The Man Who Tried To Make God a Liar - Pastor to 60+ Dave Skorupa - May 24, 2026

Ministering to the heart of Western Arkansas's River Valley for over 165 years, welcome to Chapter and First, the Bible Teaching Ministry of Fort Smith's First Baptist Church.

You'll find sermons and teachings from Pastor Greg, our ministry staff, and guest speakers.

Thank you for listening.

Well, good morning, church family.

Hope you all are having a wonderful Memorial Day weekend.

I just left the Chaffee campus after delivering a message there and made the drive over here.

So I think I might be the only person who knows what the pastor goes through when he does that.

Matt, have you done that yet?

Okay.

It's a little interesting.

But great to be with you here this morning.

Pastor Greg a few weeks ago gave us a call to gather together as a congregation in prayer before we go into the Lord's word.

So if you would please bow with me now as we go to seek the Lord.

Heavenly Father, we thank you for this day.

We do indeed thank you for those who made the ultimate sacrifice for our nation.

And Lord, we thank you that you have made the ultimate sacrifice for our salvation now and forevermore.

Lord, as we prepare to go into your word, we examine our minds, our hearts, our very spirits.

And Lord, if there are things there that are not pleasing to you, we repent and we hand those things over to you.

Lord, we are reminded that the words we are about to read have been inspired by the power of your Holy Spirit, that that same Holy Spirit has protected your word down through the generations.

And Lord, when we read your word with the proper mind, the proper spirit, we can indeed expect to hear from you.

And so, Lord, we pray that you would drive away the distractions of the day, wipe away the worries of the week.

Lord, let us focus on what it is that you want for us to learn in your word, what you want us to be reminded of, what it is that you want us to see in our own lives.

And Lord, we pray that in this work that you would be honored and you would be glorified.

And Lord, we thank you for this church.

I thank you for the men and women and boys and girls that are gathered here today.

Lord, may what we may the things we do here please you and cause you to smile.

We pray this in the matchless name of our Savior, Jesus Christ the Lord.

And God's people said, Amen.

We're moving forward in our chronological Bible study, and we are in a place in our reading that quite frankly can be very depressing because we're in that place where we are looking at the children of David and the things that they did as they were becoming adults as they were adults.

It's depressing that David had such a dysfunctional family.

David, the man after God's own heart, we read that in both the Old and the New Testaments.

David, the man after God's own heart, nonetheless had children whose hearts seemed to be very far away from the Lord.

David had 19 sons whose names are recorded for us in Scripture.

And Scripture also says that David had many other sons from slaves and concubines.

You know, two weeks ago we celebrated Mother's Day.

Mother's Day would have been a tough day there in the kingdom of David.

Among David's wives were Bathsheba, who the pastor talked about a little bit last week, and also a woman who gets less recognition in Scripture, a woman by the name of Makaiah.

And Makaiah was a princess of the Jerushites.

And the Jereushites were a pagan people.

They weren't part of the people of Israel.

They were a people that David had attacked back before he became king, and apparently he and the king of the Jerushites reached some sort of arrangement, and David married the princess's daughter.

Micaiah gave birth to three of David's children that are recorded in Scripture.

She gave birth to Tamar, to Absalom, and to Adonijah.

Now the section of Scripture that we're going to be covering today is actually going to be popping up in your chronological Bible study later this week.

I got special dispensation from Pastor Greg to go forward rather than backward.

So what we're going to be looking at today is a lesson that I like to call the man who tried to make God a liar.

The man who tried to make God a liar.

But let's summarize before we get into the material the family of David a little bit more.

David, as I mentioned, had a very large family.

Unfortunately, David had a daughter by the name of Tamar who attracted the eye of one of David's sons, her stepbrother, by the name of Amnon.

Amnon attacked Tamar.

It's one of the more tragic stories in all the Old Testament.

We see that as a result of that, another brother, Absalom, becomes enraged because that is his sister that was attacked.

Absalom bides his time, works out a plan, arranges for his brother Amnon to be murdered later in the story.

We see that Absalom, not content with that, goes away, goes away to the family of his mother, Makob the Jereushites, goes away for a while, stays with them in exile.

Eventually he comes back.

