I gave thee a king in Mine anger - o: “God, when He is asked for ought amiss, sheweth displeasure, when He giveth, hath mercy, when He giveth not.” “The devil was heard,” (in asking to enter into the swine) “the Apostle was not heard,” (when he prayed that the messenger of Satan might depart from him) , “God heard him whom He purposed to condemn; and He heard not him whom He willed to heal.” : “God, when propitious, denieth what we love, when we love amiss; when wroth, He giveth to the lover, what he loveth amiss. The Apostle saith plainly, “God gave them over to their own hearts’ desire.” He gave them then what they loved, but, in giving, condemned them.” God did appoint Jeroboam, although not in the way in which Israel took him. Jeroboam and Israel took, as from themselves, what God appointed; and, so taking it, marred God’s gift.
Taking it to themselves from themselves, they maintained it for themselves by human policy and sin. As was the beginning, such was the whole course of their kings. The beginning was rebellion; murder, intestine commotion, anarchy, was the oft-repeated issue. God was against them and their kings; but he let them have their way. In His displeasure with them He allowed them their choice; in displeasure with their evil kings He took them away. Some He smote in their own persons, some in their posterity. So often as He gave them, so often He removed them, until, in Hoshea, He took them away forever. This too explains, how what God “gave in anger,” could be “taken away” also “in anger.” The civil authority was not a thing wrong in itself, the ceasing whereof must be a mercy. Israel was in a worse condition through its separate monarchy; but, apart from the calf-worship, it was not sin. The changing of one king for another did not mend it.
Individual kings were taken away in anger against themselves; their removal brought fresh misery and bloodshed. Nations and Churches and individuals may put themselves in an evil position, and God may have allowed it in His anger, and yet, it may be their wisdom and humility to remain in it, until God change it, lest He should “take” it away, not in forgiveness, but in “anger.” : “David they neither asked for, nor did the Lord give him in His anger; but the Lord first chose him in mercy, gave him in grace, in His supreme good-pleasure He strengthened and preserved him.” : “Let no one who suffereth from a wicked ruler, accuse “him” from whom he suffereth, for it was from his own ill deserts, that he became subject to such a ruler. Let him accuse then his own deeds, rather than the injustice of the ruler, for it is written, “I gave thee a king in Mine anger.” Why then disdain to have as rulers, those whose rule we receive from the anger of God?” : “When a reprobate people is allowed to have a reprobate pastor, that pastor is given, neither for his own sake, nor for that of the people; inasmuch as he so governeth, and they so obey, that neither the teacher nor the taught are found meet to attain to eternal bliss. Of whom the Lord saith by Hosea, “I gave thee a king in Mine anger.” For in the anger of God is a king given, when the bad have a worse appointed as their ruler. Such a pastor is then given, when he undertakes the rule of such a people, both being condemned alike to everlasting punishment.”