Ahijah gave Jeroboam a prophecy that God had torn the kingdom of Israel away from Rehoboam and given Jeroboam the greatest part of the kingdom. But Jeroboam was an evil king, leading the people to worship the gods of the people who surrounded the people of Israel, even setting up golden calves, altars on the high places of the land, and fake religious festivals to lead people away from remembering the festivals that God had commanded.
There came a time that Jeroboam’s son was sick, so Jeroboam sent his wife to Ahijah, the same prophet that had given Jeroboam the news that he would rule over the northern tribes of Israel. Her task was to see if their son would live.
Ahijah gave a terrible response to Jeroboam’s wife. Not only would the boy die, but it would be the most merciful thing that God would do within Jeroboam’s house as a result of his wickedness:
Because of this, I am going to bring disaster on the house of Jeroboam. I will cut off from Jeroboam every last male in Israel—slave or free. I will burn up the house of Jeroboam as one burns dung, until it is all gone. Dogs will eat those belonging to Jeroboam who die in the city, and the birds will feed on those who die in the country. The LORD has spoken!
As for you, go back home. When you set foot in your city, the boy will die. All Israel will mourn for him and bury him. He is the only one belonging to Jeroboam who will be buried, because he is the only one in the house of Jeroboam in whom the LORD, the God of Israel, has found anything good.
1 Kings 14:10-13
Jeroboam’s son would die, but he would, at least, be buried. All of the rest would die and their bodies experience incredible indignities, becoming a warning for all of Israel and all of the peoples who surround them.
Why would they be a warning? Because they rejected God as their God and instead followed the evils of the gods of the other nations while even doing religious activities that had the pretense of being like those that God had commanded.
God completely destroyed Jeroboam and the people of his royal house. And in many ways, what happened to them is very similar to the description and imagery that we see the scriptures speak of Jesus’s return. There will be wrath and there will be justice, not only for disobedience against God, but most of all, for rebellion in placing ourselves in the place of God. When we choose to do what we believe is right based on our own ideas, based on our own plans, believing that we know what is right and what is wrong, we replace God and his sovereignty over our lives with our own plan. We become our own gods and we worship ourselves. We see this throughout our societies and across the earth even today, just as man has done from the beginning.
The wrath that God will one day bring upon us will have been of our own making, just as the wrath that Jeroboam brought upon himself was also of his own making. Yet there is good news that is available. When we say that we are “saved” by Christ, it means that we are saved from this wrath that will come. If we will repent from this sin of rebellion and turn back to God, placing our faith in Jesus’s sacrifice, we also can be saved from the wrath that is coming from God. We can instead live with him.
But it also means that we acknowledge him, Jesus himself, as king over all. Jesus is the king in the kingdom of God. We are no longer our own kings, but we are his people. We must look to him so that we will be saved from the coming wrath that will wipe away every evil until it is all gone.