Low rise Jeans

Blue jeans. A staple in every woman’s closet. I’m so thankful for my trusty jeans which recently saw me through a 5 hour First Aid course. There I was performing CPR on a plastic dummy –the torso and head variety—that had neither arms nor legs.

I knelt over my dummy, doing 5 rounds of 30 compressions to 2 breaths, to the beat of ‘Staying Alive’ by the Bee Gees in my head, without any fear of ‘plumbers crack’ exposure.

Fashion is fickle. We said goodbye to the ultra skinny, drain pipe jeans with its jegging offshoots. Thank heavens above. I never bought them for fear of resembling an overstuffed sausage, bulging to near bursting point.

We embraced the beauty of high waisted jeans that flattened our tummies with a generous panel of denim. Oh, so flattering with a well-placed tuck of a blouse or jumper. Not to mention the fact that the silhouette options are open for a looser, oversized and baggier cut. Nice.

But, like all things fashionable, it doesn’t take long for the pendulum to swing in the other direction. I’ve heard rumblings that our flirtations with the Y2K fashion, oversized shirts, scrunchies, Crocs, and Birkenstocks with socks, has also brought about the return of low rise jeans.

Eeek. What’s the big deal, you ask?

Say for instance, you’re happily eating a pulled-pork burger at a nice little café when a young woman in a pair of low rise jeans and essential crop top saunters past. All hail to her tanned, taut, surfboard flat stomach. But what’s a hot bod doing to the young men and not so young men? Driving them to distraction. That’s what.

And when she bends over to pick up the laminated menu she ‘accidently’ dropped to the floor. . . well . . . it’s hello underwear, peeking seductively over the rim of her low rise jeans. A blinding flash of lace or thong bikini to heat the blood of our male counterparts.

Low rise jeans are not only a big distraction for teenage boys. The female wearers must be wary too. So much time put into shopping for the right brand and fit. (Not to mention your belly button getting a tad chilly.) Hours chugged away at work just to pay for the darn thing all in the name of fashion. How about the verbal objections from mum or dad as you try to slink out the door?

And what about the incidence of food disorders that might be triggered because not everyone has been blessed with a brightly burning metabolism. I’d have to forgo eating breakfast, lunch and dinner for a month to be rid of my muffin top.

Teenage girls, full grown women, ADHD afflicted toddlers, blue-collar council workers, pro athletes and members of royal blood lines can give into common distractions.

Let’s now turn our attention to an intriguing character touted as the wisest and wealthiest of all the Old Testament kings.

Humble beginnings

The young King Solomon has no experience with governing a nation. We see that at the beginning of his reign. He is a humble man burdened with weight of the crown. So that when God appears in a dream and asks what he desires, Solomon asks for wisdom to make right judgements and govern the people.

Give therefore thy servant an understanding heart to judge thy people, that I may discern between good and bad: for who is able to judge this thy so great a people?  1 Kings 3:9

The Lord grants him his request and not long after, Solomon’s gift is put to the test.

Two prostitutes who live in the same house approach the king with their dispute. In the space of three days, each woman has given birth to a baby boy. At night, each woman slept with her own infant alongside her in bed.

This natural and comforting act is fraught with the risk. A mother may accidently roll over her infant leading to the suffocation of the baby.

This is exactly what one of the women claims to have occurred, And this woman’s child died in the night; because she overlaid it.   1 Kings 3:9

It is alleged that the woman who killed her baby, swapped him for the living baby in the middle of the night.

The atmosphere is charged with emotion and aneurism inducing anxiety. Voices break. A torrent of tears.

Each woman is claiming that the live infant is her own.

We can’t help but be curious about the thoughts racing through King Solomon’s mind. Perhaps Bathsheba’s face flashed before his eyes as he remembered how aggressively she fought to secure him on the throne against Prince Adonijah and his political maneuvering.

Yes, a mother’s love for her child is fierce, sacrificial, a force unparalleled—planet shaking.

He does not bother to inspect the baby’s facial features, whether they resemble either of the women. Instead, he demands a sword.

He will settle the dispute declaring that the infant be divided into two parts, giving each woman half a baby.

The rightful mother pleads with Solomon to preserve the infant’s life and to give him to the other woman. The other woman though, wants to proceed with the grisly act.

In an instant, King Solomon has discerned who the rightful mother is, and her baby born is returned to her loving arms.

The rise of King Solomon

In his early years, he penned beautiful love poetry known today as the Song of Solomon. In the middle of his life he wrote pithy and memorable proverbs which are situated in the middle of our Bibles. Finally, nearing the end of his days on earth, he wrote the book of Ecclestiastes.

1 Kings records that Solomon spoke thousands of proverbs and composed thousands of songs. He possessed great knowledge from the intricacies of plants to the anatomy and workings of animals, birds, fish and insects. He excelled in understanding and divine wisdom. Many people travelled great distances to consult with him.

What led to Solomon’s demise? How did a wise king get it so wrong?

