On kings and rulers of men (and women)

By Rebecca Vickery
I believe that God sometimes gives people exactly what we ask for, even when doing so is not to our advantage.  Time and time again throughout the Bible, we see the phrase, “he gave them over to _____.”  (Insert whatever wasn’t God that we went seeking after to fulfill our needs instead of God.)  Because you have asked thus, I will give you thus.  
In 1 Samuel Israel asks God for a King.  They said to [Samuel], "You are old, and your sons do not follow your ways; now appoint a king to lead us, such as all the other nations have." (1 Samuel 8:5)  Several times thereafter, it is made clear that it was sinful for them to ask God for a King.  He was their King, after all.  But the people are not satisfied with God as their King, so they ask for a human king instead.  
God is clearly displeased with them, he makes it clear that they are wrong to have asked, but he gives them a king anyway.  He gives them King, after King, after King.  
The first king appointed is Saul.  He is full of the Spirit of God, and he has great courage and accomplishments (because of the LORD).  And then he becomes prideful and is afflicted with an evil spirit most of his days.  He is filled with jealousy for David and cannot get over his need to compare and be the best.  It is to his and his family’s ruin.
David is the King who seeks after God’s heart.  He is sought after by many evil men, including Saul, and he refuses to seek vengeance.  In battle, he is even more victorious than Saul was, but he seeks after the Lord (way more often than he doesn’t… ahem… side route through sin starting with lust, covetousness and murder… repentance in sackcloth and ashes… return and restoration to the LORD.)  And unlike Saul, he doesn’t ask that his name (David) be made great but credits God with every victory.  
David was a great King, but so many after him would either start well and go astray or follow completely in the way of their wicked fathers to the end of their days.  In the beginning, God tells them, if you will follow me and obey my decrees, I’ll establish your kingdom.  Otherwise, I will not be with you.  Each time I picture the narrator’s voice in Arrested Development saying, “They would not go on to follow after or obey his decrees.”  And each king gets uprooted.  
Solomon, David’s son had wisdom more than anyone else before him.  He does amazing things in the name of the LORD, including building the temple.  But he loves the ladies a little too much marrying an Egyptian woman, and many women besides pharaoh’s daughter, Moabites, Ammonites, Edomites, Sidonians, and Hittites, even though the Lord had said, “You must not intermarry with them, because they will surely turn your hearts after their gods.”  He had 700 wives of royal birth and 300 concubines.  And not surprisingly, as he grew old, his wives turned his heart after other gods.  As a result of these things, God tears the kingdom from his hands; split and fractured.  
The kings to come would have plenty of opportunities to do right in the sight of the Lord, but most would choose evil instead.  After Solomon, the king makes golden calves for the Israelites to worship (did he not know history, or was he doomed to repeat it anyway?)  And he established high places and appointed priests from wherever he chose.  
Again and again and again, the kings to come seek after false gods, mediums, establish altars to false gods, establish (or allow) prostitution for false religions, and commit countless atrocities.  Several of them sacrifice their children in the names of their false gods.  They wage war with the prophets of God and they seek the Lord only to supplement their information.  (Yeah, sure, we’ve asked the prophets of Baal, of Asherah and everyone else, might as well consult YAHWEH too.)  
Before the establishment of kings in Israel, we see a verse that one might think would be in contrast.  Judges 21:25 “In those days, Israel had no king, everyone did what they thought was right in their own eyes.”  The things that Israel did during those times rivaled that of Sodom and Gomorra.  Yet, here was God’s chosen people acting every bit like the world, sometimes even worse.  Surely having a king would turn it around.  But with a king, they would follow after the wickedness set before them by the kings of men.  Omri, son of Ahab is said to have done more evil than all of the kings before him put together.  And the people follow suit.  
Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin. (Romans 7:24-25)  Apart from God coming in the flesh to establish and reign over his own kingdom, we have no hope of it faring better for us.  Thankfully, that is exactly what he did.
 America is not different from Israel.  We can ask God to put people in power, but people will fail us.  Without fail.  It is the thing that people do best.  They will disappoint.  They will distract.  They will point us in the wrong direction.  And while, yes, we are to be subject to our governing authorities, we must not put our hope in them.  Even the kings appointed by God are a frail shadow the King of kings and the Lord of lords.  Our allegiance must be with him.  Our trust and hope, in him alone.  Some trust in chariots, and some trust in horses, but we trust in the name of the Lord our God.  (Psalm 20:7)  Amen.