From David to Solomon

Several years ago we began a journey as a church teaching through Israel’s complicated history. We started with the book of Judges, and from there we decided to continue the story by teaching through 1 and 2 Samuel. Now we find ourselves at the book of 1 Kings, which starts out by describing the end of King David’s reign and even of his life. David started out following Yahweh extremely well, but as his life draws to an end we see him not finishing so well. Why is this, and what lessons can we learn from this story? What does it take to finish well?