If faithfulness to God is the key to a blessed life, then drifting away from Him and ignoring his commands brings destruction.

Solomon had to be a godly example to the people. However, spiritual infidelity led him to sin against God. Even though the Lord had given him wisdom like no other, he did not always apply or follow it. King Solomon drifted away from God in many ways. Here, we shall focus on one major distraction.

As a king of Israel we understand he had some God ordained homework to do. He had to interact with the holy scriptures by copying it all down with his own hand. He had to read, study and meditate on God’s word. He had to carry his personal scrolls of the scriptures everywhere.

So, it takes us by surprise that he would choose to ignore a very clear directive which Solomon had carefully copied down.

Neither shall he multiply wives to himself, that his heart turn not away: neither shall he greatly multiply himself silver and gold.  Deuteronomy 17:17

A matter of trust

The Lord expressly forbade the multiplying of wives.  How many well-known biblical heavy weights took on more than one wife? Too many. Solomon’s own father, King David, married many women. With such an example in his own upbringing, it is reasonable to accept that he was influenced by the behavior of his own father.

But polygamy was not God’s ideal plan, as outlined in Genesis 2. Clearly, marriage involves one man—the husband—cleaving to one woman—his wife. Abandoning God’s plan created serious familial and spiritual dysfunction in the lives of Abraham, Gideon, Elkanah and David.

In the ancient world, multiple wives were a sign of prestige and wealth. Polygamy also helped a ruler to expand his domain through these marital alliances. Neighbouring kings would give their daughters in marriage for peace treaties.

More distractions

Solomon had 700 wives and 300 concubines. The allure and distraction of these foreign women caused Solomon to drift away from full devotion to the LORD his God. To please his wives, he allowed these women to worship other gods.

Furthermore, he channeled his wealth into building shrines and altars for the false gods that his wives worshipped. Then his heart turned away from trusting the one true God to serve and to sacrifice to these false gods. Solomon became an idolater and a spiritual adulterer.

For it came to pass, when Solomon was old, that his wives turned away his heart after other gods:

Then did Solomon build an high place for Chemosh, the abomination of Moab, in the hill that is before Jerusalem, and for Molech, the abomination of the children of Ammon.

And likewise did he for all his strange wives, which burnt incense and sacrificed unto their gods. 1 Kings 11:4a, 7 & 8.

Such practices were detestable in the Lord’s sight. Some included child sacrifice and shrine prostitution.

Syncretism

God’s people were to remain pure. They were to have no other gods before the LORD. They were told not to make covenants with foreigners. They were not to intermarry with other pagan nations. They were not to create images of their gods, or bow down to them in worship. If Solomon had done his homework, he would’ve come across all of this as he copied down the scripture from Exodus 34.

Solomon was guilty of religious syncretism—the fusion or intermingling of different religious beliefs and practices.

This melting pot of pagan beliefs brought spiritual corruption and God’s judgement.

A divided Kingdom

Solomon’s abandonment of his total allegiance to the Lord meant that the kingdom would be split. His failure in keeping the covenant and God’s commands meant that in his son Rehoboam’s lifetime, the kingdom would be torn away. Ten tribes would be given to Solomon’s servant, Jeroboam, the son of Nebat, leaving the remainder to Rehoboam—namely the tribe of Judah which had absorbed the small tribe of Benjamin.

It was only through God’s mercy, and regard for his father David, that the kingdom was not taken from Solomon during his lifetime. The Lord kept his promise to continue David’s lineage from which the Messiah would come.

Howbeit I will not rend away all the kingdom; but will give one tribe to thy son for David my servant’s sake, and for Jerusalem’s sake which I have chose.   1 Kings 11:13

God demands that He be the only God in our life.

I know of one young woman—that professed Christ as Saviour and Lord—who turned around and married someone outside of the faith. In order for her to marry this man, she had to convert to his religion. Just like Solomon, she renounced her faith in the one true God and fell into apostasy.

Perhaps that extreme case won’t happen to you, but what is more likely is a slower drift away from a vibrant relationship with God.

Let’s recognise the distractions and fix our eyes and hearts on Him.

Bibliography

Author unspecified. 2022. ‘Why did God allow Solomon to have 1,000 wives and concubines?’. Got Questions.org. Retrieved 24 February 2023 from

https://www.gotquestions.org/Solomon-wives-concubines.html

Barnett, J. 2020. ‘How Did Solomon Ruin His Life-By Neglecting The Wisdom God Offered Him.’, Discoverthebook.org. Retrieved 24 February 2023 from

https://discoverthebook.org/how-did-solomon-ruin-his-life-by-neglecting-the-wisdom-god-offered-him/

Macarthur, J. 2019, The Macarthur Study Bible 2^nd Edition, Thomas Nelson Publishers, China.

Tucker, R. 2013, The Biographical Bible, Baker Books, Michigan.

Walton, J. 2000, The IVP Bible Background Commentary Old Testament, IVP Academic, Illinois.