He's welcomed back eventually after he makes peace with David the king.

And then a short time later he wages a rebellion against his father.

And Absalom tries to take the throne by force.

Tragically, Absalom's life comes to an end in that failed attempt.

David mourns the death of his son.

And all we see throughout several of these chapters, 2 Samuel 14, 15, all the way through 18, and even into chapter 20, we see all of this dysfunction, all of this violence, all of this blood being shed in the house of David.

There seems to be a short period of peace, and during that short period of peace, David grows very old.

As a matter of fact, the Bible tells us that David is so old that he can't seem to get warm anymore at night.

And the question on many people's minds is what's going to happen after King David dies?

What will happen to the kingdom?

Will there be more rebellion?

Will there be more bloodshed?

Will we have different people trying to be king?

Those who knew the promises of God, however, knew that God had already made his decision about who would be king.

As a matter of fact, on the next slide we see that God promised Solomon would be king of Israel after David, even before Solomon was born.

Not many people know this, but the birth of Solomon, his name, and the fact that he would be king were actually predicted, prophesied rather, by God in 1 Chronicles chapter 22, verses 9 and 10.

1 Chronicles 22:9

The word of the Lord said, Behold, a son shall be born to you, who shall be a man of rest, and I will give him rest from all his enemies all around.

His name shall be Solomon, for I will give peace and quietness to Israel in his days.

Verse 10 says, He shall build a house for my name, talking about the great temple of the Old Testament.

He shall build a house for my name, he shall be my son, I will be his father, I will establish the throne of his kingdom over Israel forever.

God had spoken that word before Solomon was born.

David had heard that word, he had shared that word with Solomon's mother, Bathsheba, he had shared that word with Nathan the prophet.

In fact, we get the impression that David shared that word widely during his life.

He knew that he was going to have a son named Solomon.

I'm sure when Solomon was born, word went out, the child has been born, who will be the next king of Israel.

But you know, in many people's minds, just because God says something doesn't mean that it's settled for them.

It's a tragic thing.

But we see this again and again in life.

We see where God's word provides a clear promise or a clear instruction or a clear lesson about something.

And yet we will see that people will go out of their way to try to deny that word, to try to claim that that promise doesn't hold.

To claim that, well, that's maybe your opinion, but I've got a different idea.

And that's what happened with God's promise about Solomon.

Because when we move into the first book of Kings, chapter 1, we see that there is a young man in David's family by the name of Adonijah, brother of Absalom, brother of Tamar.

Adonijah, whose name is really not popped up much at all until we get to this first chapter of 1 Kings.

And Adonijah has an idea that he wants to be king.

And we can sort of see how he might have gotten to this place.

He's the son of a king and he's the son of a princess.

He probably feels a certain sense of entitlement to taking the throne.

Adonijah arranges for a very large banquet just outside of town.

A large banquet, and he invites the military leaders, he invites the priestly leaders, he invites all of the sons of David's family, except Solomon, by the way.

He invites all of these elders and leaders of the people of Israel.

He is engaging in massive amounts of religious sacrifice to the Lord.

Everything seems to be going his way, so much so, in fact, that the people at the party start to say, long live King Adonisha.

Wait a minute.

God's made a promise.

God's made a promise that the next king is going to be Solomon.

God's made a promise that Solomon is going to have a reign as king that's filled with peace instead of bloodshed.

God's made a promise that Solomon is the one who is going to build a house for the name of the Lord.

Adonijah is ignoring the memo.

Not only that, he is encouraging other people to ignore that promise of God as well.

Adonijah thinks that if he can get enough power and enough popularity and enough persuasion among the leadership of Israel that he can force his way into the throne seat of the kingdom despite whatever it is that God said about his little brother Solomon.

Let's pick up in the scripture, in 1 Kings chapter 1, verse 24, when this party was started, word of the party got to Nathan the prophet.

1 Kings 1:24

Those of you that guys who were here on Tuesday and you were here for the men's lunch, the pastor, Pastor Greg, talked about Nathan the prophet as sort of being David's personal pastor.

I rather like that picture.

Nathan heard about Adonijah having this party.

Nathan goes to Bathsheba and says, Bathsheba, your son Solomon is supposed to be the king.

