, the captain of the host, and by Abiathar, the priest; and, therefore, they got together, and tried to steal a march upon dying David, and set up Adonijah. They utterly failed in this; and when Solomn came to the throne Adonijah was afraid for his life, and fled to the horns of the altar at the tabernacle for shelter. Solomn permitted him to find sanctuary there, and forgave
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 31: 1885

"He Ascended into Heaven:" Believe. "He Sitteth at the Right Hand of the Father...
11. "He ascended into heaven:" believe. "He sitteth at the right hand of the Father:" believe. By sitting, understand dwelling: as [in Latin] we say of any person, "In that country he dwelt (sedit) three years." The Scripture also has that expression, that such an one dwelt (sedisse) in a city for such a time. [1791] Not meaning that he sat and never rose up? On this account the dwellings of men are called seats (sedes). [1792] Where people are seated (in this sense), are they always sitting? Is
St. Augustine—On the Creeds

Whether Curiosity Can be About Intellective Knowledge?
Objection 1: It would seem that curiosity cannot be about intellective knowledge. Because, according to the Philosopher (Ethic. ii, 6), there can be no mean and extremes in things which are essentially good. Now intellective knowledge is essentially good: because man's perfection would seem to consist in his intellect being reduced from potentiality to act, and this is done by the knowledge of truth. For Dionysius says (Div. Nom. iv) that "the good of the human soul is to be in accordance with reason,"
Saint Thomas Aquinas—Summa Theologica

Whether the Angels have Bodies Naturally United to Them?
Objection 1: It would seem that angels have bodies naturally united to them. For Origen says (Peri Archon i): "It is God's attribute alone---that is, it belongs to the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, as a property of nature, that He is understood to exist without any material substance and without any companionship of corporeal addition." Bernard likewise says (Hom. vi. super Cant.): "Let us assign incorporeity to God alone even as we do immortality, whose nature alone, neither for its own sake
Saint Thomas Aquinas—Summa Theologica

Whether the Natural Law Can be Changed?
Objection 1: It would seem that the natural law can be changed. Because on Ecclus. 17:9, "He gave them instructions, and the law of life," the gloss says: "He wished the law of the letter to be written, in order to correct the law of nature." But that which is corrected is changed. Therefore the natural law can be changed. Objection 2: Further, the slaying of the innocent, adultery, and theft are against the natural law. But we find these things changed by God: as when God commanded Abraham to slay
Saint Thomas Aquinas—Summa Theologica

The Whole Heart
LET me give the principal passages in which the words "the whole heart," "all the heart," are used. A careful study of them will show how wholehearted love and service is what God has always asked, because He can, in the very nature of things, ask nothing less. The prayerful and believing acceptance of the words will waken the assurance that such wholehearted love and service is exactly the blessing the New Covenant was meant to make possible. That assurance will prepare us for turning to the Omnipotence
Andrew Murray—The Two Covenants

"The King Kissed Barzillai. " 2 Sam. xix. 39
And no wonder, for David could appreciate a real man when he saw him, and so does David's Lord. I.--LOYALTY IS PRECIOUS TO THE KING OF KINGS. In the days when the son of Jesse had but few friends, it was a precious thing to be treated in the style Barzillai and his neighbours entertained him (see 2 Sam. xvii. 27-29). They were rich farmers, and had land which brought forth with abundance, so were able to act with princely hospitality to the fugitive monarch. But plenty may live with avarice, and
Thomas Champness—Broken Bread

What Manner of Man Ought not to Come to Rule.
Wherefore let every one measure himself wisely, lest he venture to assume a place of rule, while in himself vice still reigns unto condemnation; lest one whom his own guilt depraves desire to become an intercessor for the faults of others. For on this account it is said to Moses by the supernal voice, Speak unto Aaron; Whosoever he be of thy seed throughout their generations that hath a blemish, he shall not offer loaves of bread to the Lord his God (Lev. xxi. 17). And it is also immediately subjoined;
Leo the Great—Writings of Leo the Great

Authorship of the Pentateuch.
The term Pentateuch is composed of the two Greek words, pente, five, and teuchos, which in later Alexandrine usage signified book. It denotes, therefore, the collection of five books; or, the five books of the law considered as a whole. 1. In our inquiries respecting the authorship of the Pentateuch, we begin with the undisputed fact that it existed in its present form in the days of Christ and his apostles, and had so existed from the time of Ezra. When the translators of the Greek version,
E. P. Barrows—Companion to the Bible

Barzillai
BY REV. GEORGE MILLIGAN, M.A., D.D. "There is nothing," says Socrates to Cephalus in the Republic, "I like better than conversing with aged men. For I regard them as travellers who have gone a journey which I too may have to go, and of whom it is right to learn the character of the way, whether it is rugged or difficult, or smooth and easy" (p. 328 E.). It is to such an aged traveller that we are introduced in the person of Barzillai the Gileadite. And though he is one of the lesser-known characters
George Milligan—Men of the Bible; Some Lesser-Known

Fifth Sunday after Trinity Exhortation to the Fruits of Faith.
Text: 1 Peter 3, 8-15. 8 Finally, be ye all like-minded, compassionate, loving as brethren, tender-hearted, humble-minded: 9 not rendering evil for evil, or reviling for reviling; but contrariwise blessing; for hereunto were ye called, that ye should inherit a blessing. 10 For, He that would love life, And see good days, Let him refrain his tongue from evil, And his lips that they speak no guile: 11 And let him turn away from evil, and do good; Let him seek peace, and pursue it. 12 For the eyes of
Martin Luther—Epistle Sermons, Vol. III

Kings
The book[1] of Kings is strikingly unlike any modern historical narrative. Its comparative brevity, its curious perspective, and-with some brilliant exceptions--its relative monotony, are obvious to the most cursory perusal, and to understand these things is, in large measure, to understand the book. It covers a period of no less than four centuries. Beginning with the death of David and the accession of Solomon (1 Kings i., ii.) it traverses his reign with considerable fulness (1 Kings iii.-xi.),
John Edgar McFadyen—Introduction to the Old Testament

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