Seize the Moment – Day 820
The Score at Halftime!
Good morning! This is Pastor Jerry Ingalls from New Castle First Baptist Church and today is Wednesday, June 15.
What is the least important statistic in sports? The score at half-time!
Fast forward 20 years and King Solomon’s building projectswere finished (1 Kings 9:10). As we get this glimpse of Solomon’s kingship, at the halfway point of his 40-year reign, we see that he has been blessed by God and was prospering in every way. Unfortunately, there were also strong indicators of his eventual defeat if he didn’t shore up his weak areas. God, like a good coach who challenges his players to play like champions in the second half of the game during the half-time locker room talk, confronted Solomon in 1 Kings 9:6-9:
But if you or your sons indeed turn away from following Me, and do not keep My commandments and My statutes which I have set before you, and go and serve other gods and worship them, then I will cut off Israel from the land which I have given them, and the house which I have consecrated for My name, I will cast out of My sight. So Israel will become a proverb and a byword among all peoples. And this house will become a heap of ruins; everyone who passes by will be astonished and hiss and say, “Why has the Lord done thus to this land and to this house?” And they will say, “Because they forsook the Lord their God, who brought their fathers out of the land of Egypt, and adopted other gods and worshiped them and served them, therefore the Lord has brought all this adversity on them.”
Solomon did not heed the Coach’s wisdom and all of God’s warnings were fulfilled in the destruction of Jerusalem in Jeremiah 52. Regardless of the score at half-time in your life or ministry, live like a champion today, all the way to finish line (1 Corinthians 9:24-27).
Seize the moment and finish strong, persevere until the end(Matthew 24:13).