Go and talk to David.

Ask David what's going on, and as you're talking to him, I'll come in.

And this is where we pick up.

Nathan walks in in verse 24 to David, and he says to David, Oh my Lord the king, have you said, Adonijah shall reign after me, and he shall sit on my throne?

For he has gone down today, and has sacrificed oxen and fatted cattle and sheep in abundance.

He's invited all the king's sons and the commanders of the army and Abiathar the priest, and look, they're eating and drinking before him, and they say, Long live King Adonijah.

But he has not invited me, your servant, nor Zadok the priest, nor Beniah the son of Jehoiada, nor your servant Solomon.

Has this thing been done by my lord the king?

And have you not told your servant who should sit on the throne of my lord the king after him?

Then King David answered and said, Call Bathsheba to me.

So she came into the king's presence and stood before the king, and the king took an oath and said, As the Lord lives, who has redeemed my life from every distress, just as I swore to you by the Lord God of Israel, saying, Assuredly, Solomon your son shall be king after me, he shall sit on my throne in my place, so I certainly will do this day.

Then Bathsheba bowed with her face to the earth and paid homage to the king and said, Let my Lord King David live forever.

What we see here is a crisis moment in the life of King David, even in the life of the kingdom of Israel.

We have a man who has made a claim for the throne.

He has supported his claim with powerful people.

He has even had the amazing nerve to sacrifice to Almighty God, even though it is Almighty God whose plan it is that he is attempting to overthrow by putting himself on the throne rather than the man God has chosen.

Nathan the prophet and Bathsheba come to King David.

They put the case before King David that this is going on, and now King David has a decision to make.

He can either go with what God said, or he can take the easy path that is already presented before him.

Think of how easy it would have been for David to simply say, Oh, um, sorry, can't quite hear you today.

What was that you were saying about Adonijah sacrificing before the Lord?

Well, he he needs to do that.

That's a good boy sacrificing before the Lord.

Well, I don't couldn't hear anything else that you said.

Or David simply could have said, Oh, you heard that wrong, Batshe, but Nathan, you you heard that wrong.

No, but what God said was that Solomon was his favorite, but he didn't promise him the kingdom.

He didn't promise him a throne.

As king, both of those options and others would have been quite easy for David to do.

And you know, many times when we are brought to task on not following what God's word has to say, or we want to take what God's word says and just tweak it a little bit in order to make it more convenient and easier to live, we can come up with all sorts of excuses, can't we?

I mean, oh my gosh.

Well, I would I would do that, but it's raining outside, and uh, you know, I don't think I'm gonna do that.

Or, oh, I would do that, but uh, you know, now's not the best time.

I was looking at my looking at my schedule over the next several weeks, and I really don't have time to be involved in that thing over in God's house.

Oh, well, I would do what the Lord's word says, but you know, if I do that, I've got a family member who's gonna disagree with me.

I've got a friend that's gonna disagree with me, I've got a coworker that's gonna disagree with me.

So rather than believe what God's word says about that thing, that subject, that action, that lack of action, rather than go along with what God's word says, in order to keep peace, I'm just going to take the easy road.

Let's understand that when David makes his decision, whatever decision he makes is going to have consequences.

If he sides with Adonijah, most likely Bathsheba and Solomon would be arrested, imprisoned, possibly even killed as traitors to the new crown of King Adonisha.

If he goes with Solomon, then he has a son who already has great support with the military, great support with the elders of the town, great support with many in the priesthood, even great support with other members of the family.

And if David rejects that, it may cause even more friction in a family and a kingdom that has seen nothing but blood and war for several years.

What is David going to do?

How is David going to handle this?

Well, we see in verse 28 as we read, in verse 29, I'm sorry, David took an oath and said, As the Lord lives, who has redeemed me from every distress, just as I swore to you by the Lord God of Israel, assuredly Solomon, your son, shall be king after me.

If you look at the words that David uses here, he's making it real clear that what he's deciding is tied in with the idea that the Lord is in charge.

He's doing what the Lord says, as the Lord lives, he says, I swore to you by the Lord God of Israel as the Lord lives.

He took an oath there, and Bathsheba's response was, Let my Lord King David live forever.

Now let me fill in some gaps here.

