7 Go, tell Jeroboam, ‘Thus says Yahweh, the God of Israel: “Because I exalted you from among the people, and made you prince over my people Israel, 8 and tore the kingdom away from the house of David, and gave it you; and yet you have not been as my servant David, who kept my commandments, and who followed me with all his heart, to do that only which was right in my eyes, 9 but have done evil above all who were before you, and have gone and made you other gods, and molten images, to provoke me to anger, and have cast me behind your back: 10 therefore, behold, I will bring evil on the house of Jeroboam, and will cut off from Jeroboam everyone who urinates on a wall, [1] he who is shut up and he who is left at large in Israel, and will utterly sweep away the house of Jeroboam, as a man sweeps away dung, until it is all gone. 11 He who dies of Jeroboam in the city shall the dogs eat; and he who dies in the field shall the birds of the sky eat: for Yahweh has spoken it.”’ 12 Arise therefore, and go to your house. When your feet enter into the city, the child shall die. 13 All Israel shall mourn for him, and bury him; for he only of Jeroboam shall come to the grave, because in him there is found some good thing toward Yahweh, the God of Israel, in the house of Jeroboam. 14 Moreover Yahweh will raise him up a king over Israel, who shall cut off the house of Jeroboam. This is day! What? Even now. 15 For Yahweh will strike Israel, as a reed is shaken in the water; and he will root up Israel out of this good land which he gave to their fathers, and will scatter them beyond the River, because they have made their Asherim, provoking Yahweh to anger. 16 He will give Israel up because of the sins of Jeroboam, which he has sinned, and with which he has made Israel to sin.” 17 Jeroboam’s wife arose, and departed, and came to Tirzah. As she came to the threshold of the house, the child died. 18 All Israel buried him, and mourned for him, according to the word of Yahweh, which he spoke by his servant Ahijah the prophet. 19 The rest of the acts of Jeroboam, how he warred, and how he reigned, behold, they are written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Israel. 20 The days which Jeroboam reigned were two and twenty years: and he slept with his fathers, and Nadab his son reigned in his place.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on 1 Kings 14:7-20
Commentary on 1 Kings 14:7-20
(Read 1 Kings 14:7-20)
Whether we keep an account of God's mercies to us or not, he does; and he will set them in order before us, if we are ungrateful, to our greater confusion. Ahijah foretells the speedy death of the child then sick, in mercy to him. He only in the house of Jeroboam had affection for the true worship of God, and disliked the worship of the calves. To show the power and sovereignty of his grace, God saves some out of the worst families, in whom there is some good thing towards the Lord God of Israel. The righteous are removed from the evil to come in this world, to the good to come in a better world. It is often a bad sign for a family, when the best in it are buried out of it. Yet their death never can be a loss to themselves. It was a present affliction to the family and kingdom, by which both ought to have been instructed. God also tells the judgments which should come upon the people of Israel, for conforming to the worship Jeroboam established. After they left the house of David, the government never continued long in one family, but one undermined and destroyed another. Families and kingdoms are ruined by sin. If great men do wickedly, they draw many others, both into the guilt and punishment. The condemnation of those will be severest, who must answer, not only for their own sins, but for sins others have been drawn into, and kept in, by them.