Date: Wednesday, 10th April, 2024
Text: 1 Kings 2:36-46
Author: Pastor Adedeji Fadehan
Exhortation:
Not all battles are worth fighting. One of the greatest nations of the world is reputed for counting the cost of a war before embarking on it. If the benefits of the war outweigh their investment on it, they would go for it; otherwise they wouldn’t.
In today’s text, we see a man named Shimei. Due to his past acts of insubordination and treason under the out gone King David; the new king Solomon placed him under a permanent travel ban- as a form of punishment. His movement was restricted to Jerusalem. He complied with the ban for three years and then something happened to test his level of compliance.
Two of his slaves ran away- outside Jerusalem. Instead of him to count the cost of pursuing them and either let go of them or delegate a search party to look for them, he saddled his donkey and personally went all the way in search of them. Did he get them back? Yes he did! But it eventually cost him his life because the king was informed of his contravention of the ban and the sword of judgement landed on him.
So after Shimei’s execution, what do you think would happen to the slaves he went to recover back? They would most likely escape again. So the battle of gaining the run-away slaves back was not worth it after all.
Our Lord Jesus Christ said, ““Suppose one of you wants to build a tower. Won’t you first sit down and estimate the cost to see if you have enough money to complete it? For if you lay the foundation and are not able to finish it, everyone who sees it will ridicule you, saying, ‘This person began to build and wasn’t able to finish.’
“Or suppose a king is about to go to war against another king. Won’t he first sit down and consider whether he is able with ten thousand men to oppose the one coming against him with twenty thousand? If he is not able, he will send a delegation while the other is still a long way off and will ask for terms of peace.” Luke 14:28-32
Action Nugget: Don’t be hasty in spirit, but count the cost of all actions before taking them.