Over the next few verses in that chapter, you will read that David gets the uh uh the royal mule or the royal donkey, if you will, and he puts Solomon on there, and he sends Nathan the prophet and Ben Ahiah the son of Jehoiada and several other people, and they take Solomon to a big public scene there in Jerusalem, and right there they anoint him king over Israel.

And the shout goes up from the people Long live King Solomon.

And the noise that that party makes is so loud, the noise that's happening with the coronation of Solomon is so Great that they hear the noise over in Adonijah's self-proclaimed victory party.

And when we get to, let's see here, let's go to 1 Kings 1, verse 49.

1 Kings 1:49

All the guests who were with Adonijah were afraid and arose, and each one went his way.

I mentioned when I was talking to our folks at Chaffee, I'm always reluctant to insert words into what Scripture has.

But I think it's safe to say that we could say that they were afraid, arose, and each one went his way in a hurry.

Each one couldn't get out of that room fast enough.

Why?

Because at that moment when it was when the new king was anointed, when the shout went up, long live King Solomon, everyone in that room was officially a traitor to the new crown.

No one wanted to be caught at that party.

I am sure that when Anonijah sent out the invitations, people were thinking, oh, this is going to be great.

Anonijah's throwing a party.

You know, he's kind of got his eye on the throne.

He's a strong guy.

He might at that party become the next leader of Israel.

Honey, you respond RSVP to that right away.

You make sure that my chair is saved.

But when the shout ran out that David was following the Lord and that Solomon was going to be the next king, suddenly everyone like rats scattered.

Verse 50 tells us Adonijah was afraid of Solomon.

That's putting it lightly.

Adonijah was afraid of Solomon.

He arose and went and took hold of the horns of the altar.

What's happening here?

Adonijah is so scared that he runs to the tabernacle of God.

Temple hasn't been built yet.

Runs to the tabernacle of God, goes into the tent, sees the altar, and grabs the corners of the altar, holding on for dear life, thinking, certainly Solomon won't put me to death in this holy place.

Certainly here I can escape the bitterness of death.

Verse 51, it was told Solomon, saying, indeed, Adonijah is afraid of King Solomon.

Look, he has taken hold of the horns of the altar, saying, Let King Solomon swear to me today that he will not put his servant to death with the sword.

Solomon said, If he proves himself a worthy man, not one hair of him shall fall to the earth.

But if wickedness is found in him, he shall die.

So Solomon gives Adonijah a reprieve, gives him a chance.

Says, Adonijah, if you'll be loyal to me as king, if you will not fight against me and my kingdom, if you'll live a good life, a nice quiet life, then you can live.

But if you rebel, you will be executed as a traitor to the state.

That's the paraphrase.

What happened to Adonijah?

Well, some time passed.

Solomon was able to secure his seat on the throne.

And a few, a few, probably months later, perhaps years, Adonijah tries to arrange a marriage for himself that would cause people to think that he was next in line for the throne.

Solomon in his wisdom knows that what has happened is that Adonijah has never gotten rid of the idea that he is the one who should be king.

Now, what does this story tell us today?

Because we could just cover this story simply because it's part of the chronological Bible study.

But there's a lot here that applies even to us all these thousands of years later, even in this different culture that we live in here in America.

How does this apply to us?

Well, ladies and gentlemen, just as the birth of Solomon had been predicted in prophecy, likewise was the birth of the King of kings and Lord of Lords, Jesus Christ.

The Old Testament repeatedly talks about the Messiah, talks about the one who will come.

In fact, in the prophet Isaiah, there are details where Isaiah is prophesying the events of the crucifixion so clearly that you can even hand that passage to a Jewish person who does not know about Jesus.

They will read that and they will say, this must be speaking about Jesus.

Adonijah, in many ways, is like all of us.

We have a decision to make.

Will we bend the knee and bow before the King of kings and Lord of Lords Jesus Christ?

Or do we have a different idea about putting ourselves on the throne so that we can make our decisions about how we want to live and at the same time we can ignore the promises of God.

Like Adonijah, most people want to at least appear to be in line with Almighty God.

When Adonijah went and grabbed the horns of that altar, he was basically making a show saying, Look, I am serious about the things of God.

