Queen of Sheba by Roberta Kells Dorr

Author:Roberta Kells Dorr [Dorr, Roberta Kells]
Language: eng
Format: epub, azw3
ISBN: 978-0-8024-8496-3
Publisher: Moody Publishers
Published: 2013-10-04T04:00:00+00:00

The next morning Jeroboam rose early and made his way through the narrow village streets of Shiloh until he came to a small shrine. This shrine was all that remained of the tabernacle of Yahweh that once stood here. The shrine was dark and smelled of dry blood and cheap incense. There was something depressing and gloomy about the gray stones and the door that stood gaping open. It was like a corpse, a dull, dead thing.

Jeroboam turned from its empty interior and made his way through the thistles and thorn bushes around to a gnarled and hoary old tree. This tree had once stood in the outer court of the tabernacle when Samuel and Eli were alive. It was the only thing that even hinted at the glory of what had once stood on this spot.

Jeroboam moved to a better vantage point under a great, spreading fig tree. The sun was just coming up and the birds were beginning to stir somewhere up in the top branches of the tree. From one of the round openings high in the shrine’s wall came the plaintive call of a turtle dove. There was an air of peace that hung heavy over the deserted shrine. “Lonely but peaceful,” Jeroboam decided.

Suddenly, a quavering figure of an old man materialized from the gnarled roots of the tree. His beard was long and smokegray in color, matching his worn and threadbare robe. His hair was white and stuck out in small tufts around his bald head. His bearing and dress were so colorless that it was almost startling to see that his eyes under their heavy eyebrows were piercing and intense.

He reached behind the tree and brought out his long walking stick before he said anything. “Jeroboam,” his voice was cracked and shaky. “You’re Jeroboam ben Nebat. I’ve been expecting you.”

“My mother told you I was coming?”

“I didn’t have to be told. I knew you were coming.” The old man came over to Jeroboam and looked at him intently. His eyes seemed to drill right into Jeroboam’s soul. They penetrated all his defenses, and Jeroboam drew back in sudden aversion.

He was completely unnerved by this ancient priest, who seemed to have become as weathered and tattered as the shrine he guarded. He wondered what answers an old man like this could possibly have.

“I’ve been told,” Jeroboam began, “by persons of influence, that I will become king of Israel after Solomon.” He said the words hurriedly as though they almost burned his tongue.

“And …” the old man said, striking his stick impatiently on the outcropping of rock.

“And I want you to inquire of the Lord to see if it is His will.”

The old man became very agitated, backed off, and began muttering something Jeroboam couldn’t quite hear.

“What is it, old man? What are you saying?”

“I don’t need to ask the will of Yahweh. It is plain, the prediction must be false. Though you know there is no love for the young prince, still the tribe of Judah and Benjamin will never turn against the house of David.

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