SERIES SUMMARY 

The Bible is the story of God as King and becoming King in Jesus. And we are his image bearers, created for royal reflection. But we don’t live in a monarchy, so “kingship” and “royalty” can feel like foreign ideas to us. Yet, we’re still called to recognize and submit to God as King. In the Old Testament, it was God’s desire for a king to reign over his people as a reminder of these things. Specifically, God promised David a son who would reign forever, and we see glimpses of this promised king in Solomon. Through his story, we’re reminded that there should be a royal wisdom that defines us as God’s kingdom of priests, the church. But ultimately, Solomon failed in his royal reflection. So, the question is, what does Solomon’s story teach us about ourselves and God? How can the life of Solomon be instructive to us as God’s people today? And most importantly, how does King Solomon (a son of David) point us to King Jesus (the son of David)?

PASSAGE GUIDE

The story traces Solomon’s life from stunning beginnings to sobering collapse. God graciously granted him unmatched wisdom, wealth, influence, and peace; his early reign showed beautiful dependence on the Lord, wise administration, temple building, and answered prayer. Yet alongside breathtaking success, God issued a clear warning: continued blessing and dynasty depended on wholehearted obedience, not mere achievement. Over time, small compromises, especially in relationships, divided affections, and tolerance of idolatry, turned a devoted heart into a divided heart, leading to open disobedience, divine anger, and the tearing away of the kingdom.

First Kings 11 presents this as both a historical tragedy and a theological verdict. Solomon’s love for many foreign wives directly violated God’s commands, and their influence drew him into idolatry and even abominations like child sacrifice. Unlike David, whose sins were met with repentance, Solomon’s story ends without a recorded confession, summarized in the chilling line that he “did what was evil in the LORD’s sight.” God’s response is both judgment and mercy: the kingdom will be torn from his line, yet not fully and not in his lifetime, “for the sake of David.” Adversaries rise, peace erodes, and the outward glory of his reign masks an inner spiritual unraveling.

Ecclesiastes is then read as a window into the inner world of a man under divine discipline, trying to make sense of life “under the sun.” The keyword hevel, often mistranslated as “meaningless,” is better understood as “vapor,” “breath,” or “smoke”: real but fleeting, elusive, impossible to grasp or control. Solomon probes pleasure, projects, wealth, sex, work, wisdom, legacy, everything that once defined his greatness, and repeatedly discovers their vaporous nature. Death levels the wise and foolish, wealth slips to those who didn’t earn it, and outcomes refuse to follow neat formulas. His attempt to “shepherd the wind” exposes the illusion of control: life in a fallen world will not submit to human mastery, even to the wisest king.

Yet the message does not land in despair or empty cynicism. Ecclesiastes, held together with Proverbs, insists that God is sovereign, just, and utterly beyond exhaustive comprehension. Proverbs reveals a moral order generally upheld by God; Ecclesiastes insists that this order is ultimately in God’s hands, not ours, and that creatures must live by faith, not by sight. True wisdom is to abandon the fantasy of control, receive life’s goodness as a gift, fear God, keep His commands, and trust His purposes when the fog will not lift. Read against Solomon’s fall, the book becomes a holy cattle prod exposing how divided hearts and self-reliance distort perception, and inviting a return to wholehearted trust in the God who alone can shepherd the wind.

*We are a church located in Greenville, South Carolina. Our vision is to see God transform us into a community of grace passionately pursuing life and mission with Jesus.

SUGGESTIONS FOR COMMUNITY GROUP QUESTIONS    

Remember, these are “suggested” questions. You do not have to go through every single one of them. You do not need to listen to both sermons at both campuses to participate in the discussion.  

OPENING PRAYER

Ask the Lord to search your heart, expose any small compromises or divided loyalties, and give you a whole-hearted trust in His wisdom and sovereignty as you listen to His Word.

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS

1. How does Solomon’s lack of recorded repentance contrast with David’s pattern of confession, and why is that contrast important for readers?
2. How does the word hevel (“vapor/smoke”) deepen our understanding of Ecclesiastes compared to “meaningless” or “vanity”?
3. In what ways is Solomon’s attempt to “shepherd the wind” (control outcomes, secure legacy, manage life) echoed in our modern obsessions?
4. What do these texts teach us about God’s discipline, both its severity (tearing the kingdom) and its mercy (“for the sake of David”)?
5. How might Solomon’s story function as a “cattle prod”, something honest but protective, for you today? 
6. Where are “small compromises” quietly forming in your life habits, relationships, and secret loves that could bend your heart away from wholehearted devotion?
7. What is one concrete “high place” (rhythm, influence, environment) you need to dismantle because it keeps drawing your affection away from God?
8. In what area are you demanding full understanding from God before you’ll trust Him? How can you practice trust without all the answers this week?
9. How does remembering that your success, gifts, and influence are vapor (temporary, fragile) change the way you hold them and talk about them?
10. What simple practices (Scripture, Sabbath, silence, confession, community) could help keep your heart whole instead of slowly divided?
11. If someone watched your week, what would your use of time, money, and attention say you truly trust? 

Life with Jesus: When reading the Bible Reading Plan this week, take 5–10 minutes each day this week to pray: “Jesus, use this text to show me where my heart is divided.” Sit quietly, let Him surface any compromise, distraction, or rival love, and then confess it specifically. 

Life in Community: Solomon’s decline was slow and private before it was public. In community, commit to more than surface check-ins. Identify friends and build honest spaces where they can lovingly ask intrusive questions.

Life on Mission: Think through ways you can name God as the source of your wisdom, joy, or endurance when others notice your life so your story points beyond you, unlike Solomon’s late-life drift

CLOSING PRAYER 

Thank God for His mercy and honest warnings, confess where you’ve been chasing control or satisfaction ‘under the sun,’ and ask Him to help you walk in humble trust, simple obedience, and clearer witness in the week ahead.