But all too often, even a person who comes to church Sunday after Sunday, even a person who puts a little something in the offering plate, even a person that sings along with the words of praise that our choir leads us with, their mind and their heart could be quite distant from the promises of God.

They may be going through the motions, but they've never truly bent the knee to King Jesus as Savior and as Lord.

And they live their life less upon what God's word says and more on instinct and what will make them look good and get along with everybody that they're living life with.

Adonijah's end was terrible.

Adonijah was executed as an enemy of the state, as a traitor to the crown.

All of us one day face a time when our days will end, and we stand before Almighty God, and Almighty God will tell us, either, well done, good and faithful servant, come into the rest of your Father, because we have trusted Jesus as Savior and Lord, and we have not only said the words, but we've bent the knee and we've lived lives that show that we are aligned with Jesus rather than the things of this world.

Or tragically, the words that will be spoken will be, depart from me, I never knew you.

Adonijah, you see, rejected the promises of God and instead embraced the thinking and the selfishness of his heart.

Now the title of today's message is The Man Who Tried to Make God a Liar.

How did Adonijah try to make God a liar?

Adonijah knew the promises of God, but deliberately acted in opposition to them because he wanted nothing to do with the reign of King Solomon.

He was only interested in the reign of King Adonijah.

We don't remember Adonijah much today, do we?

For some of you, this may be the first time you've heard a message focused on Adonijah.

He's a despicable character through and through, has very little to recommend him.

But we do remember Solomon, don't we?

Solomon, the wisdom of Solomon, Solomon, who God used to build the temple.

Solomon wasn't perfect, like his father David.

He had lots of problems.

Solomon was a man who embraced lust and the things of building a nation through marriages and things like this.

But in many ways, Solomon also gave us wonderful works.

We have the Song of Solomon, we have the book of Ecclesiastes written by Solomon.

When we go to those works, we can see that despite all of his shortcomings, Solomon was a man who in the end did pursue God and declared that all of his false actions were nothing but vanity.

How does this apply to us today?

Well, let's get back to the idea of following God's promises.

The first thing I want you to be aware of is that God's promises always come to pass even if people oppose them.

God's promises always come to pass even if people oppose them.

You live long enough and you pay enough attention to what happens in the news cycle, you will see from time to time that different political leaders, different influential athletes or entertainers or what have you are going to say and do stupid things that seem to oppose the promises of God.

And from time to time, you might even find yourself worrying: are God's promises going to come to pass in light of that amount of power, that amount of influence, that amount of publicity?

Ladies and gentlemen, God's promises always come to pass, even if people oppose them.

Adonijah had all of the power, prestige, and pressure of those political and religious leaders around him.

He didn't become king.

Solomon did because that was God's promise.

Second thing I want you to notice: God keeps his promises even when all seems lost.

God keeps his promises even when all seems lost.

We go to the Word of God.

God's word is filled with wonderful promises.

I was trying to make a list of all these different promises of God, and I realized that if I did that and added it to the story of Adonijah, we would be here until Tuesday.

So we're not doing that.

But instead, God promises us some things, and I just want to mention some highlights.

So if you think that I forgot some, you're right.

But here's some highlights I want you to remember.

God promises eternal life.

Amen?

God promises eternal life.

John 3.16 says, For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son that whosoever believes in him should not perish, but have, say it with me, eternal life.

God promises eternal life.

In 1 John chapter 1 and verse 9, God says, if we confess our sins, God is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

1 John 1 · chapter mention

God makes promises about eternal life.

God makes promises about how he handles our sin when we confess it and hand it over to him.

Over in Psalms, Psalm 121 and verse 2, we see that God makes promises about our help and protection.

God says, or rather, the writer of Psalm 121 says, My help comes from the Lord who made heaven and earth.

The idea in including that phrase about who made heaven and earth is that God provides us our help in all things.

If it's on earth, he made earth.

If it seems to come from heaven, he made heaven.

Later in that same psalm in verse 7, we see that God makes a promise about watching over our lives.

Let me park here for a moment.

Ladies and gentlemen, one of the things that I personally struggle with from time to time, believe it or not, is I find myself going, God, did you just see that?

Isn't that silly?

