Equips Your Successor

   1.  Act On Your Intentions To Secure The Future

1 Kings 1:32-37 (NASB)

³²  Then King David said, "Call to me Zadok the priest, Nathan the prophet, and Benaiah the son of Jehoiada." And they came into the king's presence.

³³  The king said to them, "Take with you the servants of your lord, and have my son Solomon ride on my own mule, and bring him down to Gihon.

³⁴  "Let Zadok the priest and Nathan the prophet anoint him there as king over Israel, and blow the trumpet and say, 'Long live King Solomon!'

³⁵  "Then you shall come up after him, and he shall come and sit on my throne and be king in my place; for I have appointed him to be ruler over Israel and Judah."

³⁶  Benaiah the son of Jehoiada answered the king and said, "Amen! Thus may the LORD, the God of my lord the king, say.

³⁷  "As the LORD has been with my lord the king, so may He be with Solomon, and make his throne greater than the throne of my lord King David!"

   2.  Charge Your Successor To Walk In The Ways Of God

1 Kings 2:1-4 (NASB)

¹  As David's time to die drew near, he charged Solomon his son, saying,

²  "I am going the way of all the earth. Be strong, therefore, and show yourself a man.

³  "Keep the charge of the LORD your God, to walk in His ways, to keep His statutes, His commandments, His ordinances, and His testimonies, according to what is written in the Law of Moses, that you may succeed in all that you do and wherever you turn,

⁴  so that the LORD may carry out His promise which He spoke concerning me, saying, 'If your sons are careful of their way, to walk before Me in truth with all their heart and with all their soul, you shall not lack a man on the throne of Israel.'

Deuteronomy 17:18-20 (NASB)

¹⁸  "Now it shall come about when he sits on the throne of his kingdom, he shall write for himself a copy of this law on a scroll in the presence of the Levitical priests.

¹⁹  "It shall be with him and he shall read it all the days of his life, that he may learn to fear the LORD his God, by carefully observing all the words of this law and these statutes,

²⁰  that his heart may not be lifted up above his countrymen and that he may not turn aside from the commandment, to the right or the left, so that he and his sons may continue long in his kingdom in the midst of Israel.

   3.  Advise & Leave No Unfinished Business  

1 Kings 2:5-9 (NASB)

⁵  "Now you also know what Joab the son of Zeruiah did to me, what he did to the two commanders of the armies of Israel, to Abner the son of Ner, and to Amasa the son of Jether, whom he killed; he also shed the blood of war in peace. And he put the blood of war on his belt about his waist, and on his sandals on his feet.

⁶  "So act according to your wisdom, and do not let his gray hair go down to Sheol in peace.

⁷  "But show kindness to the sons of Barzillai the Gileadite, and let them be among those who eat at your table; for they assisted me when I fled from Absalom your brother.

⁸  "Behold, there is with you Shimei the son of Gera the Benjamite, of Bahurim; now it was he who cursed me with a violent curse on the day I went to Mahanaim. But when he came down to me at the Jordan, I swore to him by the LORD, saying, 'I will not put you to death with the sword.'

⁹  "Now therefore, do not let him go unpunished, for you are a wise man; and you will know what you ought to do to him, and you will bring his gray hair down to Sheol with blood."

1 Kings 2:10-12 (NASB)

¹⁰  Then David slept with his fathers and was buried in the city of David.

¹¹  The days that David reigned over Israel were forty years: seven years he reigned in Hebron and thirty-three years he reigned in Jerusalem.

¹²  And Solomon sat on the throne of David his father, and his kingdom was firmly established.