Isn't it silly that a minister from time to time would wonder, God, did you just see that?

Because intellectually I know God sees everything.

But sometimes it just doesn't feel like God sees everything.

You know what I mean?

Okay, some of you are honest enough to nod.

But we see in Psalm 121, verse 7, the Lord shall preserve you from all evil, he shall preserve your soul.

Psalms 121:7

In order for God to preserve us from all evil, he's got to see everything.

He's got to understand everything.

He has to see all of the evil that is out there in the world, and he has to preserve us from it.

God is faithful to his promises.

Some of you today are dealing with financial challenges.

God sees you in that moment.

Some of you are dealing with medical challenges.

God sees you in the moment where you are.

Some of you are dealing with uncertainty in your life over different things that have happened or should have happened or have not happened.

God sees you in your uncertainty.

And God has promised that all things work together for good for those who trust Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior.

Amen?

And so what we have, what we have, is God keeps his promises when all seems lost.

Finally, point number three, counting on God's promises brings peace.

Resisting God's promises brings disaster.

If that is too negative for you, flip it and simply say resisting God's promises brings disaster, and that you can end with counting on God's promises brings peace.

It works either way.

When we count on God's promises, when we live our lives in such a way that we are relying upon what God has promised to us in the decision making of what we are and are not going to do today, in the way that we raise our children, the way that we raise grandchildren, the way that we select leaders, the way that we make decisions about where to spend our money and where not to spend our money.

When we rely upon the promises of God, we see greater peace in our lives.

But when we ignore the promises of God, when we resist the promises of God, and we try to do things our own way because we think we're just a little bit smarter than that book that was written all those thousands of years ago.

When we think, oh, Pastor Dave and his outdated ways and that outdated book that he points me to, and all of those people that wrote all of those books, they didn't understand what it was like to live in America in 2026.

And so while he's got an opinion, and that's his own feeling about it, I'm going to go a different way.

Go ahead.

Court disaster, if that's what you want in your life.

Go ahead.

Even a man after God's own heart like King David, he found it difficult to raise a family that would follow the Lord.

Go ahead and invest in the temporary fragility of the things of this world and ignore investing in heaven.

Go ahead and do that.

Watch what kind of disaster may befall you.

Adonijah and his story is a warning to all of us.

It's a warning that if we try to make God out to be a liar, we are inviting disaster.

And if we ignore God's primary command in all of Scripture, that all of Scripture points to, the primary command of embracing Jesus Christ, receiving Him as Lord and Savior.

If we choose to reject that, we are inviting disaster not just in this life, but also in the next.

Amen?

I'll invite our choir members, choir leaders to come up as we head into the time of the invitation.

Maybe you've been listening to me this morning and you've thought, well, Pastor Dave, I'm already saved.

So what do I have in common with Adonijah?

And my answer would be, hopefully, very little.

Hopefully you are saved and you're living your life in such a way that you're not ignoring or disregarding the promises of God.

Hopefully you're living life in such a way that you hold God's word to be true and you're living your life accordingly.

But even in the best lived Christian life, there's usually a little bit of room for improvement.

And so I would encourage you, if you identify those things in which you have not been walking with the Lord, to repent of those things.

Take those to the Lord.

Say, Jesus, I know you died for me for those things.

I just repent of those things.

Help me to walk the way that you've called me to walk.

But if you're here today and you've never surrendered to the call of Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior, then as we stand, we had this time called the invitation.

We invite you to come forward and talk to some of our gentlemen here in the front about learning more about what it means to be saved.

Learning more about what it means to live your life in surrender to King Jesus.

I'll pray and then we'll go into a time of singing.

Heavenly Father, if there's anyone here who needs you as Lord and Savior, it is our prayer that you, through the power of your Holy Spirit, would bring them forward.

May they learn who you are, may they surrender to you as Lord, and may you be glorified.

And we pray this in the matchless name of Jesus.

Amen.

We pray this message has been a blessing to you and helped to strengthen your walk with Jesus.

Please know we want to minister to you and pray for you.

Send an email to contact us at fsfbc.org and let us pray for you and help you in any way we can.

Thank you for listening to Chapter and First, the Bible Teaching Ministry of Fort Smith's First Baptist Church.